Memorial Day and Remembrance Day were huge for the Carter family. Every year on those days in May and November the Carters gathered with their extended family to remember what brought them all together, to honor those no longer with them, and to remind those who remained that the Howling Commandos were a family. Remembrance Day was always a proper sitdown dinner in a place that held meaning to the Commandos, England, France, places across Europe where their fallen brothers had been buried, and was always paid for by Howard. These dinners were solemn, a chance to pay their respects, to indulge in and acknowledge the heavier memories and feelings. It was all very British, which made sense since Remembrance Day was a Commonwealth holiday.
Memorial Day however, was a backyard party meant to celebrate not only the service of the Commandos, but their survival and their bonds. The annual cookout rotated between the Commandos homes, but no matter where it was held it was always full of food, music, laughter, fun, and at some point someone making Peggy really nervous with her child.
Natasha was five months old at her first Howlie cookout, which was held at the faded red brick brownstone in Brooklyn. The back garden, which was fairly large for a brownstone backyard, was one of the many appealing features that factored into Peggy and Angie buying the place. Peggy had grown up with lots of natural space to roam and play, and had many happy memories of gardening with her parents. Her mother always kept a vegetable and herb garden, and her father's flower garden was award winning. Peggy had wanted a place where she could decompress from the stress of her work life, tend to a few rose bushes, walk barefoot in the grass, and sit with Angie in a swing as the crickets chirped in the evenings or the birds sang in the mornings.
When they hosted the cookout Peggy and Angie would open up the french doors at the back of their home, rent an extra large grill because theirs would be nowhere near big enough to feed everyone, and place tin wash tubs full of ice in the yard for drinks. The Jarvises always came over early to help, bringing extra seating, and lots of food. Ana would help Peggy put things away that they didn't want accidently smashed by the Mini Howlies, while Jarvis helped Angie get the cooking started. In the past they had this down to a nice routine, but baby Natasha proved to much of an adorable distraction.
"I thought Mr. Jarvis was helping you with those?" Peggy says to Angie as she walks into their kitchen to find her wife piping filling into deviled eggs.
Angie chuckles. "The baby cooed at him. Now he's outback showing her the spring flowers."
Peggy laughs. "Not even six months old and Nattie has everyone wrapped around her pinky finger."
Not even Dum Dum was immune to Natasha's charms. When he and Lorraine arrived with their gaggle of Dugan children, Dum Dum smiled his big dopey smile at Peggy, and hugged. "Hi Peg. Where's the baby?"
He didn't even wait for her to reply. He simply side stepped her and went in search of his fellow ginger. Peggy greeted a very pregnant Lorraine with a hug and showed her to where she'd be most comfortable. When she found Dum Dum he was in the backyard with his kids cluttered around him, and Natasha in his arms. He'd put a tiny red bowler hat on her daughter's head and Peggy couldn't help but smile. It was an adorable scene, the massive bear of a man playing with and teaching the children how to do his trademark whoo-hoo!
"My child's first word will not be whoo-hoo." Peggy tells the man teasingly as she gently adjusts the tiny hat on her daughter's tiny head.
"Maybe not her first, but I'll get her to say it, just you wait and see." Dum Dum teases back, a huge happy smile on his mustached face. Dum Dum had always been their tank, their sheer brute force, especially after losing Steve, and he'd loved every moment of it. But the big man was never more happy than when he was surrounded by children.
Dum Dum proves himself right. Natasha's whoo-hoo can be heard clear across the expanse of the Dugan's yard. It's Memorial Day again, and Natasha is seven. She's playing with the other Mini Howlies in the double treehouses at the far end of Dum Dum's property. There were two massive trees back there that Dum Dum had built two seperate treehouses in, and then connected the girls' side with the boys' side with a rope bridge. From her place sitting with the adults, Angie sat beside her, chatting with her friends, Peggy can see her daughter running back and forth on the rope bridge welding a plastic lightsaber.
"I do hope that bridge is sturdy, Tim." Peggy says as she watches the children play.
"It's perfectly safe, Peg." Dum Dum reassures. "I can walk across it, it's solid."
Natasha does a tumble she just learned in gymnastics while on the rope bridge and Peggy's heart jumps into her throat. Natasha's adventurous spirit was surely karma for her own childhood antics. When she was Natasha's age she would roam the woods near her home, climb trees, and explore all kinds of places she shouldn't have. Now she had a little girl who did the same thing and because she knew what kind of accidents could happen, Peggy worried. But unlike her own mother, whom Peggy adored, she would not try to change Natasha. If her little girl wanted to play all rough and tumble she would get down and dirty with her, and if her little girl wanted to dress up and have a tea party she'd get her best hat out of its box and join her.
When night falls everyone gathers around a large bonfire. Natasha has given up her adventures to sit between her mothers and roast marshmallows for s'mores and listen to the adults tell stories.
"We'd taken shelter in an abandoned home that Christmas." Peggy says softly as she watches the flames of the fire flicker upwards towards the starry night sky. "It was secluded enough that we could have candle light and heat, and use the stove and water in the kitchen. It was a good place to hunker down for a while." She nods approvingly just as she had all those years ago when they'd come across the old house. "So of course these loveable idiots," She indicates her brothers-in-arms. "Nearly burnt the place down trying to very sweetly make a proper Christmas pudding."
"Peg had worked her magic and gotten us some ham and potatoes for supper, and a couple of pies too." Dum Dum cuts in. "We wanted to do something special for her, so we searched the house for what was left behind and what we had on us, and Falsworth said we could make something close to a Christmas pudding, which isn't really pudding at all by the way."
Angie laughs, already assuming where this story was going. "Too much brandy when you lit it up?"
"They tried to boil it in brandy." Peggy laughs.
"In my defense," Monty huffs playfully. "I'd never actually seen one being made before, just the presentation of them, how was I supposed to know you dosed the thing in brandy instead of cooking it in brandy."
"Bucky and Cap came back from patrol just in time." Dum Dum chuckled. "Use to say that when they walked in it was like being slammed into a booze wall, the fumes were so bad."
On nights like these with her boys all around her, Peggy didn't mind sharing stories of Steve. These men knew Steve, respected him but did not worship him the way some did. Glancing over to the other side of her wife, Peggy watches Tony tense up a little at the mention of Captain America. She tries not to sigh and shake her head at the resentment building up in her godson because of his father's actions. As the stories continue an old tin canteen cup full of aged bourbon is passed around between the Commandos, just like they used to pass around whatever they could get their hands on while they sat around campfires or hunkered down in foxholes. The cup was making its way towards Peggy, who seemed to be focused on Tony, but not too focused to notice Natasha reaching for the cup and raising it to her lips.
"I don't think so little miss." Peggy scolds lightly as she takes the cup from her little girl. "That isn't for poppets."
Natasha pouts and takes her mother's declaration as a challenge. She was going to taste what was in that cup. Every year that followed she would try, but Peggy was always there to take the cup from her and give her an acknowledging smirk of the little game they were playing and a playful smack to her rear if accessible. Natasha would finally get her victory sip when she was fourteen when her mother finally allows it. She impresses her uncles by not coughing as the booze burns it's way down to her stomach, though her blue-green eyes do well a bit with tears. Peggy gives her a soft smile as she passes along the cup.
When they gathered at one of Howard's mansions the day was spent by the pool, and there were a lot of water balloons and super soakers involved. The first time Natasha really starts to see the kind of relationship her mother has with her Howlie brothers is when she's four and they're at Uncle Howard's for Memorial Day. Her mothers are lounging in poolside chaise lounges. Peggy has her sunhat on and her red rimmed sunglasses. Dum Dum is throwing the big kids into the deep end of the pool and Natasha wants to have a go too. Dum Dum doesn't see an issue and picks the tiny redhead up.
"Timothy." Peggy's voice calls out like a shot. "Do not even consider throwing my four year old into the pool."
"She can swim, can't she?" Dum Dum replies.
Natasha nods her head eagerly. "I can swim good, Uncle Dum Dum. Throw me in!"
"Do not throw her in." Peggy sits up and takes off her sunglasses to look at Dum Dum. "She's too little for such horseplay, Timothy."
"There's no horses, Mummy." Natasha informed her mother after looking around the pool and only finding people. "Throw me, Uncle Dum Dum!"
Dum Dum thinks he's found a compromise that will appease both Carters. Instead of throwing Natasha into the pool on her own, he holds her securely in his arms and throws himself in. Peggy rushes to the edge of the pool with her heart in her throat and her breath held until Natasha breaks the surface of the water with a whoo-yoo, quickly followed by Dum Dum and his own whoo-hoo! Natasha wanted to go again but Peggy shooed her back down to the shallow end.
"Don't be sore, Peg." Dum Dum said as he got out of the pool. "She just wanted to play like the big kids."
"She's not a big kid yet." Peggy huffed at him.
She had gotten back at Dum Dum for his compromise by waiting until he was asleep in the sun and then using sunblock to write 'ginger bastard' across his broad shoulders. She wouldn't let him burn badly, just enough to make the words stand out. That night when the cup was passed around the massive bonfire Howard had arranged they told stories about the pranks they used to pull on each other during the war.
"Dum Dum had used the last pair of Peg's nylons, can't even remember what for." Gabe Jones says. "And she warned him that if he used something of hers without asking, especially if it was the last of something, he'd regret it."
Monty laughed. "Daft git used the last bit of tea her Mum sent her and her last bar of chocolate to impress a girl."
"It didn't help that I was the girl." Lorraine laughed. "Peg was mad at me at the time."
"What did Peggy do?" Angie asked, eyes wide.
Dum Dum sniffled and said, "She shaved off my mustache while I slept. I had to go around naked for weeks."
They teased each other, annoyed each other, made each other laugh, and always had each other's backs. They celebrated the lives they were blessed to have after coming out on the other side of the hell they'd fought through. They mourned the loss of the ones who weren't as lucky, the ones they had to leave behind, but would never forget. And they rejoiced when one of their own was returned to them.
Dum Dum's laugh roared from the back of the faded red brick brownstone's backyard as he and the remaining Howlie's played a round of cornhole. The sound made Natasha smile as she walked up to stand beside the man lingering in the open doorway between the kitchen and patio. Reaching out an open brown bottle she asked, "You ok old man?"
"I'm fine." Steve replies as he accepts the beer with a nod of thanks.
"You don't look fine." Natasha calls him out on trying to lie to her. They'd gotten too close since he woke up for him to pull that shit with her. "You look broody."
Steve sighs. "They all have families, wives, and kids. It's just a lot to take in, ya know? Seeing everything I missed out on."
"You can have that now, Steve." Natasha tells him gently. "You have a second chance."
"I know." He replies, and then drops his head guilty. "But it's just that…" He sighs. "Most of the time I'm fine with this, with being here now, and I can accept this is just the way it is, ya know. But sometimes, I kind of wish I could go back and make different choices."
"Well," Natasha says, not unkindly but still with a bit of force behind it. "I for one am glad you can't go back and change things." Her sharp blue-green eyes are locked on where Peggy sits on a garden chair with Angie in her lap.
Steve follows her line of sight and realizes what he's said. "Nat, I'm sorry, I didn't mean…"
Natasha offers him a smile, Peggy's smile, despite the fact that he'd just admitted to sometimes wanting to erase her entire life as she knows it. Natasha knows that Steve would never do it, and knowing that allowed her to let him have his moment of wistfulness. "You'll adjust Steve. It's just going to take time. And when you feel like you're in over your head, just remember you got a Carter at your back, Mum and I aren't going to let you drown, Steve."
That brings a smile to his lips. "Wouldn't have it any other way, Nat."
"Hey soldier boy," Angie's voice rings out from where she's sat on Peggy's lap. There are dominos set up on the table, and a smirk on her lips. "Come play. A Brooklyn boy like you should be able to give me a better challenge than these mooks."
"Don't do it." Natasha whispers. "Ma's a shark at dominos."
Steve chuckles. "I think I can handle it. I used to be pretty good back in the day."
"Don't say I didn't warn you, Rogers." Natasha calls after him.
At the end of the night when they're home or everyone else has gone home, Angie brings Peggy a slice of pie and a cup of coffee just like she did when they first met, and Natasha kisses her mother's cheek. They are both grateful for Peggy's service, because not only did she help win a war, but it's what led a young girl from Hampstead England to New York City and the two people who loved her most in the world.