A/N: Okay, it's been more than a week since the last update. Sorry 'bout that. xD;
I've been wanting to write some interaction between Pepper and Steve for awhile now. [Even though I completely FAILED because then suddenly I was making stuff up as I went along and man I don't even know. It could have gone better, I think. Eh. xD;]
Y'all can have yourselves some developing Clint 'n Natasha schtuff before we get to it. :U
My knowledge about Natasha/Natalia's back story is very limited. But from what I do understand...yeah.

And if you haven't yet, please please check out Chaos Clock by FishyIcon! She's the reasonable Steve to my obnoxious Tony and I don't know who else I'm going to bother for the next three weeks. [SERIOUSLY, STEVE. WHEN YOU GET BACK I'M MAKING YOU FEEL ALL THE FEELS BECAUSE REASONS. AND PEGGY.]

This bit is here because I don't really like leaving notes at the end and so this note is a bit longer than I would have liked.
—A big chunk of Pepper and Steve's adventure was cut out, or else this woulda been twenty pages long [and even without that, it's LONG]. I mean, it was fun and interesting to write, but...the only person I'm really used to writing Pepper interacting with is Tony. ...I need to get out more. |: It involved an extensive scene in a pizza shop with a little boy named 'Stephen' [mentioned briefly as Captain America's 'biggest and youngest fan'] and a visit to a comic book shop. I don't know, I was thinking of maybe posting that as a one-shot or short story on its own? Or maybe bringing it in here again later? What do you guys think?

So! That all aside, we can move on to chapter nine where I still pretend I know what I'm doing. Don't really know what to think of this one. Looking forward to the next one thought, since it's got part of date night in it, I guess?


Strawberries & Shawarma
—Chapter Nine:

"At this point I doubt anything would surprise me."
Steve Rogers


Natasha had briefly caught a discussion about tampons coming from the men in the other room and decided to save her sanity and go check on Clint. It was just part of her routine, she told herself. She just needed to keep an eye on him because he was still unstable after everything with Loki and it was nothing more than that.

Thor's remark yesterday had been nothing more than one of his half-brained assumptions (alright, perhaps not so half-brained, but damn his observations) and it had meant nothing.

The master assassin was contemplating why she was letting the thought of her relationship with her partner bother her even as she nudged his bedroom door open as quietly as possible so as not to disturb him. There was a moment of relief when she found him still dead to the world, flopped across the bedspread and nestled contentedly in his nest. The faint traces of a smile tugged at the corners of her mouth at the slight huff that came from him as he shifted.

Oh god, she was staring. Was she staring? She was staring. Why was she staring.

It wasn't that she'd never taken a good look at Clint Barton before and hadn't found him attractive, but their relationship had always been on a professional level and nothing more than a few quips. When they'd first been paired together Natasha would admit that she had 'checked him out,' but they'd both had too much baggage for anything else. Besides, she'd been hurt before and it had taken forever before she'd decided to trust him and he her.

One of the great things about Clint—aside from his unrelenting humor—was the fact that he didn't push things. Never once had he forced or tried to coerce her into anything like some people from her past, and for that she was grateful.

There had always been those few passing glances between them that she'd never known how to interpret, however.

Clint had never wanted nor demanded anything from her, aside from maybe another pad of gauze or asking her to just stay awake after a particularly nasty mission (pre-Budapest, maybe) but very little beyond that. In turn, Natasha had demanded nothing back, except maybe for him to shut up and stopping making jokes so she could focus (post-Budapest). Their dynamic had been safe. Comfortable.

But now. . .

But now she stood in his doorway watching him while he slept and attempted to look at him in an entirely new light. It wasn't something she preferred doing, but in the end she was only human and couldn't help it.

Natasha muttered something rather rude in her native tongue and then followed up with a sniff and a direct quote from the first conversation they'd ever had. "Your room smells like oatmeal."

Clint responded by stretching out briefly before flopping back down and muttering something about Tasha and narwhals.

She didn't know how to interpret that either.


As much as Steve may have liked trying new things, having to mess around with Stark's sound system in order to get it to play some familiar tunes for him was quickly becoming more trouble than it was worth. For the past half-hour he'd been hesitantly and mindlessly jabbing at random buttons, continually thrown off by JARVIS' attempts to aid him as he felt he'd have to learn sometime and doing so on his own was more 'normal' than having a machine do it for him.

There was also the fact that the disembodied voice always caught him off guard, but that went without saying.

He carefully adjusted one of the dials and told JARVIS that he'd try learning on his own some more, but only succeeded in cranking up the volume to blast out complete silence. Steve sighed and leaned back, taking in the dizzying array of dials and buttons situated on the wall panel before him and was vaguely reminded of a war-room—blinking lights, a map splayed out and dotted with various HYDRA locations, destroyed or no.

"If I might make a suggestion here, sir?"

The sound of JARVIS' voice startled Steve for a moment, instinctively tensing before he realized that there was no threat. He chuckled to himself briefly at his reaction before he sighed and took a breath, conceding. All he'd wanted to do is see if he couldn't play some music from his day and age (you're so funny, Stark) for some familiarity in a world that was too modern and futuristic and he'd made no headway in the thirty minutes that he'd been pressing random buttons.

"Uh, sure." Steve paused for a moment, unsure of how exactly to address the AI. ". . .sir?"

He could almost sense the smile in JARVIS' tone, though it wasn't the mocking one that Tony would have given him.

"Perhaps you ought to try to the button marked 'Power?'"

Steve actually made it a point to smack his forehead with his palm.

And then promptly smacked his butt on the floor when the stereo system roared to life, its volume cracked up all the way from when he'd been messing with it.

"I'M DRIVIN' PAST YOUR HOUSE WHILE YOU SNEAKIN' OUT; I GOT THE CAR DOOR OPENED UP SO YOU CAN JUMP IN ON THE RUN,"

Steve had his hand clamped over his ears at how loud—since when did they calling screaming 'music?'—it was and how sensitive his ears were. He rolled into a crouch before the system before him, trying to locate the power switch again but also realizing that doing so would mean that he would have to uncover one of his ears. Judging from the amount of cringing he was doing, that didn't seem like something he was looking forward to.

"YOUR MOM DON'T KNOW THAT YOU WERE MISSIN'; SHE'D BE PISSED IF SHE COULD SEE THE PARTS OF YOU THAT I'VE BEEN KISSIN',"

Captain America was still kneeling on the ground debating what it would be like to try to tear his eardrums out when Pepper Potts came around the corner, shouting over the din in order to get the man's attention only to be drowned out by the lyrics yelling at them both about. . .well. Catching sight of her out of the corner of his eye, Steve turned and shouted back.

"What?"

A small smirk tugged at Pepper's lips. "Turn it down!"

"What?" He frowned, trying to hear her over the man screaming "NO, WE'RE NEVER GONNA QUIT, AIN'T NOTHIN' WRONG WITH IT, JUST ACTIN' LIKE WE'RE ANIMALS,"

"Down!"

"ANIMALS,"

". . . what?"

Pepper was downright laughing at this point, having made her way over to him during their shouting match and shifting the stack of papers to her other arm in order to reach for the power button. She was still chuckling when Steve finally pulled his hands away from his head, his ears still ringing. While he got his bearings back the redhead made sure to crank the volume dial back down so that whoever turned the sound system back on wouldn't have their eardrums blown out.

"Huh," she said, adjusting a few other things before turning to face the man on the floor. "Never would have pegged you for a Nickelback fan."

Steve momentarily scowled in confusion and hoisted himself back to his feet. He was blushing a furious pink at this point, a hand rubbing at the back of his neck sheepishly and he regarded the patient, smiling woman. Rather than quiz her on a what a Nickelback was he simply shook his head as she did the same.

"I'm, ah, sorry about the noise, Miss Potts," he said after a beat, arms folding over his broad chest as he ducked his head slightly. "Still just trying to get used to all of. . ." He inclined his head toward the wall behind her and then the rest of the room "This."

Rather than laugh at him like he'd partly expected, Pepper just nodded with a small breath.

"It's different, isn't it? There's just something about having the ceiling greet you by name when you first walk in." Steve inclined his head in a nod at the remark, waiting to see if she'd continue or if he had to think of something else to say. Thankfully for him, she went on to speak some more. "Meeting JARVIS for the first time was interesting experience, I have to say. Second day on the job and the walls were talking to me."

She stepped away for a moment to adjust the papers in her arms before side-stepping her way to the kitchen to set them upon the same counter where Tony had tried to pass off some mush as an omelet. Without much thought to it, Steve followed her and, limited as his social skills with women were, felt that their conversation was not quite over. It was just his turn to say something.

"Meeting your, er, butler for the first time was. . .unique," he conceded. In response, Pepper turned away from one of the contracts she'd been glancing over to the find the man standing a short distance away and smiled.

"I'm sorry, I don't mean to laugh, but. . ." she broke off as she did just that and Steve couldn't help but join in. "Your reaction was quite something; and please, don't worry about the painting. That Iron Man picture wasn't exactly art, no matter what Tony says otherwise."

They exchanged another bout of laughs before Pepper leafed through a second group of papers with a frown and Steve took to standing there awkwardly, unsure of how to proceed. The conversation was over, right? There wasn't really that much else to discuss? He flexed his jaw and took a step back and tried to figure out some other way to kill some time just as the Pepper settled a contract back on the counter, not wanting to have to deal with this A.I.M. corporation from the time being.

"Hey, Captain?" Said man paused mid-step before turning back to the woman, his brow furrowing a bit as he gauged her expression. There wasn't too much to work with, save for the way her eyebrows were pulling together slightly. "Are you doing anything?"

He frowned, about to say that no, no he really wasn't because he was no idea what to do, but instead he said nothing, head titled slightly to the side as he tried to figure out what she was up to.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean it like that!" she immediately said, eyes widening as she realized how she'd sounded. "I just meant, well, I was going to pick up some pizza for lunch and thought I'd ask you to come join me, if you don't mind? I mean Tony and Bruce are off doing science in the lab, Clint's still asleep and I don't know where Thor or Natalie, er, Natasha are." Her cheeks had adopted a slight dusting of pink. "I didn't know if you had any plans and I thought maybe I could show you some of the newer New York while we're at it? Of course, you're free to stay here, if you'd like. No pressure at all."

She took a breath, clearly flustered and Steve's stance wavered for a moment. For a split second part of him had wondered what Stark would have thought of the whole thing, but at the same time he really didn't have anything else to do and it would have been nice to maybe wander the city about and try to familiarize himself with everything without someone making fun of him (see: Stark) or someone else hounding him all day (see: S.H.I.E.L.D.). And if Stark was going to get jealous than that was his problem, not Steve's. No use reading too far into anything.

A few moments passed before a smile crept across his mouth and Steve nodded. "That'd be great, actually. When would you like to leave, Miss Potts?"

She returned the gesture. "Call me Pepper; I was thinking maybe—"

The rest of her sentence was cut off by the sound of a small explosion down in the lab, accompanied by a loud "God dammit, Hammer Time!"

"Er, maybe now, Captain?"

Steve didn't put up much of an argument there. And at least they knew where Thor was now, too.

"Sounds like a plan. And it's just Steve, Miss Potts—Pepper,"

The woman smiled again before the two ventured off to find her purse, him waiting in the hallway outside of her bedroom as she did so as a few stories down Bruce and Tony ran around in search of a fire extinguisher. Natasha tensed briefly and Clint just rolled over in his nest of blankets and muttered something about bacon burning.


After ordering almost half-a-dozen pizzas and having an impromptu meet-and-greet with Captain America's apparent biggest and youngest fan, they'd had almost an hour to kill and as such had taken to wandering around the block as five different pizzas were assembled and prepared for annihilation.

Initially, Steve hadn't been what sure what to expect when it came to being alone with Pepper, but as the time wore on he found that she was quite easy to talk to and that they shared a number of interests—attempting to stay out of the public eye being one of them—along with the fact that she was generally an amicable and friendly person to begin with. And with each passing second he had grown more and more confused as to how a woman like her had ended up with someone like Stark.

He'd even voiced that concern at one point after watching the fifth taxi in three minutes careen around a van, its charge presumably clinging to the backseat for dear life and he'd cringed.

Pepper gave something that sounded like a sigh, folding her arms over her torso as they awaited the right moment to cross the street. The sixth taxi swerved away and they thought it in their best interests to maybe wait just a bit longer.

"I guess that is a pretty good question," she laughed, tilting her head to gauge oncoming traffic before it slowed as the light flashed to red. She continued speaking as they walked, Steve trailing along beside her and his eyes wandering around in troubled awe at their surroundings. "Tony and I have had a rather. . .interesting past, I guess you could say. I've been working for him for another twelve years and we've been. . .together for a few months now." She glanced to the side just to ensure that he was still with her, stepping onto the sidewalk. Her tone was slightly hushed and she was thankful for the lack of a large crowd around them.

Steve nodded, mindlessly following along as he followed her back to the pizza shoppe, plastic bag bouncing against her hip as they walked.

That visit to the comic shop she'd taken him to ("There's something I'd like to show you, if that's alright,") had been an interesting experience in itself.

Admittedly, he'd tuned out briefly and only managed to catch the last bit of what she'd been saying when they finally made it back to the parlor, doing the gentlemanly thing and holding the door for her.

". . .it's been complicated and difficult, but I'd like to think it's worth it."


Almost three hours after they'd left Stark Tower, Steve and Pepper finally returned to the living quarters they'd all been sharing for the past few days, pizza boxes in arms and still exchanging conversation as they exited the elevator. The two boxes Pepper was carrying—her companion have offered to carry the lot of them, but she'd politely declined—were also stacked with a few more papers that had come in at the receptionist's desk and she halted just long enough to raise a leg and balance their lunch on her knee as she reached out and snatched one of the files that had been slipping, sticking it between her teeth as she adjusted her grip again.

Steve chuckled as they continued their trek to the kitchen, following the sound of the voices they could hear gathered there.

". . .ten bucks says you miss," someone was saying—Tony it sounded like. The two carrying lunch glanced at each other.

"Only ten? You wound me," a man responded, sounding very much so like a Clint who had just gotten a good twelve hours of sleep.

"You're both idiots," Natasha muttered and Steve just frowned.

"A sporting challenge! This should prove amusing!" Pepper wasn't so sure she like how entertained Thor seemed.

"I really don't think this is a good idea," Even Bruce, ever the timid voice of reason, wasn't enough to calm their nerves, the two still exchanging confused, nervous looks with one another.

"Stop trying to kill our fun," Clint shot back and the woman just about bit through the file held between her teeth.

There was a collective shout of shock and fear when Pepper came around the corner.

Steve somehow managed to reach out and yank her backward just in time for something slender and deadly to sail past her nose and she gave a startled yelp in response. As it would turn out, she didn't have to worry about biting a hole in the paper seeing as the arrow shot through it had done the job for her.

For the moment no one moved, all too stunned and staring at the arrow embedded in the wall just a few inches from where Pepper's head had just been, folder dangling from it and apple apathetically leaking juices and meat from where Clint had shot it after Tony had tossed it in the air.

A few loose papers fluttered to the floor as Pepper stood there, pizza and paper clutched to her chest as she waited for her heart to crawl out of her throat and back down into her chest and stop pounding.

Tony sent his stool crashing to the floor, sprinting to where Pepper stood shell-shocked and began asking repeatedly if she was all right and dammit, Barton, "stop trying to kill my girlfriend!" Rather than break into a hysterical round of 'ohmygod,ohmygod,' like the Avengers had been expecting her to, Pepper instead calmly took a breath before making eye contact with Tony, the man gripping her arms as he fired questions at her and checked for any wounds.

"Tony," she said, teeth gritted slightly. Natasha glanced at Bruce, both knowing that nothing good really came from that tone and Thor made sure that Clint was still alive, the latter having frozen and stopped breathing the moment he'd let his arrow fly. He had yet to fully recover from having almost accidentally killed Pepper. "Take this."

"What?" he responded, brow furrowing before he glanced down at what was held in her outstretched arms and promptly took the pizza boxes and papers into his own. "Oh, right. Uh, Pep?"

Steve simply stood back and watched as the woman stepped forward, placing one hand upon the wall and wrapping the other around the arrow shaft, wrenching it out of the panel. She calmly bent down to retrieve the folder that had more or less been shot out of her mouth along with the apple lolling around on the floor with a hole in it.

The six watched in silence as the redhead stood and made her way over to where the others were gathered, Tony and Steve standing off to the side holding onto lunch as the former glanced from them to the new hole in the wall and then back again.

Pepper stopped right before Clint, the archer's arms falling to his sides and bow clattering to the floor as he started breathing out apologies.

"Holy crap, Miss Potts I swear I didn't—" he trailed off at the cool, collected look on her face as she held out his arrow. He took it slowly, regarding her carefully and taking a step back. She took a moment to breathe, her boyfriend and travel companion having made their way over while Bruce tried to remind Barton that it was natural and okay to take in some air. Thor wasn't overly fond of how pale his friend was and Natasha let her eyes flit from her partner to streak of pizza sauce spread along the stomach of Pepper's t-shirt as Tony reached for her again.

"How about, ah, no weapons on the main floor?" Pepper finally said after a moment, capturing their attention as Clint worked through some more inhale-exhale exercises with the humanized Hulk. "No arrows, no shields, no suits, no guns, no hammers?"

Steve let out a puff of air and nodded, setting the three pizza boxes he'd been carrying onto the counter.

"The Lady Potts speaks wisely," Thor admitted, Hawkeye agreeing like there was no tomorrow and still apologizing while Natasha shrugged (who really needed guns to beat up somebody, right?) and Bruce almost half-heartedly joked that he didn't really need any of the above.

Tony was anxiously prodding at Pepper like the nervous little man he suddenly was and the woman sighed, allowing a small smile to tug at her lips.

"All right, now that that's taken care of. . ." she glanced down, having folded her arms over her stomach only to find that they came away streaked with sauce. "If you'll, ah, excuse me, I'm going to go. . .Yeah."

With that, Pepper turned and headed toward the bedroom she shared with Tony in search of clean shirt; he trailed after her, pausing just long enough at the corner to make eye contact with Clint, raising his hand to his face to point at his eyes with his index and middle fingers before turning them toward Hawkeye and then back again in a sort of I'm watching you gesture.

"Is he not at fault as well?" Thor frowned, not having fully understood the action but enough that he had a vague idea of what it meant.

They all just stood there for a bit, completely ignoring the pizza and their hunger and just shuffled around awkwardly. After a few beats, Clint finally clenched his jaw and turned to glower at the four.

"Okay, someone else is telling her about the thousand dollar vase you guys made me shoot."