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Thump.
Thump.
Thump.
Shoulder to fist.
Shoulder to fist.
Shoulder to fucking fist.
She's in the gym at the playground, quickly destroying the heavy bag and she is made of rage. Her thoughts are screams with no voice and the tape on her knuckles will not hold. Even still, it's absolutely easier to keep hitting. There's no stillness within her tonight, no calm to anchor her. There's no mining it, only the explosion.
She was fine before. Maybe not fine, but handling it; Coping. There's no shortage of pain in the life she leads, and this could have simmered and died all on its own. But she's been loaded and lit and she's got an an entire helicarrier of people to blame.
Loki. Thump.
Fury. Thump.
Phil. Thump.
Herself. Thump. Thump. Thump. When the bag gives out under her hands she's stunned. Her hands shake, suddenly bereft of action, and still she burns.
"Melinda." His voice is quiet and close. It's rare for anyone to manage to sneak up on her, and his sudden proximity a testament to her distraction. She can't think, only react. She lashes out, and either he's faster than she remembers or she's too far gone, but he manages to block her hands.
"May!" His voice is louder now, and something within her snaps and extinguishes. Her fury abandons her, leaving her empty and bare. Exhaustion settles over her like another burden to carry.
"Go away, Phil." She rasps, her voice rattling and small. When she meets his eyes all she can see is his blood and the life leaving his face.
"Are you ok?" He's looking at her hands, the knuckles are bloody where the tape disintegrated. She hadn't noticed at the time. They sting, distantly. He's poised to reach for her but he's rarely pushes when it came to touching and that horizon remains uncrossed.
He sighs, and she decides he looks just as tired as she feels. She should reassure him. It would be a hard sell, he knows her, but he would try to believe her. He always wants to believe her, but she can't find the words. "Skye showed me the footage."
She pictured his death every moment between Hill telling her he had died and Fury telling her he had been resurrected. Her mind had conjured grizzly details, every time different. Now she's seen it and it is infinitely worse.
"I know. I talked to her. She found it trying to salvage S.H.I.E.L.D. surveillance archives. She was," He pauses, rubbing a tired hand across his face. "Concerned with my mortality."
"Seeing you die..." A sob escapes her. Is she crying? She didn't cry before, when he was dead. She was too busy digging a hole in her heart just as sure as they were digging his grave. Weeping never kept her strong, and she can't fathom tears over a man that still lives.
It's too much and she can't think, her mind is too heavy and too slow. She can't think in a void. "Phil, you died."
"Yes."
"I grieved for you."
"No."
"What?" Does he doubt her? They've never discussed it in detail, but she's certain he knows how she feels about him.
"How long was I dead to you?" He moves towards her, slowly, cautiously, as if she were a wild animal and he's scared of her taking flight.
"Days." Horrible days, long days. The ache inside her had split open into a yawning stretch of empty nothing in those days.
"Fury didn't give you the chance to grieve." Taking one of her battered hands in his own, he begins to unwind the tape. "It takes time, Melinda. When someone you care about dies, it takes more than days. Resurrections not withstanding, you lost a friend. You can't not feel that."
He died, unrescued and alone, and before she could mourn him he returned.
"I wasn't there." She's shaking again. "I didn't - I couldn't-"
"You're not always going to be able to save me." He says, not unkindly. Her hands are free of their bindings, and he kisses the inside of her wrists before releasing them. "You were where you were supposed to be and I was where I was supposed to be."
She refuses to believe that it could ever be that simple. "And look what happened!"
"Yes, I died. Even if you had been there, there's no guarantee I still wouldn't have died. I could die tomorrow for all we know. We could be headed down the path to ruin as we speak!"
"And if we are, I will always try and save you."
"I know!" He lets out one ragged breath. "Melinda, you didn't fail me. If anything, I've failed you."
She thinks she would feel better if she could touch him so she does. His eyes close as her hands rest over where his scar is hidden from view. She has seen him impaled in the chest by a god, but right now, under her fingers, she feels only his heart beating, strong and true. There's no failure in continuing to live, she thinks.
"You came back." She says simply.
He grins at her, but there's no joy in it. "Through no fault of my own."
He still struggles with his restoration, but she doesn't. She would take him alive and completely mad over dead and lost any day.
She leans against him and his arms snake around her. This is the anchor, a point of reference. "I've been mourning a man that's still alive and you're upset about having not stayed dead."
"More or less."
"We are kind of a mess."
A sharp bark of laughter escapes him. "But we are a mess together, right?"
"To the grave and back."