Taste of Thai- Sunday evening

[throughaphase]

Clint and Kitty had made it to their first anniversary, officially. No more rounding up to it. Part of Kitty thought she shouldn't be surprised, since they were actually pretty good at dealing with things together, but when the last year had involved a variety of transformations, one psycho religious fanatic, tracksuited bros, a nightmare dungeon, fangirl-ordered cheating, freaking Madripoor, a sharknado and now winged vampires, among other things, she thought they should get to pat themselves on the back. And also, be amazed that they were still alive.

So tonight they were going to have night out, which meant Clint got her in a dress that really could have been longer except what was the fun in that, and they could have a nice normal date.

Albeit one where after the waitress took their orders, Kitty still said, "I'm reall glad nothing's trying to kill us today."


[For the fellow celebrator/ee!]

Comments

[so_hawkward]

Clint had expected to be a little less bandaged today, but that was what he got for expecting the weekend of his and Kitty's anniversary to go smoothly. He still kind of couldn't believe he'd made it a year without screwing things up too badly. He really deserved some kind of medal for being a decent excuse for a boyfriend for so long, but Kitty in that dress was a worthy substitute.

"I'm really glad nothing managed to kill us yesterday. Those things were pretty awful," he said.

[throughaphase]

"Ugh, tell me about it. Nothing like some flying nightmares to deal with, especially on a day you can't hear them coming.' Not that Kitty had had to worry about them getting her, but she'd been worried about everyone else.

[so_hawkward]

"A lot of the students were smart and got back to the dorms," Clint said. "It probably could have been a lot worse."

[throughaphase]

"Oh, definitely. Though between flying vampire things, deafness and bouncy castles, sometimes I think Fandom's trying to show off with how bad its timing really is," Kitty mused.

Though she still found the bouncy castles hilarious.

[so_hawkward]

"The bouncy castles definitely made everything worse," Clint said. "Although fighting while deaf wasn't exactly a cakewalk either."

[throughaphase]

"You seemed to do okay," she said with a little smile, even if he was a little bandaged. "You took over protecting the dorms, huh?"

She'd really expected nothing less.

[so_hawkward]

"No, it wasn't like that," Clint said, ducking his head a little. "Bo, the security lady was out there too, that's more her job. I was just... you know, out and about near there and all."

[throughaphase]

"Don't get shy about making sure the kids are okay," Kitty told him.

[so_hawkward]

"Not all of them can take care of themselves," Clint said, not sure why he felt so defensive when Kitty clearly didn't mind. "I just feel bad leaving them all to fend for themselves when something unexpected comes up."

[throughaphase]

"I get it," Kitty assured him. "I was in town for the same reason. And when it's kids who don't really have anyone else to look out for them..."

[so_hawkward]

"And I know they think they can take care of themselves, and a lot of them are really strong and capable," Clint said. "I just... I figure I can help. And it wasn't a waste of time, I did run into one of my students. Or, actually, she ran into me running away from one of those things."

[throughaphase]

"The one who signs?" Someone listens to radio.

[so_hawkward]

Ugh, stupid radio. "Yeah." Oh Kitty, did you think you were getting more than that? "Thankfully she didn't get too grossed out by me shooting the thing."

[throughaphase]

"I'd think even if she was grossed out, it'd be balanced out by being saved from a flying vampire," Kitty pointed out. "So what's the story with the signing, anyway?"

[so_hawkward]

On one hand, they were celebrating their one year anniversary, and Clint knew he could trust Kitty with stories about himself. On the other hand, deflection was sort of his default state. "I like knowing languages besides English. It's useful and it makes it harder for people to talk about me behind my back sometimes," he said with a smirk.

[throughaphase]

Yeah, Kitty was figuring out that between yesterday and now, he was being evasive again. "So you really don't want to tell me, huh?"

[so_hawkward]

No, no he did not, but he also didn't want to make Kitty upset by being, well, himself. "My brother started teaching me," he said after a moment. "I mean, I know more now that I learned on my own but... yeah."

[throughaphase]

Kitty frowned a little. "Why'd he start?" she asked. Unless it was his brother he just didn't want to talk about.

[so_hawkward]

"I think part of it was having our own language, just me and him," Clint said. "Barney's always been smarter than me. We could be talking and no one would know what we were saying. We didn't even get noticed most of the time because we were being quiet. We made up signs for some stuff too like... it was just for us. Does that make any sense?"

[throughaphase]

"Yeah, it does," Kitty said. "That's actually kind of cute. I was worried it was something bad."

[so_hawkward]

"Something bad like what?"

Oh Clint, why did you ask things like that?

[throughaphase]

"Deafness trauma? I don't know," Kitty said. "Every time you get cagey about something it's because it's bad."

[so_hawkward]

"I'm not cagey," Clint said awkwardly. "And not everything is bad. It's not like my whole childhood was awful or anything." Just, you know, most of it.

[throughaphase]

"I'm not saying that," Kitty replied. "Just... anytime something comes up when you start trying to change the subject or gloss over something, it turns out that something bad had happened and you didn't want me to know about it for whatever reason."

[so_hawkward]

"It's just weird talking about my brother," Clint said, like that was enough of an explanation.