Chapter Text
After two-and-a-half years training to be a SHIELD agent and two years dating Melinda May, Phil Coulson knew to expect the unexpected. He rarely let anything faze him anymore- fancy new gadgets that could expand into a reflective barrier and conceal the user from the human eye, or crack any lock, or scan someone’s retinas, or any number of weird things, had become standard for him. He didn’t blink when he was taught what was really in Area 51 (though he spent several hours researching the topic later), and when his tiny Asian girlfriend took down yet another huge (huge) senior cadet without breaking a sweat he wasn’t remotely shocked. It was all part of what he had signed up for, and he was learning to roll with the punches.
Fury appreciated that in him- Phil could walk into a truly bizarre situation, blink, get his bearings, and walk out with all the relevant information. The strange and unusual were SHIELD’s purview, and Phil was becoming very comfortable with them.
None of that prepared him to open his door at 2:30 a.m. on a stormy Wednesday morning to find Melinda May, dripping wet and panting in a tank top and shorts. Phil rubbed his eyes. She was still there when his hands dropped from his face.
“Melinda-? How did you-?” He poked his head out his door to glance up and down the hall; May wasn’t supposed to be in the men’s dorms at all, let alone on his floor. “Did you run here?” In the dark it was impossible to make out her expression, but her chest was heaving. Phil glanced back into his room to make sure Garrett was still sleeping soundly, and grimaced at his snoring. He turned back to Melinda when he heard her teeth rattling, and frowned when he rubbed her shoulder and found it was ice cold.
“Melinda, what’s going on?” he whispered as he pulled his SHIELD-issued jacket off a hook. He threw it around her shoulders.
“This is it for you, right?” Phil froze in the middle of tucking the jacket closed under her chin. The dim light from his alarm clock reflected off Melinda’s eyes looking up into his, but he still couldn’t read her expression. “We’re it?”
Phil’s chest grew tight. He hadn’t felt anything off between them lately; if anything, their relationship had been growing deeper since they had started taking short field assignments. Being without each other for any length of time had proven they were at their best together, and what more could he ask from a relationship? He couldn’t think of anything, but maybe May could.
“What are you saying?” he asked, his hands still tight on the jacket, unwilling to let her slip away.
“It’s us, together, forever, right?” There was something desperately hopeful in her voice he hadn’t registered when she had first spoken, and for a second he was just relieved she didn’t seem to be breaking up with him. Then he realized she hadn’t just been talking; she had asked him a question.
“Yes,” he said without a trace of a doubt, and slid his hands up to her face. Her dark eyes didn’t leave his as he stepped closer. “This is it for me.”
He saw her for the first time at orientation. Everyone saw her- she was gorgeous, and based on the whispers flying around the hall, the name ‘May’ was a famous one in the intelligence community. But Phil was in the ‘C’s and she was in the ‘M’s, and even if they hadn’t been in alphabetical order Phil got the impression she would have had a lingering crowd around her no matter what.
She smiled wickedly at the first cadet to flirt with her, and after that, wherever she went, every man in the room was tripping over himself to catch her attention. In an academy where everyone was training to be spies, gossip flew around the school in less than two days- she was Lian May’s daughter, old friends with Peggy Carter, only 17, hadn’t even graduated high school before her mother had conned her into the academy.
When Phil had been recruited six months before term started at the academy, Fury had told him he was one of the youngest to attend in academy history. Most recruits outside the SciTech academy had a degree by the time they joined, Fury had told him. To join at 20 with half a history degree was almost unheard of.
Phil didn’t like to believe rumors, but he thought if May was really 17, she was either some kind of prodigy or her mother really had pulled in some favors.
Everyone was waiting for her to fail, to prove she didn’t deserve to be here, or it seemed like everyone. Her suitemates, Victoria Hand and Maria Hill, didn’t seem too concerned with the rumors, and Phil himself tried to keep his nose out of what he didn’t see as his business. But it seemed like everywhere she turned, someone was either trying to flirt with her or trying to trip her up, and Phil would have felt sorry for her if she hadn’t seemed entirely unaffected by it all. She shot down every poor sap in a way that made them think they had gotten somewhere, and she answered every false smile with a dangerous glare. Within a week, she had a reputation, and no one had even gotten to know her yet.
The first class Phil had with her was Introduction to Hand-to-Hand Combat. They were joined by about 40 other classmates, most of them men, and most of them over six feet tall. After thirty minutes, May was called forward to demonstrate the move they had been drilling, and Phil heard several snickers as she wove her way through everyone. The instructor asked for a volunteer, and Phil raised his hand before he knew what he was doing. He hadn’t liked the dark gleam that had appeared in the other cadets’ eyes when they were given the chance to pummel Melinda May into the ground.
“I’ll go,” he called, and the instructor waved him forward.
May faced him with an inscrutable look, and Phil nodded awkwardly. He had never realized how very tiny she was; out of her normal boots she was at least five inches shorter than him. This was ridiculous, he couldn’t fight her, his mother had raised a gentleman, not a jerk who slammed small women to the ground. Even if that was the exercise.
“Um,” he said, half-raising his hands into a defensive position, “hi.” Her flat expression twitched. “I’m Phil.” She tilted her head and glanced at the instructor, who nodded. “How exactly are we supposed to-”
The floor was the ceiling, her shoulder was digging into his stomach, and then she was pinning him to the ground. For a second all Phil could do was stare up at her, but he only realized he was gawking when she pursed her lips.
“Wow,” he said, because it was the only word that came to mind. “Okay.” The hard look in her eyes cleared into something like confusion. “That was- can I get up?” Definitely confusion. She frowned down at him for a moment before jerking his arms up into a stress position.
“Don’t go easy on me,” she said, as if she had read his thoughts earlier. Phil pressed his lips together, trying not to show the strain.
“Yes, ma’am,” he grunted, and a smile flickered across her face. She let him sweat another second before rising fluidly off his chest and giving him a hand up. He followed her off the mat, and she stayed with him for the rest of class.
Somehow, in his first six months at the academy, Phil found himself becoming best friends with the most popular girl in his class.
Once Melinda- she started as May, but quickly became Melinda- had proven herself to be more than capable, the legacy rumors had petered out. Suddenly everyone wanted to be her friend, wanted her at their table in the cafeteria, wanted her as their partner on a project. And Melinda wasn’t rude, but she mostly kept to herself and her suitemates. And Phil.
Phil and Melinda became each other’s study dates, sparring partners, and late-night existential crisis confidants. Phil learned her favorite foods, her least favorite classmates, and that she got up at an ungodly hour every morning. He helped her with history and she drilled him in hand-to-hand; he watched movies with her, Maria, and Vic, and during exam season he frequently woke up in their suite, his face stuck to a textbook. When her mother went missing on assignment, Phil wrapped her in a blanket on her couch and sat with her through the night, waiting for news. On the anniversary of his dad’s death, May watched all the old Captain America cartoons he wanted and held his hand under the table during class.
Neither of them remembered deciding to become friends, they just did, and Phil had never felt more at ease with anyone.
On his 21st birthday, he planned to sneak her into a bar to celebrate, but Vic caught wind of it and threatened to tie Melinda to the roof if they tried. Melinda complained and called Vic a killjoy, and Vic stole some rope from the gym, so Phil gave Melinda a helpless shrug and let Maria and Garrett, who had both joined at the more standard age of 22, take him out for drinks. Garrett disappeared with some blonde about fifteen minutes into the ‘celebration’, leaving Maria to tease Phil for the ridiculous face he made at his first shot of vodka.
“Have you seriously never had vodka?” she asked after knocking back her own shot. Phil glared at her through his coughs and she grinned. “I kinda wish May could see this, she’d fall over laughing.”
“She would not,” Phil said, shaking his head when the bartender approached them again. The remnants of his shot were still burning the back of his throat. “Unlike you, Melinda is nice to me.” Maria rolled her eyes.
“When are you going to come out with it, Phil?” she asked, and gave his confusion an unimpressed grimace. “Vic and I know you’re dating, you don’t have to hide it.” Phil burst into renewed coughs and Maria slapped him on the back, looking genuinely concerned. “Are you- could he have some water, please? Breathe, Phil-”
“We’re- not- Melinda and I-”
“Calm down,” Maria said, and shoved a glass of water into his hands. “Come on, drink- geez, what was that about? You can’t seriously think it’s a secret?”
“Melinda and I aren’t together,” Phil said, gasping. “We’re not- why would you think-?” Maria frowned at him, looking almost alarmed.
“Are you serious? You really don’t- this is ridiculous.” She flagged the bartender down and he gave her another shot. She gulped it down before continuing. “You’re practically married, all that’s left is to move in together.”
Phil’s brain had short-circuited at some point, and he watched her with his mouth gaping. Maria shook his shoulders. “Phil! Are you listening to me? May likes you! And everyone knows you like her-”
“Whoa, hey, no I don’t,” Phil protested, and even to his own ears he sounded way too defensive. “Melinda’s great, but she’s my best friend. And she’s 17, it wouldn’t be-”
“She’s turning 18 next month.”
It was absurd how easily it all came to the surface.
As if a lock had been flicked open, Phil’s mind completely reevaluated everything he thought he felt for Melinda, and he was caught up in a whirl of all the feelings he hadn’t let himself acknowledge.
He hadn’t wanted to fall in love with her for fear it would wreck their friendship, and her age had been the barrier he had constructed to keep his attraction and affection at bay, despite the fact they were less than four years apart. But that barrier was gone, leaving everything to spill out.
Maria got another shot and just sipped on it, watching Phil with detached interest as he went through a mini-existential crisis. “You get it?” Phil looked at her with wide eyes.
“I’m in trouble.”
For weeks, he saw his feelings as a problem he had to solve, and became jumpy around Melinda for reasons he refused to explain until she confronted him in the library the night before her birthday.
“What’s going on, Phil?” she demanded in a hiss. Not even Melinda was willing to cross the librarian. “And don’t tell me it’s nothing; you and Maria have both been acting weird since your birthday.” Phil looked up at her and deflated; he knew not to bother lying. She would see straight through him.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’ll deal with it, I promise.”
“Deal with what?” She was leaning over his table and her face was less than a foot from his, and he almost told her she was beautiful when she was angry. But he didn’t have a death wish.
“My feelings,” he mumbled, and a part of him hoped she wouldn’t hear him.
“Your feelings?” She looked absolutely crushed but it quickly masked over, and Phil cursed himself. Of course she didn’t feel the same way. “For Maria?”
“For- what? No, I’m not- why would you think-?”
“Like I said, you’ve both been acting weird.” She straightened away from him and crossed her arms defensively, looking down at the floor. “I thought maybe you were dating or something.”
“We’re not,” Phil said on autopilot. He could not make heads or tails of Melinda’s behavior, and his confusion deepened when she looked back up at him with a shy expression.
“Then what feelings?” she asked softly, and he swallowed.
“My feelings for you,” he admitted quietly. “It’s completely unfair to you, and I’m sorry. I promise I’ll work it out.”
“What-?”
“You are the most important person in the world to me,” Phil said in a rush. “And I don’t want to mess up our friendship. Forget I said anything.” Melinda tilted her head and gave him the same undecipherable look she had given him when they first sparred, as if she were trying to figure out his motives.
“Is it because I’m 17?” she asked, and he sagged. “Is that why you’re so uncomfortable?”
“That, and we’ll be working together hopefully our entire careers,” Phil said. “But, like I said, I’ll deal with it. Don’t worry about me.” Melinda opened her mouth, but he cut her off. “I’ll see you in the morning.” She stared at him for a minute and eventually took a breath as if she were about to say something, but in the end she just turned and strode out of the room. It took all of Phil’s strength not to watch her leave.
He didn’t mean to fall asleep in the library, but he knew Garrett would notice his gloom and needle him endlessly, so Phil just worked later and later until someone cleared their throat and he startled awake.
“Have you been here all night?” Phil blinked.
“Uh… I guess so.” Melinda crossed her arms and leaned all her weight onto one leg, jutting her hip out. She raised her eyebrows. Phil blinked owlishly up at her, still lying on his notes.
“Get up, Phil.” It didn’t occur to him to disobey. He rubbed his face and blinked, hard, to shake the sleep away, and got to his feet. Melinda took a step to the side so the table wasn’t between them.
“I’m 18, now, Phil.”
“... what?” He remembered their conversation vividly, but he instantly dismissed the idea that she meant what he thought she meant. He had misunderstood everything so far, and he didn’t intend to make any more assumptions.
Melinda rolled her eyes, and before Phil could comprehend what was happening she grabbed his shirt and yanked him down into a kiss.
It wasn’t real it wasn’t real it wasn’t real- but if it wasn’t real, there was no harm in playing along, right? Phil didn’t try to rationalize it further; he wrapped his hands around Melinda’s waist and she slid her arms up around his neck. Her lips were soft against his and she sank deeper and deeper into the kiss, to the point he was practically holding her up, pressed flush against him. It was the exact opposite of anything he’d ever thought she would do, and he realized with a start that his best friend was really kissing him.
He froze, and she broke away. She gave him a hard look, as if she were daring him to deny his feelings now. But behind the defensiveness, there was fear, too, and Phil tightened his grip on her waist.
“Wow,” he said, but her expression didn’t change. Phil leaned his forehead down to hers and she stared up into his eyes. Somehow, she still feared rejection, and Phil’s heart swooped as it hit him again- this was real, Melinda was in his arms, and she wanted to stay there. “Okay.” She cocked an eyebrow in an unimpressed look, but her shoulders relaxed.
“‘Okay’?” she said. He traced a finger over her cheek, and she somehow managed to look offended as she melted into his touch. “I kiss you and you say ‘okay’?” Phil grinned.
“You kissed me.” For the first time in Phil’s memory, Melinda tried and failed to roll her eyes. She smiled.
“Yes I did,” she said, and she sounded almost giddy. “Should I do it again?” Phil tilted his head so their noses brushed together.
“Mm-hmm,” was his only reply before he sealed his lips to hers. She gasped a little before she smiled against his lips, fingernails raking over his scalp.
In between threading his fingers through Melinda’s hair to cup the back of her head and hauling her behind a shelf to avoid the librarian, Phil decided to pay special attention to Melinda’s birthday for as many years as she’d let him.
Phil kissed her softly and stroked his thumb over her cheek. She shivered, but it had nothing to do with being dripping wet in the freezing hallway.
“What brought this on?” he asked, and her hands snaked out of his jacket to grab his wrists. “Melinda-”
“Say it again,” she said, and Phil frowned down at her but complied.
“This is it for me,” he said. “I love you, and this is it for me.” She stared up at him, taking deep breaths as if she were gathering her courage. Phil kept one hand on her cheek and swept her bangs off her face with the other, waiting for an explanation.
“Then let’s get married.”
He wasn’t hard to convince, once he was certain she wasn’t joking or delirious.
“I want to marry you because I love you,” Melinda said firmly, and Phil believed her. “And because we work well together, and I want to spend my life with you.” Phil grinned and rested his forehead on hers.
“Sounds like you’ve thought about this,” he teased, but he didn’t feel her facial muscles morph into a smile. She was completely serious, and his heart skipped a beat. Phil kissed her; he couldn’t help himself.
“I think that would be amazing. And perfect. And- just- really great,” he said, and kissed her again. She smiled against his lips.
“Yeah?” she said, and her cheeks lifted under his hands as she grinned.
“Yeah,” Phil said. “I love you, too, and I want a life with you. Let’s do it.”
“Twenty minutes. Meet me out front. Bring enough for two days.” Phil blinked.
“What- you wanna do this now?” Melinda nodded.
“You pack. I’ll call a taxi and get us tickets.”
“Tickets? Tickets to where?” Melinda pressed a giddy kiss to his lips and he almost forgot his question.
“Vegas.” She left without another word, still with his jacket hanging around her shoulders. Phil stared after her for twenty seconds before he turned and darted to his wardrobe.
It took him eight minutes to throw everything he needed into a bag, and three more minutes to dig a small box out of his sock drawer where he had hidden it two months earlier. He didn’t bother leaving a note for Garrett or anyone else; he trusted Melinda to tell Vic and Maria what they needed to know. He barely managed to remember to throw some clothes on that weren’t boxers and an old t-shirt before he slipped out of his room, shutting the door carefully behind him before sprinting down the hall.
Melinda was waiting on the edge of campus when he ran out of his dorm with an umbrella.
“I got us a flight, departs in two hours,” she yelled over the rain as Phil approached. “It’s cutting it close, but-” Phil pulled her under his umbrella and kissed her again. They stumbled back against the taxi and the driver twisted in his seat.
“Can’t you wait ten seconds?” he barked. “Get in the cab!”
It took an hour to get to the airport, and after that it was a mad dash to get through security and to their gate in time. They were among the last to board, and once Phil stowed their bags and prodded Melinda into buckling up, Melinda latched onto his arm, pillowed her head on his shoulder, and promptly fell asleep. Phil smiled and kissed her head.
Melinda slept for most of the flight. Apparently all the adrenaline of their impending impulsive marriage had worn off, and after a few hours Phil found himself nodding off, too.
Las Vegas was hot, even in the early morning, and Phil and Melinda blinked in the sunlight outside the airport. Melinda laced her fingers through Phil’s and tugged him towards a line of buses.
“So what’s the plan?” Phil asked as the bus took them into the city. Melinda hadn’t let go of his hand.
“Hotel,” she said. “Showers. Wedding chapel.” Phil nodded. They held eye contact for about five seconds before neither of them could keep from grinning. The bus was mostly empty and they were in the back anyway, so Phil slipped his hands around Melinda’s waist as she wrapped her arms around his neck. They didn’t normally like public displays of affection, but it was their wedding day, Phil thought, they had the right. But he did break away before they progressed to a full make-out session in the back of a bus.
“What about rings?” he asked, and swiped an errant hair off her face. She was gorgeous, and smart and deadly and perfect- what had he done to deserve this?
Melinda shrugged. “They sell them at the wedding chapel,” she said. “Do you want to wear rings?” Phil nodded, and despite the fact it was probably worse than making out, pulled Melinda into his lap so they weren’t twisted awkwardly to hold each other in the bus seats. Melinda slung her arms around his shoulders and crossed her ankles. “Me, too. Silver.” Phil nodded again. “Anything else you think we should do?” Phil wrapped his arms more securely around her waist and pretended to consider.
“There is one thing.” His bag was at his feet, and Melinda lifted it into her chair for him. He yanked it open with one hand and unzipped an inner pocket. “Just so everyone knows you’re taken. Can’t risk someone sweeping you off your feet.” Melinda rolled her eyes, but she was smiling.
“If all goes according to plan, we’ll be married in about three hours.” Phil narrowed his eyes as if he were mulling it over, then shook his head.
“Like I said, can’t risk it.”
“Phil, what-?” Phil pulled the box out of his bag, and her eyes widened. Her linked fingers slackened around his shoulder.
“I wasn’t planning on giving this to you until we finished our first mission as agents, but lucky for you, I’m always prepared.” Phil opened the box with one hand, and Melinda’s breath caught.
It wasn’t a very extravagant ring- in fact, it was pretty subdued. He had wanted something she could wear all the time, so instead of one big diamond, he had selected a silver ring with three smaller diamonds in a row.
Melinda said nothing, and Phil’s heart rate skyrocketed as he realized he must have made a mistake- she didn’t like it-
Then Melinda was kissing him, and Phil snapped the box shut to make sure the ring didn’t roll away somewhere before he kissed her back.
“I love you,” Melinda mumbled against his mouth, and Phil grinned. She smacked his shoulder but kept kissing him until she pulled back for air. Phil smiled at her, slightly stunned.
“You like it, then?” he asked. Melinda wrapped her arms more around his neck and nestled her head between her arm and his cheek. Phil stroked one hand up and down her spine.
“You wanted to marry me already.” Her voice was muffled, and Phil kissed the side of her head.
“Yep. That was the plan.” Phil held her until they were almost to the bus stop. Melinda seemed content to sit in his arms in silence, expressing her affection in the way she was most comfortable. Phil thought of having Melinda every day for the rest of his life- Melinda and her habitual silence, her smile, her teasing, the way she could give him a look and his life would flash before his eyes. The idea put a giddy grin on his face.
“Do you want to try it on?” he asked eventually, holding up the ringbox. Melinda sat up on his lap. “Vic got me your ring size- don’t ask me how- so it should fit.” Melinda held up her left hand, and Phil slid the ring onto her finger. Melinda stared down at it for a moment, twisted it a few times with her thumb, then abruptly crashed her lips to Phil’s.
“I like it,” she mumbled, clutching the lapels of his jacket, and Phil smiled into the kiss.
The hotel they could afford wasn’t exactly luxurious, but it was clean, the shower had good water pressure, and the bed was very soft, which Phil tried not to think about too much while he waited for Melinda to finish showering. He also tried not to think about her showering. It was a losing battle, but he made a valiant effort.
They were going to get married. Melinda May wanted to marry him. A goofy grin spread across his face.
He expected doubts, or at least jitters, but there were none. He was nervous, to be sure, but not at the thought of spending his life with Melinda. She had decided to choose him, and he knew he would gladly do anything to make her happy. But there was the question of whether he could, whether he would make a good husband, whether they could continue to make this work through a career in SHIELD. If he had to choose between Melinda and SHIELD, what would he pick?
He knew before he even finished the question. Yes, he had worked for years to be a part of SHIELD, but SHIELD wouldn’t be his life forever, and he knew Melinda would. Besides, before Fury and the Academy and a whole world of secrets and adventure, everyone had thought he would make a pretty good teacher. There was always that if he had to leave SHIELD.
Phil heard the shower shut off and the curtain swish open, and he abruptly launched himself into a whirl of thoughts to keep from imagining what Melinda was doing.
Melinda Melinda Melinda. They were going to get married. In a few hours they would be married, and they would come back to this room with its soft bed and-
Phil gulped. He wasn’t helping himself. In the bathroom, Melinda turned on the hotel hairdryer, and Phil took a deep breath, trying not to sweat. He only had the one nice shirt.
Melinda hadn’t shown him what she would be wearing, but it was difficult to imagine her in white or anything close to it. Purple, maybe, if she didn’t want to wear black, but nothing lighter. Phil didn’t really care what she walked out in- she always managed to take his breath away- but part of him hoped she would wear a dress, even a black dress. He had never seen her in anything but jeans or slacks, or her skintight operations suit.
Phil tapped out a nervous rhythm on his thighs. Melinda turned off the hairdryer and he heard her unzip something, possibly her makeup bag. Phil felt like he was about to explode, but Melinda never took long with makeup. He had watched her apply it, once, and the speed and precision of her brushes had been astounding.
With absolutely no warning that Phil heard- there might have been footsteps, but the blood rushing in his ears drowned them out- the bathroom door swung open, and there she was.
She was beautiful. Her hair flowed down her shoulders in waves, and her dress-
“You’re wearing white,” Phil croaked. “You’re- you look- wow.” Melinda smirked and strode past him to her bag. Phil opened his mouth, but Melinda cut him off.
“If you say ‘okay’, I will tie you up in the shower curtain.” Phil shut his mouth with a click and watched from the bed as Melinda pulled on a pair of white sandals. She straightened, and her dress flared out as she spun to face him. Phil grinned.
“This is definitely in a league way beyond ‘okay’,” he agreed, and her lips twitched into a smile. She stepped up to the bed to stand between his legs, and Phil rested his hands on her hips. She raked her fingers through his hair a few times, parting it this way and that, then cupped his face and stroked her thumbs over his cheekbones.
“You ready?” she asked, leaning down towards his lips. Her nose brushed his, and he smiled.
“Absolutely.”
Her kiss was slow and passionate and full of promise, and Phil found that his nerves were gone.
It was easy to marry her. The judge seemed to speak unbearably slowly, but then Phil finally got to kiss her.
Melinda.
His wife.
Phil collapsed back into the bed, panting, and Melinda did the same beside him.
“I think we should do that every morning,” he said once he caught his breath, and Melinda laughed.
“What, four times last night wasn’t enough?” Phil grinned at the memory, and Melinda smacked him with a pillow. He waved it off, laughing, and grabbed Melinda by the arm to drag her on top of him.
“Hey, if we wanna become experts at this, we’ve got to practice.”
Melinda laced her fingers through his, then pinned his arms above his head. Phil’s eyes danced and he opened his mouth, but Melinda cut him off with a warning look.
“I wasn’t kidding, Phil. The shower curtains.”
“As long as you come with me,” Phil said without missing a beat.
Melinda laughed and leaned down to kiss him.