Chapter Text
* November 1941*
Bucky stared at Steve, all ninety pounds and drenched from the pouring rain that neither of them noticed anymore. He didn’t know how they’d gone from laughing to this. He wanted to go back to laughing.
Why couldn’t they go back to laughing?
“Did you hear me, Buck? I said I love you. I’m in love with you.” Steve stared at him, eyes wide and hopeful and just a little apprehensive. He should be terrified by what he’d said but Steve had always been more than a little stupid and reckless. He had the courage Bucky wished he had. There was a yellowing bruise beneath his left eye. His split lip had finally started to heal.
“Please don’t do this,” Bucky whispered. He was terrified enough for both of them. Buzzing filled his ears. His mouth felt thick.
Steve took a step forward. It would be nothing to push him away, small as Steve was. He could run away. He did nothing. Steve put a hand on his elbow, something he’d done a thousand times before, but it was different now. The touch burned Bucky all the way to the bone.
“Steve, please. Let’s just go home.” He thought he’d said the words, but either the rain was too loud or they’d been blocked by the painful lump in his throat.
Steve was against his chest now. It was far from the first time they’d been in this position, but it was different now. That was the thing about realizations: they turned innocent things into implications. Bucky had promised himself he’d never think about his feelings for Steve because if he didn’t think, maybe they’d go away. He’d be normal. His father would continue to be proud of him. He’d have a place to go if ever he needed it.
Staring at Steve, ninety pounds and beautiful and everything that mattered to him, Bucky was forced to confront the fact nothing had changed. Nothing would change. He loved Steve, too. Always had. And god help him if he wanted to do nothing more than grab Steve’s shoulders, push him up against the wall, and kiss him the way he’d always dreamed. And that terrified him.
He shouldn’t want that. It was wrong of him to want that.
“Bucky?” Steve looked nervous now. His teeth worried his bottom lip.
All Bucky had to do was push Steve away. All he needed to say was that he couldn’t do this. It wouldn’t be lying. His arms moved, but they didn’t do what he wanted them to. His left hand cupped Steve’s cheek, his thumb sweeping across a sharp cheekbone. (Maybe it was exactly what Bucky wanted. He didn’t know anymore.)
Don’t.
His right hand pressed against the small of Steve’s back, pulling him forward. He could feel every ridge of his twisted spine.
Stop.
If Steve were taller, their noses would be centimeters apart; he’d be able to feel his warm breath against his skin.
If you stop, you can still salvage this .
It could still be easy to explain away to anyone if they saw. Bucky had stepped forward to keep Steve from falling. The hand on his cheek was to check for broken bones and bleeding. There’d just been a fight. No one would question it—it was Steve Rogers, after all.
“Buck?”
Bucky shouldn’t have been able to hear the whisper above the pounding rain, but it seared through him. Steve still worried his bottom lip. The cut started to bleed again. Bucky’s thumb pulled it from between his teeth and swept over the chapped flesh. And then before he knew what he was doing, he bent his head and crushed their lips together.
Bucky had dreamed of kissing Steve Rogers for as long as he could remember. He’d told no one. Told no one he noticed men more than women. He wasn’t stupid. He knew what happened to the men and women who dared to go about their life publicly with a member of the same gender. He knew the newspaper headlines and saw the police brutality. He heard his father both sober and drunk, muttering or yelling about how they would ruin the city, how they were vagrants and disgusting, how the government should do more than make homosexuality illegal.
George Barnes was proud of his son. Welterweight boxing champion. Top student. Strong and handsome. Bucky could have any choice of woman he wanted.
Steve wound his hand in Bucky’s hair, his nails scratching his scalp. Stop. Bucky angled his head, allowing the kiss to deepen. This is wrong. He tasted the tang of Steve’s blood. If anyone sees you . Bucky pushed Steve against the alley wall, giving them some protection from the pouring rain. Stop. Steve’s lips parted. His tongue brushed against Bucky’s.
STOP.
Bucky pushed him away and heaved air. What did he just do? He wiped the back of his hand across his mouth, trying to scrub away the feeling of Steve’s lips on his. (He couldn’t. He’d memorized them.)
“Let’s just go home,” Bucky whispered. “Forget this ever happened.” He scrubbed harder. His head spun. Breathing became a chore.
“I don’t want to forget, Bucky.” Steve breathed hard as well. He stopped forward. Bucky stepped back.
“This is wrong!”
“Why? Because they say so?” Steve stared at him, eyes wide in defiance. It was startling that so many thought he was weak. Seeing him here, arms folded over his chest, he looked anything but.
Bucky nodded. If everyone agreed, if there were laws about it, if people went to prison, if people were killed because of it, if it brought on this much fear, it had to be wrong. Didn’t it? (He tried to ignore the longing to do more than just kiss the man in front of him. He wanted to worship Steve the way he was supposed to worship God.)
“They also say I shouldn’t be allowed to live. Are you going to start agreeing with that, too?” Steve’s words were sharp now. It seemed like eons ago they were walking the docks after a day of work.
“If people find out, they’ll kill you, Steve.” He couldn’t understand how Steve didn’t care about that.
Steve shrugged. “They haven’t managed to do it yet.”
The buzzing in Bucky’s ears grew louder. His skin was hot. He wanted to go back to when he could ignore his feelings and be the son his father thought he was. He wanted to go back to when he could pretend.
“Do you know you talk in your sleep?” Steve asked. “You say a lot, actually.”
Fear twisted in Bucky’s stomach. Lately, his dreams had involved Steve. Kissing Steve. “I don’t,” he said automatically. “You’re wrong.”
“Usually, it’s nothing. Sometimes you say something about your da. A few nights ago, you said you loved me.”
“You’re wrong. I don’t.” Bucky spoke automatically, his brain working overtime to process everything. They’d been walking back from work when it started to rain and Steve suggested the shortcut through the alley. None of this should be happening.
Steve stepped back against his chest and kissed him hard. Bucky kissed him back. And then he pushed him away.
“I don’t, I can’t—” Bucky didn’t know what was happening. There was a dark haze on the edge of his vision. His lungs didn’t seem to be working properly.
“You can’t what?” Steve’s eyes were hard. “You can’t love me?”
“I can’t—” Bucky couldn’t even say it. He loved Steve more than anything.
“Then why did you kiss me? Were you hoping to say I caught you unawares? Were you hoping you could prove the rumors true—that Steve Rogers really is a faggot?”
“I can’t—” Bucky tried to swallow but the lump in his throat had grown.
“You can’t what? Use your words, Bucky. That’s what you’re always telling me, isn’t it?”
“I can’t be this!” Bucky yelled. “I can’t love you. It’s—I can’t—I’m—”
Steve didn’t even have to raise his voice for the words to cut him to his core. “You can’t, or you won’t?”
His father’s words spilled out before Bucky could stop them. He’d listened to him talk about ‘that Rogers kid enough and he was scared. “Even if it wasn’t wrong, do you really think I could love you when you’re like this? You’re a waste of space and resources.”
It was the look on Steve’s face that made him realize what he’d said. He took a step back. Betrayal and pain masked every feature. “Fuck you, Barnes.”
“I’m sorry,” Bucky whispered. Or he thought he did. “I don’t—I didn’t—”
Everything burned. His chest from the lack of air he was taking in, his eyes from where tears threatened to fall, his lips where he could still feel the imprint of Steve’s. He saw Steve’s mouth moving, but he couldn’t hear anything over the buzzing of his ears and the fall of rain. He needed to make Steve understand he hadn’t meant a word of what he’d just said, but he couldn’t make his voice work.
Steve shivered now. Bucky took off his jacket and automatically went to drape it around Steve’s shoulders. Not that it would do any good. They were both drenched to the bone. Steve took a step back.
“You think a jacket is going to make this better?” Steve asked with a laugh. For some reason, the laugh was the worst thing Bucky had ever heard. It was a twisted perversion of its usual sound. “If I’m just a waste of space, might as well just stay out in the rain ‘til it kills me, right?”
“Please take it,” Bucky heard himself saying. “You’re not a waste of space.”
To his surprise, Steve did. He held it in his hand like he didn’t know what to do with it.
“Can we go home?” Bucky asked. “Can we talk about this when we’re dry and have had time to think?” He couldn’t think now, not with the feeling of Steve’s lips on his.
“I don’t need time to realize you’re just like everyone else,” Steve said. “I never want to see you again.”
“Steve, please.” Bucky didn’t know how he’d expected this to end. Maybe part of him hoped they’d be able to forget about it, hoped they could put it in a box, bury it deep and move on. Because no matter how bad this was, no matter how wrong their feelings were, nothing was more frightening than the thought of a life without Steve by his side. “Steve, let’s just go home and talk—”
“I hope you have the life you want. Go join the army—”
“Steve.” Bucky couldn’t recognize his own voice.
“—find a girl. You have the top pick, right? Be another brainwashed pig of the United States.”
Jacket still in hand, Steve turned and walked out of the alley, leaving Bucky alone, freezing and more confused than he’d ever been. He tried yelling after him, but his voice still couldn’t work.
It took him a long time to find the strength to move.
When he finally made it back to their apartment hours later, he half-expected Steve to be sitting at the table. They’d had bad fights before. More times than he could count, Bucky had needed to leave the apartment to cool down before coming home and finding Steve at the table, picking at the paint flecks. They’d talked and figured things out and their relationship was stronger than ever.
This time, the apartment was empty and all of Steve’s things were gone.