Fic: Better a Couch Than An Empty Bed
Title: Better a Couch Than An Empty Bed
Author: deHavilland
Rating: PG
Genre and Spoilers: Hurt/Comfort, None
Pairing: Clint/Coulson
Word Count: 1,231
Warnings: None
Summary: There’s a lot of things Clint Barton would rather do than face a night alone in his and Coulson’s apartment.
* * *
Hand swiping through his hair, Clint gives the covers one last kick before they’re off of him completely and pooling in a heap on the floor next to the bed. Without them, the night air nips at his bare chest unhindered, drifting in through the open window that it’s Phil’s job to close when he gets home. Only he’s not home and the window’s not closed and the bed is empty and Clint’s cold.
He ignores the window for the moment, though, arms going up over his head in a stretch as he pads barefoot out into the living room.
The apartment feels twice as empty out here than it did in the bedroom, the open space illuminated by little more than the greenish glow of the timer over the oven, shining out a blurry “3:56 AM.” Everything out here is undisturbed; afghan still thrown haphazardly over the back of the couch, no one using it as a bed because the real one was too far away, the Chinese takeout Clint had had for dinner’s still sitting otherwise untouched on the kitchen counter - he should really throw that in the fridge.
And would have, if he’d been expecting it to sit untouched all night.
The coffee machine starts to rattle when he turns it on, but it’s a finicky thing that no one’s gotten around to replacing yet and Clint leaves it to do its job, disappearing back into the bedroom. When he re-emerges, yesterday’s t-shirt pulled on over his lounge pants and the keys to the battered Honda in the parking garage downstairs in hand, there’s a passable pot of coffee ready for him. Which is all he could really ask for at this point.
He doesn’t bother with shoes as he locks the apartment behind him, treading quietly into the elevator that takes him down to the second basement level. The night-cooled concrete is freezing against the soles of his feet, but it just serves to clear his head for the drive back into the city.
There’s some kind of S.H.I.E.L.D. clause that cites lower-level agents as needing to live within a specific twenty-mile radius of HQ - just in case - and as a specialist, he technically falls right into that category. But back when he’d actually had a place of his own, it had still been farther away than the one he shares with Phil - who, with level seven clearance has the added perk of being able to set up camp as far away as he wants.
Far away, in Agent Coulson’s book, being a twenty-minute drive.
The mug of coffee he’s brought along with him is cold when Clint finally remembers that it’s there and by then he’s already pulling into the parking lot. S.H.I.E.L.D.’s Manhattan HQ is pretty lax on its external security, even this late at night, but the building is mostly administrative offices anyway. The really sensitive stuff is off and away in miles-deep underground laboratories in the desert or stashed up on the Helicarrier.
Which is great, because anything more than the quick glance at the subtly placed sticker on the windshield and the ID tag that Clint flashes at the security gate’s night guard and he’d have rolled his eyes, parked down the street and just broken in to the place. It helps, probably, that this isn’t the first time Clint’s pulled in after hours. This week.
The car he parks in space 47, next to its usual neighbor, a familiar black Acura from back home. Lot 47 is Sitwell’s reserved parking space, but since Clint doesn’t have one himself and the agent’s clearly not here, he doesn’t think anyone’s really going to care. And just like that, he’s back on his bare feet again, treading across the cool concrete, coffee forgotten once again and left in the car to continue to chill as he heads for the elevator.
The elevator cars operate on a keycode after 11 PM and after a frustrating moment of trying to remember if his passcode is 6543 or 6453, the doors finally open with a ding. From there, it’s a short ride up to the fourth floor and another jumble of numbers to punch in before the elevator will admit him to the higher-clearance hallway.
Predictably, there’s no one around, and Clint moves through the empty hall much the same as he would the one in the apartment, a bleary-eyed late night wander as mundane as fetching himself a glass of water from the kitchen.
Then it’s key in lock, passphrase typed into the security pad on the right hand side of the door and he’s in. Which is great, because he’s made this whole trip practically on auto-pilot and he’s more than ready to finally go back to sleep.
There’s a couch in Coulson’s office. Worn, black leather, standard-issue for all the offices on this floor and Clint makes a bee-line for it. Hands sliding between the cushions to pull the bottom seat forward, the whole thing groans under the strain of movement as he converts it into a pull-out cot.
A second, echoing groan issues from across the room and Clint grimaces, he hadn’t meant to wake him up just yet.
“ - fall asleep at the office again?” Phil’s mumbling where his face is cradled against his arms, back hunched over his desk. He’d had the presence of mind to loosen his tie and lose the suit jacket before buckling down on whatever late night paperwork kept him from coming home, but otherwise he looks to be his perfect, unflappable self.
Clint presses down on the fold-out until it clicks and into place and then moves around behind Phil, hands light on his shoulders as he dips down to kiss his temple. “You left the window open.”
“And you came all the way back here - ” There’s a fondness to his tone as he rubs the heels of his hands over his eyes and pushes his chair back from the desk. “ - To ask me to close it.” He smiles and rises to meet Clint’s lips with his own, looping his arms around the specialist’s waist. “What time is it?”
“Five,” comes the prompt answer and Clint’s already manoeuvring them both in the direction of the cot, dipping Phil down onto it and crouching to untie the agent’s shoes.
Phil yawns and pulls off his tie, hanging it on the nearby filing cabinet so that when he has to put it back on later the silk won’t be completely crushed. He lies back as Clint finishes with his shoes, kicking them to the side once he’s out of the way and scrambling up onto the cot next to him.
“You’re supposed to be on the range at seven-thirty, Barton.”
“Mm.” Clint’s sidling in closer, forehead pressed against Phil’s shoulder.
“Shouldn’t have come all the way out here.”
Clint doesn’t answer, and Phil doesn’t press him, pulling him closer so that his hands can slide down his spine, rubbing light circles into his back. He shouldn’t have stayed so late, shouldn’t have fallen asleep at his desk - again. Not when he knows that Clint truly struggles with being left alone in the apartment. And that’s his fault, too, for “dying” when he did.
In his sleep, Clint shifts a little closer, and Phil catches a glimpse of dirt-stained feet.
“Did you come all this way barefoot?”