Widow Sisters and Friends (Restoring Our Broken Hearts)

The Greatest Treasure

Summary: When Yelena is out for a run with Natasha, she falls and scrapes her knee. She experiences a flashback to her Ohio days, and she is absolutely shocked when Natasha treats her in a manner that mirrors those times. When they get back home, Yelena asks her about it and realizes that her older sister is still carrying a deep guilt that Yelena had thought was gone.

   Yelena and Natasha were out on a run together, the both of them quietly enjoying one another's company as they exercised. It had been raining the past few days, and they had been trying to dodge the random sticks and branches that had fallen on their usual path.

However, as they turned the corner, Yelena was moving too fast to stop before falling over the branch resting on the sidewalk before them. Yelena's foot caught as she catapulted forward, landing on her knee heavily. She just barely grunted with the pain that ran through her knee. She was really regretting her decision to wear shorts instead of leggings.

However, the worst part was how intensely a flashback ran through her as she watched Natasha running ahead of her slightly. Their last day in Ohio together when Natasha and Yelena had been playing chase and Yelena had fallen on her knee, scraping it slightly.

And as Natasha paused in front of her and turned to face behind her, realizing Yelena was not there with her, Yelena was even more strongly reminded.

"Yelena?!" Natasha called as soon as she realized she fell, and Yelena just winced a little as she was thrown back into the real world and how badly her knee hurt.

"Well, that was embarrassing," Yelena pointed out with a light chuckle, and Natasha wasted no time in bending down to inspect Yelena's knee. The blood droplets were starting to form on it just barely, and Natasha looked at her worriedly. Yelena felt a large amount of humiliation starting to overcome her, and she found herself very thankful that they were on a more secluded part of their running route.

"Are you okay?" Natasha asked, her light greens boring holes in Yelena's own gaze. Yelena just shrugged nonchalantly, finding that she was mostly fine besides the sudden flashback to Ohio and the overwhelming embarrassment that she was clumsy enough to fall like that.

"Well, yeah. Just a bruised pride, but other than that, I'm fine," Yelena chuckled slightly, and Natasha just furrowed her brow before grabbing the bottom of her black t-shirt and bringing it up to wipe Yelena's knee gently.

Yelena let out a slight hiss, not relishing the feeling of the fabric against the raw skin. However, she completely lost her voice altogether as Natasha leaned forward and gently kissed Yelena's knee. Yelena just gaped at her, unable to speak at all as Natasha's gentle touch graced the skin. Natasha then stood up as if nothing happened, looking down at her and offering her hand.

"Here, I'll help you up," Natasha told her, and Yelena slowly reached up to take her hand. Natasha helped her to her feet and Yelena winced as she put weight on her knee. Aside from the burn of the raw flesh touching itself, her knee was still sore, and she could not help but wonder if she damaged something internally when she fell with all of her weight on the joint.

"Come on, let's go back home and let that knee rest," Natasha told her as she wrapped an arm around the younger woman and started heading back in the direction of their home, letting Yelena lean against her as they walked.

Yelena was honestly totally bumfuzzled at Natasha's gentle gesture. It brought back a flood of emotion and a vulnerability that she thought she had left behind a long time ago. And the nonchalance of the entire thing threw Yelena off terribly.

Natasha just flashed her a small, gentle smile as she caught Yelena staring at her. Yelena forced herself to avert her eyes as she focused on getting home. However, her mind was still racing and trying to wrap itself around the softness of the action.