When Kate had first told Emily she could decorate Black Widow House for Christmas, she’d seen the beginnings of the craze settling into her. Christmas was her favorite holiday, too, so she didn’t think much of it. It was cute, and obviously she was willing to give her whatever she wanted. It was their first big holiday away from their respective homes, and if this would make Em feel a little more settled, she was in.
That was until the morning Nat came back in from the garage, demanding to know why she’d gone insane with Christmas decor, only to be met with genuine confusion. She’d followed her out there to see what the hell she was talking about, and that’s when she’d seen them – Pingy, Wingy, Snowy, an entire Nativity set, a good-sized model of Santa, the sleigh, and two reindeer (for which Kate was grateful; she’d expected a whole fleet). Then, another dozen tubs and boxes filled with assorted lights, garlands, obscenely large ornaments, and who even knew what else.
It was… a lot.
But Emily had been so excited when she’d texted her with pictures. She knew how much this meant to her, and even though there was a part of her that wanted to tell her it was just too much, she couldn’t bring herself to in the end. Using any of this at Morningside wouldn’t be feasible, so Black Widow House was the only choice she had. And really, they wouldn’t be the most outrageously decorated house by far; with no Thanksgiving creating some imaginary boundary, some of the neighbors on their block had started going all out early in November. If anything, they were behind.
Of course Yelena had fled the moment Kate had reminded her what was happening, and it was only because she’d managed to soften Natasha up so much that she’d agreed to stay. The process wasn’t without some grumbling so far, but they were making progress. It was definitely going to be an all-day affair, though, there was no doubt in Kate’s mind about that.
She and Natasha were currently on the roof over the garage, trying to arrange Santa and his reindeer on the peak without any of them tipping over, while Emily was down below winding lights around the trees and bushes in the front yard with Christmas music playing loud enough to carry up. In all honesty, it was a little excessively cheery even for Kate, but she was grinning and bearing it.
“Nat, Rudolph’s crooked,” she called out. She was currently a few feet away and had an unfortunately good view of the angle of the plastic reindeer butts. She crouched down to work on fastening the wires that would hold the whole damn thing still into their proper places on the roof.
Natasha responded by shooting Kate a look and rolling her shoulders to relieve some of the tension that was building there. She liked Emily, of course. She was sweet, and polite, and more than anything, she made Kate happy. But giving up her entire day off to help with these gaudy decorations hadn’t really been at the top of her list. Still, she bit her tongue and straightened out the plastic reindeer. “Better?”
Down below them, Emily had finished wrapping the bushes in lights. She took a step back to survey them and confirm that they met her standards. She made a few adjustments before she was satisfied, then moved to gather some garland to line the front door.
She hummed along to the Christmas music, but there was a little bit of sadness to her expression as she unwound the garland. The reason she and her mother had started going to hard with Christmas decorations had always been about her dad. It was a way to welcome him home for the holidays. So of course it was hard not to think about him. Memories of him were tied to every single decoration here. It had taken her some time, but Emily had finally reached a point where she wanted to balance missing him and keeping up traditions that she knew he loved. So, decorations. It gave her something warm and comforting to remember not just her dad, but happy memories from home too. She knew she was lucky that Kate and her sisters were allowing this at all.
After the door was lined with twinkle lights, garland, and a festive wreath, Emily stepped back out to the front lawn and looked up to the roof. “That looks great!” In truth she probably could have made a few placement suggestions, but she didn’t want to push her luck too much. “I have eggnog and cookies if you two want to come take a break!”
Kate knew this wasn’t Natasha’s ideal day off, so she was being good and biting back the usual playful snark that wanted to roll off her tongue. She knew she was lucky Nat was humoring them instead of taking off like Yelena had. So, despite the glare, she responded with a grateful look and rose, crossing over to her side to kiss the side of her head. “Better, thank you,” she murmured, before crouching down to fasten those wires into place, too.
She was pretty sure that would be the end of the roof work, at least until they got to hanging the icicle lights. But she would do that herself and let Nat go inside to rest when the time came. She’d seen pictures of how the Fields house usually looked at this time of year, and there was more, but Black Widow House was built entirely differently. Hopefully, the majority of their efforts would be focused on the lawn, and it would move a little quicker than she anticipated.
“C’mon, you’ve earned eggnog,” she told her sister with a grin, taking her by the hand to lead the way over to the ladder down onto the driveway. She let Natasha head down first, then followed her over to the front and accepted a cookie before leaning in to snag a kiss from Emily. “How’s the vision coming? Are we up to Fields standards yet?”
Natasha nimbly made her way down the ladder and stepped back onto the driveway. Grounded once more, she looked up at the roof where Santa and his reindeer waved cheerily down at them. Her life had become very different. She briefly thought about the Barton kids and how she would happily put up any number of insane Christmas decorations if they wanted it, and she felt some of her annoyance ease. It really wasn’t that bad.
She accepted a cup of eggnog from Emily and took a long sip. She couldn’t help the amused smile when she realized Emily was pouring the drinks from a pitcher shaped like a Christmas snowman. She really had all her bases covered.
Emily happily leaned into the kiss from Kate before she poured herself a drink as well. “It looks so good! Obviously not quite the same as home, but I love it. Thank you both for helping me with this. It really means a lot.”
“You’re just lucky I know how to sweet talk the boss here,” Kate joked, nudging Natasha’s shoulder with her own as she bit off half her cookie to munch on. The heaps of Christmas decor had been a surprise, but it hadn’t taken too much coaxing for Kate to get a yes out of Natasha for the decorations. Yelena hadn’t seemed to mind either; she didn’t want to assist (which was probably for the best; Natasha may be grumbling and eye-rolling, but Yelena would be outright groaning), but that had been the case with the Halloween decorations, too.
“What’s next? Are there diagrams? I feel like there must be diagrams.” She was teasing but also wouldn’t be too surprised if that was the case. There was more here to work with than at some of her mother’s fancy Upper East Side parties. Certainly more than had ever decorated even the interior of the Bishop’s penthouse.
Natasha winked in response to Kate’s comments and snaked her hand out to break off a piece of the cookie she’d been eating. “Christmas Tax,” she replied with a smirk before popping it into her mouth.
“Oh I definitely made blueprints one year.” Emily laughed and took a sip of her drink before she set it back down on the small table she’d set up for the refreshments. “Luckily for you, that was 12 year old Emily. But I was thinking next we could set up Snowy, Pingy, and Wingy right over here, on the grass next to the driveway? And then the Nativity scene over there under the big tree.”
Kate briefly looked scandalized, seeing as there was an entire plate of cookies available that weren’t currently in her hand, wow. But she decided instead to get her revenge by taking Nat’s eggnog out of her hand and taking a drink. She let out a dramatically pleased hum before handing it back with an echoed, “Christmas Tax.”
But her attention swiveled back to her girlfriend, who wasn’t technically here to witness the two of them screwing with each other, and nodded. “Sure, that sounds good.” She almost asked if all of that would fit, but the lawn was actually a good stretch out to the street, so it should be fine. “Remind me which one’s which? Snowy’s kind of a no-brainer.”
Emily didn’t mind watching them mess with each other at all. It was nice, actually. As an only child, she’d never had any siblings to interact with. And whenever she did see siblings in action, whether it was Ali and Jason, Spencer and Melissa, or Aria and Mike, all sniping was definitely done with a whole lot less love and affection. Certainly none of them would ever offer to help her decorate.
She turned back toward the lawn where several of the decorations stood waiting to be placed. The large snowman smiled back at her with two penguins in Christmas hats sitting nearby. “The one on the left is Pingy, and the right is Wingy.” They looked exactly alike, so how Emily could tell them apart was a mystery, but she declared it with absolute certainty.
Kate was slightly bewildered by how Emily was so sure of herself, but she didn’t question it. Those penguins had clearly been around a while. How was she to know there weren’t some kind of distinguishing marks invisible to her eye that Emily used to tell them apart? It was cute, anyway. The whole shtick may have been a lot, but knowing the story behind it all made it extremely sweet, too. She’d have done the same for her dad if their family had been in that situation.
“Cool.” She nodded determinedly. “Maybe you and I can work on that? Give Nat a break to go call her hot boyfriend who, by the way, would have been useful today. Just sayin’.” Nat had done enough for now, helping her on that roof, and this was Kate’s decision and her girlfriend’s wishes. She could handle some of it on her own for a little while. “We can call you back out when we’re getting the giant stable set up.”
“Oh, yeah, of course.” Emily nodded and turned back to Natasha. “Thank you again for helping. And for letting me take over your house with all of this.”
Natasha nodded and grabbed a cookie from the nearby plate. “It’s not a problem. Far be it for me to argue when the Vallo Powers That Be send us all of this. Besides, I like giving the neighbors a run for their money anyway. You two have fun. Call me when you need help with the rest of the lights.” She gave them both a wave and a smile, but wasted no time in slipping back into the house. She did have a hot boyfriend to call, after all.
Once Natasha had gone back inside, Emily turned to Kate and pulled her in close. “Hi.”
Kate would be quick to admit this was part of her motivation for letting her sister escape as well. She generally had no problems with public displays of affection, and that was still true. But she doubted Nat would have appreciated the two of them slacking off like this after Kate had monopolized her all day. At least with her inside, she had no reason left to hold back.
“Hi.” She grinned, her arms sliding around Emily’s back and pulling her in for a much less PG kiss than she’d stolen from her earlier. She stroked up her back and met her eyes. “Are you happy? You look happy.”
Emily sighed happily into the kiss. Though they’d been together for a few weeks now, she was still in the stage where she got butterflies every time they kissed. As Kate’s hand trailed lightly up her back, Emily shivered lightly with pleasure. “I am happy. Not just because of the decorations and Christmas. Because of you.”
She definitely wasn’t alone in the butterflies, but the shiver, that was another jolt of pleasure Kate hadn’t expected. She could feel it pass through her and she bit down on her bottom lip for a moment before chasing Emily’s lips again, kissing her slower and deeper. One hand lifted to cup her cheek and hold her there until she drew back to breathe.
“Good. All of that, that’s good. You make me happy, too.” Some part of this would always feel selfish, feeling this strongly for Emily and wanting her here when she was so far away from her world. But if she made her happy, maybe it wasn’t so bad. “Even with your crazy Christmas penguins included.”
Emily made no move to escape this kiss, happy to stay there as long as Kate wanted. She brought one of her hands up to where Kate’s rested against her cheek and covered it with her own. She could still smell the scent of Christmas cookies and broke out into another smile.
“You’re going to love them once you see everything all set up, I promise.”
“I know I will,” Kate chuckled softly. “I always liked seeing the houses outside the city that had really good decorations. I’ve just never gotten to do any myself. Manhattan’s not exactly known for its spacious lawns, you know?”
“What else did you like about Christmas that you weren’t able to do?” If Kate was doing all of this for her, then Emily wanted to make sure she returned the favor. If there was anything at all that she could do to make this Christmas season special, then she’d throw everything she had at it.
“Just getting to relax, I guess,” Kate answered with a shrug, gently pulling away so she could get ready to heft one of the giant decorations into the place Emily had assigned it. She needed something to do with her hands if they were going into her stuff now. “Mom always had some sort of gaudy, pretentious party to go to, so we were always busy. No downtime, really.”
She was sure the holiday wouldn’t be without a tinge of sadness. Despite some of the upper-class obligations that she wasn’t fond of, she and her mom did have their own things they did, and she would miss that. But her mom also wasn’t the person Kate had always believed her to be, so that tainted things a bit. Here, though, she had all she needed for the makings of a much cozier Christmas – her sisters and the extended little family she’d made, Emily herself, a life that was entirely of her own choosing and not part of her mother’s dynastic plans. It was already looking up.
As Emily felt Kate shift to extricate herself from their embrace, she dropped her arms back down to her sides again. She definitely understood the impulse to keep busy when sharing vulnerable things. It was a tried and true tactic for her as well, so she went to collect the penguins as Kate went to get the Snowman. “Relaxing is good,” she smiled as they hauled the decorations over to where she wanted them. “I know this hasn’t exactly been the most relaxing day so far, but I promise once everything is set up I’ll be much less crazy about it.”
She looked down at her t-shirt, which proudly proclaimed This Girl Loves Christmas and laughed. “Well, a little less crazy. There will be lots of relaxing, at least. We can watch movies, sit by the tree, whatever you want.”
“I like a little crazy,” Kate assured her with a grin. “And I meant it, I think it’s sweet you want to do all this and that you love Christmas so much.” She set Snowy carefully in place before reaching over to tug playfully on that corny Christmas shirt – which she’d laughed at the sight of the first time, but she’d been surprised. “I don’t mind putting in work like this. I wanted to do it for you, and Lena and Nat, too, since normal Christmases weren’t really a thing for them back home. I just think the day of, it would be nice to enjoy it for more than a couple hours before rushing out the door.”
Emily took a step back and smiled at the care Kate seemed to take with Snowy. She knew she was ridiculous, but it meant a lot to her that in spite of that, Kate was being so supportive of it all. She blushed softly at the tug on her shirt, then busied herself with setting up Pingy and Wingy.
“Well that we can definitely do.” It wasn’t like Emily had a ton of holiday obligations here in Vallo, and she knew she’d be perfectly content to spend Christmas day relaxing with Kate and her sisters however they wanted.
As soon as Kate was sure Snowy was stable (he was tall and the yard was a little bit sloped), she backed up to retrieve a few of the stakes and a hammer to get him nailed into place. It took a few minutes, and she ended up pushing the stakes further in with her boots, but soon, he was successfully upright without risk of toppling over.
“You’re staying over, by the way,” she said, turning to scoop up more stakes for the two penguins on either side of the snowman. She handed a couple over to Emily to hold. “I want you here all through the holidays, if you’re up for it. Seems kind of silly to get all this set up and only be able to enjoy it a couple times a week.”
Emily took the stakes and straightened them in her hand. She moved closer to Kate so she could easily hand them off to her girlfriend as needed.
“I’m definitely up for it. I like your house. There’s always something going on.” She handed Kate one of the stakes. “My place just seems really quiet by comparison.” She never did care much for living alone, and her apartment at Morningside still didn’t feel much like home, even after a few months. “You just have to promise you’ll tell me if Natasha and Yelena start getting annoyed. I do not want to get on their bad side.”
Kate scoffed, looking up at Emily with a grin and affection etched into her face before she placed another stake. “If they can handle me, they can handle you, Em. They like you, and you’re way less high-maintenance than I am. They’ll probably be thrilled someone else is around to rein me in.”
“Yeah, but you’re their sister. I’m the new girl they didn’t even know a month ago. I just don’t want to encroach on their space by being around too much.” She handed Kate another stake. “Though I am happy to rein you in.”
Kate hammered the last stake into place and straightened up again, shoving down on them with her toe to make sure they were solid. One more penguin to go, but she paused a minute first, slid the hammer into the back pocket of her jeans, and reached out to pull Emily close again.
“You’re my new girl,” she clarified, leaning in to graze her lips across Emily’s jaw, up to just beneath her ear. “I want you here. That’s enough. If my sisters need time alone, they’ll take it.” Neither Natasha nor Yelena were shy or likely to tiptoe around the situation; she wasn’t worried it would be a problem.
Even if Emily had wanted to continue protesting, words suddenly became much more difficult to find as Kate’s lips were on her skin. Her mind went fuzzy and her heart rate sped up. “I feel like this is cheating.” The smile on her face said she didn’t mind one bit, either. “But if you want me there, then that’s where I’ll be.”
“Good.” Kate shifted to bring their lips together again, hand pressing against her lower back to bring her closer. “Because I want you here. I wasn’t gonna take no for an answer no matter what.” She was a little spoiled and always had ways to get what she wanted. And she wanted Emily very much.
Emily had completely forgotten that they were out in the front yard in full view of all the neighbors. She pressed herself in closer to Kate and deepened the kiss. Kate had her feeling things she hadn’t felt in years. When she’d fallen into her depression, dropped out of school, and isolated herself, she wasn’t sure she even wanted to feel any of this again. But Kate had woken up all of her senses in the best possible way.
A passing car and a shout out the window snapped Emily back to the present, and she finally broke the kiss. She gave an embarrassed chuckle. “No more distractions. Penguin, Nativity scene, lights.”
“Don’t forget the line of giant candles and that North Pole sign I saw somewhere,” Kate countered. If they hadn’t already started pulling things out and unboxing them, she’d have happily pulled Emily inside for a different kind of activity. But they were in this now. She was committed. They’d get all the standing pieces hooked up, then they could move onto the Nativity scene with the heavy wooden stable – she’d call Nat back out for that, as promised.
Emily couldn’t help but beam at that. “It’ll look fa la la amazing.” She gave Kate an appropriate moment to groan at that before she kissed her once more for good measure. “Okay, back to work!”