"Hey," Steve said after a minute. "are you okay?"
She shrugged, resting her elbows on the counter, rubbing her eyes.
"Did they really lock you in a closet?" he asked, and this time she nodded.
"For a couple of days, actually. Back then, I thought every family was like that, though." she said. "I still have those panties somewhere, too." she laughed. "Dug them out of the garbage."
"Very Carrie, huh?" he said, and she looked up in surprise.
"You've seen Carrie?"
"It was on my list."
"I think that surprises me more than my mother showing up." she said, and he laughed. After a second, his face turned serious again.
"Look, I was going to come home anyways to tell you something." he said. She didn't like his tone.
"You're leaving, aren't you?" she said. "A mission? Christmas is next week, Steve."
"I'll be back by then," he said, reaching for her hands and kissing them. "I promise."
"When do you leave?" she asked.
"Tonight." he said, and she sighed. "But I think I know how you can keep yourself busy." he smiled, and she gave him a curious look. From his jacket he pulled out a magazine and handed it to her. She looked at it.
"Real Estate." she said flatly, looking up at him. He nodded.
"Your Christmas present."
It took her a moment, and she clapped her hand over her mouth.
"No, Steve, you- this is too-"
"You're not going to change my mind." he said, kissing her on the top of the head. "We need a place that isn't an uptown apartment. There's a couple brownstones and Victorians in Brooklyn I think you'll like."
She looked down at the catalog, smiling stupidly. "Okay." she said.
"That's better."
Within the next couple of days, as if they had both had some sort of stroke, Danielle received invitations to Christmas festivities back home from her mother. She ignored each and every one of them. She wasn't ready for that.
She instead focused on searching for houses. Not many real estate offices were open during the holidays, so she did a lot of online hunting.
She wrapped gifts for everyone at SHIELD, sent packages to her friends from the super human unit. She invited everyone over for Christmas Eve dinner, since too many of them had no family to celebrate with. She felt very much like she had become the nurturer of the group, as she was a natural at it anyways.
Her cell phone woke her up the morning of Christmas Eve. It had been a few days since she heard from Steve, so she answered quickly.
"Goodmorning beautiful." she heard his voice on the other end, and she smiled, yawning.
"Hello, handsome." she replied.
"I'm going to be home tonight." he said.
"Yaaaay," she said sleepily.
"Did I wake you up?"
"Yeah. Turns out I sleep a lot more now."
"It's nearly noon, Dani."
"Jesus, is it?" she looked over at the clock and giggled. "Did you get the bad guys babe?"
"Yes, I did."
"Good." she said. "We're having people over for dinner tonight."
"Which people?"
"You're probably with a few of them right now, actually."
"Tasha and Clint?" he said.
"Yes, and Bruce and Tony and Pepper, but I don't know if the latter will come. Sam and Kiara, and I invited my SAFE team, but they probably all have engagements."
"Presents too?" he said.
"Yes, presents." she replied.
"Okay, I'll see you soon. Love you."
"And I love you. Now, I'm going to go throw up."
He hissed. "Sorry, baby."
"You should be, it's entirely your fault. Safe travels."
She climbed out of bed and hobbled into the bathroom. She lay on the cool tile floor after she was all flushed out, staring at the ceiling, running her fingers over the minuscule bump on her stomach. After a while, she pulled herself up, put on a Christmas Classics record and set to work cooking. Snow fell outside the kitchen windows, and the small tree she'd bought glowed merrily in the corner. She couldn't remember the last time she felt so content.
After a few hours, the apartment felt extremely cozy and smelled fantastic. Kiara, much to her surprise, was the first to show up, since the invite said had said 'anytime before 7.' Kiara knocked at the door around 4, and Danielle was thrilled for the doctor's company.
"Hi, I know I'm early, it's just since everyone else was out on mission, I figured you'd need some help setting up." Kiara said quickly as Danielle opened the door. She was weighed down with two huge bags and a plate of food.
"Oh my gosh, you are so sweet." Danielle said, hugging Kiara tightly.
"It smells amazing in here." she said, walking into the apartment. "Wow, this place is really nice. How are you feeling?"
"Very...human." Danielle said. "And I'm over the whole morning sickness thing but...it's going to be worth it."
"Yeah, of course. Can I put these under the tree?" she held up her bags, and Danielle nodded.
"Do you want something? There's wine and cider, tea, coffee."
"Tea's great, yeah."
"So not spending the holidays with the family?" Danielle asked
"They live on the West Coast, and I went over for Thanksgiving." Kiara replied.
Danielle passed Kiara a cup of tea.
"What about your family?" Kiara asked.
"Well, you guys are it for right now." Danielle sighed. "Not that I mind.""
As everyone began to show up, the evening trickled down into a night filled with story swapping and laughter. Gifts were exchanged, ranging for the extravagant to the bizarre. Kiara's gift to Steve and Danielle was probably Danielle's favorite. She'd printed out and framed four charts of their heart rate readings, of before and after they looked at one another, and you could visibly see how the heart rate increased. Bruce got everyone a massive bottle of whiskey. Tony and Pepper, who had not made it, sent over everyone expensive tablet computers, all installed with a JARVIS of their very own. Natasha got Danielle a pair of boots and a book on how to learn Russian. Clint got Natasha brass knuckles with diamonds, which made her tear up.
Danielle had cooked a whole massive feast, everything from turkey, potatoes, pie, kettle corn, yams, and green beans. The whole counter was overflowing with food. At the end of the night, as they all sat around the living room with wine or coffee in their hands, talking about the past year. Steve pulled a box from his pocket, and Danielle whined.
"This is too much." she said.
"It's nothing at all."
She frowned. "You're just trying to top my gift."
"You bought me a brand new motorcycle." he said. "It's hard to top."
"You're buying me a house."
"Can you open this, now, please?" he said. She opened the small velvet box. She pulled out the antique set of dog tags, holding them up, smiling. "Not too corny is it?" he asked.
"Not at all." she said. "But don't you need these?"
"I've got a new pair." he pulled them out with his thumb.
"I really love you." she said, pulling the tags over her head. "And there's another gift for you, but it's going to have to wait until tonight." she said, and his eyebrows shot up. She grinned, patting him on the butt as she walked past.
"A toast to the hostest." Clint offered, raising his beer.
"Hear hear!" Natasha chimed in, sounding slightly slurry.
"You know for a Russian, you really can't handle your booze." Clint said, and she smacked him.
"Thank you, Danielle." Bruce said. "The best Christmas dinner cook of all time."
"Cheers!" Sam said. Kiara, with a few glasses of wine to fuel her courage, was draped around him on the couch. He looked smug.
Danielle smiled gratefully at all of them, at her new family.
A/N: As of today, I have been working on this fanfic for a whole month! WOW! Thanks all of you for your amazing continual support. There's more cutesy stuff to come, and maybe some drama, who knows. I will update soon!