*mom voice* absolutely fucking not

His smirk is barely visible, half hidden by the fact that his lips are pressing against her skin, leaving a trail of kisses until he is kneeling on the ground, one hand resting on her calf and rubbing his thumb over the fabric of her pants.

She bites her lip against a pleased smile as his kisses continue, but a frustrated huff ends it when he has to, of course, play her favorite card. Hypocrisy be damned though, as she leans forward until they’re once again face to face. “But I’m you favorite bad idea,” she reminds him before stretching to purr in his ear. 

“I’m heartbroken. And here I thought you came to see the famous Hawkeye for yourself - dangerous, talented, good with the ladies…” He smirks even as the water burns agains his wounds, though he is surprised by how naive she seems. Maybe she doesn’t know him, after all. That’s almost insulting.

A small smile catches on her lips, and Laura has to bite back a laugh. “Talented I might give you, but it’s hard to see dangerous with your face such a mess.” Of course, by now it’s only half a mess, but the bruising isn’t really something she can clean up. In fact, she’s almost offended that beneath it all his smirk makes her cheeks feel a little hot. “And in my experience boys who say that they’re good with the ladies never are.”

It’s not been Clint’s best day, overall. It’s not been his worst either, thought it might rank somewhere in the top ten - mostly, he just really could imagine better than sitting in a cell with his face hurting. Granted, that one’s on him, mostly, but that doesn’t mean he likes it.

For a moment Laura searches his gaze before biting her lip and cautiously slipping her hand between the bars to dab her apron against his cheek. This close she’s actually surprised how young he is. “You’ll only have my company until I’m sure you don’t need stitches, and if there’s a next time you won’t even get that.”

Oh god, this is worse than he imagined, and he can’t help to think that this is his fault. That she used to be more serious before he told her to take things lighter. Enjoy life. And she did and now here he is, ruining it all. “Well, you are an incredibly cute Midwestern girl who has stolen my heart”, he says, weakly, because there is no denying that, but he also doesn’t want to encourage her.

The smile dies slowly on her face, and she’s stumbling to catch up, realizing a little too late that he’s actually being serious. An embarrassed flush touches her cheeks, and Laura hates how stupid she must have sounded, how immature. Straightening her posture as a familiar defense mechanism, she can just sense that something’s ending.

“Is it? Well, maybe you can hold me up to it.” He grins, pulling another chair close to sit down. “I’m so sorry, mylady. I won’t mock you any more, I promise.” He leans forward a little, his eyes promising the exact opposite. “Maybe you need to compliment me some more, so I get used to it.”

“Oh, but you’re such a gentleman. I could never ask you to do something so...” She trails off, averting her gaze to the fire as if shy. Still, peeking back at him through her lashes, she doesn’t miss the glint in his eyes. “Oh, I take it back,” Laura gasps with a laugh. “You’re a rogue through and through.”

@youbxryme

Normally he would have laughed, told her that he loved her too, twirled her around maybe. Instead his entire chest just hurts. He shouldn’t have let it get that far, he shouldn’t have been selfish and let her fall in love with him. Clint turns his head, kisses her shoulder, but he simply hums in response (all in him says yes, i love you too, i love you so much).

She laughs lightly at him, guessing incorrectly that he’s trying his shy, bashful act again, and even those four foreboding words aren’t enough to scare her off. God, he’s such a dork, not that she really minds. He’s a cute dork, and she almost tells hims so when she presses a finger to the corner of his mouth, pulling it up to force him to smile.

He nuzzles into her hands when he can, closes his eyes at her touch. It’s easy to pretend that there is more to it than simple pleasure (and he likes pretending, it doesn’t hurt anyone after all). His lips curl into a smile as he watches her, teasing although he very obviously likes what he sees.

She almost laughs at his act, as if she of all people would fall for any “innocence” on Clint’s part, but before she can a soft “oh” escapes her lips when his lips meet the skin of her stomach. She can’t help close her eyes to appreciate the feeling even as her face flushes. 

The past few months had been true happiness, if Clint had ever known any. Being with Laura was…well, it reminded him what it felt like to be loved. And it had been a long time since he had felt this way last time.

It’s been so long since she’s laughed this much or smiled this much or just been this happy. Being with Clint is like... it makes her feel young, almost, which sounds silly. She is young, but Clint makes her remember the person she was before bad boyfriends and nasty break ups had made her doubt herself.