Your Hand To Hold

Chapter Thirty-Six: Girls Just Wanna Have Fun

May 24th, 2015

                Wanda and I were washing dishes, covering for Nat and Steve as they were out on various calls when Tony lifted his glimmering phone and smiled.

   "Jem, Wanda; you ready?"

   "Go, I'll finish up here."

   "Are you sure," I asked her; "I had hoped you would come along with us."

   Wanda smiled and touched my face gently with one of her damp, soapy hands. "Today should be about you, Iubi, so go and have fun. I cannot wait to see what you get!"

   I smiled, drying my hands as quickly as possible so I could give her a small side hug before I dashed around the Island to where Loki sat, quietly chatting with Bruce. I leaned down, my hands on his knees as I kissed him gently, urging him to behave. He held my hand, telling me to be careful before relinquishing it as Bruce smiled. As I waved goodbye to the others, a part of me noticed how small our group was without Thor, Steve, Nat, and Clint. While still a good-sized group, it felt more like Asgard with only the eight of us in the big compound. I had overheard Tony and Rhodey talking about others like us over breakfast though; perhaps our group was about to get even bigger if Loki and I were to be made official members.

   As I hurried behind him to the front of the compound, I debated asking, yet the tall, gracefully slender woman with strawberry hair standing beside a shiny, silver car gave me pause. She had a smattering of freckles across her face and the bluest eyes I had ever seen; her crisp white shirt paired with a close-fitting black skirt gave her an air of authority, yet the way her eyes lit up as Tony came toward her told me everything I needed.

   "Evie, this is Pep, Pep, this is Evie and I have just realized that I really am surrounded by redheads. Gorgeous ones at that," he said with a smug smirk before he leaned in to kiss Pepper's cheek.

   "Yes, you do have a habit of collecting those. Hi Eibhlin, I hope I'm pronouncing that right; I sort of looked it up on youtube and I'm not sure how accurate the options were."

   "You did lovely, the b is more of a v though."

   "I'll try to remember that. So, you ready to spend some time away from all the boys; and is it just us?"

   I nodded, as Tony shrugged. "Looks like it," he said as he checked his watch and sighed. "Alright, so Pepper knows when the party starts to get you back here in more than enough time and she has access to all of my money. Go forth and have fun, just remember the two rules: no boys, no cars."

   Pepper rolled her eyes, her long lashes almost tickling her eyebrows as she waved me over, opening the door for me as she muttered an unimpressed goodbye to him. I chuckled under my breath as Tony continued to attempt to halfheartedly remind her of the rules before she kissed him and told him to play nice before she got in the driver's seat and we took off. For the first few miles, we listened to music that the person inside the little box claimed was from the nineteen-eighties which made little sense to me yet I still enjoyed the sounds as the wind whipped through my hair from the open windows.

   "So, Loki, huh," Pepper had eventually asked, lightheartedly teasing me. "Limited guys on Asgard?"

   I shook my head, smiling softly. "There is an understanding between us that not many would understand or know how to process... Differences that set us apart from many others."

   "Like his desire to rule the world and your ears?" I stopped smiling, my eyes widening slightly. "Please don't be upset, Tony only told me so that if something happened, I would be prepared in case I need to divert attention. It's his weird way of showing that he cares."