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Jemma and Daisy sat together on the bathroom floor, ankles intertwined, and stared at the wall ahead of them. It was Daisy who spoke first.
“Do you want me to get Fitz?”
Jemma thought for a moment before speaking. “No. No, I don’t think so.”
“Okay?”
“I got him a really awful Christmas present.”
Daisy laughed. “That’s a pretty good one.”
“Covers everyone else, too.”
“Aw, thanks!”
Jemma rolled her eyes. “I already got you something. And I know Fitz got me something good because he wants to give me hints. So I think I’ve got him beat.” She sighed and dropped her head to Daisy’s shoulder. “Thank you,” she said softly.
Daisy kissed the top of her head. “I’ve got your back”
For several minutes, they fell back into a warm silence, neither speaking until Jemma’s phone dinged.
“Fitz is looking for me.”
“Early Christmas present?”
Jemma shook her head, standing up. “No, I’ll wait until we’re home.”
“I’ll put ten bucks on you not lasting that long.”
Jemma teasingly aimed a kick at her. “Have some faith in me.”
“You can’t lie.”
“It’s not a lie!”
“When he asks why you’re crying?”
Jemma brought a hand up to her cheek. “I’m not crying.”
“Jem…”
“I’m just…really, really happy that you’re coming with us.”
There was a knock on the bathroom door.
“Jemma? Daisy?”
Jemma grinned. “Just us in here! You can come in.”
They could almost hear Fitz shaking his head. “No, um, it’s the ladies’ room. I just wanted to remind you both that we have to leave for their airport in…forty-five minutes. Though, I might add, we’d have an extra hour if we flew into Manchester.”
Jemma rolled her eyes. “I like Heathrow so much more. You’ll survive.”
Daisy scoffed as she opened the bathroom door. “Still, you’d think that S.H.I.E.L.D. would be able to fly us straight to Sheffield. ‘Merry Christmas. Thanks for all the almost dying slash getting kidnapped slashed getting stuck in another dimension you do. Let us fly you back home to your family.’”
Jemma could only laugh as she headed back to her’s and Fitz’s room to finish packing.
The flight to London was uneventful. Five minutes of puppy-dog eyes from both Jemma and Daisy had landed Fitz in the middle seat, and both women were fast asleep, each leaning on his shoulder, before they were over the Atlantic. A little turbulence passing through Ireland, but otherwise it was an unmemorable flight that they would all remember.
(How often was it, after all, that the three of them flew somewhere together with possible death waiting for them upon landing?)
“There’s a train in about ninety minutes we should be able to make,” Jemma said for the umpteenth time as they made their way through customs, smiling exaggeratedly at Daisy, who had her arms crossed in the Foreign Passports line. “We should be home by lunch!”
Fitz only yawned in response, nearly robotic as he passed his passport to the customs officers. After collecting both Daisy and their bags, they made their way out of the terminal.
“JEM! JEM!”
Jemma spun around, nearly losing her footing.
“Oh my god,” whispered Daisy as her eyes found the man calling—late twenties, as they were, with dark eyes and brown hair peaking out under and orange beanie. She turned to Fitz. “Is that a male Simmons?”
Fitz didn’t respond, only laughing as Jemma dropped her bags and ran straight at him, squealing as she practically jumped into his arms.
“I didn’t know you were picking us up!”
He grinned and lowered her to the ground. “I was planning on driving up last night, but Mum and Bea ganged up on me to stay and drive you up!”
Jemma slapped his arm. “Don’t give me that face, you’d have been miserable up there without me.” She grabbed his arm and dragged him to Daisy and Fitz. “Daisy, this is my brother, Liam!”
Daisy set down her bag to shake his hand, but Liam immediately pulled her into a tight hug. “You have no idea how glad I was when Jem said you were coming.” He released her to grab Fitz. “I love these nerds, I do. But I could use someone slightly less…”
“Them?”
Liam laughed. “They can be a pain when they want to be, can’t they?”
Jemma rolled her eyes. “C’mon, let’s just start driving.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah.” Liam grabbed Daisy’s dropped bag, waving off her objections. “Oi, Fitz, you remember Sophie Walters?”
“Ginger next door?”
“Yeah! She got hot since last time you were here. And she just finished up her PhD in biomedical engineering.”
Jemma, Fitz, and Daisy all stopped in their tracks. Liam turned around and raised an eyebrow. “Oh, don’t give me that look. We couldn’t wait on you two idiots forever. Apparently your mum’s been interrogating her since she got in yesterday. They’re all very focused on it, especially given that there’s no bloke in a five kilometer radius who Jemma hasn’t insulted at least six times over the years.”
He stood there, confused, as Jemma and Fitz stared at him. Daisy took a deep breath, doing her best to keep her laughter controlled.
“Well, Liam, this is shaping up to be the best Christmas I’ve ever had.”
He snorted. “Well, don’t get ahead of yourself. I think Mum may have faux-drunkenly ordered everyone matching pajamas.”
Daisy Johnson 11:48 AM
iMessage to Jemma Simmons and Leo Fitz
You guys are officially the worst people ever
Daisy Johnson 11:48 AM
iMessage to Jemma Simmons and Leo Fitz
You literally forgot to tell your families you got together. It’s been A YEAR AND A HALF
Daisy Johnson 11:48 AM
iMessage to Jemma Simmons and Leo Fitz
MORE
Jemma Simmons 11:48 AM
iMessage to Daisy Johnson and Leo Fitz
Don’t say anything
Jemma Simmons 11:48 AM
iMessage to Daisy Johnson and Leo Fitz
If we play this right we can call it a christmas gift
Daisy Johnson 11:49 AM
iMessage to Jemma Simmons and Leo Fitz
You’re killing the gift game this year jem
Jemma Simmons 11:50 AM
iMessage to Daisy Johnson
don’t you fucking dare
“So, Jemma. Jems. Jemmy. Sweetest sister.”
Jemma looked over her shoulder to the back seat, where Fitz was sleeping and Daisy was still trying not to laugh.
“What?”
“Fair warning: Mum’s been holding off on a proper interrogation.”
Jemma breathed out a sigh of relief. Of course Liam would now pretend to ignore hers and Fitz’s relationship, just to be annoying.
“About?”
“About six months of zero contact. Fitz wouldn’t even give us more than two words at a time.”
“Oh.”
“We thought you were dead.”
She looked over her shoulder again. Daisy was at least pretending to sleep now and she was thankful for that.
“If I tell her I wasn’t dead, and that I’m fine now, and that I don’t want to talk about it, do you think she’ll accept that?”
Liam shrugged. “Maybe until after Christmas. But you know her. She won’t let you leave again and until she finds out where you were and how you got back.”
For several minutes, Jemma only stared at her lap. And then, very quietly, “I went away. Fitz brought me back.”
“Jemma?”
“Yeah?”
“If you don’t want me to press him to talk to Sophie, I won’t.”
There was a snort from the back seat.
“Daisy snores,” Jemma said quickly. “But, um, I…I…”
Liam laughed. “You’re a shit liar,” he said. “But I’ll back down. You’ll figure it out one day.”
Jemma nodded. “Yeah. Some day.” Without another word, she leaned forward and turned up the radio.
The front door opened as soon as they parked the car.
“Ah!” Mr. Simmons exclaimed, stepping out onto the porch. “The brilliant children have come home. And brought Jemma and Liam with them.”
Jemma rolled her eyes. “Dad, Daisy. Daisy, Dad.”
“Chris,” he said, giving Daisy a quick hug. “It’s a pleasure to finally meet you.” He released her and turned to hug each of the rest. “I’m about eighty-five percent sure your mums are already drunk. Started the morning with Bloody Mary’s and never stopped. I’m not unconvinced that this is their girls’ weekend and we’re all just intruding.”
Jemma laughed and stepped around her dad into the house.
“Mum!”
There was a scrape of chairs and a short woman with sandy blonde curls came running into the room.
“There’s my girl!” she shouted in a heavy Scottish accent before enveloping Jemma in a tight hug.
Jemma laughed and kissed her cheek. “Bea! I’ve missed you!”
Bea released her as she moved towards her own son. “And I’ve missed you! Ana, come here and see your child.”
There was a snort from the kitchen. “If she can abandon me to go live in ‘America,’ she can walk to my kitchen.”
Jemma rolled her eyes. “If I can fly over three thousand miles to wish you a happy Christmas, you can walk fifteen feet to say hello.”
Ana laughed as she walked into the room and Daisy was sure that she was getting a glimpse of Jemma some thirty years down the road. She watched as Jemma hugged her mother for just a moment longer than she had hugged anyone else before stepping back. Ana held out her glass.
“Drink up. You are on holiday, aren’t you?”
Jemma’s cheeks flushed. “I’m fine, Mum.”
“Don’t be ridiculous.”
“Really, Mum. I’m so tired from the flight.”
Fitz laughed as he came over to kiss Ana’s cheek. “You slept the whole time!”
“Plane sleep. Doesn’t count.”
Ana shook her head. “Live a sad life, Jemma. What do I care?” She turned to Daisy. “Do you want a drink, dear?”
Daisy shrugged, but grinned. “We are on vacation.”
Bea gave an approving click of her tongue. “I like this one.”
The rest of the day passes in ease, with Daisy helping Jemma make an excuse (or, rather, making the excuse for her and without her knowledge to prevent Jemma from having to lie) to go out for some last minute Christmas shopping, and distracting their families so that Jemma and Fitz could ‘say goodnight’ before being separated for the night.
“You and Fitz didn’t just finish banging, did you?” Daisy whispered, standing on one side of Jemma’s bed.
Jemma tossed a pillow at her as she slid beneath the blankets. “I wish. Liam’s far too perceptive.”
“I still can’t believe you and Fitz forgot to tell your families you got together.”
“We got distracted!”
“By what?”
In the dimness of her bedside lamp, Jemma gave Daisy a pointed look.
“Yeah, yeah, point taken.” She crawled into bed beside Jemma. “Does Fitz always stay with Liam when you’re all here?”
“Only technically. He normally sleeps in here, but only because we’d fall asleep talking or watching a movie. A doors open, still dressed, parents can spy on us like we’re naughty teenagers thing.”
Daisy shook her head. “They’re all gonna flip a shit tomorrow.”
“Hopefully happily.”
“Your mom will actually kill you. Did I tell you she cornered me in the kitchen?”
Jemma propped herself up on her elbow. “Oh, god.”
“‘Is she okay? Why isn’t she drinking? Is she sleeping with anyone?’”
“Oh, god.”
“And then Bea was all ‘I just finished with Fitz about that! How is it there?’ They were strangely concerned with if everyone gets off enough on a secret base. ‘Government can be so puritanical!’ They’re hilarious. I love them.”
Jemma sighed. “They’ve always been…open. And disappointed that Fitz and I aren’t together. We’re fairly certain that it’s their way of hinting that we should just start sleeping with each other.”
“They’ll be happy for you,” Daisy said softly.
Jemma sighed and dropped her head back to the pillow. “I hope so.”
“I am.”
“Daisy…” Jemma bit her lip, tears pricking her eyes. To her surprise, Daisy snorted.
“Are you crying?” she asked, the incredulity of her voice barely masking the sweetness.
“No!” Jemma exclaimed, immediately reaching up and turning off the lamp.
“Jemma Simmons!”
“I’m fine.”
“Aw, Jems!”
In the darkness, Daisy reached out and grabbed Jemma, pulling her close and kissing her forehead. “I don’t think I’ve seen you this precious ever.”
“Get off me, Daisy.”
“You’re so sweet and emotional and I made you cry.”
Jemma smiled at the giggles breaking through Daisy’s words, despite her sniffling. “I don’t know why.”
Daisy let out a cackle and Jemma couldn’t help but join her until Liam’s voice broke through the silence of the night.
“WILL YOU SHUT UP PLEASE? YOU ARE GROWN ASS WOMEN, PLEASE GO THE FUCK TO SLEEP.”
Leo Fitz 6:51 AM
iMessage to Daisy Johnson
happy xmas. actually got j something decent. will you video? thanks
Liam, as it turned out, was absolutely right. Christmas morning, Ana woke both Jemma and Daisy by throwing open the door just before seven, shouting “Happy Christmas” and tossing matching pyjamas sets onto the bed. When they found their way downstairs some twenty minutes later, Fitz and Liam were already on the couch, looking exhausted in their matching outfits.
“We’re so doing this with the whole team next year,” Daisy murmured, plopping down next to Fitz as Jemma squished her way between him and her brother. “I want to see Mack in a fuzzy onesie.”
Jemma laughed. “May, too.”
“Please!”
Fitz groaned and buried his face in Jemma’s shoulder. “It’s so early.”
The smell of fresh coffee permeated the room as Bea walked in with a tray. “So you don’t want any gifts then, Leo?”
He grunted. “Only the gift of a new name.”
“Oh, hush!”
“Alright!” Chris exclaimed, far too loudly for the hour. “Who’s starting?”
To Jemma surprise, Fitz immediately straightened.
“Yeah!” He cleared his throat. “I’d, um, I’d like to go first.” He stood, his fingers lingering just a moment longer than platonically acceptable on Jemma leg as he moved away from the couch towards the tree. “Um, I’ve got to be honest, I planned all this before I realized that, well, I’ve been a horrible son. And probably person in general. You know me, I’m not a liar or secretive or anything. Just forgetful. And only fifty percent at fault.” He picked up a small box from under the tree. “Chris, would you mind turning off the lights?”
Chris raised an eyebrow, but turned them off. “Want the curtains drawn, too?”
“Yeah, just a bit.”
Once the room was mostly dark, he walked back to the couch. “Happy Christmas, Jemma.”
Heart pounding, Jemma reached for the box, carefully removing the ribbon and peeling off the paper. “Your wrapping skills improved,” she said with a light laugh.
Fitz sat back next to her. “Just open it.”
She smiled at him. “You better not one up my gift for you,” she whispered, as if they were the only ones in the room.
“I probably will. But I hope it’ll be okay.”
“I’m sure,” she said, and opened them box.
Immediately, blue and purple and silver and gold stars and suns and moons and galaxies danced across the Simmons’s living room, plunging them all into the terrifying comfort of space. Even in their confusion, Bea and the Simmons’s looked around, soft gasps falling from their lips. But Jemma could only stare down at the box before her, tears springing to her eyes (three times in three days—she’d have to get ahold of herself) as she brought her hand to cover her mouth, nodding frantically. It wasn’t until Daisy looked over her shoulder and breathed, “Oh, my god,” that the others turned the attention back to Jemma and Fitz.
“Fitz?”
“Jemma.”
Jemma let out a giggle that turned into an excited sob as it left her lips. Fitz grabbed her hand and slid off the couch to kneel before her. Someone, perhaps one of their mothers, gasped.
“Jemma,” he began softly. “I don’t really know when I fell in love with you. I know when I realized it was too late—not to terrify anyone, but it was the first time I had to contemplate a world without you. And I got scared and held it in, but it kept happening again and again and I realized that I couldn’t live without you. I’ve tried. But that’s not living. And, um, I probably should have realized the first time someone got confused that Fitzsimmons wasn’t one person that I was gonna be stuck with you for the rest of my life. But I think realizing that was the best thing of my life. And yesterday sucked, because not only did I realize that we’re horrible people who forgot to tell our families we’ve been together almost two years, but I had to fall asleep to Liam’s face, which is close, but not quite yours and I’ve been really spoiled. Because seeing you first thing in the morning makes it possible to get through the day. And seeing you last thing at night makes whatever horribleness happened during the day seem trivial. So, if we get better about seeing our families, I’d really like to have a good excuse to never sleep with your brother again.”
There was a peculiar noise as Liam tried to mask his simultaneous crying and laughing. Jemma couldn’t help but laugh as she slid off the couch to curl up in Fitz’s lap as he continued talking, her head nuzzled between his neck and shoulder.
“I never want to be without you, Jemma. Not as long as I live. And I know how smug you get about giving the better presents, and I had hoped to top you this year—Liam, don’t you fucking laugh at that. She’s your sister and I’m having a moment.”
“Yeah, right, sorry.”
“Anyway, I had hope to top you this year, but I think that if you would marry me, I think you’d win best present for the rest of our life.”
Immediately, Jemma tightened her arms around her neck, box still illuminating the room from her hand, and nodded into his neck. For several minutes, no one spoke, the only sounds being everyone’s stifled tears as Jemma clung to Fitz, her repeated breath of “I love you” barely audible. It was her mother who finally spoke.
“I can’t believe this,” she said through her tears. “I’m not surprised, but I thought we still had years of trying to force you two together.”
Bea nodded. “I was almost looking forward to that. Honestly, we should kill you both for forgetting to tell us.”
Jemma pulled back from Fitz, wiping her tears from her face. “Can I—Can I give Fitz my present first? Before you kill us?”
Her mother nodded and looked around the tree before grabbing a box and handing it to Jemma. “At least this is too big to be another ring.”
Jemma took it and laughed as she turned back to Fitz. “I love you,” she said simply. “More that almost anything in the world.”
Fitz kissed her nose. “Almost?”
She nodded.
Shaking his head and smiling, Fitz ripped off the paper and lifted up the lid. He stared down for a moment, almost confused, as he read the black words on the grey fabric.
Let’s cuddle and talk science
He had his eyebrows half raised in confusion when he suddenly squinted, his fingers reaching for the tag.
“Are you serious?” he managed to choke out.
Jemma nodded. Fitz pressed his face into her shoulder, breathing deeply before looking up at Daisy, who still had her phone’s camera trained on them.
“Did you know?”
She smiled. “Merry Christmas.”
He let out an excited sob, holding out the box for his mother to take as he wrapped both arms firmly around Jemma—his fiancee—smiling against her at his mother’s gasp when she pulled the infant onesie from the box. Grinning, Daisy moved the camera slowly across the room, careful to capture everyone’s reaction as a happy lump grew in her own throat. It had taken her time to realize the family that had grown around her. And kept growing and growing and growing. She laughed as Liam leaned across the couch to smack her arm.
“I cannot believe you knew the whole time.”
She focused the camera on him. “You’re still gonna help me spoil this baby rotten, aren’t you?”
Liam nodded. “They’re gonna fucking hate us.”
Daisy looked at her friends, still curled around each other at her feet, happier than she had ever seen them. Over Jemma’s shoulder, Fitz looked up at her and grinned. She rolled her eyes and turned back to Liam.
“They’ll probably hate me more. I’m gonna spoil the shit out of this kid.”
Liam laughed again, sliding off the couch to pull his sister to him. “I’ll take that as a challenge.”
“Good.”