Melinda used to love Christmas. As she sat in the common room, cup of tea in hand, she remembers herself as a little kid ice skating on the lake behind their old house. Another image of herself, this time with a teenaged Phil, appeared in her mind. At the Academy, they used to have Christmas movie marathons in his room. Finally, there were her memories Andrew cooking their first Christmas dinner as a married couple, with her just watching because she would rather literally beat up fifteen guys than cook. Now though, she isn't really a Christmas person. Even if she doesn't totally hate it, she isn't exactly the most festive either. Whether she misses it or not, she's not really sure.
She is snapped out of her thoughts with the sound of footsteps. She knows immediately whose they are, and by the sound of it he was also carrying something, a box maybe.
"Woah, May, do you mind toning down that Christmas spirit of yours?" Phil says in mock offense.
Melinda lets out a huff of breath that almost counted as laughter. "Sorry, can't. These nonstop Christmas songs Mace plays all over the base really makes everybody cheery." He sees the corners of her mouth slightly turn up and he can't help but return his own dopey smile. He won't admit it, but he misses the Melinda that incited snowball fights back at the Academy.
"Do you want to help me decorate the Christmas tree?" Phil makes a show of shaking the box in his hands lightly.
She arches her brow, looks around the room faintly. She didn't even notice there was a Christmas tree. Sure enough, there it was, around the corner of the room. There were already conspicuous Christmas lights hanging around the windows that the poor tree went unnoticed.
"Did the person who hung these obnoxious lights somehow forget the tree?" the subtle snark in her voice would be recognized as condescension by people who didn't know her well. Phil snorted.
"Actually, I asked Fitz if I could personally decorate the tree," beaming, he tilts his head toward it. "He picked the tree out. Used his drones to bring it in here."
Melinda sets her cup of tea down and walks towards Phil. She grabs the first ornament in the box, a mini Mjolnir. "Well, the tree isn't going to decorate itself."
Phil sets the box down on the floor and picks the little Lola ornament. Everything in the box is all his own. He's accumulated some of them from missions, a reminder of the Christmases he's spent away from home. Some were gifts, and the oldest ones were the ornaments he and Melinda used to decorate the two-foot Christmas tree in his dorm room. These ornaments could told stories of every Christmas he's celebrated.
"Ooh, do you remember this?" If it weren't for the rich, velvety voice, Phil almost thought that somebody else entered the room and said it. She genuinely sounded... excited?
"Barton's first arrow," he nods toward a piece of Hawkeye's arrow, just the pointy tip broken from the whole one. "Won it in a bet," He cockily tilts his head to the side. "He loved that, you know. Kind of guilty I actually took it."
"Well, you can't return it now," she smiles. "He still thinks you're dead." She takes it from his hand and hangs it on the tree. He wouldn't tell her, but his breath caught in his throat when their hands brushed against each other.
"You know, I always wondered what happened to this," Melinda raises a smaller version of Captain America's shield. He repurposed it to become a Christmas decoration? It was her gift to him during their first year at the Academy. They clicked almost immediately, God knows why. On his birthday she gave him a Captain America keychain because he just couldn't stop talking about his love for the super soldier. When she apologized for how insignificant she thought her gift was, Phil hugged her for the first time, and for the first time she couldn't help but think of Phil as someone more than just a friend. Since then she's pushed the thoughts away. "I don't think you know the difference between a keychain and a Christmas ornament," she tapped it on her chin, just a little bit below her mouth. Phil licked his lips.
"Well, just because people say that one thing is this, doesn't mean it can't be another thing," he wasn't talking about just the keychain, and she knew it. He was talking about her. People saw her as this killing machine, this indestructible, stoic warrior, but she's so much more than that. Despite everything that's happened between them and because of everything that's happened to them, he sees her for all that she is. "You of all people should know."
When they finish hanging the ornaments, Phil turns the lights they put around the Christmas tree on. The whole room lit up, finally looking complete. He turns to look at Melinda, captivated by how the lights seemed to highlight her features. Wow. He's never denied that Melinda was beautiful, but this is something entirely different. He's literally and figuratively seeing her under a new light.
"Only one thing missing," he takes the SHIELD emblem, a circular ornament not fit to be called "star", but is still the customary decoration on top of his Christmas tree. "Would you like to do the honors?"
"I don't know what to say, are you sure?" she puts both her hands on her chest and fakes flattery. For a moment, Phil swears he could see a glint of mischief in her eyes, and that was further proven when she steps closer and places the emblem on his head. She giggles and his heart sinks, his mind panics. He's been a master of not showing any reactions on his face – he's a really good spy. But honestly Melinda doesn't make it any easier for him.
"Merry Christmas, Phil," she smiles again, and this time he steps closer, against his own will, losing at his attempts to control himself.
"Merry Christmas to you too," he whispers, looks into her eyes, and not a second later his gaze travels to her mouth.
Melinda notices. Of course she does. And so, because it's Christmas, and because there's mistletoe at the door (which is actually about ten feet away from them), she moves her hand from where she's holding the emblem and runs it through his hair. The emblem falls, making a thud, but Phil couldn't care less as he savors the sensation of Melinda's hand touching his hair. He closes his eyes and hums in delight. When he opens them, she's closer to him, which he didn't think was actually physically possible.
They don't know who closed the gap between them, but they end up kissing each other. Phil's hands immediately land on Melinda's hips and she just kept running her hands through his hair, only moving them to grip at his collar when he licks her bottom lip. As they explore each other's mouths even further, the Christmas songs playing throughout the base changed from It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year to All I Want for Christmas.
Melinda decides she's beginning to like Christmas again.