After being dragged away from the lab, Natasha and Eleanor decided to nap for an hour or so. They had left at nighttime before going to Sokovia, where it was the morning at arrival time, and now it was early morning back in New York. So, all of the Avengers definitely needed some rest.

Flopping into bed, they fell asleep in each other's hold and woke up feeling a lot more refreshed than before, so with a pep in their step, they made their way down to the kitchen to make some lunch.

"Your usual?", Eleanor asked as Natasha placed herself on one of the kitchen stools. She never really needed to ask, Nat was a creature of habit and had her favourite lunch every day. A peanut butter sandwich.

"Yes please", Natasha sounded rather chipper, even after years of being together, and how she had the same lunch 365-days a year, she loved the fact that someone could anticipate her needs. Eleanor noticed how Nat's mood would increase when she asked if she wanted her usual instead of just getting on with it and making it. It was the small things in life that caused the most happiness.

She watched fondly as Eleanor made the two sandwiches and gently placed Natasha's plate in front of her, before hopping up onto the counter right next to her. "Do you have to practically sit on my sandwich?", she laughed and took a bite.

Eleanor shrugged as she began inhaling her own sandwich, "Your sandwich is fine. Anyway, what are you wearing on Saturday?". Tony's farewell party to Thor mixed with celebrations of finding the Sceptre was in two days. Stark found any excuse to throw a giant party, they had already had multiple in the time that they had lived at the tower, so the two always made sure to have clothes suitable for a party hanging around.

"Probably a white blouse with that new skirt I got, what about you?".

Eleanor smiled as she pictured the ensemble, it would look great. "You'll look dashing my love", she exaggerated her English accent making Natasha roll her eyes.

"Answer the question".

"Probably that navy jumpsuit I got ages ago, the one I was going to wear to Colleen's outdoor baby shower but there was that storm so she cancelled and I said that she should still have had it because then it would have been an actual shower?".

Natasha blinked quickly a few times as she took in everything that Eleanor had said as she had spoken unbelievably fast, "Yes".

"Yeah, thought I might as well wear it to something as it's been sat sadly in the closet for a while". Nat hummed in agreement as she took a sip of water, but spat it all over the counter when Eleanor added on, "Much like I was".

Both women started laughing at the conversation and how Nat was frantically trying to wipe the side down with a cloth. Steve had walked into the kitchen to get himself a snack, but at seeing Eleanor almost falling off of the counter whilst wheezing, and Natasha shouting about how the cloth isn't absorbent enough, he just decided to let them be.

---

Saturday soon rolled around, and the Stark party was in full swing. Natasha and Eleanor couldn't see it, but they could most certainly hear it, even though it was a few floors up.

The music was blasting and the hum of muffled voices rang through the top quarter of the building. The pair wasn't a fan of these giant parties that Tony frequently held, they much preferred when it was a small gathering of close friends, but it was Stark so they expected nothing less.

"You ready to go?", Natasha walked over to Eleanor who was quickly flattening her hair down in the mirror after straightening it.

"I thiiink so, though I would rather not willingly get the headache of a lifetime". Natasha chuckled and agreed before linking their arms together and guiding them over to the elevator.

Whilst ascending they could hear the thumping of the music getting louder and louder until the vibrations from the bass could be heard, and when the door opened they could see one hell of a party.

There were multiple layers on this floor and each one of them was filled with people engaged in conversation, some already drunk. Natasha looked a bit disappointed that there was already a crowd of people around the pool table which likely meant that they wouldn't get to have a go, so continued forward through the mass of people.

They mingled for a little while, some of the people around were important around the city so they wanted to keep the good connections.

Networking. Something that Eleanor hated with a passion. She didn't want to talk to people that she had no interest in just to keep them interested in the group. But still, she engaged in the tedious initial conversations with some of the important people.

They then moved on to some of the people that they had met at previous Stark parties with whom they usually had fun conversations. Eleanor's attention was completely on an old man telling her about the new group of ducklings that he had adopted along with the mother and she was listening with a big smile on her face for twenty minutes.

After twenty minutes of duckling stories, Natasha just wanted to get a drink. She had to physically drag Eleanor away from the man after explaining that they were needed elsewhere, and guided her now pouting wife over to the bar to grab a beer each.

"I wanted to hear more about the ducks", Eleanor huffed before taking a sip of her beverage.

"El... It was twenty fucking minutes, I thought I was going crazy", Nat deadpanned as she scouted the area, but before she spotted something interesting Rhodey came up to the pair. They cheerfully greeted him, it had been around four years since they had last spoken to him so there was a lot to catch up on.

They made their way over to some couches in the middle of the room and chatted for a while about anything. Rhodey had been explaining the work that he had done over the last few years and was very interested in hearing about some of the work that Nat and Eleanor had been doing since 2011.

Because of the SHIELD files being leaked online, they could talk about some of their missions more freely and some of the stories were great.

Natasha was chuckling as she told the story of a mission in Romania that had been just her and Eleanor, and how when chasing a target through a warehouse Eleanor tried to Tarzan across a gap between two balcony areas. However, the chain snapped and she ended up getting stuck on a moving conveyor belt whilst Nat had to continue chasing after the target.

Rhodey laughed, Eleanor did not. That had been her most embarrassing mission story, so she crossed her arms and leaned back into the couch as she allowed Natasha to continue speaking.

After a few more minutes Natasha looked at the bar to see that there was no bartender, she didn't know what had happened to the other one but decided that she should probably step in as she was quite a talented drinks mixer.

"I think I've embarrassed her enough for one night", Nat chuckled and gestured towards Eleanor with her head, "I'm gonna go mix some drinks". She bid farewell to the two and told Eleanor to come and find her soon.

She nodded and continued talking to Rhodey, and also tried to get revenge on Natasha, telling him of the time when the two were once again chasing a target down but this time Eleanor had to continue the pursuit as Natasha placed her foot into a giant pothole filled with water. It had looked like a puddle so she ran over it with force but ended up body slamming the ground when her foot sunk into it.

The way that Rhodey laughed at Natasha's misfortune told Eleanor that she had completed her task well, and so went over to find her.

She caught sight of her mixing drinks for others who came up to the bar, and she seemed to be having a nice time. There was a calming aura around Nat as she completed the tasks at the bar, so of course, Eleanor needed to disturb the peace.

Nat poured herself a red cocktail as she saw her wife approaching, Eleanor thought it looked like a vodka cranberry but wasn't too sure.

As she sat she cleared her throat before launching into a joke, "How'd a nice girl like you wind up working in a dump like this?".

Nat smirked and looked down briefly to prepare for her rebuttal, "Wife done me wrong".

Nat poured a drink for Eleanor as well and pushed it towards her, which was gratefully accepted. Natasha made good drinks. "Well, your wife sounds like a real ass".

"Oh, she is", Natasha replied all too quickly in Eleanor's opinion, who had now narrowed her eyes as she bit back a smile.

"So, where is she now?".

"Probably doing something stupid, she has a knack for that". Just as Eleanor opened her mouth to protest Natasha continued, "I can count the number of times that she takes things seriously on one hand", she raised her arm to outstretch her hand to prove her point, before pushing Eleanor's face away with it.

"Oh yeah, because you're so serious yourself?", Eleanor laughed whilst rubbing her cheek.

Nat shrugged and turned around to tidy up, leaving Eleanor to sit anticipating her response, it was killing her. When Nat eventually did turn around she wore a giant smirk at seeing that she had affected Eleanor in the way that she wanted to. But she put a neutral expression on her features again and shrugged, "She's a bad influence".

With that she walked away and up the stairs to a higher level, swaying her hips knowing that Eleanor would follow. "Hey, what do you mean bad influence?", she half-yelled as she ran after Natasha up the stairs.

She caught up with her at the top and was about to talk again but Natasha cut her off, "Oh hey honey, was just looking for you, I just had an interesting conversation with a very gorgeous woman at the bar".

"More gorgeous than me?", Eleanor played along and put on a confident front. But her front faltered when Natasha looked her up and down with an eyebrow quirked.

"Hmm, I'd say so".

Eleanor's jaw dropped with a smile mixed into it, "Why you little-", she started when Nat started chuckling.

"Hey you two, I've been looking around for you all night! Desperately need a break from all of this testosterone", Maria walked up to them and gestured behind her with her thumb. She was right, this party had been pretty dominated by males.

Even the upstairs place was filled with old businessmen and donors, it was very easy to count the number of women there. A couple of the women that were in attendance were by the sides of some of the older guys all night so she suspected that some of the couples had used this party as a chance to socialise without risk of being seen by a spouse. Eleanor didn't have an opinion on it, she just shrugged and had the 'you do you' attitude.

"Yeah, not exactly my crowd", Eleanor chimed in while Natasha hummed in agreement as she took in the sight of the upper floor. This level was crowded but wasn't nearly as busy as the lower floor. Which made sense, the bar was on the lower floor so people who are having drinks aren't going to be too enthusiastic about walking up and down the stairs. Sounded like an accident waiting to happen.

The three women sat on a bench near the stairs and settled into a nice conversation. Although they worked in the same place, they didn't see each other as much as they had done at SHIELD, their jobs didn't cross over as much. Maria was busy with more office work whilst Eleanor and Natasha had a lot of fieldwork and then their spare time was resting due to exhaustion and injuries. Though Maria was offered clearance to visit the Avengers floors at any time so she did try and visit them as often as she could.

However, they only got a few minutes of catching up in before Tony was yelling at them to come down the stairs. The party was over aside from a few passed-out guests that they didn't have the heart to move knowing that a monster headache would kick in.

The Avengers' after-parties consisted of just them seated around a table and talking with some drinks, and that night was no different.

They made their way downstairs to the middle level and took a seat on one of the couches. Having walked in on a conversation they didn't really know what was going on, but Clint was rolling a drumstick around between his fingers, which left only one question in Eleanor's mind as the conversation carried on.

Where the hell did Clint get a drumstick, and where could she get one?