Chapter Text
Darcy Lewis loved Valentine’s Day. It all started when a five year old Darcy passed out her very first Valentines to her Kindergarten class. Between picking out the Disney character cards, choosing which one to give each classmate (no way could Melissa have Belle, and only Josh could get Prince Eric), attaching the accompanying suckers, and helping her mom sprinkle little red and white hearts on the prettiest pink cupcakes she’d ever seen, Darcy’d been hooked.
When junior high came around she mourned the loss of all inclusive class participation, but rolled with it, spending almost her entire February allowance buying all her friends candy and flower grams. She kept that tradition through high school, the only deviation coming in tenth grade when she started dedicating ten bucks of her V-day budget to send anonymous grams to people she knew probably weren’t gonna get one from anyone else. She thought everyone deserved to feel the love on the one day a year dedicated to it.
College changed things up again. She’d gone mostly with anonymity, leaving boxes of conversation hearts, mini chocolate bars and kid’s style Valentines on random desks as she left class, or the library. There’d been a lot of anti-Valentine’s day propaganda, but there were also girls scrambling to find any date, and crying in the bathrooms. She thought it was all a little much on both sides. Although she did support the girls nights that focused more on celebration and less on V-day hate. Then again, for her the romantic aspect of the holiday had never been the most important. She thought love was awesome in all its forms, and Valentine’s Day was just a day set aside to celebrate that concept. To remind people love was all around, and to appreciate that.
So yeah, Darcy loved Valentine’s Day. It was her holiday. She didn’t care how many people ridiculed, lamented or dissed her day either. Haters gonna hate was her philosophy in life. She liked it and that was all that mattered. Which led to her current happy mood, Valentine’s Day had arrived once again, and she had a group of awesome friends who were like her second family, and not one but two men in her life to share her most favorite day with. Life was good in Darcy’s world.
Whistling a little tune she made her way to the elevator after making her final stop in the Tower. She’d dropped Tony’s gift off first, knowing he was flying out to Malibu to see Pepper later that day. People tended to give Tony expensive things, like a million year old bottle of scotch, aged in an ancient oak barrel made from a sacred tree grown on hallowed ground - something ridiculous like that - or nothing at all. Assuming there wasn’t anything they could offer the billionaire he didn’t have or couldn’t get himself. They never thought to get larger-than-life Tony Stark something normal, which she kind of understood. But still thought it was lame.
The jar of snickers minis were for her friend Tony, though. The guy who gave her a place to live for no real reason, tricked out her Taser even though Son of Coul gave him the “Supreme Stare of Disapproval”, although looking back, that might have actually encouraged him, he was Tony Stark after all. But still. He’d also been the first to openly support her and her boys’ unconventional relationship. Even if there’d been a lot of teasing and inappropriate conjecture involved. Because again, Tony Stark.
Besides, he was always digging through the candy dish on her desk looking for the little chocolate treats, and complaining the few times he couldn’t find any. He would appreciate the gold and red bow topped jar of cheap candy, and the kiddie Hulk valentine she’d propped against it. He showed his love one way, she showed her another, neither one needed acknowledgement. It was what it was.
Her next stop had been Tasha’s and a lot less covert. She knew all her friends would know the gifts were from her, but she still wanted to leave them sort of anonymously. Partly because it was fun for her, but also because she knew none of them were really good with emotions, and things could get awkward. She didn’t want her presents to cause anything more than a smile, even if it was only mental, for her friends. Unfortunately, the reasons for their emotional issues also made them paranoid and untrusting of pretty much everything. Leaving a box at any of their doors unattended and expecting anything good to come of it was just plain stupid. At best it’d get tossed and at worst…she shuddered to think. These people all carried weapons, and more than a few liked to blow perfectly good things up, for no good reason.
Tony had been relatively easy, because only a select few had access to his workshop, and Jarvis monitored it twenty four/seven. He would trust his AI when questioned about the appearance of his gift. Natasha let her guard down a little around the Tower, but not enough to take the word of Tony’s AI as the only thing standing between her and death by poison or something. So she had to settle for knocking on Tasha’s door under the guise of setting up her next self-defense lesson, and pretending the spy didn’t clock her every move as she “snuck” the little red foil wrapped box out of her purse and set it on the coffee table while they chatted. She’d tied the box of dark chocolate raspberry truffles with a black ribbon and a Hawkeye valentine. Tasha and Clint were her real life brOtp.
Bruce and Jane had been the easiest. Neither one even bothered to look up as she strolled into their labs. She’d waved to Maggie, the replacement she’d trained, in Jane’s lab. She knew once Jane came up for non-Science! air, she’d share the chocolate croissants with her assistant. For nostalgia’s sake she also made her a cup of coffee and set it and two Pop-Tarts cut out with a heart shaped cookie cutter on a paper towel, on the safest flat surface in her general vicinity. She left a Thor valentine on top of the pop-tarts.
Unlike Jane, Bruce actually knew she was there, the other guy made him hard to sneak up on, but she knew unless she engaged him, he would continue on as if she wasn’t there. So, she left the box of double fudge brownies and Iron Man valentine on the counter near his electric teapot. He’d get to them eventually. Hulk did not like getting the grumblies.
Darcy grinned as she made her way through headquarters. Most of her special deliveries had been made, and she still had five minutes before her work day officially started. She hummed a little as she arrived at her desk. She got her stuff situated, setting aside the container of heart shaped jam filled shortbread cookies she’d managed to save from Steve and Bucky. She’d had to make them their own batch and threaten a sex strike to make it happen though. Sigh, men. She’d drop them off in the break room as soon as she knew Kristin from Statistics, and Jenna from accounting had made their morning pilgrimage to pilfer coffee from the executive floor’s superior machine. Thank you, Phil for being a crazy caffeine addict, and Tony for always needing to apologize for something, but never wanting to actually say sorry.
The only bad thing about Tony having Baron von Java (she was still trying to get the name to stick) installed in their break room, were those two. Kristin was a gossipy annoyance, and Jenna, that girl needed to keep her eyes off Bucky’s arm and ass. She constantly stared at him, like she wasn’t sure if she was freaked out by, or wanted to fuck the science experiment bad boy - probably both, the freaky little skank. No way either of them, were getting their grubby hands anywhere near her men, or her goddamn cookies. The world wasn’t full of that much love.
Scooping up her last two gifts, she knocked on her boss’ office door. Getting no answer as expected; he had an eight a.m. briefing. She juggled the boxes and entered her code on the keypad, then placed her palm on the reader. Finally, she said her name for voice recognition and made her way into Phil’s inner sanctum.
His office was neat and tidy, with minimal frills and set up for maximum efficiency, much like the man who occupied the space. She placed the box of red velvet cupcakes on his desk, snickering as she leaned the Captain America valentine against it, facing his chair. Steve had rolled his eyes when she’d asked him for his autograph, but indulged her as usual. She hadn’t even had to break out her Disney Princess eyes. Bucky had shaken his head at the whole thing.
Giving a whistle she smiled when it was returned. She put the box of cake pops (she figured the food on sticks thing must be a circus thing) and Black Widow card on top of a file cabinet (her boss loved his hard copies) and winked at the ceiling, or y’know Clint up in the vents. She figured he’d be fine with something locked up in Phil’s office, but this way was even better. Now he could assure Phil it was all good too. Win, win.
All her people taken care of, she sat down to start her actual work for the day. She couldn’t wait to finish off her perfect Valentine’s Day with her boys that night. She had awesome plans.