I like the idea that Natasha continued to chain herself to her bed after she escaped the Red Room because of OCD- And because one of the only memories she has left of before the room brainwashed her is when she was brought in. Chained down. Scared and confused. Chaining herself at night is not just something she was trained to do, or a compulsion she has, it is her link to back when she was more human than agent. More human than spider. I have suffered from OCD, and drew upon my own experiences to describe how I think she would feel.

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For the first week or so, she didn't even have to be asked to be handcuffed to the bed. No one at Shield trusted her, they were scared she was going to murder them in their sleep. So, every night when she went to bed, Clint would come in and handcuff her. She had acted like she didn't like it, and had told Clint that if she wanted to kill everyone handcuffs wouldn't stop her anyway. She could just pick the lock with her fingernails. Or break her thumb so she could slip free of the shackle.

She thought it would be months before they trusted her enough to sleep without being chained to the bed. So, that night, when Clint escorted her to her room and started to leave without producing the handcuffs, she thought he must have forgotten.

"Don't you need to chain me up Barton? Make sure I don't go crazy, and stab everyone tonight?" She spoke coldly, her eyes were flat an emotionless as they bore into his. Clint just shrugged, "I told Fury chaining you up was pointless. Like you said, if you really wanted to do some damage you could easily break out. Besides, we have security cameras everywhere and agents are on call at all times. How much harm could you do here really?"

He was dead serious confident in cameras and agents. Natasha almost smiled at how naive he was. Give her an hour, she could run this group into the ground. It would almost be too easy. Except that she couldn't smile, couldn't make a joke. The urge, the compulsion, the desperate need was surging through her. It was an instinct that she couldn't ignore. The Red Room had messed her up so deeply, she had to be handcuffed to fall asleep. She just had to. Just like she always had to smile when seducing the mark, had to hit the target every time she shot a gun. Like she had to recognize a poison by smell alone, had to become whoever the person she was manipulating wanted her to be. The need to sleep handcuffed was ingrained in her, it was part of her training. Part of who she was.

Barton was leaving now, Natasha's heart pounded in her throat. She couldn't just ask him to chain her up, right? He would think she was crazy. Was there something she could use instead of handcuffs? No, they were scared any object in her hands would become a weapon, her room was empty. There wasn't even dental floss in the bathroom. Ok, they weren't wrong, she could weaponize anything, but that wasn't what she wanted now. She wasn't looking for a weapon. Just wanted something to use as a handcuff, something that would secure her, keep her sane. If she wasn't handcuffed when she slept, Natasha felt like the last remaining parts of herself would shatter into a million little pieces and she would never, ever get them back. The handcuffs held her together, kept her whole.

"Ok, you have another Psych eval tomorrow Tash, but see you for training in the afternoon?" Clint said, smiling as if he was talking with his best friend. She couldn't ask him for handcuffs. He was the only one who trusted her at all, her only "friend" in this place. She couldn't have him think she was as insane as Natasha knew she really was. "Goodnight Barton." She said coldly, turning away waiting for him to leave the room. He chuckled at her cold reply, and left. The door locked behind him.

Natasha was left alone, with her thoughts and fears. She had overcome so much in the red-room, why couldn't she get over this too? The Black Widow laid down on the bed, and closed her eyes in an attempt to sleep. It didn't work. Her brain needed the sensation of being anchored down to reality, had to know that she was safe and secure somewhere before it would allow her to drift away to sleep. Natasha was sweating now, she felt how quickly her heart was beating. She recognized the early symptoms of a panic attack. They were sickly sweet, thrumming through her body in time to the beat of her heart, all consuming and impossible to escape from.

She threw the blankets off of the bed and began intently searching the room, for something, anything that could anchor her down. That would not let her fly apart in the night, that held fast to what human parts of her were left.

Nothing. There was nothing in the room but a bed, sheets and a blanket. Damn it.

Her hands were trembling now, every ounce of her being was focused on this. She had to do it right, fix it, or she couldn't sleep no matter how tired she was. Finally she realized what she could do. It was almost too easy. She yanked the sheet off of her bed, and tore it into long strips that she then braided into a thin rope. It wasn't long enough to strangle someone, or even be much of a weapon. But it would do the job for what she needed tonight.

Natasha wound one end of the rope around the head of the bed, tied the right knots, made sure it was pulled tight. Then she wrapped the other end tightly around her hand, tight enough that she felt the rough fabric digging into her skin. She could practically feel the blood flow to her hand slow as the fabric constricted her veins.

It still wasn't tight enough.

She spent the next ten minutes checking the rope, checking the end around her wrist, tightening it, checking the end tied to the headboard, fixing that. Then back to checking the rope. It was a vicious yet comforting cycle, until she finally felt the restraint was just right. Just perfect. She would have to wake up early to make sure Barton or one of Fury's lackeys did not see like this, but she could handle that.

Natasha laid back, her left arm being pulled up just right above her head. This was good. She was going to be fine.

For one more night she was tied down.

For one more night, she would keep what was left of her humanity, what she had left of her shattered memories.

For one more night, she would keep doing this thing that made her feel human.

But now, she would sleep.

Please please please review!