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"Sweetheart, I like you, but I swear if you put that on the table one more time, I’m leaving."
It was meant to be a joke, but the silence that followed said otherwise.
He cleared his throat. "You alright man? I mean you still down for that, right?"
Bucky turned on his side and rested his head in his right hand to look at Sam in the eyes.
"I mean it would be fun to use annoying pet names and to hold your hands. To wake up next to your ugly face…" Hearing that, Sam gently punched him in the arm.
"You know that I’m handsome and you would be lucky to wake up next to this ugly face every morning." Sam chuckled.
"My point exactly," Bucky whispered. "And as much as it hurts me to admit it, you would make a good boyfriend and it wouldn’t be so bad to have you around. I could get used to seeing you daily."
"You know that you are a great guy Buck, right?" Bucky’s eyebrows started to knit. This conversation wasn’t headed in the right direction.
"But…"
Yep. Here it was.
"We’ve already talked about this, and I told you that with all the responsibilities that I have and all the pressure that comes with being Captain America, I’m not ready to be in a relationship. Not the kind you want and deserve."
"I think that I’m old enough to make my own decisions and know what I want and what I deserve or not." He grumbled.
"Honestly, I don’t know what you want me to say. We are going in circles here and I’m starting to get a little tired of having the exact same conversation with you man." Sam was getting annoyed and decided to get up to pick up his discarded clothes.
"Well, you could at least have a valid reason to reject me. If you don’t like me you don’t have to pretend it’s about something else or because you think you know what I deserve or not. If you don’t like me just say so." The former soldier stood up abruptly.
"Oh my God, Bucky are you being obtuse on purpose? Not everything revolves around you! Can’t you just accept that I have my own shit to deal with and I can’t be in a relationship right now ?"
Sam started to pick up his things even faster, heading for the door. However, Bucky was a super-soldier, so he easily rushed to stand in front of the said door. He could not lose the only thing that made him feel alive.
"I know that you have your own mess to deal with, we’ve already been there, with the shield and everything… And I apologized. But I don’t understand your decision this time."
The man knew that he was probably making things worse now, but he would not give up just like that. It was the first time in a while that he had something worth fighting for. Sam was incredible in so many ways. If you asked him, he would probably say that he was nothing out of the extraordinary, but Bucky knew otherwise. Sam was kind, selfless, and always the optimist, and sure, on top of all of that it was pretty handsome. But that was just a detail.
"Well for people who’ve already been there as you put it yourself, we are strangely not making any progress." Sam cut him off and pushed his friend out of his way.
Sam was about to open the door when he slowly turned around.
Leaning against the door, he was looking around the room, carefully thinking about the next words that would come out of his mouth.
"You want something I can’t give you, and you know that. Please, don’t make this harder for both of us. Let’s just forget about it, okay?"
Bucky started to laugh sadly when he heard what the other man said.
"What’s your problem now?"
Sam was looking at him curiously, sporting his oh so aggravating half-smile, the one that Bucky usually liked. Not this time.
"My problem is that you act like I planned to love you, Sam." He said with a quiet voice "I didn’t." He licked his lips, gaining some time. "But I love you and you are breaking my heart." He was looking everywhere except in Sam’s direction now. He was so embarrassed.
The other man was a little taken aback, he was not expecting Bucky to come clean about his feelings so openly. He was usually so broody and well.. not so keen to communicate with people. And Sam knew what he was talking about, he had been on the receiving end after all.
"What do you want me to say, Bucky?"
"I don’t know." He shrugged. "I guess I wished you could tell me that you love me back… I wished you could see me as more than your fuck buddy. Your fuck buddy with who you have fun every once in a while. But what I want more than anything Samuel is for you to tell me the fucking truth."
Sam looked at Bucky straight in the eyes, not knowing what to tell him. They weren’t seeing eye to eye anymore.
It was so fucked up.
"I’m not going to lie to you, James… And you know damn well that when we started this, it was just a way to blow off some steam for the both of us, and it was fun. And- and I’m not going to deny that I’m attracted to you, but I’m not in love with you." He stopped himself, trying to find the words not to hurt his partner. If there were even such words. "We- it was never meant to be more than this… I- I’m not lying to you when I’m saying I’m not in the right mindset to be in a relationship. And yeah, okay, I wasn't completely honest, I should have told you more clearly that I didn’t like you like that."
Suddenly something flashed in Sam’s eyes and he seemed so far from Bucky, while they stood only inches apart.
"You know what, I’m sorry Barnes. Maybe we should uh… We should call it a day and say it was fun while it lasted. I don’t want this to end with bad blood between us."
Bucky had never looked more crushed than now, and Sam had been there when he had gone through some tough things.
He had been there when Bucky was still the winter soldier.
He had been there after the blip.
He had been there in Wakanda.
He had been there when Steve had left.
The ex-winter soldier took a deep breath and went to open the door for Sam. It took two to make a relationship work and Bucky could not fight alone. If Sam did not want it, then there was no point.
They looked at each other one last time, memorizing every feature, every trait, the color of their eyes, the shape of their mouths. There was a time when they both said that they did not want to see each other anymore and perhaps this time had come.
Then Bucky closed the door. He knew that this simple gesture meant so much more. There would not be any Sam and Bucky ever again after this.
It hurt so much.