Title: Badass Like That

Paring: Natasha Romanov X Reader

Request: Yes, by SmeagolTheHouseElf who wanted F/F Nat X Reader

Warnings: lesbians, Nat is kickass, art galleries, food, fluff, Reader loves food (and Nat)

Spoilers: set in the Avengers Facility, but no spoilers.

Author's Note: I know I've written F/F stories before, but this has really hit close to home because, well, I have an announcement...in the last month, I've actually realised something about myself that I wasn't able to perceive before. And unknowingly, it's always been a part of my identity. Internet: I'm bi. And I'm proud. 

So, now that's over with, enjoy this fic about Reader who just wants food, and Nat who just wants to fight crime.

_______________________________________________________________________________

The one thing worse than being alone with your own thoughts, is not being alone with your own thoughts. It had been a long, stressful month, and while you were supposed to be reclining on your favourite chair, lazily watching reruns of Dancing with The Stars, and exfoliating your cares and the last thirty days of undercover work in the Shushan district, you were not. On the last thirty minutes of your extraction plane back to base you had been roped into working alongside the Widow herself, her usual partner in crime having come down with a nasty case of morning sickness.

So, instead of being asleep in front of the television in your day clothes like a heathen, you were silently standing in an art gallery beside the kickass Natasha Romanov. Maybe it was awkward, because since you two got into your undercover outfits and entered the gallery, you'd barely spoken. Or because all you were thinking about were the Pop-Tarts you hoped would greet you once returning to base, and not the mission at hand.

"Darling," Natasha rolled her eyes at something she could only see, and tucking the tickets into her jacket pocket, went on, "I can't see why you're upset about coming here."

You're silent as she looked around, eyes touching softly over the room, as if she owned it. With her history, you would not be surprised if she did own the lot. You follow her gaze to where a statue of a naked woman without arms stands on a rock, isolated, eyes wide, hollow. Mouth agape, aghast.

Your partner looks back to you, and adds, "You like art."

Itching under the wig you're wearing, ("It's a precaution, Agent R." Nick Fury had told you over a grainy video chat as you put the long black head of hair on) you scoff. "I resent that. I like motel art. Cheap posters in tube rolls...weird graffiti in dive bars." You retort, and stifling a yawn into a fist, you gesture to the frame before you. "Not...DiCaprio."

Nat laughs. "Da Vinci, darling."

A guard by the exit milled idly, tiredly. Nat's eyes trained on his sneakers, yours following the camera in the corner of the room as it scanned the near-empty cavern full of priceless pieces of naked people or religious overtones. You itched your elbow. Nat smacked her lips, and with a compact mirror, added a coat of blood-red to her paper-cut straight hair.

Into her mirror, she muttered, "You want to stop being so infantile?"

You shrugged a shrug that showed more than you thought at the time, but did anyway. Maybe it was just because you were going on coffee and adrenaline now, or that you wished that her old partner was here instead of you.

"I want chilli cheese fries." You retort, whining loud enough for the nearest people to hear. "...and a shake."

A kid nearby tugged on his parents' shirts and requested the same thing from them. Seeing this, Nat gave you a glare, but relented. "We're here to see the new instalment, honey, not eat stuff you can get on the street."

You begin to moan, dragging your feet past a Picasso-mimicry. Nat's glare hardens, and with her hand around yours, she takes you to the restaurant on the side. Before she can take her wallet out to pay for the order you're placing, you tap your phone onto the EFTPOS machine and collect a table number with the number twelve inscribed on it.

"What is your problem?" Nat huffs, and this time, you can tell she's not being her undercover self, but the irritable lady who just a month ago kicked your ass on the wrestling mat. You take a seat at a window table. "You're screwing up our – day." She says day instead of mission because unlike you, she can think straight.

You huff. "It's still going to be a good day, I'm just hungry." A waiter walks by, the smell of chicken parmigiana tantalising your inner animal. Another one comes, and delivers you your dish of fries, and the drink. "Want a chip?"

Nat ignores you.

You all but stuff your food in your mouth, but with cheeks full à la chipmunk, you notice someone sitting alone in the centre of the room, someone whose appearance looks so very mundane, but not to you. This is the face you saw on the brief that was shoved into your line of vision on the return from China. This is the face of the suspect who has committed treason, release of top-secret documentation, evasion of arrest, and assault. This is what you're here for, and despite the hunger screaming inside you, you're magnetised to the criminal before you.

"My twelve o'clock. Behind you." You mutter, swallowing. Nat frowns. "Darling. I think I can see a mutual friend of ours here, do you want to say hello?" You say a little louder, pushing your chair back to stand. Catching on, Nat follows your lead, adjusting her sunglasses from her blouse to above her nose, snagging a fry from your plate before flanking your side. Her fingers gravitate toward her hidden pistol, yours to the strap of your bag, full of enough gear to immobilise the fugitive until backup enters later. She went first, and even with the suspect starting to discretely get away, you both had him secured and packed away within the next hour with help from S.H.I.E.L.D. "I didn't get to eat my fries..." you moan, head in hands.

Nat huffed, boarding the quinjet. "After all that trouble..."

You smacked her arm with a manila folder Coulson had handed you at some point that probably needed a million signatures and filing in the next twenty-four hours. "Hey! If it weren't for my fries, we would have spent more time looking at loads of pompous dead guy's art."

By the time you'd submitted all the paperwork, had a full eight hours of sleep, caught up on your stuffed-full DVR, you realised that you hadn't seen much of Natasha since the arrest was made. Really, you hadn't seen any of the other Avengers, which was odd, since you all lived together in the facility in Upstate New York like domestic cats with no parents. It was great. But since on a regular day you'd see at least two sweating super soldiers in different stages of undress, Wanda and Vision making out in different broom closets and Tony wearing his own Iron Man merchandise, it was odd.

"F.R.I.D.A.Y., where I can I find Nat?" You ask the empty kitchen, mouth half-full of cornflakes.

The Irish-lilted interface replied, "Miss Romanov can be found sparring in the weapons room."

"Thank you, F.R.I.D.A.Y.," you tell the open air, rolling your eyes at her location, because where else would Nat be?

Placing your empty bowl in the washer, you go to seek the red-head you're having troubles thinking that is pointedly avoiding you. By the time you make your way there, your thoughts are thick, arguments wavy. When you actually see Natasha, all words disappear. Unlike when she's all slicked back, make-up done, killer smile and smooth as a lace-trimmed gown on granite floors, when she trains with James Barnes, she's undone, openly human. Hair falling out of the half-up bun. Sweat patches under her arms, flush of red over her cheeks.

Bucky sees you in the doorway before she does, and steps away from the sparring session, pointing you out to the Widow, and excusing himself to wash off in the showers. He says no words to you, but that is normal. The Sargent is a private man, and after all he's been through, you don't blame him for selecting those he can trust.

"You here for me to sign off on some of your paperwork?" She asks, working to undo the strapping over her wrists. "Earth to ________, don't tell me you're spacing out again."

You shake your head. "Not here for signatures," you mutter, eyeing the mat that's coated in a layer of sweat. It's been a month since you were last here, when just before your mission in Asia she beat you like an egg for omelettes. "I – damn."

Nat smirks, rolling the strapping up quickly, the smell of sweat overwhelming your senses. "I – it was good being partners together, you – we do good together." She manages to tell you, her eyes searching yours.

Over the P.A., Steve Roger's voice booms, "Please stop making us all uncomfortable and tell each other you like each other already!" he demands.

But while your face blushes, because, yes, indeed you do have a thing for Nat, and have been stewing on the way she looked above you when pinning you down to the wrestling mat a month ago, she chortles at the century-old super-soldier playing matchmaker, and goes in for a kiss. Because she's Natasha freakin' Romanov, and she's badass like that.