A/N Loki is also not in this one, and it is also a birthday fic for my friend caitlynsnow-yayyy on tumblr/ChocolateXMyMouth on ao3 who you should still check out on both this sites and also this is a WandaNat fic and also don't question the timeline mkay
Tony Stark is a strange man.
It stands to reason, then, that his parties would be strange, too.
And that – Natasha would assume, at least – is why the theme for tonight's party is essentially being an attention whore. There's even a contest later, for those who dare enter it, where the person who's deemed the biggest attention whore of the night wins ten thousand dollars – with that same amount matched to a charity of their choice, because Tony may be a strange man, but at least he's a kind strange man.
Natasha can already tell she's not going to win this. Her idea of drawing attention to herself was a long dress with a low neckline and a thigh-high slit up the leg. She even threw on her beloved tap shoes for some extra pizazz (and some extra noise).
Meanwhile, Peter Parker is hanging from the ceiling in a neon Spider-Man costume, and Pietro is dressed in what appears to be a giant homemade cardboard Christmas tree costume with a boombox blasting Mariah Carey in the middle of summer.
It seems that Natasha is simply not strange enough for this.
She makes her way over to the bar, where she pours her own drink and takes a seat. People-watching at Tony's parties is always fun, but tonight takes it to a whole new level. The things some of these people came up with are nothing short of fascinating. Perhaps more fascinating, though, is that Tony himself is just wearing jeans and a Metallica t-shirt.
He really is a strange, strange man.
Natasha spots a familiar face from across the room, and she raises up a hand to get her attention, waving her over. Wanda smiles and obliges, just as Natasha knew she would. What's the fun of this party if there's no one to laugh at everyone's outfits with?
"Hey!" Wanda greets her with a grin.
"Hey yourself," Natasha replies, pressing a quick kiss to her cheek. "Well, don't you look stunning?"
Wanda looks down at her outfit, a slight blush spreading across her cheeks. "Do you think it was too much?"
Natasha snorts. "Your brother is literally dressed like a Christmas tree, and you think a ballgown is too much?"
Wanda gently brushes out her long, flowy, tulle-filled skirt. It could just be a trick of the light, but Natasha is pretty sure she sees it glitter faintly as it moves. She has to admit, if there's even been a time to wear a red, glittery ballgown, this is probably it.
"You know," Natasha says, "I don't know what bra you're wearing, but your boobs look great."
Wanda giggles at that. "I think it's just the dress."
"I think it's just 'cause you've got good boobs," Natasha counters, a playful smirk on her face.
Again, Wanda giggles, her cheeks turning a faint shade of red.
"I think I have you beat, though," Natasha tells her.
Wanda scoffs. "Excuse me?"
"I think I tried harder with the whole 'pay attention to me' thing," Natasha says (mostly) jokingly.
"You're wearing the same kind of thing you always wear!" Wanda says defensively. "I've seen you wear this before! I got a whole new dress for this!"
"Yeah, but look what I got." Natasha taps her toes against the tile floor, showing off the tap shoes on her feet. It may not be a whole boombox, but Pietro wasn't the only one who thought to make a little extra noise tonight.
Wanda just stares at her. "Nat." She digs her heel out in front of her and moves her dress out of the way.
Wanda is also, apparently, wearing tap shoes.
Natasha scoffs. "I thought I was being so creative with this!"
"I thought I was being creative!" Wanda says, incredulous.
"Thank god your brother's gonna win," Natasha says, "because if we actually had a chance, one of us would have to go change shoes."
"Oh, yeah, no, I'm not even going to enter the contest," Wanda says. "I saw Sam hot-gluing glow sticks to his Falcon wings earlier? There's some really intense stuff going on."
"Do you think they know that if they just asked Stark for ten thousand dollars, he would write them a check?" Natasha wonders aloud.
Wanda ponders that for a few seconds. "You know, I'm not fully convinced Pietro even knows there is a prize. He just wants to win."
Natasha huffs a laugh. That sure sounds like him.
The conversation fades, and it grows comfortably quiet between them. The silence stretches on for a minute or so, until Wanda slowly starts tapping her feet. It's just simple paradiddles at first, but when she catches Natasha looking at her, her movements grow more intense, keeping in rhythm with "Dominic the Donkey" that's blasting from Pietro's speakers.
Natasha can't help it. She has to join in. There's no discernable pattern to the moves Wanda's doing so Natasha can't tap along, but she can still tap with her. She does her own thing, sometimes a little bit faster than Wanda, other times a little bit slower. It sounds like a bit of a mess, the two of them tapping over each other, but the room is so loud that nobody else can hear it.
The song ends, and "Last Christmas" begins. Natasha is physically incapable of not singing along as she taps, including some very big, very dramatic arm movements to match the lyrics.
Wanda covers her mouth with her hand, her face turning red from laughing so hard.
"C'mon, sing along!" Natasha insists.
"I don't know the words!"
"How do you not know the words?" she asks, incredulous. It's only one of the best Christmas songs of all time.
"I don't celebrate Christmas!" Wanda says, playfully defensive. "I'm Jewish!"
Natasha opens her mouth.
Then she closes it.
Then opens it again.
Then looks at Pietro, who's taking photos with some of the other party guests and living his best life.
"Pietro doesn't celebrate Christmas, either, does he?" she asks slowly.
"Nope."
"And yet he's dressed as a Christmas tree and blasting Christmas music."
"Yep."
Natasha blinks a few times.
Maybe Tony's not the strangest person on the team.
"I know," Wanda says, amused. "My brother is weird."
"Your brother is so weird," Natasha agrees.
Wanda rests her head on top of her girlfriend's, and they both gaze out at the rest of the party, enjoying the scenery. Peter's dancing to "Last Christmas" on the ceiling, and that alone makes for a good show, though his and Pietro's shared audience begins to grow and grow the longer it goes on for, which makes the clapping and the cheering nearly unbearable at times.
As though reading her mind, Wanda asks, "You want to sneak away?"
"That depends," Natasha says. "After we sneak away, can we do some season-appropriate tap dancing?"
Wanda grins. "I thought you'd never ask."
So Natasha and Wanda sneak off back to their rooms, where they spend the next few hours tap dancing to Frank Sinatra songs. It's a lot of fun – maybe even their favorite bedtime activity, though it's hard to say – and the bouncing of Wanda's ballgown skirt just adds an extra layer of fun and giggles (and, in Wanda's case, an extra layer of sweat).
They're so distracted by their own dancing, they don't learn until the morning that the winner of the attention whore contest was, in fact, Carol, who showed up in her light-up multi-colored neon outfit from Captain Marvel and stole everyone's attention with her impromptu Irish step dance routine.