“Guys….you know this isn’t a competition, right?” Clint said, looking up from his book. He was sitting on an armchair between the two smallish sofas Laura called ‘snugglers’ (wives knew the names for these things), each of which was occupied by an Avenger couple. To his left, Pepper was tucked between Tony’s outstretched legs, fiddling with his hair; to his right, Natasha was perched in Bruce’s lap, and smiling at him, which was the Nat equivalent of screaming ‘I love you’ from the rooftops. She almost looked a little – goofy – and Clint suppressed that thought immediately, in case she somehow found out about it and decided to cause him immeasurable pain. There was a movie playing on the tv, but really they were all just sitting around, chatting.
“When I’m around, there’s never any competition,” Tony remarked. Pepper prodded him in the ribs and he squeaked.
“Oh yeah? Go check out the dents in Veronica and you might change your mind,” Bruce countered.
“You wanna go, kiddo? Cause I have a Hulk-proof sparring room in my basement and I swear I will whoop your sweet green ass.”
“I meant the lovey-dovey-ness,” Clint said.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Natasha hooked a leg around Bruce’s waist and pulled him closer.
“Nope, no idea,” Pepper agreed, straddling Tony so his head was within an inch of her breasts. Natasha arched her back and pouted. Pepper tossed her hair.
“You two are as bad as they are.” Clint got up to leave, shaking his head.
“Can’t handle the heat, huh?” Tony called triumphantly after him. “You can’t touch this, Princess Merida!”
“You’d sound a bit more dignified if you weren’t lying helpless underneath your girlfriend right now,” Bruce said.
“Helpless?” Tony snorted. He ran a hand under Pepper’s knee, jerked his body upwards and flipped her, laughing, onto the sofa, leaping up to pin her wrists above her head. “Who’s helpless now?”
Bruce looked at Natasha.
“Don’t try it,” she advised. He shrugged. A moment later he was face-down on the carpet with his hands behind his back and Natasha’s knee pressed against his neck.
“If aggressive-sexy’s what you’re into, Nat beats you all hands down,” Bruce said, his voice only slightly muffled by the carpet.
Tony shook his head. “You’ve never seen Pepper angry.”
“I’ve never seen Pepper deadly,” Bruce corrected. “Not that you’re not gorgeous, of course, Pepper, but I just love the feeling that Nat might rip out my jugular at any moment.” Natasha shoved his head against the floor again.
“Okay then,” Tony said, “I can see we’re going to have to sort this out the hard way. – heh, ‘hard’.” He shifted backwards to sit on the arm of the sofa. “Back on the snuggler, you guys. Three minutes, may the hottest couple win. Aaaaand – go!”
He and Pepper launched themselves at one another and began kissing. Out of the corner of her eye, Pepper saw Bruce and Natasha do the same. Tony nibbled her lip and she made a soft moaning noise, surprised at herself. She ran her hand down his back, took hold of a handful of ass and squeezed, and Tony groaned in return.
Bruce had a hand nestled in Natasha’s hair, and he was pulling her head down to meet his. She stroked his cheek with her fingertips. He reared up, trying to get at her neck, but she dodged adeptly down to sink her teeth into his instead, and he gasped.
Bruce crooned, “Come on, snugglebunny, let me at that pretty little neck of yours.” Natasha tried to arrange her face into its customary ‘I could kill you in a dozen different ways’ expression, but after a few moments she collapsed giggling into his shoulder instead.
Tony’s eyes widened. “Oho, you did not just whip out the snugglebunny! That’s it, Pep, I think we’re beat.”
Pepper caught Natasha’s eye, and grinned. “I can think of a way to settle this…”
“Mud wrestling!” Tony chipped in. “I can get a pit built in – oh, minutes. And there must be some mud around here somewhere, this house is huge. Jarvis, how’s the situation regarding mud?”
“Sir, I regret to tell you that there is a distinct lack of mud in your house. The garden, on the other hand, is amply supplied.”
“No. No mud wrestling,” Nat said. “I think Pepper has something else in mind.”
“A swap,” Pepper supplied. “That way we can compare properly.”
Bruce looked thoughtfully at Tony. “It would have to be a four-way swap, for a true comparison.”
“Hell yeah!” Tony burst out. “There can be only one winner – and it shall be me! Get your face over here, Banner, and prepare to be astounded!”
Bruce laughed. “Oh, be still my beating heart!” He pressed a hand to his forehead in a mock swoon, fluttering his eyelashes
“Don’t keep the poor man waiting,” Pepper urged.
Tony swoopeddown upon Bruce, who breathed, “Take me, Mr Stark! My body is ready!” Suppressing a giggle, he pressed his lips to Bruce’s.
“Pull his hair, Tony,” Natasha advised. “He likes that.” Tony complied, and Bruce’s eyelids fluttered. He tried to protest, but Tony just kissed him harder, muffling the sound.
“If you’re any good at dirty talk, that really gets him going,” Pepper said. Tony broke away from the kiss.
“You’re supposed to be on my side!” he complained. Pepper rolled her eyes.
Bruce dropped a few light kisses on Tony’s neck, murmuring, “Oh, Tony! You glorious chunk of man-meat!” The girls laughed, and, encouraged, he went on: “My loins ache for you, oh virile one!”
“Sounds like Thor,” Natasha said. “C’mon, Tony, you’ve got to up your game here.”
“I’ll give you aching loins all right,” Tony growled, going for Bruce’s neck.
“I can only assume,” said a voice from the doorway, “that this is something – modern.”
For a brief moment, the room went totally silent.
“Steve! Hey, buddy!” Tony swivelled to grin at him. “How would you rate your ability to objectively judge a situation?”
Steve considered the question. “Well, I like to think of myself as fair. I’m subject to the usual human biases, of course, but my capacity for objective reasoning is-“
“That’ll do! Pucker up, star-spangled-boy, we’ve got some assessing for you to do!”
(Fifteen minutes and one rather red-faced Steve later, Natasha won.)
(A few months afterwards, Steve suggested to a group of newly-made acquaintances that they play the common party game, Who Kisses Best. Reactions were mixed but mainly positive.)