Have Yourself A Sparkling Little Christmas
When Phil woke up, his nose was full of hair. It was in no way a novelty, since Clint usually burrowed as close to Phil as he could. Since the day they had started sleeping together (and even a bit before that), Clint had always claimed he wasn’t a cuddler, but the reality had proven otherwise. Not that Phil minded, not at all. He couldn’t think of a better way to wake up than with Clint in his arms.
It was the day before Christmas, and, unless the world was about to end, the whole team had a day off. In a bout of holiday spirit, Fury and Dr. Doom had made some sort of a gentleman’s deal to have a holiday break in destroying the world, and since they didn’t have to worry about Loki, there was, in fact, a chance of having an actual Christmas.
Loki not being a problem meant that, in a bout of something nobody really understood, Loki had been redeemed — not fully, but to the extent of being allowed back to earth under a heavy Asgardian surveillance to help to repair the mess he had made. When Loki’s return had been announced, Clint had furiously opposed to the point of escaping to the vents on Helicarrier. For a moment, Phil had been seriously worried that Clint was going to cause an intergalactic war by killing Loki, or worse, get himself killed in the process. However, Natasha had caught him on time, confiscated his bow, and forced him to talk to Phil.
As much as Clint had seethed about being denied revenge, he didn’t stay mad long, not after Phil had kissed him silent, while Natasha was still holding him by his neck.
There had been some need for explanations afterwards, mostly because Phil hadn’t exactly given much warning about what he was about to do. Fortunately enough, Natasha had rolled her eyes and muttered something about idiots in love, followed by a string of curses in Russian and a pledge of never having to endure their making-out ever again.
That had been five months ago, and they had been together ever since. It had been, and still was, a rough ride, saddled with Phil’s slow recovery and Clint’s recurring nightmares and trust issues, but they had made it eventually.
Carefully, Phil untangled himself from the sleeping Clint and stretched to get the cricks out of his neck and back. Beside him, Clint let out a slurred sound, smacked his lips a couple of times, and buried himself deeper under the blankets. Phil huffed a silent laugh and shook his head fondly as he got up.
The bedroom was dim with curtains drawn to shut off the light of the city around them. Phil didn’t need to say anything about the lights — JARVIS knew that, unless specifically asked, Phil and Clint didn’t want him to turn lights on automatically — and walked to the window to take a peek of the world outside.
It was white.
More specifically, glittery white.
Phil blinked.
”JARVIS, did it snow last night?” He asked softly.
”It would seem so, Agent Coulson,” JARVIS confirmed just as softly. ”Although I suspect the snow is more of a… magical origin,” he added hesitantly.
”You mean Loki,” Phil said. It wasn’t a question.
”What about Loki?” Clint asked sleepily from the bed.
Phil glanced behind him. Clint was leaning on his elbows, looking ruffled and groggy, blinking owlishly at Phil. His hair spiked out in every direction, and sheets pooled on his lap, baring his upper body. Phil felt a very pleasant flare of heat in his gut at the sight.
He had learned early on that Clint wasn’t even remotely body-shy, and he was used to parading around naked. At some point, Phil had asked Clint about it, but he had just shrugged and said that he felt more comfortable naked. Phil didn’t complain, on the contrary: naked Clint was a sight for sore eyes, even though the man knew that himself and enjoyed teasing Phil accordingly.
Phil himself tended to sleep in his t-shirt and boxer-briefs, especially after what had happened with Loki. He had been self-conscious for his whole life, and a scar the size of the palm of his hand wasn’t the most beautiful sight, no matter what Clint said.
Phil gave Clint a small smile. ”Come and see for yourself,” he said, beckoning with his head.
Clint blinked, scratched his hair, and scrambled out of the bed, nearly falling on his face in the process. For a master assassin and a former circus performer, he was sometimes unbelievably clumsy, something especially Natasha found extremely hilarious.
True to himself, Clint didn’t bother with clothes, padding towards Phil buck-ass naked, and Phil drank up every second of it. Stopping behind him, Clint draped himself on Phil’s back and slipped his hands under his t-shirt. Letting out a content sigh, Phil leaned back to rest his head on Clint’s shoulder and relaxed into the hug.
”Look outside,” he said and drew the curtain aside. ”We’ve got ourselves a white Christmas.”
”But… how?” Clint breathed in wonder. ”I mean, it’s great, but… It was like 50°F yesterday!”
Then he froze. Phil could practically feel the frown as Clint thought back.
”Wait. You said something about Loki. Is this his doing?”
”It does seem so,” JARVIS said. ”However, as far as Sir and Dr. Banner are aware, the snow is, if uncommonly glittery, basically harmless.”
Clint let out a shuddering breath. ”A White Christmas. Wow.”
Frowning, Phil turned around. ”You’re from Iowa. I’m sure you’ve had white Christmases before.”
Clint bit his lip, a bit sheepish. ”Not really. Didn’t have much Christmases when I was a kid, and later… well.” He shrugged and looked out again. ”It might be fun,” he said quietly.
Glancing back at the window, Phil had an idea.
”Dress up, we’re going out.”
It didn’t take much convincing to cajole the rest of the team to join them, even though Tony complained loud and clear about the inconvenience of cold (it wasn’t) and how it would make his arc reactor slow down (it didn’t). After about fifteen minutes of continuous whining, Steve rolled his eyes, and shoved a handful of snow under Tony’s collar, effectively cutting off his complaints. Tony sputtered and narrowed his eyes, and threw Steve in the head with a snowball.
After that, the game was on.
Natasha didn’t bother with the snowball fight, opting to care for the picnic basket and, most importantly, the rum-spiked hot chocolate they had brought along. When Clint teased her to be a pussy, it earned him a giant snowball in the face with a raised brow and a smug smile. When Tony cackled at him about it, Clint thanked him with a shower of snowballs.
Phil didn’t even remember that running around in snow could be so much fun. They weren’t the only ones in the park, and they definitely weren’t the most quiet party, but after everything they had been through, he felt they had earned a bit of silliness in their lives.
After they all were covered in glittery snow from head to toe (except for Natasha, of course, and Bruce who had decided on building a snowman), Natasha served them hot chocolate and gave pointers about their performances, reverting into a Russian-spiked word war with Clint.
Phil watched them with a small, warm smile. He was sweaty and he had snow under his shirt, but he didn’t care.
”Whatcha smiling at?” Clint asked, as he sauntered closer, cheeks rosy, grinning over the rim of his cup.
”You,” Phil answered easily.
”Oh, really?” Clint murmured and stepped closer to give him an Eskimo kiss. He smelled like winter, happiness, and chocolate, and Phil wanted nothing more than to keep kissing him.
”Stop canoodling in public, you two,” Tony hollered from beside Natasha. ”We’re heading back to the tower.”
Clint rolled his eyes and gave Phil a small kiss on the nose. ”Later,” he promised with a wink.
The short walk back was filled with banter and little snow balls to the heads of everyone except Natasha.
When they stepped into the lobby, Pepper was waiting for them.
”There you are!” She sighed at Tony, exasperated. ”I looked for you everywhere and — wait… Why are you covered in glitter?”
Tony spread his hands. ”It’s sparkling snow, by courtesy of Loki.”
Pepper blinked. ”No, Tony. It’s glitter. Like the real, sparkly glitter.”
Suspicious, Phil checked himself and the team and, yes, apparently the snow turned into glitter when it melted.
Tony froze, his hands still spread wide, and glanced down at himself. ”Oh shit. I’m covered in craft herpes!”
”A craft what?” Steve asked, eyes wide.
”Craft herpes,” Tony repeated, flailing his hands and spreading glitter around. ”Highly contagious and persistent as fuck. You’ll never get rid of it. Don’t ask me how I know.” He turned to Pepper, making grabby hands as he whined, ”Pepper, help! It’s all over the place!”
Pepper took a step back. ”Oooh no, I don’t think so. You are all going to shower.” She smiled at Steve who still looked somewhat worried. ”Don’t worry, Steve. A good scrubbing will get you rid of the glitter, which, as I’m sure you know, is not the case with regular herpes.”
She started herding Tony into the elevator and, after a moment of hesitation, the rest of the team followed.
Clint hung back a little and poked Phil on the shoulder.
”Look Phil, I twinkle,” he said, swirling around like a ballerina. ”I think I have this stuff everywhere.” He paused, giving Phil a mock-seductive look from under his eyelashes, and waggled his brows. ”Wanna go and see if I have sparkling balls?”
”Of course I do. In fact, it’s been on my to-do list since the morning,” Phil deadpanned as he started towards the elevator, earning an undignified snort of laughter.
Once back in their apartment, Phil ordered Clint to the shower first by the excuse of being more glittered than him. As soon as he heard the shower go on, he hurried back to the door. As promised, the small Christmas tree was waiting in the corridor, along with a box of ornaments. Phil carried the tree inside and placed it by the window to wait. Then he stripped and headed to the shower.
It was no surprise that washing up turned into a lazy make-out session. They both were too tired and hungry for much else than kissing and languid stroking, more interested in getting rid of all the glitter than getting off. Clint’s hair especially proved to be challenging to clean, and after the fourth shampooing, Phil resigned to the thought of a sparkling Clint for the foreseeable future.
Dressed in their bathrobes, they finally made their way out of the bathroom, and Clint stopped on his tracks as he saw the Christmas tree.
”Wha—? Where did that come from?”
”I asked JARVIS in the morning if he knew where to get a moderate sized Christmas tree. It’s bare on purpose so that you can decorate it if you want,” Phil said.
The idea had seemed brilliant in the morning, but now he felt slightly nervous, not entirely sure how Clint would feel about the tree. His nervousness was soon proven unnecessary, as Clint whirled around with wide eyes and an unbelieving smile.
”Really? I can?”
He didn’t wait for an answer, but hurried to the tree, eager to start. Phil smiled fondly at his enthusiasm and went to get dressed.
When he returned to the living room, Clint was darting around the tree, muttering quietly, and stepping back at times to give his efforts a critical eye. Phil settled on the couch with the pretense of reading his book. In truth he just wanted to watch Clint.
After a moment, Clint whirled around to face Phil. ”What do you think?” He asked eagerly.
”Hmm?” Phil asked, momentarily distracted by the way Clint’s bathrobe had slipped open. Then he blinked and dragged his eyes from Clint’s bare torso to the tree, which was decorated to the point of overflowing. Phil was quite sure Clint had used every single ball, garland, candle, and star in the box, and the result looked very much like Clint.
In other words, it was perfect.
He must’ve been quiet for too long, because Clint cleared his throat and asked timidly, ”It’s not too much, is it? I can take some of it off if you want.”
Phil’s eyes snapped into Clint’s and took in the hesitant hope. ”Absolutely not,” he said firmly. ”It’s your tree, and it’s perfect just the way it is. Just like you.”
He barely had the chance to brace himself before his lap was full of Clint.
”Thank you,” Clint mumbled against his neck, hugging him tight.
”My pleasure,” Phil answered with a kiss on his temple.
Carefully, he maneuvered them to rest more comfortably on the couch. Clint draped himself on top of him, burrowed closer and let out a content purr.
Phil closed his eyes and smiled. Later, they would go to the communal kitchen for dinner, but now they were exactly where they should be. He tugged at the afghan Natasha had bought them and spread it over them as much as he could.
”Merry Christmas,” he whispered and hugged his archer close.