Cookie Competition

The air was filled with the aroma of freshly baked cookies and a hint of vanilla from the candles lit around the apartment. The blizzard outside had prohibited Steve and Natasha from going out so they decided to spend the night in and watch Christmas
movies and doing festive things like putting up the Christmas trees and bake cookies. Natasha was hesitant at first but the puppy dog eyes he gave her made it nearly impossible for her to say no. It's not that she hated Christmas or anything like
that but she's never had the opportunity to celebrate the holiday - the red room wasn't exactly fond of celebrating much of anything so this was foreign territory for her. A few years ago, if someone would have told her she would be in a happy relationship,
she would have laughed in their faces. Funny how things turned out.

"You know, this doesn't count as baking cookies." Steve teased as he held up the package of premade pillsbury cookies.

"Shut up" she rolled her eyes at him. "You're lucky I even agreed to doing this. It's called compromising" she teased back with a smirk. There was no way in hell he could have gotten her to make cookies from scratch. There were far
too many ingredients and steps - this was much easier. Besides, the cookies in the package always turned out great anyways. Fool proof.

Steve set the package down on the counter and walked toward her with a smile. He wrapped his arms around her waist and pulled her in for a sweet peck on the lips. "I love you" he whispered softly.

"I love you too" She smiled and kissed him again before pulling away to get the cookies out of the oven. "So I was thinking, we could do something fun." She kinked an eyebrow at him.

"What, baking cookies and watching home alone isn't fun to you?" He crossed his arms trying to pretend to be offended.

"No, this is fun but I thought a little competition could never hurt" she smirked before pulling out a box of decoration icing from the drawer beside her.

"You want to challenge me to a cookie decorating contest?" He raised his eyebrow. "Where is my girlfriend and what did you do to her?"

She playfully glared at him and punched him lightly on the chest. "Funny. What are you scared I'm going to kick your ass?"

"What's the wager?" He chuckled. They were always getting into silly competitions so this didn't surprise him.

"Loser has to do whatever the other person wants for a whole week." She smiled triumphantly as if she had already won.

Steve thought for a moment before nodding his head in agreement. "You've got yourself a deal."

30 minutes later

Steve had underestimated his artistic abilities. Apparently, the little tubes of icing were harder to use than he thought because his dog ended up looking more like the poop emoji than a cute furry friend. Natasha was on the other side of the table so
he couldn't take a peek at her progression but whatever she was working on obviously took a lot of focus and determination. He picked up the next cookie and prayed it turned out better than the last few ones he made. They agreed on a time limit of
35 minutes which meant he only had 5 minutes left to do something worth a week of Natasha doing whatever his heart desired. She may be his girlfriend but that didn't change the fact that he was just as competitive as she was which was why they worked
so well together. Steve picked up the blue, red, and white icing and decided to draw his shield since it was free of complicated shapes. How hard can some circles and a star be?

The timer on the phone rang which signified that the time was up. They both put down their icing.

"I think I got this one babe" Steve smirked at Natasha. He wasn't above a little trash talker especially when Natasha was the queen of trash talk herself.

"We'll see about that. On a count of three, we'll both place our plates of cookies in the middle. 1….. 2….. 3…."

They both placed their decorated cookies in the middle of the table at the same time. Natasha bursted out laughing as soon as she saw his cookies.

"I thought you were an artist." She said between laughs. "What is that?!" She pointed to the green blob on the cookie. "Is that supposed to be Bruce?"

"Yes" he mumbled sheepishly. "In my defense, those little tubes are delicate." He scanned over her cookies and noticed how decent they came out. She had obviously decided to keep her decorations simple which turned out great for her
even though the competitiveness in him wouldn't let him admit it out loud. "So who decides the winner?"

Natasha smiled and pulled out her phone and facetimed Clint. It only took a few rings before he picked up.

"Hey Nat." Clint said, his face was a little too up close to the camera - he was still getting used to the whole video chat.

"I need my babies now." Natasha demanded, referring to her niece and nephews. It only took a few seconds after Clint had yelled out that their aunt was on the phone for her to hear running footsteps in the background.

"Hey Auntie Nat!" Both children yelled excitedly.

"Hey. I need a favor from you two. Me and Uncle Steve are having a little contest and we need you to tell us who's cookies you like better." She quickly flashed the screen to Steve so the kids can see him.

"Hey uncle Steve!" They yelled almost louder than they had for her. It was no secret that Steve was their favorite uncle out of everyone. No one could quite compare to Captain America after all.

"Hey guys" he gave a quick wave to them before Natasha flipped the camera and showed them the cookies. "Which one do you like better?"

"What's that green thing supposed to be?" Cooper asked curiously. Natasha had to cover her mouth to keep herself from laughing.

"It's the Hulk" Steve said defensively. "Come on Coop. Boys gotta stick together"

Cooper nodded his head in agreement as if Steve's words were law. "I choose Uncle Steve's. The shield is my favorite one"

Natasha rolled her eyes at the boys. Typical. "What about you Lila? Which one is your favorite?" Natasha asked but she already knew the little girl would pick the simple flower cookie - Lila was practically the girliest girl ever. If it was
pink or hearts or flowers, she was sold. After Lila gave her answer, Natasha blew a kiss goodbye and hung up the phone. "Seems like we have a tie Rogers." She smirked.

"So does that mean we both win?" He raised his eyebrow hopeful even though he knew a tie breaker was never an option.

"Baby Nate is the tiebreaker" she smirked at Steve's confusion.

"But baby Nate isn't even born yet" Steve furrowed his eyebrows.

"Exactly and I am his godmother so I get to speak for him." The smirk on her face grew wider as she waited for him to come up with a counter to her proposal however it never came. Instead he looked at her with soft eyes filled with admiration
with that sexy little smile of his. Truthfully, he didn't care about winning. The fact that he was able to see her this happy was more than enough of a win for him. He leaned in and gave her a deep kiss, savoring the moment.

"What was that for?" She looked up and smiled at him.

"For being the best girlfriend a man could ever have"

Natasha could feel a slight blush on her face. "Don't think that's gonna get you out of being my personal slave this week Rogers" she joked lightly.

"Whatever you want pretty girl" he said before pulling her in for another long kiss.