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The tradition started when Peter moved into the tower with Aunt May.
The Rogue, newly pardoned, Avengers had just moved back in, and tensions were high. Bitterness lingered in most of their voices, and they ended up acting like, well, toddlers quite a bit.
May had recently transferred to having half her shifts be in the pediatric wing of the hospital, and the kids often had trouble deciding on what game to play. May had started playing duck duck goose and the third person to get catch someone got to pick the next activity.
So one evening when May was fresh off a double shift in the pediatric wing, and the Avengers were acting particularly toddler-ish, it took nothing for her tired brain to start circling them, bopping her hand on top of their heads, calling out “duck”. The rowdy group quieted as they stared at her in confusion. She kept circling, mentally counting to 87, and on the 88th bop, she turned to the person and cupped their head, “Catch me if you can”- and started fast walking around the room, before walking bodily into one Captain Rogers. She blinked at the chest in front of her, then to the face, then to the room behind her.
“Oh. You were acting like my toddlers. Sorry, I’ll leave you be now.” Grabbing her purse, she left the room to bewildered silence. Bruce sat with his hands cupping his flushed cheeks, staring at the door May had walked out of.
A mere ten seconds passed before laughter was heard peeling from the ceiling. Steve ran to catch the spiderling when his grip failed him in his gleeful state, but he collided with Bucky who had the same intentions. With those two groaning on the floor, Wanda caught Peter with a flick of the wrist and a surge of red. She gently set him down next to the others, before joining in on the giggles. The room stayed silent with the exception of the peels of laughter until Peter had gone through all his bouts of calming down.
“Oh my goodness, you guys just got owned .” Peter looked at the confused faces, before coming to another realization. “You guys totally don’t know how you got owned, do you?”
“Care to enlighten us, bud?” Tony piped in from where he sat frowning at the head of the dining room table.
“Do none of you listen to what May and I talk about at dinner?” At the shamed glances down and simple shakes of the head, Peter continued, and explained the recent job shift and ensuing game. “So essentially, in May’s tired state, you guys are no better than a bunch of toddlers with behavior issues. Which really all of this should say a lot about your communication -and especially listening- skills.”
“Hey! What about you?”
“Please, I do those just fine. Nat’s gone for coffee runs three times this week, and at least five of you have complained after she returned with coffee alone that she didn’t get you any, although she announced her errand and asked for company. Steve lost his shield on Wednesday and 3 of you walked past it, commented on it, then when asked said you ‘saw it around somewhere’ -which has to do more with observation and memory but still. Mr. Stark has been trying to organize a sit down to read through and annotate the new accords amendments all day, which is what led to this argument anyway, while Bucky was trying to get opinions on dinner - which I recommend just going with spaghetti Buck, it’s easiest of the options to make in bulk - and Sam was trying to figure out when to work on bringing Scott in to train with the team. Wanda has done the dishes every night this week and only came in the room to ask if someone else could tonight so she could go on a date with Vision after dinner. Thor wants to discuss Loki’s integration to the team now that Asgard’s people are refugees here. There’s so much going on and you guys refuse to take turns. You guys have no idea how to communicate or work together anymore. So in the end, it’s not surprising that May did that.”
Peter looked at the shocked, hurt, and slightly angry faces around him, before nodding and turning to leave. “Let me know when dinner’s done, please!”
As time went on, the team worked to listen better and actually communicate. Although, on rare occasions, they did bring in some “childish” games to help decide things, like who would speak next, though often it was duck duck goose.
More often than not, Bruce was the one picked during duck duck goose, enough so that they affectionately renamed the deciding game “Duck Duck Bruce”.