Natasha realized she was in trouble when Laura single-handedly dragged a small pine tree into their living room. 

“The boy scouts were selling christmas trees in the grocery parking lot!” Laura’s cheeks were bright red, from excitement or the cold Natasha wasn’t sure. “I had to grab one. The whole house will smell like Christmas now!”

Clint came thumping down the stairs and stopped short when he saw the tree taking up their entryway. “Um,” he said, “What’s that?”

Natasha shrugged right as Laura said, “A christmas tree!” Some of her hyper excitement had begun to fade in the face of her partners’ lack of holiday spirit. She didn’t let that deter her though as she barreled onward. “Have the two of you never celebrated Christmas before?”

“When I was like, six,” Clint said simultaneously with Natasha’s, “Christmas in Russia is celebrated in January.”

“Oh,” Laura said, “would you rather do Christmas in January?”

Natasha gave a thought to her fake family memories. “No,” she said, “I’d rather not.”

“Great! We’ll have a big white Christmas then!” Laura began to bodily drag the tree through the house to the living room. “I’ll get this guy set up and then we can decorate!”

Clint came down the stairs to stand next to Natasha and they both watched Laura go. “Uh,” Clint said, turning to Natasha. “Is she gonna want some big thing?”

Natasha shrugged. They’d never done Christmas before, not like this. Last year, they’d spent Thanksgiving meeting Laura’s entire family and Christmas on a deep undercover op. But after the first snowfall had come around their new farmhouse, holiday celebrations were all Laura had been talking about for weeks. 

“It’ll be fine,” Clint said, “Laura won’t go too crazy right.”

Natasha snorted. “Laura? Overboard?” she said sarcastically. “Never.”

-

Maybe Natasha would have an easier time with it if Laura wasn’t trying so hard to be so...accommodating. Yesterday it had been her gently prodding Clint about Christmas traditions when he as a kid until he remembered something (“My mom made cookies...I think we watched the movie with Snoopy?”) and today it entailed her bringing a stack of books from the library that were titled some variation of “Christmas Around the World”. 

Natasha fingered one of the books lightly, grimacing at the smugly smiling children on the cover. 

“Ugh,” she groaned, trying to make it soft so Laura didn’t hear. 

“What’s up?” Laura said.

“You’re trying to figure out how to throw me a Russian Christmas?”

“Yes,” Laura said, “Apparently borscht is an important component.”

Natasha made a face and Laura laughed. 

“I don’t think I even like borscht,” Natasha said. “I can’t remember the last time I ate it.”

“I’m going to try to make it, it seems like a challenge,” said Laura. “We’re going to have borscht and cookies and do puzzles in front of the tree.”

Natasha swallowed. That wasn’t a lot, in theory, but all together sounded overwhelming. “Where’s Clint?”

“Outside, I think. Why?” 

“I have a question for him, be right back,” Natasha said and then bolted out of the house. 

 “Clint!” she called as soon as she cleared the front door. 

“Up here!” she heard in response and she climbed the ladder leaning on the side of the house up to where Clint was methodically sorting through plastic bins. 

“I thought you were escaping the house,” Natasha said.

“Sort of. But I did tell Laura I’d hang Christmas lights.” Clint examined the lights and the hooks he was using curiously. “What’s up?”

Natasha sat down on the roof, which was luckily free of snow. “It’s weird right? It’s not just me.”

“No it’s not just you.” Clint set the lights down and came to sit next to her. “It’s bizarre to be celebrating Christmas.”

He looked at her expectantly, like he thought she’d follow up his statement with some other observation, but instead she turned away and stared out over the brown fields. 

“At least it won’t be crazy, like Thanksgiving,” Clint said finally. Natasha’s mouth quirked up at the thought. Thanksgiving was with all of Laura’s extended family, plus whatever friend didn’t have a meal to go to. There’d been thirty people crammed into the house this year, all of them chattering and talking all over each other. It had been the absolute best kind of chaos. Clint had hated it. 

“I think it’ll be nice, just us,” Natasha said, knocking her leg gently against Clint’s. 

There was a clatter on the ladder and Laura’s head poked up over the edge of the roof. “I knew you two were hiding from me.” She scowled, but there was no real anger behind it. “You thought if you hid up here you could escape the Christmas spirit?”

“A little, yeah,” Natasha said.  Laura shoved her way between the two of them, forcing them to scoot along the roof. 

“Joke’s on you, you can never escape the Christmas spirit. It appears as soon as Halloween ends and hangs around until Valentine’s day.” She leaned back on her hands and crossed her ankles together, forcing herself to look relaxed. The three of them stared out across the fields in silence. 

“I know you guys don’t do Christmas,” Laura said, suddenly, “and I really don’t want to go overboard and make it uncomfortable for you. I’m just...so excited to have my own home and host my own Christmas for the first time.”

“We could tell,” Clint said jokingly, stretching over to squeeze Laura’s knee. 

The three of them sat in silence for a while longer. 

“What if we watched Christmas movies at some point?” Clint said. 

“What?” asked Laura.

“Like the snoopy one? Or Die Hard?”

“You said there’d be cookies and puzzles in front of the tree?” Natasha said.

Clint perked up. “Cookies?” he said.

“On Christmas Eve, with hot chocolate and eggnog. And then presents Christmas morning.”

Clint glanced over at Natasha. “That doesn’t sound so bad,” he said.

“No,” Natasha said with a smile. “No, it doesn’t.”