Oblivious

Rated: G
Category: Double Drabble. Post-End Game. Movieverse. Barton Family. Angst.
Spoilers: End Game.
Summary: Children are often oblivious. That's a mixed blessing.

The boy looks up at his father and grins. Then his smile falters when the man doesn't respond.

"Dad?" he asks.

When he gets nothing, he tries again, hurt filling his tiny voice.

"Daddy?"

His only answer is silence. His face scrunches up, like he's about to cry, when his mother appears and gently places a hand on his father's shoulder.

"Clint," she says pointedly, though not without sympathy.

His father shakes his head and looks down at the boy like he's just noticed him.

"Yeah?"

The boy blinks. "Is it right? Did I get it?"

The man smiles, more sadly than one would expect, as he examines his son's work.

Then he nods, the slightest sheen of tears in his eyes.

"Yeah," he says, voice husky. "Yeah. That's exactly right."

He hangs the boy's drawing on the fridge. The boy beams. He's gotten his name right. Or part of it, anyway, for the first time. He didn't even make the "N" backwards, though he'd left off everything past the "t," like usual.

He's so proud. So it's a good thing he's too young to notice that his father doesn't look at the picture for the rest of the night.