Atlas Gym, Saturday

[so_hawkward]

When Clint had arrived at the gym, with Lucky in tow, he found an immediate problem. At some point in the morning, one of the treadmills had started playing salsa music. He'd tried the old standard of turning it off and turning it on again. And turning it off again. And unplugging it. And replugging and unplugging it again.

Now he was armed with a wrench. He wasn't entirely sure what he was going to do, but hopefully it wouldn't involved getting electrocuted.

[Open!]

Comments

[throughaphase]

After yesterday, talking to Clint was kind of a priority for Kitty, and she was glad he wasn't that hard to track down today.

"Did you break it?" she teased when she saw what he was doing.

[so_hawkward]

"Not yet, but I'm trying to," Clint said, smiling back at her from where he was digging into the machine. "I hope you weren't hoping for a quiet workout today."

[throughaphase]

"Nah, I came to see you," she said, and paused. "You know the objective usually isn't to break it..." Just checking.

[so_hawkward]

"I think breaking it might be the only way to get it to shut up," Clint said, ignoring the treadmill for the time being. "So, what's up?"

[throughaphase]

Kitty paused, trying to figure out the best way to say this, especially since she still didn't really buy into what Derek had said. "So I dragged Derek out shopping yesterday, and he seems to be under the impression you think he's trying to get in my pants?"

[so_hawkward]

Clint's grip on the wrench tightened a little, and he wondered if he could accidentally knock himself out with it. It wasn't like a head injury would surprise anyone, right? "Well, isn't he? You're like the only person on the island he tolerates. There's got to be a reason for that."

[throughaphase]

"...Wait, seriously?" Color Kitty legitimately surprised. "Whatever the reason is, that is not it."

[so_hawkward]

"I wouldn't be too sure about that. Guys don't exactly go shopping with women without a good reason," Clint said. "And I'm not so sure it's because he wants to share his leather-loving fashion sense with you."

[throughaphase]

"I think the reason is that I drag him because he has good fashion sense," Kitty countered. "The only way he could put out bigger 'stay away from me' signals is if he set himself on fire whenever someone talked to him. That includes me."

[so_hawkward]

"Really? So you don't think he's interested?" It wasn't that Kitty was super hot or anything but, come on, Kitty was super hot, and now Clint felt kind of weird.

[throughaphase]

"No, I don't. And even if he was, I'm not," she assured him, offering him a little smile. "And that's even if I didn't have a certain someone I'm kind of massively hung up on."

[so_hawkward]

Well, that certainly made Clint feel better. "Are you sure? Because he's got that whole tortured bad boy thing going, and the word on the internet is that ladies are all over that stuff."

[throughaphase]

"Oh, well if the internet said so..." Kitty grinned, and turned more serious. "I went for the bad boy once. It caused problems. I'm sure."

Granted, she still missed Pete, but it just hadn't worked in the end.

[whenshewasnice]

Weirdly enough, Natalie's current moods made her more social. Even if her attempts at social involved faking a normal state of mind at people while making them distract her. She needed it even more badly today, because she knew there was a call she should make, but really didn't want to.

So, thank you for the random extra distraction, treadmill!

"... Why is there salsa music?"

[so_hawkward]

"Because this thing hates me," Clint said, banging the wrench hard against the inside of the treadmill before looking back. "Oh, Natalie, hey. How's it going?"

[whenshewasnice]

Natalie considered the merits of saying either 'not great' or 'you don't want to know'.

She settled on a shrug, and saying, "Maybe a gremlin got into the wiring."

[so_hawkward]

Clint leaned away from the treadmill for a moment, like the proverbial gremlin would hop out at any moment. "Yeah, we'll see, I guess. So what does this mean?" He shrugged, mimicking her movement.

[whenshewasnice]

"It's a shrug," Natalie deadpanned. Helpfully. "A pretty common gesture, usually conveying indifference or uncertainty, or something."

Had he really been expecting a non-literal answer?

[so_hawkward]

Really, he should have known better by now. "I meant what's that shrug mean? Is everything okay?"

[whenshewasnice]

"No."

And she stated that with a perfectly neutral expression, too. But hey, at least she didn't lie.

[so_hawkward]

Clint nodded, matching her neutrality. "If you want to talk about it, god knows I'd love to listen to something besides salsa music, but if you don't, I understand."

[whenshewasnice]

Natalie and talking wasn't really happening much these days. Well, not talking about that, anyway – it would have been a little counterproductive for her efforts at keeping herself distracted.

She shrugged again, just the one shoulder this time. "Can I just shoot things?"

[so_hawkward]

"Of course. I can't imagine discouraging you from that," Clint said. "Would you like some help shooting things?"

[whenshewasnice]

Natalie skipped the shrug this time. "Yeah."

Again with the not-being-alone. Though this could also be construed as momentarily saving him from the salsa music.

[so_hawkward]

Oh god, how Clint needed to be saved from the salsa music. "Great! If you want, you can get my bow out of the office." Yes, he always had it with him, shhh. "I'll go set up a target for you."