It's Christmastime, which is Maria's favorite time of year. Darcy is home for break for a whole two months starting today. Her and Phil have three weeks off, and then only work three days a week from the New York base until Darcy's back in school.

Phil is at home, getting dinner going and setting up the living area for family movie night while Maria and Darcy run a few errands. They've picked up Phil's dry cleaning, got Darcy some new clothes for school, and now grabbing a few snacks for movie night. Darcy has a dry cleaning bag thrown over her shoulder with some of Phil's nicer suits, while the rest are casually hanging over the edge of the shopping cart Maria is pushing.

"Sweet! Gushers!" Darcy cheers when Maria drops them in the cart, but something else has Maria's attention. She can hear grumbling and someone talking on their cell phone and it sounds familiar. It's one aisle over, she's sure.

"No, Pep. I've got the eggnog. Have some faith in me. I can handle going to the store by myself."

It couldn't be. Maria slows down and listens closer, pretending to choose between which kind of fruit roll up to get for Darcy.

"Well, ok. I'm going to go get the eggnog. It's on the list... Whoa, calm down Pep. Ok, just eggnog. I'll put the other stuff back. ...I can handle this. ...No! You do not need to come get me! I am doing fine!"

Maria squeezes the boxes in her hands and throws them both in the cart. That's definitely Stark. But it's no problem. Maria can easily navigate out of the store without running into him. Getting Darcy out might be harder, but she's sure she can manage.

"Mom, are you okay? You've been staring at the display for paper towels for like five minutes?"

Maria blinks a few times and turns to Darcy, staring at her like he's lost her mind. "Sorry, it's just... I remembered we forgot to pick something up... And the store is going to close soon, so we'd better hurry."

"Oh, okay..." Darcy says, doubtful.

Maria pushes her cart forward and listens for footsteps, trying to pinpoint his direction and the best ways for avoiding him.

She and Darcy finish gathering the snacks, and she's sure she's out of the clear. She just has to turn down this one aisle and go to the check out and they're done.

Then she spots him. Right in front of the dairy aisle, staring at her. She freezes for a moment, trying to think of a plan. Maybe he doesn't recognize her. Maybe they still have time to sneak off. She's a high skilled agent, and while weapons, brute force, and yelling are her specialty, covert operations are something she's well versed in. Surely she can just push Darcy down the cookie aisle and he'll never see them and he definitely won't find out the one thing Nick Fury directly told her that Tony Stark should not find out about until Stark agrees to finish the upgrades to the helicarrier.

"Oh my god. Mom, is that Tony Stark?!" she hears Darcy whisper. She looks over and sees her daughter has whipped out her iPhone and is snapping pictures.

"Darcy! No! Shh!" Maria cries out, but it is too late. He's seen them, well her. Damn it. She tries to carefully back away and turn into another aisle, pretend she doesn't see him.

"Agent Hill?"

Nope, not her. Definitely not Agent Hill. Just some woman and her daughter shopping, no need to bother.

"Mom! Tony Stark is coming over here!"

Oh god. Okay, okay. There is no way any of this will negatively impact anything as long as she and Darcy don't reveal any information.

She whips her head to Darcy and lowers her voice. "I am begging you Darcy, do not say anything and walk away. My job is on the line."

"But I hate your job," she whines back.

"But you love food, and my job pays for your food."

"Uhg, fine. Whatever."

Darcy frowns and starts playing Where's My Water on her phone and grumbling as Maria pushes Darcy and the cart into another aisle.

Hopefully, Stark has given up. The two of them will make it out of the store with snack food and Phil's dry cleaning and Maria won't get an angry call from Fury while she's on vacation.

And then Tony Stark rounds the corner at the other end of the aisle.

"Agent Hill!"

Maria's hands clench on the bar of her car and crack the plastic. God. Damn. It. Darcy looks up from her game and grins, ready to jump up and down.

Stark bustles over and parks his cart so that the whole aisle is blocked. He grins and Maria can feel her blood boiling. Darcy is still excited. Maria knows about the Iron Man calendar under her bed. She knows.

"Agent Hill, in a super market. SHIELD send you out for a grocery run?"

"Stark."

Stark leans over and takes a good look at Darcy. "Did they send a trainee with you?"

Darcy opens her mouth to say something, but Maria slides right in front of her and glares at Stark, hoping he will just drop it and leave.

"Mom!" Darcy whines.

Maria can tell this catches Stark by surprise. Of course it would. There are about five people from work who know about her personal life, and she's married to one of them.

"Whoa. That's your daughter?" Stark asks. He then looks both Maria and Darcy up and down. "Wow..."

"She's nineteen," Maria growls.

Stark stares at her for a minute mouth slack, and Maria can feel her hands shaking. She hates this. She's already said too much. She's being so hostile. Fury is going to have her head.

"Well... Okay... So..." Stark mumbles. Good, now maybe he'll leave, and Fury will never hear about this and Stark will finish the upgrades and life can move forward.

Darcy pushes past Maria. "Mr. Stark! Can you sign my iPhone?!" She holds out her phone, covered in an Iron Man theme skin, and Maria tries not to slam her head into the nearest solid object.

Stark grins and turns the phone over in his hands. "This is a nice skin! Where'd you get it?"

"I made it," Darcy replies, beaming.

Stark holds it up for better lighting and looks closely. "You used the Mark VII armor too. Impressive." He digs around in his coat pocket and pulls out a gold metallic sharpie and carefully scribbles his name on the back and hands it over. "Here you go."

Darcy takes it back and is almost vibrating in joy. Then she turns to Maria. "I don't see why you couldn't have just asked him at work." Maria stares back at Darcy unamused.

The atmosphere returns to awkward and hostile, and Maria hopes it will make Stark leave, but then he notices Darcy hauling Phil's suits and he pulls it off her shoulder. "Here, I got it."

Panic floods Maria's system. She hopes he doesn't head the tags. Please don't read the tags. If he doesn't read the tags, she will call Jessica Glitter tonight and throw a reunion tour. She will wear the jean jacket to work if he doesn't read the tags.

He reads the tags.

"... Are these..? Phil's suits?" Stark asks, looking at Maria with a sad look on his face.

Well, looks like Canada gets to spend another year with Maria Sparkles.

"Yeah. Now that Dad's on vacation, we have time to get them all cleaned," Darcy replies.

Stark visibly freezes. Maria slams her face into her palms, and Darcy looks at both of them questioningly.

"Mom? What's going on?"

Maria looks over at her daughter and tries not to look like she's about to knock over the shelf next to her. "Princess, Stark didn't know about your dad surviving the incident."

"Oh."

"Yes."

"...You could have said something!"

Maria shakes her head and pats Darcy on the shoulder. "Go grab some ice cream, I'll meet you at the checkout."

"Mom."

"Darcy. Go."

Darcy looks at her mom, not budging and glaring, but then she sees that little line that forms on her forehead when she's stressed to the max and quickly leaves.

"Phil is alive," Stark starts.

"I can't confirm or deny that," Maria says defensively.

"Phil has been alive this whole time, and you... SHIELD didn't say anything? It's been almost six months," he says through gritted teeth.

"Whether or not you think a man who you barely know is alive is very low on the list of SHIELD's priorities, Stark," Maria growls back. She grabs the broken handle on her cart and tries to turn it around and leave.

Stark grabs the cart and stops her. "No. No, you tell me right now if he is alive or not, Hill."

Maria looks up at him, seriously wanting to just beat him up in the middle of a grocery store, but instead looks at the hand on her cart and squeezes his wrist. "I don't have time for this. Unlike you, I have a family waiting for me," she grunts out and she forcibly rips his hand off the cart and snatches the suits out of his other hand.

She turns her cart and around and briskly walks away and to the checkout, not caring one bit about the hurtful thing she just said. SHIELD is at a standstill because Stark won't finish the upgrades to the helicarrier. This is her job, and the only thing keeping the world, and Darcy safe, and he won't finish his stupid job.

And where does he get off acting like Phil, her husband and father of her child, is his priority. Like Phil's almost death hurt him so badly. She was there, she saw how he and Captain America acted. Yes, they were angry and sad to loose him. But Stark didn't know anything about Coulson other than he worked for SHIELD. How dare he act like he knew Phil. Like he cared.

She sees Darcy holding a giant tub of ice cream and waiting by a check out and heads over to her. She starts putting items on the conveyor belt and pushes the last five minutes out of her mind.

It's Christmastime, Darcy is home and here, and Phil is waiting for them.

She pays the cashier and turns to see Stark buying a single bottle of eggnog, frowning. They lock eyes for a moment, before she turns back around and picks up her bags wraps an arm around Darcy and ushers her out.