Elaine grinned and got up to go greet her friend. The Clan was already half-way through presents, and two people were already in the kitchen starting on breakfast.

"Everyone may as well join us," Kenny invited. He seemed to have unofficially become the spokesman for the Clan, aside from Elaine.

Kae grinned. "Sounds good to me," she agreed.

"Let's see, everyone's here now, right?" Tony looked around the group quickly, holding a paper bag.

"Yeah," Kenny replied cautiously, "why?" He glanced at Elaine, who shrugged. She had no idea what Tony was planning.

"Excellent." Tony held out the bag to the nearest adult. "Everyone gets one, no, I said one, don't be greedy." He grinned at the kid who had tried to take two, and he went around to everyone, making sure each of the Clan got one obscenely bright envelope.

Even Elaine got one, and she turned it over briefly.

"Can we open them?" one of her cousins piped up.

"Sure, go ahead," Tony said, finding an open seat and sprawling out. "The amounts should be written somewhere. Feel free to swap."

Each envelope held a gift card to various places, ranging in amounts from 100 to 500. Tony hadn't gone over that only because Pepper had said not to.

There was silence for a moment, until someone (and nobody was quite sure who) broke the silence with a "Holy god."

Elaine just glanced at Tony.

"I'd say this is a bit excessive, but for you, it's not," she said. "It's excessive for normal people, I'll put it that way."

"Peps wouldn't let me do more," he said with a shrug. "I figured this would have to be good enough." Because never let it be said that Tony did things by halves, ever, or that he wasn't generous when he felt like it.

"Pepper is sensible," Elaine said, nodding. "Remember that normal people don't usually get things like that, next time. And the Clan is 'normal people.'" She grinned. "Now, if you really want to throw money around, I'm sure I can point you at something appropriate. FIRST Robotics or something."

Tony rolled his eyes at that. Hey, he'd brought something for everyone in the Clan, he was feeling proud of himself for that accomplishment.

Elaine just smiled and tucked her clothing-based gift card into her stocking with the rest of her small gifts and sat back to watch the rest of the Clan swap cards around.

Steve settled in next to her, grinning as he watched. Yeah, this was a lot of fun, and a lot more active than he remembered his Christmases being.

"Merry Christmas," Elaine murmured to him, leaning up to give him a kiss.

"Merry Christmas." Steve smiled, giving her another quick kiss. "I have a few things for you back at the hotel."

"Really?" Elaine asked. She smiled a bit. "You didn't have to, you know. Although, I guess it's only fair..." Reaching under the tree, she pulled out a wrapped box and handed it to him. "Here. I will admit I made Tony help me with it, but still." Because she didn't know the first thing about programming, and a tablet with cutting-edge art software was way outside of her knowledge base.

Steve blinked but unwrapped the present eagerly enough, smiling when he saw it.

"You didn't have to either, you know," he said quietly, looking at the tablet. Oh he would be having fun with this.

"I wanted to," Elaine said, leaning against him slightly. "I know it's high-tech, but I tested it out and it's simple enough to use. And it's got all sorts of art programs on it." She rummaged in the wrapping for a moment before her hand emerged with a full-size pen stylus. "Here, this goes with it."

Steve smiled. "Well, I'll have to see how it works," he said, taking the stylus and kissing her quickly. Then he started sketching the scene in the living room.

Elaine smiled and returned the kiss, sitting back and just watching the Clan disperse to play with their new toys.

Steve stayed where he was sketching all afternoon, while Kae spent most of the afternoon in the kitchen helping to cook. She was vaguely distracted but nothing too noticeable for most of them.

Elaine, however, knew Kae well enough to know something was bothering her. So she went into the kitchen to talk to her.

"Kae?" she asked softly.

Kae blinked and looked over at her. "Hmm?" She looked back at the potatoes she was cutting and dropping into a pot.

"You've been distracted all day," Elaine said, leaning against the counter next to her friend. She knew better than to get in the way of cooking. "I know you have. Something up?"

"It's most likely nothing," Kae said after a moment. "I'm just a day late, is all. Probably nothing to worry about."

It took Elaine a moment to process that.

"A day?" she asked. "A day's nothing to worry about... I mean, we've both been later than that before." She looked at her friend. "A day normally wouldn't even be enough for you to notice. Unless there's something else?"