FIVE DAYS LATER

★ ★ ★

"How does it look?" Marlena asked as she was spun around in her chair.

Natasha studied her for several seconds before finally answering. "It looks. . .short."

Marlena laughed at her friend and turned around to look at herself in the mirror, feeling slightly shocked—yet exceedingly happy—with what she saw. Her once-long brown hair was no more. Instead, her hair was now of medium length, sitting roughly an inch below her shoulders. It had been far too long since her hair had been cut. She had never really had the time to get a decent haircut with everything going on in her life, so she was ecstatic that she had finally found the time to get one. She felt much better now that she had shorter hair; it would be much easier for her to take care of than her long hair had been, so for that she was grateful.

"I hope I've succeeded," Marlena's hairdresser, Jessica, chuckled. "It was so hard for me to cut."

Marlena glanced at her. "Long hair is a bitch."

Jessica shook her head. "That's not what I meant. I meant that your long hair was so beautiful—I felt as if I were committing a crime by cutting it."

"Bucky's gonna think the same thing, too," Natasha chimed in.

Marlena made a face and began playing with her hair. Just as Marlena was a fan of Bucky's long hair, Bucky was an even bigger fan of hers. He adored playing with her hair, as well as attempting to braid the long locks. He was unaware that Marlena had been planning on cutting her hair, so he was in for a big surprise when she and Natasha returned back to the tower.

"Is Bucky your boyfriend?" Jessica asked sweetly.

"Yes," Marlena answered, turning around to face the two of them. "And he's going to hate me for this."

Natasha shrugged and pulled Tony's credit card from her wallet before handing it to Jessica. "There's a possibility he might."

Jessica chuckled as she ran the card through the machine and handed it back to Natasha seconds later.

"Thank you so much, Jessica," Marlena said as she gathered up hers and Natasha's gift bags, as well as her purse and Natasha's.

"You're welcome! I hope you have a nice day."

Natasha and Marlena waved at her and left the hair salon. Marlena handed Natasha her purse, as well as the numerous bags holding the countless amount of items she had purchased. The two had spent the entire day Christmas shopping, and because of the amount of people they needed to buy for it proved to be a rather prolonged endeavor, not to mention a very heavy one. Originally, it had taken a lot of convincing on Marlena's part for Tony to actually allow her out of the tower, considering she had yet to begin working on controlling her abilities, but after being promised Shawarma he agreed to let her go just as long as Natasha kept a close eye on her.

Marlena would not be getting Tony Shawarma though, at least not today she wouldn't be. She was already tired of carrying around so many shopping bags, and she didn't necessarily feel like carrying around one with food inside it.

"Tell me again why we're carrying so many damn bags," Marlena grunted, pulling her arm up to prevent a bag from slipping from her grasp.

Natasha scoffed. "Because the men in our life are needy assholes. Don't worry, though—just a few more blocks until we're back at the tower."

"Where are we supposed to put the bags once we get back, though?" Marlena asked the redhead. "I mean, we don't necessarily have to worry about Clint or Sam snooping, but I feel as if Tony, Steve, and Bucky are nosy as hell."

"Why don't you let me worry about hiding and wrapping the presents?" Natasha smirked as the two approached the tower doors.

The two stepped through the automatic doors and Natasha wasted no time at all in summoning one of Tony's workers to remove the bags from Marlena's hold. She struggled to hand over all of the bags but managed, nonetheless.

"Now you can take your pretty little legs on upstairs while I handle this," Natasha said before walking off with the worker following behind her.

Marlena let out a breath and pulled her purse farther onto her shoulder before stomping off towards the elevator. She waited on the elevator for about thirty seconds after instructing JARVIS to take her to the loft. She stepped into the hallway, the sound of voices in the loft meeting her ears instantly. Bucky, Steve, and Tony seemed to be the only three occupying the living quarters of the tower, as Marlena could not register Thor's mind anywhere. She wondered where he could possibly be, but didn't spend too much time thinking about it.

"I'm sorry, Tony, but I did not get your Shawarma," Marlena spoke as she stepped into the loft.

Tony, Steve, and Bucky turned their heads at the sound of Marlena's voice. The three men practically froze at the sight of Marlena, and Marlena, unsure of why she was being scrutinized, made a face.

"What are you looking at?" she asked skeptically.

Tony squinted his eyes at her. "I'm looking at the absence of Shawarma. Those two are probably looking at your absence of hair."

Marlena pursed her lips and brought her hand up to run through her hair. "Oh yeah, I got it cut."

"We see that," Steve said, studying her closely; he was trying to figure out whether or not he liked this new do on Marlena. "You look different."

Marlena chuckled. "That's totally what I was going for."

"Really now?" Bucky questioned, raising a brow.

"No, idiot," Marlena retorted. "I was sick of my long hair."

Bucky frowned. "But I wasn't."

"I really am sorry, but I just couldn't take it anymore," Marlena whined. "Now, before you make some ignorant claim about how you're now allowed to cut your beautiful hair, I'm going upstairs to put my stuff up and change."

Marlena took off up the stairs before any of them could respond. Once in her and Bucky's room, she sat her stuff down and proceeded to rid herself of her clothes. She grabbed one of Bucky's Nike hoodies out of the closet and put it on before changing into a pair of black leggings. She left her socks on and her hair down and began making her way out of the room and back down the stairs.

"Bucky!" a loud voice exclaimed from the loft, catching Marlena's attention immediately.

She stopped on the stairs for a fraction of a second as she tried to process the voice she believed to belong to her little brother. When realization hit that he was in the same building as she was, she sprinted down the stairs, nearly falling in the process.

The moment she stepped into the loft she saw Mason hugging Bucky and a large smile appeared on her face. It had been months since she had last seen her brother, and now that she was finally getting the chance to see him she was more than ecstatic. Being away from her brother all the time was one of the main reasons why she hated being in New York, and she wanted nothing more than the opportunity to leave so she could be with him the way she used to always be.

"Mason James Claire, I am so hurt. How could you hug Bucky before hugging your big sister?" Marlena teased as she stepped further into the room.

Mason ripped himself away from Bucky the moment he saw Marlena and rushed over to her, practically tackling his sister to the floor; had Marlena not been as fit as she was, the two most likely would have fallen to the floor. He was definitely growing up, though, and although he wasn't on an accelerated growth scale as most boys his age were, Marlena could just tell by his height and his strength that he was going through some stage of puberty.

"My god, you've gotten strong," Marlena breathed out as she squeezed him. She was thankful her arm was just about healed, otherwise Bucky's hoodie would have been stained with blood.

Mason laughed and pulled away. "I gotta stay fit for the ladies, Mar."

Marlena's mouth fell open at the sound of his words, and she placed her hands on either side of his face, pulling him slightly closer to her. "You are thirteen years old, Mason—the only ladies in your life should be me and mom. These little girls are evil nowadays. Don't you dare let them corrupt you."

Mason opened his mouth to respond but was cut off by the sound of Miranda's voice ringing loudly in the air.

"Thanks for leaving me to carry all of this crap, Mason," she grunted, dragging several suitcases into the loft.

Steve and Bucky noticed her struggle and moved to help her, leaving Marlena and Mason to stare at their disheveled mother with shared expressions of amusement on their faces. However, Marlena noticed that there was one particular person was missing from her mother's side: Greyson.

"Where's Greyson?" she asked as she stood back up.

"He has family of his own, remember?" Miranda breathed out as she picked up a suitcase. "I'll be back."

She, Steve, and Bucky took off up the stairs, leaving Mason and Marlena alone. Marlena smiled and ruffled his hair before heading over to sit down on the couch. She wondered where Tony had gone off to but didn't linger on it too much. Her main priority at the moment was her brother. She would see Tony soon enough.

"So, how's life treating you?" Marlena asked as Mason sat down beside her.

He shrugged and looked down at his hands. "It could be better, I guess. I just wish you and Bucky were back home; it's so weird without you guys there."

Marlena frowned. "We'll be home soon, buddy. We just have a few things to take care of here. . .well, I do anyway."

"Yeah, mom told me you had these weird powers Mr. Stark wanted you to control," Mason chuckled, looking up at her.

"They're not that weird," Marlena scoffed.

"Can I see them?"

Marlena pursed her lips and nodded. "Just don't tell anyone. I'm not supposed to be using them, because apparently I could hurt somebody."

Mason chuckled. "You're too weak to even hurt a fly."

"So, you think you know me?" Marlena smirked, holding her hand out to him.

Mason watched with wide eyes as the silver—almost blue—energy engulfed her hand. He had never seen anything like it before, except on movies and TV shows. To him, this kind of stuff didn't exist, though he knew better than anyone that superhumans did in fact exist in the world. He had spent months with Bucky, and now his sister was one. He was bewildered by it, yet he also believed it to be incredibly awesome.

"That's so cool, Mar," Mason exclaimed. "What does it even do?"

Marlena opened her mouth to answer him but wasn't given the chance before a loud voice rang out, startling her slightly.

"Marlena," Bucky called, his tone chastising.

Marlena balled her hand into a fist and pulled her hand back to conceal it, but this only caused even more of a problem than Bucky catching her using her abilities. Due to her startled nature and the abruptness in which she snatched her hand from view, the cable attached to the light fixture above the coffee table snapped, sending the fairly large light panel falling towards the floor.

Marlena cursed under her breath and threw her hands back out just in time to catch the panel with her psionics. Mason snickered under his breath at his sister's disgruntled expression and Bucky shook his head while Miranda followed him down the stairs with raised eyebrows.

"This is exactly why you're not supposed to be using your powers," Bucky tsked as he approached the two on the couch.

Marlena glared at him, all the while struggling with not dropping the panel. Though she was not holding it with her bare hands, she was physically connected with her abilities, which meant that the panel was quite heavy. "But this is your fault! By the way, this is kinda heavy; mind lending a hand?"

Bucky gave her a look before walking over and removing the panel from the air. Marlena retracted her hands immediately and watched as Bucky carried the panel to the wall with very little effort. She bit her lip and looked away from him, turning her attention to her mom. She glanced around to see if she could find Steve, but she could not.

"Where's Steve?"

"He went to find Natasha," Bucky answered from behind her.

Marlena chuckled and sat back on the couch, propping her feet onto the coffee table in front of her. "He's not going to find her."

Bucky walked over and sat down beside her, wrapping his arm around her shoulders. "Why? Where is she?"

"She went to go hide Christmas presents, I dunno," she answered turning to look at her mom, who was now sitting alone in the love seat. "Speaking of which—mom did you bring that stuff I asked you to bring?"

"I might have forgotten," she answered, earning a groan from Marlena. "Greyson is taking care of it, though."

"Wait, I'm lost. What stuff are you talking about?" Bucky questioned Marlena.

"Nothing," Marlena answered, standing up from the couch. "Mason, come and watch a movie with me."

Bucky scoffed and rolled his eyes. "I despise you."

Marlena smiled at him and leaned down to kiss him on the lips. "I love you."

"Mhm," he hummed, smiling and kissing her again.

She pulled away and grabbed Mason's hand, pulling him off of the couch. The two ran up the stairs, leaving Miranda and Bucky to wonder exactly how they got so lucky to have two very extraordinary people in their lives.