ᴏɴᴇ ɢʟɪᴍᴘsᴇ ᴏғ ʙʀɪɢʜᴛᴇʀ sᴋɪᴇs (sᴇᴍɪ-ᴏᴘᴇɴ)

[uprightness]

Who: avengersmas guests and starstruck crew!
Broadcast: nope
Action: on the starstruck
When: forwardate to christmas eve!



[ to all those who were invited, the crew, plus ones and random guests, you can use this mingle log for dinner stuff and drinking stuff and gifts stuff and passing out stuff.

don't ruin the christmas decorations though, they mean a lot to steve. ]

Comments

[mucked]

Everything else was Christmas enough.

[ but it's hard to sell her bah humbugs when she's coming off the back-end of a lovely kiss -- head spinning and heart thumping and her posture curves ever-so-almost toward him. peggy's hands flatten against his back, easing beneath coat and shirt and finding skin. ]

Besides, the music went down well. There was a refreshing minimum of drunken singing.

[uprightness]

I thought you liked drunken singing after all those times with the team.

[ a bystander might have wondered what team he's talking about but here in steve's arms is the only person who knew the Howling Commandos as well as he did. ]

I've figured it all grew on you.

[mucked]

That was different. [ that was war, that was the howlies, that was roughing it and sleeping in barns and drinking whatever they could barter or forage.

peggy cranes her neck. she steals a brief kiss. ] Leagues away.

[uprightness]

It is.

[ leagues away, another time in another world and as much as a part of him will always long for the familiarity of that setting, he learned a long time ago to try and create new connections. It's much easier here, always was. Steve's insistence over the ordeal of marriage is enough of a proof that no part of him really misses the 21st century.

Not when the alternative is peggy's fingers on his skin and her voice in her ear. He moves away only to toss aside his jacket and take a seat, tugging her sideways into his embrace. ]

Still. One round of 'jingle bells' couldn't have hurt.

[mucked]

[ she'll do one better, then, and climb into his lap. away from the ship and prying eyes, peggy displays a capacity to be altogether nearer -- warmer -- and tonight proves to be no exception. she stretches upward to ruffle her fingers through his hair. ]

I didn't see you volunteering to lead the chorus.

[uprightness]

Maybe if you played that Christmas album a bit more often.

[ it's all done in harmony, she slides closer and he shifts, wraps his arms around her waist. ]

I know the words to those songs.

[ so of course he would have sung if there was Christmas music. That's the sensible conclusion. ]

[mucked]

-- Or you could make an effort and learn the words to the other albums.

[ how is it, she wonders, that steve rogers is the one stuck in the 21st century and yet she's the one managing to adapt to lengths and strides of cultural progress? oh, yes, she gets shirty about some things. movies especially.

but peg has taken to the music something fierce. so long as it's good. ]

[uprightness]

Alright then.

[ it must be a rule by now: that his easy agreements are mischief in disguise. He twists, leaning down, trapping her beneath him. ]

I tell you what, if you teach me I promise I'll try and learn.

[ she likes those albums after all. ]

[mucked]

[ contrary to every barbed remark she's ever made about it, peggy doesn't much mind being 'trapped' beneath him. as angles go, this one offers up all manner of untold benefits. she can get at his skin, for one -- hands sliding smoothly up his sides and hitching his shirt up his ribs. all before her palms glide back down to his hips. her touch settles, pulls, tugs him nearer so that their bodies bump.

she might be 'trapped' but she's hardly shy. here is the man she's chosen to spend the rest of life with -- well, the rest of her life in the fleet. peggy tries not to think of the beyond. instead, she curves upward to kiss just aside from the hollow of his throat. ]

Good God. What's there to teach? Just sit and listen to the damned things.

[uprightness]

Well, I've tried that already.

[ has he? Surely not lately. With everything that has happened, sitting down to listen to music or read a book seemed like a luxury. But he commits himself to these supposed former attempts as it is. Steve shifts his weight to his side, traces a line from her cheek and down to the necklace he gave her nearly a year ago. ]

You're going to have to think of something else.

[mucked]

[ she knows where his fingers fall. and she swallows down a charmed smile -- not least of all because she knows it's too quick and too soon to throw fuel on that particular fire. for now, she settles with her back against the sofa cushions. she twists to face him -- laying nearly nose-to-nose with little room to spare. ]

I'd like to know why the burden falls on my shoulders.

[uprightness]

we're going to married, Peggy. I think it's a part of the commitment to help me where I fail.

[ as if not remembering song lyrics amounts to a terrible failure. or maybe steve is going to do just this from now on, dance merrily around the subject of their engagement, every each word he says is brimming over with joyous sentiment. ]

besides, you like those records. I bet you already remember all the words.

[mucked]

[ -- she laughs. deep and merry and happily ducking forward to nip at his neck and take some of the sting out of her words when she scrapes her teeth across the skin just behind his ear.

she whispers: ] It will never be my job to stand behind you and prop you up, Rogers. Equal effort or none at all. That's the deal.

[uprightness]

I'll do all my homework.

[ he promises in a tone that's terribly serious and not serious at all. equal effort, she said, after all. ]

really, whatever you say.

[ but then there it is, he smiles and lets their noses bump. everything is warm and terribly cozy. ]

how about that Christmas gift? wanna see it?

[mucked]

[ whatever you say -- and it's like music to her ears. prettier than any symphony or slow jazz. bright, brilliant, sweeping. and her heart thunders in her chest to hear him say it. once, she never thought such easy devotion would touch her so deeply. but here she is, touched.

he mentions a gift and she appears thoroughly reluctant to let him loose. ]

Only if you don't mind that I never got you anything.

[ her stomach's been too in knots about this engagement mess to even stop and think about christmas gifts. ]

[uprightness]

I thought I already got my present.

[ that is, her question has been a gift in its own right and a remarkable one at that. he almost seems confused by the statement. of course she's gotten him something, perhaps the most precious of things. he shifts but just enough to rest his head above her rib cage and tilt his head up to look at her. his smile is lazy and indulgent. ]

besides, it's nothing big.

[mucked]

It never is.

[ she presses her smile against the crown of steve's head -- not quite a kiss, because she can't stop grinning long enough to give one. ]

And yet each one trumps the last all the same. [ her arm tightens around his body; a little wordless argument that it can wait a little longer. ] You're terribly good at it, you know. Giving gifts.

[uprightness]

Funny, I never really got to do that before this place.

[ out of lack of money and means and friends first and lack of time, later. the avengers never traded gifts. christmas was a time to spend in stark tower and shake his head at the variety of modern alcohol and the names people gave cocktails these days.

this is nicer. his gift is somewhere in the room but it is, for now, forgotten. ]

besides. you're good at it, too. you got me a baseball bat.

[ best gift ever, okay. ]

[mucked]

[ -- peggy breathes him in: the lingering smell of party drinks and holiday spices; his musk and his aftershave. ]

I was good at it once. How many of your birthdays have we got ahead of us, yet? [ a beat. ] If we're lucky, we'll have plenty more for me to fail at.

[uprightness]

You now, I'm pretty sure we can stop celebrating once I turn a hundred.

[ which, technically, he will; come July, that is. bucky's one hundred birthday featured glitter and large amounts of super-brew. steve doesn't remember much of that afternoon. it was one of two times in which he was thoroughly drunk.

he doesn't plan for such fuss on his own birthday. actually, this here seems like an appropriate way to celebrate. he listens to peggy breathing, lets his fingers ghost up her side just beneath her blouse. ]

so just one more and you won't fail. This is enough for five or six birthdays.

[ her proposal, that is. ]

[mucked]

Oh, bollocks. [ peggy rolls her eyes -- it's all terribly unromantic, given their positions and circumstances. she balls her fists in the front of his shirt and gives him a gentle nudge backward so she can look him in his eyes. ]

You know, I'm beginning to tire of this whole centenarian nonsense. Yes, alright, your body has been kicking around for that bloody long but -- it's not like you've celebrated a hundred birthdays. Seen a hundred years.

[ she touches his cheek; this is important to her. ]

You're still young.

[uprightness]

[ his groan is a noise of complaint. the concept of moving even a bit recieves a bit of grumpiness but oh, alright. ]

thirty-three then.

[ that's how old he'll really be, if one ignores the years in the ice. ]

that's a pretty good number, too.

[ so many people have joked throughout the recent years that steve rogers is a bit of an old soul, an old man in a young body. this is one of the first times he feels his own age. time, for once, seems linear. ]

I guess you still owe me a birthday present this year.

[mucked]

[ thirty-three. he's still older than her, of course. although on some days it hardly feels like it. peggy nudges him upward, reluctantly rising up as well so the two of them can sit beside each other. ]

And what, pray tell, would you like for your belated birthday gift?

[uprightness]

a forth day.

[ he says with a curve of a smile. what, she asked, after all. he's bound to be honest about things such as birthday gifts, belated or otherwise. ]

wouldn't take too much work on your part.

[mucked]

Try again. [ she'll hold this line. ] Anything but, Steve.