Title: It Is Christmas In The Heart That Puts Christmas In The Air
Prompt : . (Man dragging Christmas tree home)
Rating: PG
Warnings: Fluff, fluff, fluff. And rambling. (And a very, very brief cross over between Marvel and DC)
Summary: Pepper doesn't have a Christmas tree and Tony sets out to right this heinous wrong.
Notes: The only thing that belongs to me is the plot. Neither the picture nor the characters are mine. Ta!
It Is Christmas In The Heart That Puts Christmas In The Air
"Alright, Tony, what is so urgent no-?" Pepper's sentence died in her throat as she took in the scene before her.
Her employer, best friend, boyfriend and resident superhero was sat on the floor in the living room of his mansion unravelling tinsel. Yards and yards of tinsel. It was everywhere; it covered the furniture and the carpet and she was sure she could see some trailing into the fountain.
Yet the tree in the corner stood completely naked.
"I think you might have missed a spot." Pepper hinted dryly as she nodded towards the forlorn looking pine.
"I was waiting for you." Tony looked up at her and put on his best little boy voice; the one that Pepper hated because it was so hard to say no to.
"What for?" She asked, warily.
"So we could decorate the house together, of course!" He said this like it was the most obvious thing in the world and went back to unravelling the gold tinsel from the red and, in the process, managing to knot the two even tighter together. Pepper glanced at her watch and grimaced. 2.30pm. She still had several meetings to re-organise, a decision to make about which New Year's Eve party Tony Stark would be attending, a statement to write for the press, not to mention her own Christmas plans.
"Tony I don't-"
"Oh, come on, Pepper! I need your artistic eye, your flair for colour coordination and an excuse to ogle you freely." He waggled his eyebrows in an entirely inappropriate way and she rolled her eyes.
They hadn't seen each other much in the last two weeks with the run up to Christmas; the balls and parties that Tony was meant to attend, Stark Industries employee Christmas presents and making statements to the press about Iron Man's latest mission abroad had kept them both very busy. It was a very tempting offer; the entire afternoon with Tony and (hopefully) no interruptions. Pepper clicked her tongue against her teeth, sighed and toed off her shamelessly high heels.
"Okay. Where shall we start?"
Tony's answering grin was almost blinding.
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Hours later, the entire living room was decorated and the giant tree was looking much merrier with lengths of tinsel wrapped around it and glass baubles hanging from its branches. The star atop the tree was slightly wonky, due mainly to the fact that Tony had been far too engrossed in looking up Pepper's pencil skirt instead of holding the ladder still.
"I think we've outdone ourselves, Potts." Tony grinned as Pepper began her descent down the ladder. She let out a very ladylike squeal when she felt Tony's arms wrap around her waist to lift her the rest of the way down. She wriggled out of his grip to survey the living room and nodded happily.
"Very Christmassy." Pepper agreed with a smile.
"I reckon we deserve a treat. Come on, I'll treat you to one of those gingerbread lattes you love so much from Starbucks."
"Tony, I still have a million and one things to do and you sho-"
"Pepper, please." He turned his liquid, chocolate eyes on her and she almost hated the fact that her knees wobbled slightly. "I'll drive us into town, buy you a coffee and take you home. It's only 6; plenty of time for all that boring stuff." Tony scooped up her heels that had been abandoned beside the coffee table and waved them at her temptingly. Pepper pinched the bridge of her nose and, with fond exasperation, relented.
"Fine. But you're buying."
Tony smirked and wound his arm around her waist.
"That's my girl!"
Pepper didn't even bother hiding her smile or the blush that crept prettily onto her cheeks.
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Coffee with Tony turned out to be a 2 hour long affair with the staff of Starbucks tapping their feet impatiently. This impatience transformed miraculously into an entirely different emotion when Tony ordered two more coffees to take away and casually slipped the cashier a $50 bill and refused to accept the change. Tony held the door open for Pepper and she stepped out into the crisp, evening air. She was somewhat surprised when Tony slipped his free hand in hers and began strolling down the sidewalk, away from the car.
"Tony, the car is that way."
"I know." His eyes sparkled at her as he took a sip of his peppermint mocha. "I thought I'd be a gentleman and walk you home."
She had nothing to say to his suddenly boyish charm and fumbled for something else to focus on instead of his dark, amused gaze. Her eyes dropped to the scarf wrapped loosely around his neck.
"So uh...what's with the Gryffindor tribute?"
"Huh?"
"The red and gold scarf." Her hand slipped from his grasp as she tugged one of the tasselled ends. She knew he was about to say something stupid when she spotted his pout.
"It's not meant to be for Gryffindor it's...oh never mind."
Pepper stared as she watched his cheeks fill with colour and she realised that he was blushing. Suddenly, he wouldn't meet her gaze and her brain flipped through what else red and gold could possibly mean. Her short term memory recalled that his entire house had been filled with red and gold decorations; there had been no silver tinsel, no green baubles, no blue snowflakes. She frowned as she wondered why on Earth Tony was suddenly so interested in colour coordination.
"Why is everything in your-" She stopped mid sentence and glanced once more at the scarf as something dawned on her. She had seen that colour scheme before. "Did you pick red and gold decorations in your house to match Iron Man?"
Tony's bashful smile was the only answer she needed.
"Wow. You know, for Christmas I feel like I should buy you an entire humble pie. One slice will, clearly, not be enough for your ego."
"It's not like the others don't do it." Tony pouted. At Pepper's questioning look he continued. "I know for a fact that Rhodey insists on silver, Sue and Reed have blue up everywhere and Oliver Queen only has green and gold decorations."
"Okay, I get the others, I guess, but why does Ollie have gold up with the green? Surely Green Arrow would want green exclusively?"
"Nah, he's spending Christmas with Dinah so he thought it would make her laugh." Pepper frowned and Tony elaborated. "She's the Black Canary."
"Of course." Pepper sighed fondly. "You know, nobody ever mentions that, when dealing with super heroes you have to contend with their super hero personas, alter egos and then just their egos in general."
"Aw, we're not all bad." He wrapped an arm around her waist and tucked his hand into her coat pocket like he couldn't bear to not be touching her in some way as they walked. "So what does your place look like? Traditional red and green, I take it?"
"No, actually." His fingers tapped out a random rhythm against her hip and she avoided his eyes.
"Okay, so silver and gold? Multi-coloured? White? Help me out here, Potts."
"I...umm... I actually haven't decorated my place." She tried shrugging like it was no big deal but she could sense the frown before she saw it.
"Tell me you at least got a tree?"
"Well...I've been so busy and it's really not that important so-"
"Not that important?" Tony gasped dramatically, wasted the rest of his coffee by throwing it in the trash can next to him, and spun Pepper fully into his embrace, her latte resting between them. Her blue eyes were wide with surprise and Tony continued. "The tree is the most important part of Christmas, Potts. What are you thinking?"
Pepper rolled her eyes and elbowed him lightly in the ribs to release his hold on her. Spluttering indignantly, Tony let her go but was placated when she slipped her smaller hand back in his.
"It doesn't matter because I'll be at your house for Christmas anyway so what's the point?" Pepper drained the last of her coffee and threw the cup away before tugging on his hand. "Come on, I thought you were walking me home."
"Right, right." Tony grumbled, walking beside her once more. "I still can't believe you don't have a tree. It's just...wrong."
Pepper laughed and squeezed his hand. As they turned the corner, the lights from Macy's impressive Christmas display came into view and Pepper felt the breath in her chest hitch ever so slightly. The entire building was covered in twinkling lights and, out the front of the store, there was a beautiful tree that stood at an incredible 80 feet, adorned in hundreds of ornaments and surrounded by three smaller trees sprinkled with fake snow.
"Isn't it beautiful, Tony?"
"Yeah." Tony's voice was almost as breathless as Pepper's and when she turned to look at him, he wrenched his hand from hers and, as she watched with abject horror, he scrambled over the hip high fence that separated the general public from the marvellous display.
"What are you doing?" The redhead demanded of her crazed boyfriend who was busy heaving one of the smaller trees out of its stand and onto his broad shoulders like it was the most normal thing in the world. With a grunt, he shoved the tree over the little barrier and hopped the fence with the agility of someone 20 years his junior. He hauled the tree over to her by the trunk, the rest of the tree being dragged along the ground.
"What does it look like I'm doing? I'm stealing you a tree." Tony announced this with a rather proud grin, as though this were perfectly normal and sane.
Pepper stood and stared at him, flabbergasted and speechless.
Seeing that she wasn't going to move of her own volition any time soon, Tony wrapped his tree-less arm around her waist and continued to move towards her house, the tree scraping along the sidewalk as they moved. Several paces down the street, Pepper seemed to come back to reality and lightly hit his arm.
"Take it back! You can't go stealing things from Macy's! This is ridiculous. Christmas isn't about thievery and ... and plundering!" She crossed her arms indignantly.
"Plundering?" Tony gave her a sideways glance. "Seriously, Potts?"
"Oh, don't even...you just stole a Christmas tree!"
"Will you calm down? They won't even notice it's missing." At her disapproving glare he amended his statement. "I'll send them a cheque or something. Oh, come on, Potts. Lighten up. What other boyfriend would have pillaged Macy's for a Christmas tree for you?"
Tony could tell he had won the argument the moment he spotted the twitch of her lips.
"Fine. But it better be a big cheque. And an apology letter."
He only let her see his grin when she wrapped an arm around his waist and pecked his cheek.
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Getting the tree into Pepper's apartment proved to be something of a mission for the pair. Whilst the tree was not large, it was an awkward shape and, apparently, did not enjoy confined spaces such as those of doorframes. After much heaving and grunting, Tony managed to manoeuvre the fir into the corner of Pepper's living room, standing in her mop bucket with the bits of paper found in her shredder and some tape keeping it upright.
"Thank you, Tony." Pepper kissed him soundly on the lips and, several warming, wet minutes later Tony responded with a dazed 'welcome'.
Tony had only been in Pepper's apartment a handful of times and, even then, not for extended periods of time. Since she was always at the mansion he rarely needed to come out to see her but, now that he was in her personal space, his eyes took in every detail. The seemingly new furniture, the plush, cream carpet, the personal pictures lining the walls, the slight crack in the door that led to the kitchen, her slippers tucked under the rocking chair in the corner of the living room, the shelves of books against the back wall and the large, window looking out onto the street below and eventually his eyes rested back on the redhead smiling at him. There was a brief pause and Tony was about to suggest that he should go because, as she had previously stated, she had a lot of work still to do but Pepper beat him to it.
"It's pretty late." She yawned for effect and gave a luxurious stretch. "Maybe you should just stay here tonight." Pepper suggested casually as she shrugged off her coat.
"That's actually not a bad idea." It wasn't really that late but Tony wasn't about to alert her to that fact. The walk back to the car, whilst not particularly long, would not be as enjoyable by himself and he would relish any opportunity to spend time with his leggy girlfriend. Waking up to the sight of her in her bathrobe and slippers would definitely not be a sight to be missed. He eyed up her fairly new couch and determined that it would be comfy enough for him to get a decent night's sleep. "Is there a spare blanket anywhere?" He turned to her in time to watch her unravel her scarf from her neck and shake out her hair.
"I didn't mean sleeping on the couch, Tony." Her nimble fingers began working on the buttons of her shirt.
"Pepper?" Tony gulped as her midriff became visible and his tongue swelled up in his mouth.
"You know, for a certified genius, you're really not that bright." She threw her blouse at him and sauntered towards her bedroom.
And it was a very merry Christmas indeed.
&&Fin