Widow Sisters and Friends (Restoring Our Broken Hearts)

It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year

Summary: As a result of some misinformation from Yelena, Kate comes to the Avengers Christmas party wearing an ugly sweater. Fortunately, Natasha saves her from too much humiliation and loans her one of Yelena's pantsuits, much to Yelena's displeasure. But things quickly turn bad for Kate once again when Yelena turns her attentions to embarrassing Kate in front of Clint...

   "Definitely not an ugly sweater party," Kate mumbled to herself, taking in the entire room that was dressed in formal attire while she was the only one wearing an ugly sweater.

It was the Avengers Christmas party, and Kate had been so, so excited to come and hopefully make a good impression on what would maybe one day be her future coworkers if her Avengers training turned out well.

However, her biggest mistake had been expressing this to Yelena because the blonde had assured her that the entire thing was going to be an ugly sweater party and that Kate had nothing to worry about.

Kate now saw that Yelena had been very much messing with her despite Yelena's insistence that she was being sincere. Kate swallowed nervously, not sure what she was going to do considering the fact that everyone saw her when she came in and seemed to keep staring at her likely because they did not recognize her.

So now she was stuck in this predicament and could not exactly turn back super easily until she was sure that people had stopped looking at her.

So much for making a good impression. Now everyone was going to know her as the idiot that showed up in an ugly sweater to a formal party.

"Hi, Kate!" a voice suddenly spoke up, and Kate turned to look at the person. It was Peter and he was very nervously walking in with a person that must have been MJ. Kate could not help a slight smile, happy to see that he had finally worked up the courage to ask the girl out since he had been talking about it and stressing over it weeks beforehand.

"Hey, Peter," Kate greeted kindly, and Peter suddenly froze, looking at her with wide eyes.

"Oh, no! I didn't know this was an ugly sweater party! Do you think I have time to—" Peter stopped as he looked at the groups of people in the party and away from Kate. Kate sighed deeply, forcing a smile on her face that felt more like a grimace. Peter slowly nodded with the realization, taking in the sight of everyone carefully.

"Oh... It's not an ugly sweater party," Peter trailed off. However, as soon as he uttered the words, his eyes went wide as he gaped at Kate with horror.

"And that sweater you're wearing is gorgeous! It's really beautiful on you and you look great in it! Don't get me wrong, you're—"

"Quit while you're ahead, Parker," Kate nodded to him with a strained smile, and Peter quieted immediately, still looking humiliated about his blunder. Kate could practically feel MJ's amusement rolling off of her in waves, and Kate felt herself growing pretty embarrassed as well with the whole thing.

"Okay... Well, um... You want me to get you guys some punch or hot chocolate or whatever they have?" Peter offered somewhat nervously, looking between Kate and MJ. Kate shook her head, shrugging a little.

"No, that's okay... I'm good," Kate told him, and he nodded before turning his attention to MJ. MJ just smiled somewhat.

"Sure, Pete," MJ agreed, and Peter wasted no time in rushing off to the tables of food and beverages to escape the situation he successfully created for himself.

MJ chuckled a little, and Kate smiled slightly, trying to move past her awkwardness. MJ looked over at her after a moment, offering the smallest of glances, and Kate found herself slightly uncomfortable even though she was technically older than MJ. Something about MJ's ridiculously cool and calm disposition made her a little uneasy. Of course, there also was the fact that she had never met the girl before and she did not know anything about her outside of the fact that Peter had a ridiculously huge crush on her and had somehow managed to ask her out to this Christmas party.