Chapter Text
The ice skating outing is Pepper's idea. This, in and of itself, is not surprising to Bruce. Out of all the people he's come to be friends over the last two years, Pepper is definitely the one most likely to ask everyone to put on a holiday sweater and go ice skating at Rockefeller Plaza. (Doubly so if she can figure out a way to turn it into a PR opportunity for the Avengers and Stark Industries.)
What is surprising to Bruce is that the idea's biggest booster is Natasha. She is not the sort to get giddy about things, but she is damn near giddy about a potential group outing for ice skating. And once Natasha's on board, Clint's agitating for matching ugly Christmas sweaters and Thor is asking Steve to give him ice skating lessons and Steve is deferring to Tony because he never got to ice skate much as a kid due to one thing or another and Hill is offering to step in for both Tony and Steve -- and even Rhodey, of all people, is nagging at Bruce to say that he'll come along.
The thing is, Bruce isn't really into this idea of frou frou holiday togetherness. As much as he's glad for the friendship of these people (and most of them have indeed become his friends), as much as they've gelled as a team -- as much as they have even started feeling like family to one another, Bruce's initial impulse is to think of this whole thing as some sort of semi-crass marketing ploy.
Which, honestly, isn't like Pepper at all. Pepper's a genuine person, and she's shown Bruce a good deal of care since everything went down, for which Bruce is grateful. (And of course, the notion that it might be a good PR moment is just Pepper multitasking, being good at her job, and he certainly doesn't begrudge her that.) But his knee jerk response is to brush the whole thing off as if that's all it is, good press, some good pics for the glossies, or whatever. He guesses that's unfair, but there you go.
It's Natasha's enthusiasm that wins him over in the end -- she's like the proverbial kid at Christmas, and once she's got everybody on her side, the peer pressure around the whole ice skating thing is incredible. He holds out for a while, but Natasha comes into his lab pretty late one night - turning up at his elbow, silently, the way that she does, her hands behind her back and that quirk of a smile that on somebody like Tony would be an all-out troublemaking grin.
"You've got to stop sneaking up on people, Ms. Romanov," Bruce says, wryly, glancing at her before turning back to his work.
"Wouldn't want to put me out of a job, would you?"
"No, ma'am, I would not. What've you got there?"
"Turn around and see." We he turns, finally, she's staring at him, challenging him almost. "Got you a present."
"Little early for presents, yeah?"
"Not for this one."
She has a gift bag behind her back - a sort of weirdly bulky one - and she holds it out to him.
Bruce takes it, and pulls out an obviously custom-made sweater... the threatened "ugly Christmas sweater" that Clint's been going on and on about, as if they were some kind of grand holiday tradition dating back generations. It's purple -- it's obviously meant for Clint himself, seeing as all the snowflakes are made of arrows.
"You got the wrong one," Bruce says, and Nastaha's grin quirks even more.
"Nope. Figured Clint could wear the green monstrosity he was trying to inflict on you. You can wear this tasteful number."
Bruce can't help but laugh.
"Bonus?" Natasha says, "Clint looks terrible in green."
He does go -- they all do -- and it is fun. They show up at Rockefeller Center with just a little advance warning, and the place is packed. Bruce is a terrible skater, but he manages, and he doesn't even fall on his ass or have to cling to the wall. Steve does fall, but just once, and only because he and Sam and Rhodey get a little too into their game of chasing each other around the ice. Thor is, as always, strangely graceful for someone so huge and unearthly who claims to have never ice skated before. Pepper skates as if she had lessons all her life, right down to graceful twirls and direction changes, and Bruce cannot say that he's surprised by this. Tony has taken this as an opportunity to work out some new sort of repulsor tech (in addition to mugging for the cameras) and Clint is harassing him about both of those things -- Clint's a clumsy skater, but he gets by, and Bruce suspects the 'clumsy' thing is just an act anyway. Natasha drifts around the rink serenely, as good at this as she is at apparently everything else in the universe, and Bruce has to admit she's a joy to watch -- calming, somehow. Soothing.
There are lots of really excited kids, and lots of photographs taken, and afterwards there's hot chocolate and hot chocolate vouchers for everyone there, and by the time they get back to the tower, Pepper is cajoling Bruce into admitting out loud that he had a good time.
''Course he did," says Clint, "He's the one that got to look halfway decent -- my sweater suits you, Banner."
"You think?" Bruce asks, gamely.
"We should go ice skating more often," says Natasha, quietly. She's already curled up in her preferred chair with a glass of wine.
Bruce looks at her for a long moment, and at last he says, "Yeah. We should."
"Holiday outing tradition," says Tony from the bar, "Done deal."