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This would be his last stop. There was no going back from here on now. All stones except the Space Stone. The case with the tesseract felt heavy in his hand as he walked through the tunnels back to the place from where they got it the first time. No one was bothering him and while he expected to be problems, knew he needed to be on top of his game, all he could think about was the person whose office he just passed. Now that Steve knew she was here, knew she was still thinking about him, he wanted this chance again. The chance at a normal life. How many times did the others tell him this was what he needed, for him to have more than another fight to pick up. And this was it. Peggy had been on his mind ever since he came out of the ice and found she was still alive. Was alive. The one person he couldn't bring back.
Steve's throat felt dry after dropping the case off and walked back passed Peggy's office. This was not the right place or right time for them to see each other again. Then again...
Turning around, Steve slipped once again into Peggy's office. This time it was completely dark and the only noise he could hear was coming from the hallway so he dared opening the next door as well, stopping right in front of her desk. Right there was his picture, the one before the serum the day they met for the first time. He remembered her decking Hodge right in the face, standing up to Colonel Phillips, and helping him saving Bucky.
Bucky. They talked about his plan, about going back. Was he supposed to go after Bucky, searching him and freeing him and to his surprise Bucky said no. Bucky had his reasons, starting by saying they already meddled enough with time as it was and no one knew what would happen if Steve went after him, changing his future and the person he was. Bucky didn't let him go before he promised to him he wouldn't do anything stupid and it was the most difficult promise Steve ever had to make. Standing here, thinking about the friend he had left behind, the friend who helped him when no one else was there for him after his parents died, who picked him up whenever he had another fight in another back alley, he wasn't sure he could keep this promise. And worst of all he realized how selfish this made him, wanting all while others were not so lucky. He thought about Pepper and Morgan, about Wanda and Clint. Their losses were his as well, he would never get everything back. And neither would they.
All of the sudden Steve felt tired, the weight bringing him down and he slipped into Peggy's chair. His eyes slipped from his picture to the ones standing to the other side. There was a picture of a young girl sitting on Peggy's lap, next to them a dark haired man who looked at the two with so much love and admiration it was hard for Steve to breath. There was another picture behind this one, a wedding picture. Steve reached for it, picking it up to have a better look at it. Peggy and the dark haired man, the man bracing himself on a crutch but it didn't dim the strength he was radiating, the happiness on his face from having Peggy on his arm. They both looked happy, genuinely happy.
Peggy already had a live. And how could he already forget the stories she told him. Sometimes it was the same story all over again, but they were there. Those where her memories. Her excitement when she heard she was pregnant, watching her daughter growing up, seeing her off to college, being at her wedding, becoming a grandmother. She told him about it. Over and over again. She told him, like Tony and Nat and Clint before, how she wished he could have lived a life. Because she already lived her own.
But this could be your life. This could be your kid.
The voice was there, accompanying him ever since the whole time travelling came up in the first place and even more so since Steve saw Peggy again.
He put the picture down again and then started opening drawers, going through the papers and in hopes to find what he was looking for. There were files and notebooks, office supplies and at the bottom of the last drawer a tiny, old schedule from the year before the gold letters reading 1969. Flicking it open, right at the front he saw what he was hoping to find. Putting the schedule back where he found it, Steve headed out of the office and the building and got in the first car he could find. Getting off the compound wasn't hard and once being on the road, he knew where to go. Of course Peggy would live close to the SHIELD facility and so it didn't take long for him to find the address she wrote down in her schedule.
The house wasn't any different then any of the other places around here and yet it embodied everything Steve ever dreamed off. He saw movement behind the kitchen window, probably Peggy having a day off and taking care of her daughter. Steve wondered if her husband was home too, where they met and how long they knew each other. But the longer he thought about this question, the longer he tried picturing him at Peggy's side, the more he realized this was not about him getting his happy ending with Peggy.
Back when the got word of her still being alive, seeing her for the time and the talks they had, they already got their closure. Sitting here in the military jeep and staring at a house he thought he wanted to share with the only woman who ever saw him, really saw him before the serum, wasn't what he truly longed for. Seeing her wedding picture, he wasn't shocked to find she had moved on. He knew it, heard it from her own lips. What got to him was everything that this entailed. The normality of a home and someone to share it with. And he had this for a while.
After the dust settled and the losses were count, Steve looked for Bucky. He saw him from the corner of his eye for a split moment on the battle field, realizing they turned things around. It was the moment he knew they could win, they could defeat Thanos. What it would cost, no one truly understood until they stood at the lake and said goodbye to Tony. Even Bucky was there and he knew how nervous he had been. But they also received in the end. Steve got Bucky back, the guy who held his bucket when he got sick again in their shabby little apartment with the molt covered corners which made his asthma even worse. The guy who always tried to set him up with a pretty dame but would go home with him whenever Steve told him he felt uncomfortable. The guy who he got drunk with for the first time. Who told him then he had prettier lashes than any dame he ever saw. The guy who also gave him his first kiss.
His lips quirked up in a smile just thinking about it. It was the same night he told him how he pretty he was, both of them wasted and completely drunk on a cheap bottle of whiskey Bucky got from the guys at the docks. War was looming over them and while they were struggling, Steve's health getting worse with each year, it was the best time he ever had. That night he told Bucky how he was never kissed and the fear of never kissing anyone. Bucky being Bucky told him how he couldn't allow this to happen and a kiss was a kiss, right? But this kiss was not only a kiss. In the years that followed, this kiss was all Steve could ever think about. He expected for Bucky to be forceful giving their drunken state, but he was anything but. His hands framed Steve's face and he remembered this short moment before their lips connected. Steve expected for Bucky to laugh at him, telling him he was stupid to believe he would actually kiss him. But then he tasted Bucky on his lips and then his tongue.
With the little experience he had back then, Steve thought it was a kiss. But there was more than kissing involved. They never mentioned it again, but something changed that night. It set the tone for their relationship for the years to come. The things both of them were willing to do for the other. Steve going behind enemy lines in hopes of finding Bucky alive again. Bucky being too stubborn to leave without him in this prison camp, Steve's heart shattering when he screamed at him he wouldn't leave without him. Bucky being stupid enough to follow him against Schmidt and losing so much by doing so. Steve going against Hydra in an attempt of taking revenge for what they did to Bucky. Steve dropping the shield during their fight against each other, showing him he could and would never hurt him. Steve going against Tony and one half of the Avengers, his new family, so he could prove to the world Bucky wasn't behind any of the attacks he was accused of.
Both of them went beyond their limits for the other and all this time neither of them spoke of this one night so many years ago. What he felt for Peggy wasn't erased by what he held in his heart for Bucky. It was a different kind of love, one that felt right to that time and in the years after he was found in the ice. One he would never replace. Yet it showed him what he truly longed for. Yes, he wanted a normal life, a house and someone to come home to and he thought he wanted it with Peggy. Seeing her made him realize who he truly wanted. Who he truly longed for. Who he said goodbye to and who didn't expect for him to ever come back again.
"Seems like I really took all that stupid with me," Steve mumbled under his breath before slipping out of the car and pressed the button which returned him back to the platform where Bruce was looking at him with relief. Bucky was the only person who knew he wasn't supposed to coming back so it didn't surprise Steve seeing him already walking away. To them his trip didn't last longer than five seconds, but to him, the hours he sat in this jeep in front of Peggy's house, lasted a lifetime and changed everything.
Sam smiled at Steve as he walked passed him and followed Bucky over to the bench that overlooked the lake. He didn't allow him to get there and settle down, instead he quickened his pace and made him stop by turning him around.
He thought this step would be the hardest and yet nothing ever felt as easy as pulling Bucky closer and pressing their lips together. This time there was no whiskey to blame on and Steve didn't want to. There was fear inside of him, of Bucky pushing him away, asking him what he was doing, but then he found arms sneaking around his waist and hands settling on the curve of his lower back and he found himself laughing into the kiss.
"Hey, I'm not that bad," Bucky mumbled.
"Guys, should I act disgusted or can I just finally congratulate you?" This was Sam, still a couple of feet away but ever present.
Steve didn't have a reply for him, his sole focus was on Bucky. "You remembered it. The whole 'taking all the stupid with you' thing."
"Be glad I did or else I'd have decked you. Sneaking up on me like this? You really do like getting punched."
Despite the relief Steve was feeling, he also felt Bucky's hesitation. It was in the way he looked at him, his smile not reaching his eyes. "What is it?"
"You said you wanted to go back to her. What made you change your mind?"
Of course Bucky wanted to know, but was it so easy to explain? "You." Steve was still holding Bucky by his elbows but he could feel him slipping away. This was the break or make it moment for them and wasn't it funny how he could come up with a motivational speech before a mission but as soon as this was about him, his mind drew a blank.
"You remember when we kissed? The first time?" Steve held onto Bucky just a bit tighter, feeling him stopping from pulling away and he knew this was his chance. "It's this time I long for."
"If you want your asthma back..."
"I want to know what can be if the whiskey is gone and no one will judge us for kissing in public or holding hands. I want to know what it means for you to follow the little guy and me dropping this shield. I want to know what we can be."
Holding his breath, Steve waited for any reaction from Bucky, fingers digging into his arm with every passing second. Was Bucky expecting to hear more? Didn't he believe him or didn't he remember any of this part of their past?
But then he felt Bucky shifting and he was sure he had lost him, but his eyes grew a bit bigger when Bucky's hands slipped straight to his ass.
"I can work with that. But what was that about kissing in public? I think you need to..."
Steve didn't need any more convincing. For now he gladly brought their lips back together while holding him and realizing he was finally home.
END