Nat's Perfect Day
Days when Nat got to wake up next to Maria were her favorite days, and they were rarer than one might expect. Maria usually got up between 4:30 and 5 in the morning for work, whereas Natasha didn't need to be in until 8, so she woke up at 6:30. Their days off didn't usually align and SHIELD didn't exactly follow the 9-5, 5-days-a-week mentality, so they didn't have weekends off either. Usually when they woke up together, it was because one of them was on mandated leave, and technically, this was one of those times.
Maria's leg had been acting up lately, and she was due for an upgrade anyway, so Fury had been forced to give her time off to get it fixed. He usually wouldn't have been so reluctant, except for the fact Maria's leave just so happened to correspond to the days off Coulson had requested months in advance. Maria stood by the fact that she hadn't purposely planned it that way, but Nat knew that her wife could've gone longer without complaining. It was unlike Maria to take injury leave unless she physically couldn't move. It had been hard for the family to all spend time together since Maria's promotion, because Fury could never spare both her and Phil at the same time. If Maria had aquiesed a bit to quickly to her forced leave just so she could attend Thanksgiving with her family, Natasha sure wasn't going to complain.
Nat snuggled closer to Maria in bed, soaking in her warmth, before finally opening her eyes. They immediately locked onto Maria's blue ones, which were gazing down at her. Maria was smirking, revealing a soft dimple in her left cheek. That smile always took Nat's breath away, because she knew she was one of very few people that had the privilege of seeing it. "Good morning, Sunshine," Maria whispered. Nat smiled back at her, raising her right hand to guide Maria's face towards hers. They kissed softly, before Natasha pulled back and responded.
"Good morning, Masha. Happy Thanksgiving!"
Their blissful bubble popped when a voice called from their kitchen. "I hear voices in there, Natka, Masha! I am very bored and if you do not come and entertain me soon, I will begin to make the stuffings for dinner. And I will be sure to use lots of hot sauce!" Nat rolled her eyes and shared a look with Maria.
"We'll be out in just a few minutes. Have some patience, Lenochka!" Nat grumbled good-naturedly, getting out of bed. She took off her pyjamas and threw on some sweatpants and one of Maria's t-shirts. After giving her wife one last, short kiss, she slipped her feet into some slippers and headed out to entertain her younger sister.
Yelena was lying on the couch in the living room, dressed in a similar way to Natasha. Her blonde hair was still in its two dutch braids that Natasha had done last night, though they were significantly messier. Nat pressed a kiss to the top of her head. "Good morning, sestra. How did you sleep?" Yelena crained her head to look at her big sister.
"Fine. I woke up two hours ago, though, and I am very bored of being quiet." Nat laughed, and turned on some music.
"We can't put any hot sauce in the stuffing, but would you still like to make it?" she asked. Yelena nodded, suddenly shy. It was her first real Thanksgiving. They had had the day off from school when they were in Ohio, but Alexei and Melina had never made the traditional dinner. Yelena had only been living with Nat and Maria for a few months, and this was going to be her first major holiday with them. She had also never been around the whole Coulson family. She had met everyone except for Laura and the kids, who lived too far away, but not all at the same time. Nat could tell that Yelena was overwhelmed.
"Okay, good. Are you ready to start now?" Yelena nodded again, then paused.
"Should we wait for Masha?" she asked.
"I'm just going to be a few more minutes!" Maria yelled from the bathroom, "Go ahead and start the prep without me!" With her permission granted, Yelena took Nat's offered hand and got up off the couch. The two sisters walked over to the kitchen. Yelena turned the faucet on to start washing her hands, but Natasha hip-checked her out of the way.
"Oldest goes first," she teased, sticking her toungue out at her sister. Yelena nudged her back, sticking her hands under the warm water. Nat shoved pushed them away to get her own hands wet. Yelena stole the soap and moved it to her side of the sink so Nat couldn't use it. Nat flicked water at Yelena. Yelena flicked some back. Soon, they were having a splash fight in the kitchen, and both of them were giggling up a storm. They only stopped when Maria cleared her throat behind them. Both sisters looked at her guiltily, but Natasha had a secret smirk on her face. Yelena's shoulders had dropped and her eyes were sparkling again, just what Natasha had hoped for when she started teasing her.
"Ordinarily, I would join you two in whatever contest you were just partaking in, but unfortunately, we are on a tight schedule today, and we need to start the stuffings now." Maria walked past them to the drenched sink, where she too washed her hands. Nat and Yelena shared a look behind her back. 'Partaking?' Yelena mouthed at Natasha with a glimmer in her eye. Nat nodded back, amused as always by her wife's formal speech. Maria had two modes, one where she was completely relaxed and casual, and one, which had been termed Hard-ass Hill by her underlings, where she was formal and organised. Usually at home, Maria was in the first mode, but if she set a task for herself, like making Thanksgiving stuffings, she often would slip partially into the second.
Nat moved past her to the fridge, running a hand along Maria's back as she did so. They had laid out the non-perishable ingredients on the counter last night, and Maria had made it a point to put all the refrigerated ones on the same shelf of the fridge. This made Nat's job easy, as all she had to do was take them out and put them on the counter with the other ingredients. Yelena decided to pull out the mixing bowls, measuring cups, and other equipment they needed for the stuffings, and put them on the center island for convenience. Suddenly she groaned. "I hate this song, Natka. Will you change it?" Nat had put her phone down by the sink before wasjing her hads and had left it there. Before she could say anything, Maria picked up the phone and unlocked it.
"What do you want to listen to, Lena?" she asked. It warmed Natasha's heart to see the two of them getting along. They had belonged to such different parts of her life for so long that she was never sure how they would connect. Maria's help in taking down the Red Room had secured her place in Yelena's affections, however, and Maria had already loved Yelena from the stories Natasha told. There had been some bumps, yes, but overall, the melding of Nat's two worlds had gone very well, and it made her very happy.
While Nat had been lost in her thoughts, the music had been decided on. Yelena was a fan of rock, and luckily both Maria and Natasha liked it too. The sounds of Paramore filled the room as the three of them cooked. With such a big family and with so many different traditions, they were making three types of stuffing. Growing up, Maria's grandmother had always made a stuffing out of cornbread and sausage, and making it with her was one of Maria's most treasured childhood memories. Phil's family had always done one with challah and apples, and it was a nice, sweet, compliment to the otherwise heavy meal. Laura's side of the family took a more traditional approach to stuffing, with regular white breadcrubs and mushrooms. All three stuffings were going to be assembled at Nat and Maria's, and cooked once they got to Phil and Mel's. Even so, it was already 9am and they were supposed to be there at around noon, so they were really starting to get tight on time.
They did manage to finish all three stuffings, and even have time for a few impromptu dance breaks in the middle. They even had time to take quick showers to wash off all of the breadcrumbs before they left. Nat knew this day, even though it wasn't even half over, was going to be engraved in her mind as one of her best days ever.