Chapter Text
Harry knew as soon as opening his eyes took a herculean amount of effort that it was not going to be a good day.
They tended to creep up on him, days where his limbs felt like lead and a cold tightness radiated in pulses from the pit of his stomach and crawled up the back of his throat. It was best, he had learned, to stay in bed all day and ride it out.
Certain someones disagreed.[1]
“Harry, you can’t go on like this.”
“‘Mione’s right, man. C’mon, get up.”
“I know. ‘M just tired.”
“What happened to Monsieur Potter? Never tired, always cheerful and messy and-”
“I don’t feel like lying today.”
“Harry . . .”
“Why did you bloody call us then?”
“Ron!”
“Look at him! He knows he’ll be better off if he gets up. He just called us to kick him out of bed, like always.”
“Really, Ron . . .”
“‘S alright, ‘Mione. It’s true.”
“Still . . . We’ll leave you be, then - come on , Ron - as long as you promise to at least make some tea.”
“Mm.”
Harry made it all the way to the kitchen area of his studio before he heard knocking coming from downstairs. Grumbling a little to himself about meddling best friends, he made the executive decision to ignore the sound, instead bustling about making himself a good cup of tea.
Five minutes later his temples had started pounding to the rhythm of the incessant rapping, and the wizard had finally had enough.
Storming downstairs he slammed open the door and fixed a glare of death at whoever was on the other side, only to let out a squawk as his nose was gripped firmly and twisted until his eyes watered. “Is that how you look at your elders, sonja ?” he heard. Through his tears he could see floral print and immediately knew who he was talking to.
“Hey, Miss Kim,” Harry responded, resigned.
‘Miss Kim,’ as the lady insisted people call her, was an old woman with wispy gray hair and piercing brown eyes who lived a couple of buildings down from Monsieur Potter’s. Her face was wrinkled and her posture was stooped, but she was still surprisingly limber for her age, and her mind was as sharp as Draco’s chin. In fact, Harry was pretty sure she should have been arrested a couple times before for some of the things she did, but she always managed to weasel out of it. He was half convinced[2] she acted like that only because she knew she could get away with it. No one was actually going to do anything to a batshit crazy elderly woman, and if they attempted to, Harry and everyone else on the block would come rushing to her aid.
After shooing off Miss Kim with promises to bring the old album she had asked him to repair with him the next time he dropped by for coffee, the wizard headed back up the stairs. As horribly as the day had started out, he was actually . . . feeling a bit lighter now. Maybe his friends actually had a point.
All traces of that good mood evaporated when he entered the apartment to find Clint Barton standing in the middle of the room.
“Don’t you have bad guys to shoot and one-eyed dogs to feed?” Harry asked, clearly still pissed off. At least he now had a steaming cup of tea in his hands, which he cooled to the perfect temperature using a nifty spell and took an angry sip. The archer looked appropriately chagrined, but didn’t appropriately get the hell out of Harry’s apartment. After a short staring contest, Harry sighed and sat down on his couch, motioning for Clint to join him. The agent hurriedly complied, immediately adopting a surprised look when he sunk a good few inches into the couch. Harry smirked a bit at that but asked in an idle tone, “So why’re you here?”
Clint was clearly hesitant. Harry definitely hoped this was his first time breaking into someone’s home, though considering his occupation, that was very unlikely.
“. . . Well, I probably wouldn’t have been allowed back on active duty so soon if you hadn’t talked to Fury, so . . . Thanks?”
Harry almost pinched the bridge of his nose[3] but snapped himself out of it, waving a hand. “Just doing my job,” he said wearily.
“What exactly is that, by the way?” Clint couldn’t help but ask curiously.
Harry supposed he hadn’t really introduced himself fully back on the Helicarrier, so he allowed a short, “Magical consultant, I think is the official name.”
“Oh. Huh.”
Harry was expecting a stronger reaction than that , but he wasn’t complaining.[4] They sat in silence for a few moments, Clint clearly not knowing what to do with himself after breaking in and thanking Harry. The wizard, unfazed, let him stew while sipping his brew.[5]
After taking the final sip of his tea, Harry finally spoke. “I’m sure you actually have work to do, and I have to finish up a few orders. Is there anything else?” he asked, managing to sound genuinely curious despite his general dismissive tone.
It seemed to be the push Clint needed, because he fidgeted a bit before finally saying, in a rather meek tone, “I was . . . wondering if you had anything for nightmares?
“I’m not a vending machine, Barton,” Harry grumbled, “Go see a damn therapist.” He chose to ignore the irony in him, of all people, saying that, though he could just see Hermione and Ron rolling their eyes at him.
“Oh,” the archer sighed, sounding absolutely dejected. Harry looked over. He looked like a kicked puppy, somehow using his bulging biceps and defined deltoids[6] to make himself even smaller and more pitiful.
Harry groaned. “Fine, fine,” he said, muttering under his breath about hero complexes and damn puppy eyes as he rose from the couch and headed to the kitchen, where he pulled open a random drawer. Grabbing a spoon[7] and Transfiguring it into a dreamcatcher with the Deathly Hallows symbol displayed prominently within the hoop, he muttered some enchantments over it before tossing it to the archer, who caught it without fumbling.
“Here. Hang this up in your room; it should help.”
“Wow- Thank you.”
“Don’t thank me now . You don’t even know if it works. Shoo,” he directed, starting to wave Clint out of the apartment.
The archer refused to budge, instead fixing the wizard with a serious look in his eyes. “Really, Harry. Thanks.”
“Yeah, yeah. Just leave me alone,” Harry said with a roll of his eyes, but the archer could see them soften around the edges. He couldn’t hold back a smile as he allowed himself to be pushed out of the apartment, one hand wrapped securely around the good night’s sleep contained in his pocket.