"Wha's next on the list then?" Leo Fitz said, pushing the trolley slowly as he strolled along the isle.
Fitz-Simmons were making their way around the local supermarket, collecting large amounts of party food.
"Oh! Um…" Simmons checked the list Mrs Fitz had given her, "Single cream, milk, and we need to go to the cheese counter."
"oh'kay." Fitz swerved round the corner into the dairy isle. He began searching the shelves for the cream as Jemma collected the milk. His eyes narrowed; where was it?
"Jem? I cannae find the single cream!" Leo called, now resorting to searching behind other pots. A delicate looking, elderly lady's hand popped out of nowhere, softly picked a pot off the bottom shelf, and held it out in front of him.
Leo read 'Single Cream.'
"There ye go, Dear." A kind voice said.
"Thank …" Leo turned to face the woman, surprised to find he knew her face. She was a little older now, perhaps around 70, but her rosy cheeks and short curls were astoundingly familiar. "Mrs Connell?" Fitz almost laughed.
"You're all grown now, Leopold, you can call me Eleanor." The old lady chuckled.
"Leo? Did you find it?" Jemma appeared, slipping two milk bottles into the trolley, and giving the lady a polite smile. The elderly lady smiled back genuinely, her eyes warm and her wrinkles deepening.
"How are yeh? How's the nursery?" Leo grinned, placing his arms around a woman he hadn't seen in so many years. A woman who had helped raise him. A woman who was practically family.
"Oh, I'm retired now, dear. My Ruth, you remember my granddaughter Ruth, Leopold? Well, she's taken over now, I still visit from time tae time tae read tae the little'ns though." Eleanor Connell caught Jemma's slightly befuddled expression, "I own the local nursery, dear. I've helped look after two generations of Fitz babes." Eleanor Connell stated proudly, "Maybe I'll look after a third before I pop my clogs!" A glint appeared in the woman's, blue eyes, swimming with something akin to excitement, "Are you two married?"
Leo almost choked trying to formulate a sentence, whereas Jemma went mute, her mouth opened but no sound came out.
Fitz eventually managed to create something resembling a coherent sentence, "To each other! No… no, Mrs Connell. This is Jemma, she's … she's my best friend. We work together, in the US."
Mrs Connell sighed, "Oh well, you two just looked so lovely together, I assumed ye were. I was hoping ye were thinking about moving back tae toon to start a family. I'd really love to look after one more beautiful Fitz bairn before I'm pushing daises!" The old lady reached out to gently grip Jemma's hand in a friendly hold, her face ablaze with affection. "Oh, Leopold was a sweet, sweet babe, Jemma dear, all smiles and honey curls, always obsessed with the building blocks, always a dead cannie lad, used to cry when we tore him 'way from 'em for his nap. The Fitz's always make such beautiful wee children."
Something stirred somewhere deep in Jemma's stomach looking in Mrs Connell's proud blue eyes as she spoke. It was like butterflies, but stronger and more frantic. The thought of her and Leo Fitz being together …married! Having children! It all too unrealistic, and yet contradicting totally plausible at the same time.
Jemma imagined Fitz as a baby, with little blonde curls and big calculating, inquisitive blue eyes, forever intrigued by the things and people around him.
Mrs Connell continued, "And you're such a pretty girl as well! What's that accent of yours then? Which English county? Surrey?"
"Yes actually. My family lives just outside greater London." Jemma said. She started thinking back, picturing the iconic rolling green hills, cottages and woodlands of Surrey. The image was becoming a little fuzzy, maybe she'd been away from home too long.
"Oh lovely, tae London green belt, all fields and little villages, what a lovely place tae grow up. My Freddie lives down that way, in a pretty little village not far from 'ere. Anyway, I must be getting on. I promised your mother I'd bring some of me famous Victoria sponge tonight." Eleanor Connell informed Leo.
He smiled as the old lady pottered away as swiftly as she had come, humming an old folk song as she went.
"She was nice." Jemma stated.
"She always has been." Leo told her; still watching as Eleanor Connell's figured disappeared round the corner of the shelves.
Soon the two of them were unloading their haul onto the till, and Fitz was digging around in his pockets to find his cash.
"Have you ever thought about it, Leo?" Jemma wrung her hands and turned to face him.
"huh, wha'?" Fitz said, searching his back pockets.
"When you'll leave SHIELD? If you'll have a family? Where you'd live? What you'd do with yourself?" Jemma sucked in a breath.
"'Course I have." Leo shrugged, "Doesn't everyone?"
Jemma cocked her head and then shook it, "You really think Ward thinks about that sort of thing?"
Leo considered Ward settling down as a traditional husband or father for a second, "Yeah, okay, maybe not Ward."
"Well?"
"I don' want tae stay with shield too long, I might miss my chance to do all the other stuff I wan' tae do with my life. I'd want to move back tae the UK. It wouldn't be hard to get finish a degree in Civil engineering, that'd mean I could join me da's company. I suppose I'd get married. I'd like to live near family, doesn't have to be mine, it could be hers. I'd love a couple of kids… one day."
"You'll make a good dad?" Jemma admitted, smiling softly.
"Thanks," Leo glanced at the floor, sticking his hands firmly in his pockets, "and you?"
"The same. I want to move back here. I've always wanted a family, you know that." Jemma mumbled as Leo gazed at her, "I want to be around for my kids as well; I don't want to do the career mum thing like mine did. I know she meant well, but now, I'm grown up and I hardly have any childhood memories of her." Jemma's teeth worried her bottom lip.
Leo slipped his hand in hers and gave it a gentle squeeze, "You'll be 'n amazing mother Jemma. Those little monsters 'll be lucky tae have yeh."
Jemma slipped her arms around his waist and brought her head into his shoulder, "Thanks,"
Leo wrapped his arms around, stroking the soft skin of her arm with his thumb, la little lost for words.
Leo Fitz couldn't move for people. It wasn't that the space was crowed really, there was plenty of space, just people apparently wanted to stand in the most inconvenient places. Relatives blocked his every movement. He was attempting to get over to where Jemma was but he'd been trapped in-between his Great Uncle Graham and the back door.
Jemma felt a little overwhelmed by it all. The heat of so many bodies in one place was making her sweat under her jumper, and by now she'd seen so much of the family tartan that she could still see the pattern etched onto the back of her eyelids when she closed her eyes.
Leo located each of his close family in turn; noting Amelia was sat with Mrs Connell, and their ancient Grandpa Stuart and Grandpa Fitz. The old men giggled as they drank whisky, watching their brood. Grandpa Stuart had had eight children, and Grandpa Fitz five, all of which went on to have children of their own, who had children of their own, resulting in their family reunions looking slightly like the world cup.
Hamish Fitz captured the three year old he'd been chasing, their baby cousin, Martin, and dumped him back on his mother's lap. Tasked with keeping track of the little ones, Alfie Fitz wasn't having to great a time, especially since there were over a dozen of them, and so had enlisted the help of his older brother. Mandy was no help whatsoever, leaning back in her chair with a drink in her hand with an amused and content smile plastered on her face as she watched her fiancé chase a giggling toddler through a forest of legs.
Jane Fitz however was in her element, forever the gracious hostess with a tray of nibbles balanced elegantly on one hand. Whereas, Leo's father, Angus, was nowhere to be seen.
"Oh, Leo!" Fitz was dragged into yet another conversation with a relative. His broad, loud cousin, Douglas Fitz, from Aberdeen, spoke up, "Ooh Leo! Still a skinny bugger I see. How are ye?"
"I'm fine, Doug." Leo forced a smile, sending Jemma a desperate look over his cousin's shoulder. She just shrugged back at him, grinning, indicating for him to just get on with it.
Fitz heard his father yell over the noise from somewhere down the hall, looking toward the voice Leo could see Angus Fitz standing above the crowd, probably on a chair, "What'a ye say? Shall we have an ole sing-song then? Tonight we celebrate not only Christmas, but my son's engagement!"
The entire Fitz-Stuart family cheered and yelled in unison, raising their drinks to the sky.
"Alfie get over 'ere, grab the guitar. Who's for the tune of bonnie King Charlie?" Mr Fitz shouted merrily. There was another cheer.
Alfred Fitz breathed a sigh of relief, placing a small baby in a surprised Hamish's arms, and marching over to his father's side, his family clearing the way for him. Jemma made her move, scampering over to find her place at Leo's side. Gripping one of his arms she said, "This is quite something." Electricity sparked over the skin, spreading heat all the way from the tips of his toes to his ears.
"Now! Just quickly, Hamish, Mandy. Get over 'ere kids."
Hamish carefully placed the baby Alfie had dumped on him into their cousin's, the child's mother's, arms. Taking Mandy's hand he led her out in front of his slightly eccentric, energetic family.
"Give 'er a kiss!" A male voice yelled. There was another chorus of cheering and clapping.
Hamish gestured for them to cut the noise before leaning in to softly and tenderly peck Mandy on the lips. This action met with another bout of cheering. One of their young cousins, Charlie, high-fived Hamish.
"One down only three more to go, eh?" Angus Fitz announced cheerily.
"My bet's on Leo, 'cause it sure as hell ain't gonna be me." Alfie acclaimed loudly and proudly, gripping his guitar with a grin, and nodding firmly to where Leo was stood at the back door with his arm around Jemma. Fitz gapped a little, taking a minute to process the way he was being stared at.
"Now ye give 'er a kiss, Leo." A faceless male voice drifted from across the room, Leo guessed it was probably Charlie, who thoroughly resembled Alfie in demeanour.
Leo looked to Jemma, his eyes falling to her lips, wondering what it would feel like. Just a touch. Just a small taste and he would never have any regrets.
Panicking, Fitz-Simmons instinctively and sharply separated; this only resulted in raucous laughter from his family.
"Now, Alfred, lad, the tune please." Mr Fitz drew attention away from them as Alfie began to strum the old folk song.
"Now would be a great time to make a quick exit," Jemma said, keeping her tone low.
"Right behind yeh," Leo confirmed, following Jemma swiftly out the back door. They stumbled out onto the crisp grass, its frozen quality causing it to crunch under their feet. Jemma breathed out, a puff of condensation appearing in the chilled air. They both revelled in the feeling as the coolness hit their heated skin. They sat themselves on the bench pushed up against the wall at the back of the house.
"Wow," Jemma muttered after a while.
"That was a close one." Leo nodded.
"Not really," Jemma laughed, licking her lips absent-mindedly, "It's not like you were ever actually going to kiss me."
Jemma expected him to laugh along with her at the absurdity, but Leo Fitz stayed silent, deep in thought. She turned her head to regard his features, noting the longing in them. His shoulders were tight and square, as though he were restraining himself.
"Leo?" Jemma asked, placing a hand on his knee. It broke his control.
Leo Fitz lost no time in reaching for her and placing his lips on hers, soft and warm despite the searing coolness of the night. Soon his fingers were weaving themselves through her hair, his other hand palming her waist. Jemma gasped in shock, a short, sharp noise that buried itself in Leo's soul. She pulled away a little. For a second he thought everything was ruined, but then his insides twisted again as she brought her mouth back to meet his. Fireworks burst into colour behind his eyelids. He spread his fingers, his arm encircling her waist and pulling her toward him.
Jemma's hands were on his neck, her thumb smoothing the fine hair at the nape of his neck. He deepened the kiss, allowing his lips to part further, coaxing Jemma's open with them. He wasn't entirely sure what he was doing, but he knew the basics, he'd kissed a few girls before, but he was definitely no expert. The heat spreading, crackling with electricity, sparking in waves through his body, almost made him gasp, but his mouth was busy.
Jemma was the one to end it, slowly getting up of the bench with a calm but stunned expression as his arms fell away; she squeezed Leo's shoulder as she walked past him. He didn't know what to think when he heard the back door open and close signalling her departure.
She was nowhere to been seen when Leo made his way back inside just as his crowd of a family was finishing yelling a hefty round of Rule Britannia.
"RULE BRITIANNIA! BRITIANIA RULE THE WAVES! BRITONS NEVER, NEVER, NEVER WILL… BE… SLAVES!"
Fitz huffed, gladder than ever that they didn't neighbours out here.
"Oh! Leo, Sweeth'art, get over here!" He heard his mother holler at him, beckoning for him to join her.
"Leopold, 'ave yeh grown? I swear he's grown!" His Aunt Aubrey shrieked.
"Hey, Auntie." Fitz greeted her begrudgingly, kissing her cheek and politely accepting a hug. His Aunt Aubrey Fitz was his father's much younger sister, and was the sort of woman who could find even the tiniest thing to be something worth celebrating, so you can imagine what Christmases would be like.
"How are things? Is your boss treating you nice over there? Have you found a nice place to live?" The woman gestured erratically with her hands, almost swiping Leo's rather short and disgruntled Great Uncle Norman in the process.
"Yeh, he's great, very… friendly. And yes, I don't see much of it because of work, but I have a really nice place."
"Donnae work too hard, Leo, ye don't owe those people your life, so tae speak." Leo smiled nervously as his Aunt laughed heartily. It wasn't as distant a possibility as she might think. "You got a lass though, Leo? Handsome lad like ye'll have a girl!"
Leo shook his head a little too ferociously as he answered, "Nae, no girls, nothing like that, nope." Leo saw his mother's eyes narrow in the corner of his eye, and he panicked a little. As a phyciatrist it was her job for her to see what people where really thinking about, so why had he thought bringing Jemma here would be okay? He'd deluded himself, thinking that he didn't feel anything more than a platonic brotherly love for Jemma. "Nice to see you. Would you excuse me?" Fitz said sharply, charging through the throng of people to find her.
I'm actually having a really hard time because I've actually got to play down the scots accent for you guys to be able to understand everything but still give the illusion of an accent and it's dead difficult.
So Toon is Town in case anyone was confused.