Archive of Our Own

I thought you wouldn’t come back, Bucky thinks. He wants to say – he wants to ask. But he doesn’t. He stares at the ceiling of their shared apartment, life buzzing again outside the building and doesn’t say anything. He listens as Steve moves in the kitchen, no doubt cooking something for the both of them because they don’t go out and Bucky prefers to not let anyone in.

There's a certain peace that comes along the subtle noise. Steve's socked feet padding against the hardwood floor, his humming. Bucky's life has revolved around chaos for so long that this, right now, is the most peace he's come to know. He doesn't want to disrupt it. He fears the answer, mostly. I almost didn’t, Steve would say and that would just literally ruin Bucky, but I had to take care of you. He can’t listen to these words coming out of Steve’s mouth – not after everything. Not after all Steve had done for him.

He would feel bad, he would feel horrible and there’s enough of that going on already. There’s enough of guilt and regret and hurt and sadness. 

The sting behind his eyelids gets worse but still, he doesn't ask for help. Steve ran chores the day before, he got a few pills for Bucky. Mostly painkillers, antacids, things like that. His migraine pills are in Steve's drawer. He could get up, search for it. He could tell Steve his head is heavy and his eyes are stinging and Steve would get it for him. He does neither: the pain is welcome.

He's keeping Steve trapped inside this apartment. Steve will end up regretting coming back. Bucky will only have himself to blame. 

"Buck," Steve calls. "Dinner's ready."

Bucky hums. He nods and his head thumps against the hardwood floor, "Coming."

"You're not on the floor again, are you?" 

Bucky presses his lips together. Then, he says, "No."

Steve laughs. Bucky gets up. His vision is blurry, but he perseveres. "What's for dinner?"

"Uh," He says. "Pasta."

"You don't sound so sure."

Steve shrugs. "You'll have to try it out." He smiles a little. This is why Bucky lingers around: the smile. All of Steve's smiles. They are worth the guilt.

Death jokes are prohibited, so Bucky swallows back a few jokes that he knows Steve would force himself to laugh at and says, "I've had worse things in my mouth." There, it's a safe joke. Nothing depressed or gloomy about it. 

Steve flushes a soft pink colour and clears his throat. "Well," He says. "Eat."

They sit together on the couch. The kitchen table feels too small for them, but so does the couch. There's a reason why Bucky comes to the couch instead of the perfectly useful chair. He doesn't know why Steve follows, though. Bucky is selfish, greedy –  he chooses the couch so there will be an excuse in case his foot touches Steve's thigh. 

The TV is unbearable. Everything that they want to ignore is on there all the time; deaths, consequences, guilt. Everything they want to not think about even for a damn second is constantly being talked about, so they don't watch TV. But there are DVDs and they are distracting enough.

"Thoughts?" Steve asks after a few minutes. He'd been in charge of choosing the movie. It's an action movie, a horror movie, maybe. Bucky can't say he's paying attention.

"On the movie or the food?"

"I know you're not watching, Buck."

"Food it is, then," He says. "It's good, Steve."

"And how's the head?" 

"Loud," Bucky replies. "How's the head?" He asks back.

"Messy," Steve says. 

They eat the rest of their food in silence. 

Sometimes Bucky tries to think of the past without letting the weight of it completely crash him. He rarely succeeds. It's early morning, the sun is barely up in the sky. There are no noises coming from outside, people are either asleep or fighting the urge to going back to bed. Bucky looks over to Steve's bed. It's empty. Steve's out for a run – it’s the only thing he still does. He closes Steve's bedroom door behind him before he finds his way to the soft bed. 

He lies there, quietly. It's warm from Steve's body. Smells like him. Bucky reminisces about the past, then, as he's surrounded by comfort – even if Steve is far away. He used to lie with his back to the wall, Steve plastered against his chest. His frail, small body shivering from the cold. Bucky took care of him. Bucky had his cheek pressed against Steve's ear as the thunders resounded through the cheap building.

He used to watch Steve every second with hawk eyes. Where Steve went, Bucky's eyes followed. It wasn't just because Steve had a thing for trouble, or because Steve was as fragile as he was insane, but because Bucky couldn't not look. This Steve, Bucky knows – Bucky has seen it first hand – doesn’t need Bucky to take care of him anymore. Bucky is the fragile one now.

It's such a pity, he thinks, nowadays he can do neither. Looking at Steve hurts, touching him feels like the world is about to swallow Bucky until there's nothing left. 

He takes a deep breath. They don't talk much about all that happened ever since Bucky came back to Steve. They didn't have time: it was a constant fight. Now there's no fight. There's no urgency, either. Still, Bucky feels scattered around. He feels like he's everywhere at once and nowhere at all. Steve is an anchor, but sometimes Bucky feels like he's floating away.  He knows he should ask.

Why did you save me?

Why did you do all that?

Why did you come back? I thought you wouldn't. I thought you’d grab at the past. Bucky would understand. But Steve came back to deal with grief and hurt and guilt and Bucky. 

He leaves Steve’s bedroom. It feels suffocating sometimes to have him so close yet so far. So close yet so untouchable. Steve gets home at half-past seven in the morning, Bucky is on the living room floor.  

“Buck?”

Please, Bucky thinks, please. He comes closer. His hand is cold against Bucky’s nape. “Migraine?” He asks. 

Bucky shakes his head.

“Still loud?” Steve says. His fingertips press down on Bucky’s shoulder, an inch away from his metal arm. “You haven’t talked much lately.”

“Stupidly loud,” He says. “And messy.”

Steve laughs. “That’s my word.”

“You’ll share.”

“Okay,” Steve says. “I’ll share all my words with you.”

Bucky bites back the question. He’s afraid to know the answer. “It’s too much, isn’t it?” He asks instead. “To be here.”

Steve’s hand slides down to in between his shoulder blades. “Yeah, Buck, it is.”

Because Bucky only had Steve to lose – but Steve had more. Steve lost more. Steve was stripped down from his people. His friends. The people he relied on when he needed the most, the people who had his back constantly. Bucky doesn’t know how to be them, he only knows how to be Bucky. Not even the Bucky he used to be, not the Bucky Steve must need. This is the only thing he can be: half alive, half knocked down, damaged and raw and hurt.

Steve adds, “But I wouldn't have it any other way.”

It's almost the answer Bucky wants, but he didn't ask the question so it's not the same. Steve wouldn't want it any other way because his loss meant someone else had their wife, their best friend, their child back. His loss meant the world back at its axis. He wouldn't trade it for personal pleasure. The Blip happened, they overcame it and Steve would deal with his grief quietly if it meant everyone else had their people back. 

Bucky needed a lot of time before stepping outside again. Steve was up and ready for it much earlier than him; he'd started small: going out for a run every morning before the world was awake, running errands every other day of the week so Bucky would have his greek yoghurt and his migraine medication. Then, he visited Sam a few times. Baby steps turned into adult steps while Bucky didn't go outside at all for the first few months. That is, until tonight. 

It's hot. It's not even May yet, but the late evenings are already warm enough to make Bucky's back stick to the couch. He often lays on the floor, but Steve's bothered by it. So the couch is the next better choice. The bed is out of the question unless it's Steve's bed and Steve is out of the apartment and Bucky can hide under his covers and press his pillow against his nose. 

But tonight, the couch was sticky and he decided he'd sit on the floor by the window. The glass windows take the whole wall, extending from the ceiling to the floor. Bucky is watching the streets below, perched close on the windowpane. Steve is reading across from him. Their legs are stretched in front of them, their feet a few inches away from touching. "I wanna go out," Bucky says. He touches the window glass with his index finger. It's warm. 

Steve closes the book. "Now?"

Bucky hums.

"Where do you wanna go?"

"Anywhere."

"Vague answer," Steve says. "Let's try again. Where do you wanna go, Buck?"

He asks as if he'd take Bucky anywhere he asked. As if the answer didn't really matter because Steve would get Bucky there. He bites his bottom lip. "I don't know," He says, but he does. There's a place he wants to go, a brick wall behind an alley where he wants to press his forehead. He clears his throat, "Brooklyn."

Steve nods. He looks outside. It's still early, people are getting home - exhausted, stressed. He looks at Bucky again, "Okay. Let's go."

It takes them a few minutes to get dressed in clothes that aren't old sweatpants with holes in them. Bucky wears a windbreaker jacket, even though it's warm because he'd rather not deal with the staring. 

It's cooler outside the apartment which makes Bucky feel instantly better. He made the right choice – staying in would turn his mood sour. Steve walks next to him, so close that their arms bump into each other as they walk. The sidewalk isn't big enough for them to walk side by side when people are everywhere, so Bucky skips from the sidewalk to the street and from the street to the sidewalk like a kid and Steve laughs. He pulls Bucky by the hand, guides him by his elbow until they're past the crowd.

They take the subway. It's crowded because it's New York but they're wearing caps and so isolated in their own bubble that even if someone recognises Steve, they don't cause a scene. 

Brooklyn can change, but not enough for Bucky not to recognise every corner. 

Steve takes a deep breath next to him. "It doesn't feel real." He says.

"What?"

"To be here with you." Steve smiles. "An eternity ago before everything when you didn't remember me. Someone said your name and I felt like I was here again and nothing had changed. Just by hearing your name, I was transported." He looks at Bucky. 

Bucky's throat closes up. "That must've felt horrible."

"No," Steve replies. "Not at all."

He takes Steve by the hand. They walk close together. This word – close. Everything related to Bucky and Steve has this word attached to it. Close friends who stayed close to each other in a fight, in a war. Even when they were on opposite sides, they were still close. Close in life, close in death. Pressed closed together on a couch, on the subway. Walking close to each other on a sidewalk in Brooklyn.

Steve's hand on Bucky's elbow again, his laugh pressed against Bucky's shoulder as they walk around Brooklyn thinking and talking and remembering.  

This was a choice that Bucky made for himself. A choice that he won't regret. A good choice. He finds the alley where, so long ago, he saved Steve from getting his ass beaten. The fight isn't the reason why Bucky remembers this alley so vividly.

It was Steve's mouth –  split lip, dripping blood. Eyes wet with tears he would never let fall. Bucky had looked at him and had wanted him so much, so bad, with such intensity that he had to look away. He pressed his feverish forehead on the brick wall, cold and dirty against his skin. Steve had poked him, asked, "What's up?" And Bucky hadn't trusted himself to turn around and look at him. He would've kissed him, would've licked the blood from his mouth, would've pressed Steve – small, delicate Steve – against that brick wall and he would've–

“Bucky?”

He doesn't say anything. Bucky places his hand on the brick wall. Like everything else, it's warm. A very different feeling from the one from his memory. 

"You're so weird," Steve jokes, but there's a very palpable worry underneath his light tone. Bucky sighs. 

"I'm okay," He says. "You worry too much. It's a wall."

"I worry a very reasonable amount. It's you, after all. I could worry so much more."

"I'm a very reasonable adult."

"Right," Steve rolls his eyes. "What's up with the wall?"

"It's just a wall in a dirty alley," Bucky replies.

"I remember this alley."

"Of course you do," Bucky says. "You got beaten up in every alley in Brooklyn."

"Not every alley." He whines. 

"Most of them." 

"Yeah," Steve concedes. He closes the distance between them. Bucky turns to look at the wall again. How is it possible that he wants Steve more than he wanted back then? That day, the desire inside him felt unbearable. 

This, right now, is worse. Steve settles his hand on the small of Bucky's back. "Let me see this wall, too. What's so important about it?"

It's the wall that kept me from kissing you a hundred years ago. It's the wall that I kept thinking about when they tried to keep me from thinking about anything that wasn't murder. 

"For some reason," Bucky says. "This wall stuck with me. Through all that shit."

If he had kissed Steve that day, what would've changed? Their future? Their present? Would Steve kiss him back? Would Steve kiss him back now, if Bucky turned around? 

“Thank God for this wall, then,” Steve says. 

His breath is warm against the side of Bucky's neck. "Let's head back," Bucky says. "I've done my duty for today."

"What duty?"

"Of being normal."

Steve squeezes his waist before letting go. "Okay."

A few days after their Brooklyn visit, Bucky tries to isolate. It is true that sometimes Bucky needs to be alone. Most of the time, though, he needs Steve. Because twice in a day –  if he's lucky – he'll close his eyes and remember a face he'd give everything to be able to forget. Several faces, several lives he took. It's at that moment that Bucky forgets he needs to keep his distance and he runs to find Steve. 

He opens his bedroom door with his metal arm and it's a miracle he doesn't rip it off. Steve is on the bed, eyes alert, and Bucky is momentarily taken aback – it's as if Steve was waiting for him before he even decided he would come. 

"Everything okay?" Steve asks. He already knows the answer.

"No," He replies. "Every day is a bad day to me."

"Not every day," Steve says. He pats the bed and Bucky is so tired of keeping a distance, he's so tired of pretending he doesn't want to stick to Steve like a tattoo. He goes. He lies down on the bed, face pressed against the sheets.

Bucky wants to press his face against Steve's chest, but this closeness is the only thing he can allow himself to have. Steve, on the other hand, allows himself a lot more.

He reaches out for Bucky, combs his hair with his fingers. Bucky groans. “Not every day, right?” Steve asks again.

Bucky realises something, right there. He realises Steve needs to be taken care of in different ways than before. He realises Steve also needs to know that Bucky wants to be here.

And so he takes a deep breath and says, "No, not every day."

And it's the truth. It's not every day. Some days he barely remembers. Some days it feels as if his past life happened to someone else, someone he knows it's dead and gone. Some days he only thinks about one past – the one he shares with Steve. Some days he feels like he could reach out and touch Steve and he believes that his touch wouldn’t feel dirty.

Because Steve is so good, he’s been so good, but Bucky is… not. Steve could be so wrong about all his choices that are related to Bucky. He could, in the future, regret them. Bucky is scared shitless that he will. 

“Good, Buck,” Steve says. He’s still caressing Bucky’s hair. “You deserve to have good days.”

Bucky chuckles. “Do I?”

“Of course.”

“You truly believe that, don’t you?” Bucky asks. His voice is muffled against the bed. Steve doesn’t ask him to move, though. “You believe I deserve good things.”

“I could never think otherwise.”

“Other people do.” He says. 

“Other people don’t know you as I know you,” Steve replies. “They’ll never know you as well as I do.”

Bucky doesn’t answer, but Steve continues, “They’ll never know me, either.”

“They’d have to be your best friend,” The words taste like vinegar in his mouth. “For at least a hundred years for that.”

“Yeah,” Steve agrees “But I don't think anyone would be fit for that. Just you.”

"Yeah?"

He hums. "Definitely."

Bucky feels smug, obviously, he does. It's Steve. He wants to be for Steve at least half of what Steve is for him. He wants to be valuable, irreplaceable. He wants to be so fucking important to Steve... and right now, he feels like that. 

"Are you smiling?" Steve asks. "You liked hearing that?"

Bucky presses his lips together. "So what if I did?"

Steve rolls one strand of Bucky's hair around his finger.  "I'd say that's kind of cute, Buck."

“Shut up.” He huffs.

“I think we should go out again.” Steve starts after a few minutes of complete silence. Bucky could've fallen asleep with the way the room was silent, only Steve's breathing resonating in Bucky's ears. The darkness of it was like a cocoon - cosy, safe. Steve's hand on his hair, tracing his fingertips on his scalp. 

He turns his head, opens his eyes and stares at Steve's side profile - high cheekbones, stubble on his chin. 

Steve wants to go back to work. The country needs Captain America, that's what Steve must tell himself, and Bucky doesn't think Steve knows how to tell them apart anymore. Not after The Blip, at least. The country – the world, if he's being honest – might need an icon, someone the government can use to placate the people who are mourning and aching. Some people lost their hope and Captain America needs to give it back to them. 

Bucky doesn't say, but he does not believe Steve has much of it to offer. The bottom line is, Steve wants to be useful again and so he's trying to take Bucky with him. Step by step. 

"Really?" Bucky says. "I don't know. Might be pushing myself too far."

"I think you felt better after we went out. Didn't you?"

"I did," And he did. But only because it was Brooklyn and only because he was with Steve. "Did you feel better?"

Steve opens his mouth. Then closes it again. Bucky waits. "Buck, I don't think I have a choice."

"What?"

"I can't choose between feeling better or not. I have to. I have to feel better."

"Who the hell said that?"

"I'm saying that. I have to feel better. I got you back, Buck. Some people got back to find out they were alone." 

"You didn't get everyone back."

"But I got you." He says again. Like it matters the most. Like Bucky is the only thing he couldn't bear to lose. "You're here. I have to feel better."

"Stop, Steve. Don't do this."

Steve stays silent. Bucky asks, "Is this why you didn't stay?" He doesn't need to clarify. "Because you wanted to take care of your damaged and fucked up best friend?"

"I made that choice," Steve says. "Because I had you again. After not having you for so long. I realised I couldn't go a day without you. It's cruel."

"You'd get over it." He knows, as soon as he says it, that he's about to get Steve mad.

And he's right. Steve pulls back his hand and replies, "Bucky, I didn’t get over it not even after almost 80 years.”

Bucky can’t be here anymore. Lying on the same bed as Steve, in the same room. He feels trapped and a little bit insane. “Let’s go out.”

“Okay.” Steve agrees. 

They end up at Sunset Park, eating noodles in a cheap noodle shop. It's cold, later than it was when they went out two weeks ago and Bucky forgot to put on a fucking sweatshirt. His arm doesn't go unnoticed, but his stare keeps people away. He's not even mad. Not particularly. Not at anything or anyone but himself.

A whole hour went by in between their leaving the apartment and ending up at a noodle shop, and yet not a word was said. Steve's mouth is red because he can't blow on his noodles long enough for them to cool down before he eats. He's also not mad at what Bucky said anymore.

One thing that Bucky knows how to do is read Steve like a book. He knows Steve can’t really get angry at him for more than a few minutes. He knows Steve faltered when he got to the past. He knows that, for a second, Steve entertained that thought. He knew Steve would come back to... him. To his life.

He can't, or rather, he is scared of facing up the reason why. Because after so many years of hiding feelings and burying desires, Bucky still has trouble understanding himself. That's not entirely his fault, for so many years he was viciously put away from his essence, for so long he was not himself.

He was a machine, a murderer. He's still trying to understand who he is now that the choices he makes are his choices and the thoughts he has are his thoughts. And the people he wants to fight are the people he wants to fight. 

And the person he wants to kiss is still the same person he wanted to kiss back in 1930. This might be the only part of himself that didn’t suffer a drastic change. 

"Are you mad?" Steve asks.

"What?"

"Are you mad because of what I said?"

"No, of course not," He says. "Are you mad?"

"Not anymore."

"Good."

"Good."

They eat the rest of their noodles in silence. 

"You know," Steve says, later when they're walking around aimlessly. The cold rush of wind is the only thing keeping Bucky thinking straight. "In a few years, robots are likely to take over the world."

Bucky makes a confused noise. “What?

Steve murmurs, "Robots."

"I got it. Robots." He says. “Where did you get that from?”

“I don’t know, Buck, I just remembered something Tony used to say. Science and stuff. Technology. Robots. There are already robots who can solve Rubik’s cubes. Some can do repetitive jobs faster than a human can.”

Bucky hears what he doesn't say. Captain America and Steve Rogers are, now, separate people. "Maybe we could get a robot to take him off your hands.” He doesn’t clarify with words because  Steve hears what he doesn't say. 

Steve smiles. “Maybe not a robot, maybe just– someone else.” He replies.

“You’re tired,” Bucky says.

“Yeah,” Steve nods. “I think I am.” 

And then they both hear a whimper. It's a stray dog, dirty and very obviously poorly nourished. It's a small dog, scared and hungry and Bucky instantly feels like he should take the dog home. He should take the dog back to their apartment and give it a bath and take care of it. He'd feel better knowing they didn't leave it behind.

Steve could walk with the dog in the morning. Bucky would play with it at night. While he's thinking, Steve kneels on the floor and reaches for the dog. It tries to bite his hand and Steve laughs. "Easy there," He says, softly. "We aren't gonna hurt you."

The dog whimpers again, like it's asking "really?". The puppy doesn't trust Steve, probably won't trust Bucky. They are humans and all the humans this dog had in its life were probably horrible. So the puppy is suspicious. Bucky knows the feeling. 

The dog sniffs Steve's hand. Then Steve's allowed to touch him. "Oh, look at you," He says. He sounds so soft, softer than Bucky has ever heard him, and to be honest, Bucky has heard Steve speak softly before. Bucky must not be as cute as a stray puppy. He can live with that. “You wanna come home? With us?” The dog licks Steve’s hand. “I think that’s a yes, Buck.”

“I think so too.”

“Do you think we can smuggle him inside the building?”

“I think Captain America might be able to do that.” 

Steve laughs. “Gotta use him while we can.”

Bucky smiles at him. “Let’s get the dog home, Steve. I think it needs a bath.”

“It’s not it,” Steve rolls his eyes. “It’s a he. I think. I am almost sure. Maybe after a bath, I’ll have an answer.”

“It’ll need a name.”

Steve groans, “Buck, it’s not it.”

Bucky’s laugh echoes in the crowded street. At home, they bathe the dog – it is a he, after all – in the bathtub. Well, Steve bathes the dog in the bathtub. Bucky watches, but he’s holding a towel so he’s technically helping. Steve is just good with dogs, ever since their youth stray dogs would always let Steve pet them.

Bucky makes a list inside his head as he watches Steve playfully bathing their dog. They’ll need toys. And dog food, that’s very important. What else does a dog need? Perhaps Bucky will give in and start using google. They’ll definitely need a dog doctor just to check if the pup is okay. Bucky doesn’t think he is – but he’ll be. Steve has a way of making things better.

Bucky wishes he’d focus on himself as much as he focuses on others, but alas. Maybe he’s asking for too much. 

Maybe Steve Rogers won’t ever learn how to be a little bit selfish.

Bucky didn't believe a dog would make him, dare he say, happy. But here it is, the puppy asleep on his chest as Bucky lays on the floor with his feet up against the wall. His dog tags are chewed because the puppy likes to play with them when Bucky is holding him. 

Steve is not home. The whole thing about being tired and giving in meant he'd have to find someone to replace him. Bucky doesn't think it will take much longer. But being alone means Bucky can pick apart every thought and the weight of the little dog on his chest is as much an anchor as Steve himself. So, he thinks. 

He thinks back to Steve caressing his nape, combing his hair. Massaging his shoulder, squeezing his waist. He thinks back to Steve's red mouth, slightly burnt from the noodles. He thinks back to Steve's stubble and how it would feel against his skin. 

Bucky tries to remind himself why he shouldn't think of these things. He tries to remind himself he's supposed to feel broken and raw and undeserving. He fails. 

He's got control over his own brain again but sometimes it doesn't feel quite this way at all. He picks apart every sentence that came out of Steve's mouth in the last few days. He thinks back to "it’s cruel to go a day without you" or "i wouldn't change a thing" or "i heard your name and was transported".

He thinks back to Steve's voice as he said: I didn't get over it , and right now Bucky thinks maybe Steve had wanted to say, I didn't get over you not even after almost eighty years. Bucky is suddenly so sure that even death couldn't take him away from Steve's side.

He'd find his way back to this man. He did it once when he was brainwashed and controlled. He did it once when he was turned into dust. He'd do it over and over again. He would die and come back and meet Steve again. He would die and turn into a ghost and haunt Steve's steps. He would die and become the earth beneath Steve's feet. 

Steve would want him to. 

Because Steve had a choice. Steve could've gone back to the past and he could've had everything else. But he chose Bucky. He chose Bucky over and over again. Who's Bucky, if not someone eternally at Steve's mercy? Who's he to keep resisting? Who's he to let everyone else hold him away from Steve when, for the first time, he's allowed to reach out and bring him closer. He's allowed to choose his own words, his own movements.

He's allowed to heal however he feels like doing. To help Steve heal, too. The world is going to be rebuilt, people are learning how to live with their realities. Bucky needs to do the same. He needs to rebuild his own world, he needs to learn how to live in this reality. He's free to choose whatever he wants and Steve is right by his side. 

So, as the puppy awakes on his chest and Steve's key turns in the door lock, Bucky decides he'll simply stop running. He'll stay where he is, and Steve will come to him. He's sure of it. He's so sure of it – it’s what Steve does. He comes all the way around to Bucky.

“He looks comfortable,” It’s the first thing Steve says. “I’m jealous.”

Bucky smiles, plays with the dog’s floppy ears. “You’re too big to sleep on my chest now, Steve.”

“Always an excuse,” Steve whistles. He throws his keys on the centre table and sits on the couch. “Why are you on the floor again?”

The dog jumps off Bucky’s chest. His little paws are going thump! thump! thump! on the hardwood floor. “I just like it here. How was it?”

“Sam is not making it easy, but I know why. It’s gonna take some work.”

“You’ve always liked some work.”

“The easiest it is to come, the easiest it is to go.” 

Steve gets up from the couch to sit down on the floor, just next to Bucky’s head.  "How was your day?"

"Pretty normal," Bucky answers. He lifts his head off the floor at the same time Steve slides his thigh under it. "My head is not made of glass, you know, not that fragile."

"Could've fooled me."

Bucky frowns, amused. "Is that a brainwash joke?"

"No," Steve says. "I'm not sure. Maybe?" 

"You've changed, Rogers."

Steve doesn't say anything at first, but then he places his palm on Bucky's face. "I did."

"Me too." 

“I know. I don’t mind.”

“Really?” Bucky presses his lips together. “Don’t you miss the way I was before?”

“Do you mind that I’m changed?”

“It doesn’t compare, Steve.”

“Answer the question, Buck.”

I only care that you’re too big to hide in my chest like you used to. “No.”

“Then why would I?”

"You're right. If I don't mind that you're painfully huge now–”

"Shut up," Steve says. The hand on Bucky's face squeezes his cheeks, forcing his mouth into a pout. "Let's take the dog out for a walk."

"I thought you did that earlier today." He sounds muffled because of Steve’s hand that is still pinching his face.

"But I wanna do it again. With you."

“Like–” A little family, he almost said. Once again Steve hears what he doesn’t say. 

“Yeah.” Steve agrees, easily. 

Steve has always been romantic, Bucky thinks. He's not that much into grand gestures, but the little things. Like when he met Peggy Carter and their first dance was a majestic thing he so badly wanted to experience. Bucky doesn't know what would be their equivalent. Doesn't know if Steve is into him that much. If he compares at all. 

They walk around their neighbourhood with the puppy on a leash. Bucky bites his bottom lip. "I think he should have a name."

Steve hums. "Any ideas?" 

"Loaded Gun."

"No."

"Killing machine."

"No."

"Hitman."

"Hmm," Steve says. "No."

"Then no, I don't have any ideas."

"You're a dork."

Bucky laughs –  loud enough to startle himself. “Oh,” He says. “I forgot I could do that.”

Steve smiles. “I didn’t.”

It's not always Bucky Barnes who's in desperate need of some kind of support. Steve Rogers has bad days too. They're rare, but they happen and it's easy to spot when they do. 

In the morning, Steve doesn't go out for a run. 

Bucky doesn't know what to do for about ten seconds before he's decided: This is Steve. This is Steve –  who else would provide him a better kind of support? He doesn't knock. Steve's room is dark and quiet and ridiculously cold. He's under a fort of blankets. Bucky stays quiet, doesn't make much noise until he's sitting cross-legged on the bed. Steve reaches out for Bucky in a matter of seconds, his hand finds Bucky's knee. 

"Messy head?"

Steve doesn't reply.

"Do you want me to go?"

Steve squeezes his knee. 

"Okay."

He stays silent, Steve's hand on his knee. Then, he opens his mouth before he even knows what he's saying.

"Remember when we met," Bucky says. "You needed me to help you. And after so long when we met again, you were bigger and stronger."

Steve does not move. Bucky wants to kiss him, hug him – make him feel better. "Sometimes I forget you aren't always that strong. Sometimes I think you go through a lot and leave unscathed. I am wrong, I know."

"I still need you to take care of me," Steve says. "I don't need anyone else, Buck, as much as I need you."

"I'll take care of you, Steve, just like you do to me," Bucky replies. "Might not be good enough. Throwing punches and kicking things is less scary than using my words."

That makes Steve laugh a little. "Thank you."

"For what?"

"For everything," Steve says. "For coming back to me."

Now's the time, Bucky thinks, "You came back to me. Even when I thought you wouldn't."

"Bucky," Steve pulls the blankets off of his face. "I'd never leave you. I would never leave you, I went through hell to get you back, Buck. My whole life changed over and over again but you were a constant. I don’t think you understand what having you mean to me. If you weren’t with me right now I’d be ruined. You have to get this. Tell me you get this."

Bucky feels his bottom lip trembling. 

"Tell me you understand this," Steve squeezes his knee again. "Buck, I made a choice to stay here with you because there was no other option. No other choice I'd ever make."

Bucky feels his heart unclenching. Up until now, he was feeling guilty. As if he'd held Steve back for a chance of being where he wanted, with who he wanted. As if he was a chore, a dead weight dragging Steve down. But now, upon hearing this, he feels like a weight was lifted off his shoulders. He was scared of asking and getting the answer that would break him, but... Steve. 

Oh.

"Steve," He starts. "I get it."

They don’t say more. Steve pulls Bucky until they’re lying side by side. He scoots over to Bucky’s side until he’s within reach to hide his face on Bucky’s neck. It's familiar to have Steve so close, but it's different. Better. 

"I'm tired." 

Bucky's arm – made of flesh and bones and as bloody as his metal arm – goes around Steve's waist. "I know."

"It's not wrong for me to choose myself, right?"

"It's not."

"It is not wrong to let Cap go?"

"No."

Steve falls asleep on Bucky's chest. Bucky can't sleep. Steve's snoring softly on his chest, the smell of his hair is impregnated on Bucky's nose. He doesn't think this is the appropriate time to feel slightly obsessed with Steve in a sexual way, but he's absolutely obsessed with Steve in a sexual way right now.

He's been repressing, trying at least, but now that this weird rock of repressed feelings was ripped from him, he can't stop himself from wanting Steve just like he did back then when they were young and reckless and Steve wasn't a hero and Bucky wasn't a killing machine.

Bucky might not be a killing machine anymore and Steve might not want to be Captain America anymore, but he's always going to be a hero. Bucky thinks that, maybe, he's a little bit of a hero himself.

Steve moves, throwing his leg over Bucky’s hips. God, he thinks. Feeling Steve’s body crushed against him like this is awakening in him things he hasn’t felt in so long. He didn’t even know if he’d ever feel like this ever again. Steve grunts, waking up, dragging his nose on the line of Bucky's jaw.

It's been half an hour, tops since Steve fell asleep but it's apparent that he's a little bit disorientated as he awakes. He grunts again, says, "Bucky?"

"Yeah."

He thinks Steve is gonna ask why he's still on the fucking bed. Instead, Steve sighs content, "Thought you'd leave."

"Why?"

Steve is clearly still in a fine stupor of sleepiness because he answers, "Might've scared you away."

"I'd never," Bucky frowns. He knows he did before, but he'd never choose to do it out of his own will. "Still tired?"

"Obviously," Steve says, then he yawns. "I've been tired for years. This little nap isn't enough."

"Maybe you should sleep more, my arm isn't tired." Bucky presses his lips together. "I wouldn't mind."

"I know you wouldn't," Steve giggles. "You don't mind much when it's me, do you?"

"I don't mind anything when it's you."

Steve pulls away from Bucky's chest and he's got a second to panic that he said something he shouldn't have before his confidence kicks in. Steve rises on his elbows to look at Bucky's face. "I know that, too."

They just keep looking at each other. Staring dumbly as if they were thirteen again. Bucky glances quickly at Steve's lips and he feels fourteen. He looks into Steve's eyes and feels fifteen. He reaches out to touch Steve's earlobe and feels sixteen. He palms Steve's face with his metal arm and feels seventeen – the arm doesn't matter. He lets his metal hand touch Steve's chin and he feels eighteen. 

He keeps touching Steve until he feels twenty-seven. The age he was the last time he was still Just Bucky and Steve was still just Steve. 

Bucky is so fucking hungry for more. He lets his metal hand slide until he's got a hold of Steve's throat. He feels ageless. 

"Buck," Steve calls. It's not a warning, he's not asking for Bucky to stop, to pull away. It's a plea. He's asking for more. 

"Yeah?"

“When we were kids,” Steve swallows. "I wanted you to kiss me every time you looked at me."

"I wanted to kiss you every time I looked at you. I wish I had kissed you. I still wish I would kiss you. Just once."He flexes his metal hand, fingers tightening around Steve's throat. 

"Just once?"

Bucky smiles, "Maybe more than once."

"A lot more, I'd hope."

"You'd hope?"

"Sometimes you can be so fucking dense."

"Oh, Steve," Bucky laughs. "What a filthy mouth."

"You'll make me beg?"

Bucky tightens his hand around Steve's throat one more time before he pulls Steve into him. "Would you?"

"Absolutely."

Bucky leans in, catches Steve's mouth in an old kiss. Slow and intense and heated and full of tongue and teeth and Steve's grunts as he throws his body over Bucky's so he can get closer. Bucky pulls an inch away to say, "Then beg."

"Please," Steve begs, softly and wanting and so, so honest. Bucky flips them on the bed, kisses Steve's mouth hard enough to bruise, to hurt, to make it linger when he pulls away. Steve's legs fall open and Bucky just fits in between them like he always had matched with Steve. They've always been inseparable, after all, and right now the urge to just touch all over Steve's body is what makes Bucky feel insane, unhinged. 

In a good way.

He wonders, for a very brief moment – because Steve is kissing back and there’s no room inside his head to anything else –, if someone else in the whole wide world could feel the same way he does about their own person. He wonders if he is the only person capable of feeling so much, so many different things, at such intensity and at once and still makes it out alive. He wonders if there’s someone else in the world that has their own Steve – a cool, genuine, bright, loving and strong person who might not know it, but it’s probably the only person who actually deserves love in the world. 

He wonders – and then Steve moans and Bucky has only one thing in mind: keep Steve making that same soft, addictive noise. 

In the morning, Bucky’s got Steve pressed against his chest, his cheek against Steve’s ear and Steve is talking – mumbling, really – and Bucky feels so whole. It’s weird and unfamiliar to feel like this because not ever – not even before – he felt this way. Bucky has never had Steve this way, he has never had everything he wanted this way.

Neither has Steve. 

Steve presses his lips to Bucky’s arm. “You listening?”

“Mmm,” Bucky mumbles. He’s not, actually. He interrupts Steve very quickly saying, “I’ll grow old with you.”

Steve stops talking. He closes his mouth so fast Bucky is sure he heard the way Steve’s teeth clacked. “Buck?”

“We’ll grow old together. We’ll take the puppy out every morning and I’ll start using Google so I can learn how to cook stuff you like. And we will travel everywhere. We’ll do a lot of things we’ve never even thought about doing before. We are going to be free and we’ll be together. How does that sound?”

“Like the life I’ve always wanted.”

“Me too.”

Steve kisses him again.