She doesn't like that he doesn't say anything when she opens the box for him and shows him they tiny kitten inside. Or that his face gets pale when she tells him the kitten is named Agent Phil Coulson II. Maybe it's the II he doesn't like; it implies there will be a III eventually. However, Hill is pretty sure it's the idea of the two of them being cat parents he doesn't like.

Which Hill doesn't understand at all.

You can't just sit in a dark room and wax poetically about how amazing it would be to just get out and start a family and live in a nice little three bedroom suburban ranch and little Captain America halloween costumes and hockey practice, and then comment how it will never happen because they are both in too deep. She's deputy director and he's the top agent. They can't just walk away from this.

But Fury will overlook a cat aboard the helicarrier. They can have a cat, and isn't that good enough? That can be their family. They can be the modern couple with a cat, although they aren't publicly a couple, but everyone pretty much already knows (but everyone is too busy fawning over Clint and Natasha or Bruce and Tony's new brotherhood or Thor's little brother and Thor's problems).

So when he ignores the cat the first couple of days, Hill is a little sad. Her bun isn't exactly tidy like always and when she rattles off reports to Fury, she seems to sigh at the end.

She's foolish for trying to hold onto these little girl dreams of a happy family. She has accomplished so much in her life motherhood shouldn't matter. And it really never did. But maybe she just wanted to mother specific children.

Either way, at the end of the day, Hill has a glum cloud following her around the base, and everyone steers clear of her because they all sense she's a ticking time bomb. She's been ripping people down all day for not getting things done fast enough or for wasting time playing games. She almost makes a nurse cry in the med bay. One too many interns get in her way and she's ready to just explode at Phi-Agent Coulson.

She storms into his room, not even knocking and so quickly, because she knows that passcode so well, it's tattooed on her eyelids right under her own. She opens her mouth to yell and scream and readies herself to break every single piece of his Captain America memorabilia, but instead she finds a very tuckered out Phil, probably stress from dealing with Stark and recovering from recent injuries, with the tiny kitten he shares a name with curled up on his chest.

Hill relaxes and locks the door behind her, and then steps out of her boots and carefully peels off her uniform and grabs a very patriotic tee shirt out of Phil's dresser before smoothly curling up on Phil's side. She scratches the kitten's chin, who purrs in response, and then snuggles into Phil's shoulder and drifts off.

This is all she wants.