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Steve and Stark exchange a look that clearly says, “Can you believe this shit?”
Barton just says it aloud.
Bucky raises an eyebrow. “I’m sorry I party-fouled on your stupid coffee table.”
Stark’s hands strangle the air.
So Bucky tries again. “I’m sorry I party-fouled on your stupid, expensive coffee table?”
Steve is the first of the pair to recover his faculties of speech, and he gets this earnest “here’s the thing, son” look on his face. The first word out of his mouth is, “Bucky—“
“Arm’s not worthy,” Tony spits, and that’s that, he’s breathing loudly and looking slightly homicidal. Bucky’s seen that face before. It was the face of men who held dead-man switches right before they let go of the button. Bucky holds up his free hand and very gently places the hammer back on the coffee table.
“Look, if it’s that important to you, I’ll let your damn robot clean it up.” Bucky turns to Steve. “You didn’t tell me I wasn’t supposed to touch his hammer.”
“It’s Thor’s hammer, Buck.”
“You didn’t tell me I wasn’t supposed to touch Thor’s hammer.” Bucky suddenly feels like there are a lot of references here he’s not getting, but he shrugs as Steve crosses the room to put a hand on his shoulder. “I’ll apologize to Thor.”
“Mortals!” booms the hearty voice, right on cue. “I felt a disturbance! Are you holding trials of valor with Mjolnir again?” Thor doesn’t look upset; on the contrary, he sweeps into the room looking like a very large, very happy Norse golden retriever in sweatpants and not much else.
Tony, having lost his ability to speak again, points at Bucky, then at the hammer, then at Bucky again, and then makes a sound like steam escaping a kettle and marches out of the room dramatically, trailed by Barton, who seems to be mumbling, “It’s a trick. Come on, it’s a trick,” over and over.
Thor smiles wider and waits for an explanation from Steve. Steve’s arm is heavy where it’s draped across his back, resting on the shoulder that’s still flesh and blood, but it’s a welcome weight. The hand that’s not on Bucky’s shoulder gestures weakly at Mjolnir. “Buck…spilled his drink on the table, so he cleaned it up—“
“It’s shit vodka, Steve, it’d eat right through the table if I didn’t—“
“And he…well, okay, Thor, we’ll just show you.” Steve slides his arm off of Bucky’s shoulders, where it seems to leave a ghost of its former weight, and sidles over to the coffee table, a sway to his hips that isn’t usually there courtesy of Asgardian mead. It’s enticing, is what it is.
“Of course, Captain. I regret only that I did not partake in the revelry!”
“We were playin' Mario Party and gettin’ trashed,” Bucky drawls, but stops short as Steve puts his hands—both hands—on the shaft of the hammer, shooting a pointed look over his shoulder at Bucky as he pulls.
The hammer doesn’t budge. It rocks a couple degrees, maybe, but Steve breaks a sweat trying to lift it, turns red, the whole nine yards. Bucky chuckles at the effort, remembering a time when that would have set off an asthma attack and thanking whatever power was interfering with his life that Steve was so…this, now.
After a few seconds of grunting like a bad porno, Steve relinquishes the hammer, and it settles the few degrees back into its original position. Thor laughs his full-bodied Asgardian laugh (seriously, gods, what the hell kind of company is Steve keeping these days) and says, “A valiant effort! You always did come closest, Captain.”
Steve grimaces and says, “See, here’s the thing,” and tosses Bucky a look. “Show him what you did, Buck.”
“What, spilled my drink and picked up a trick hammer?”
Thor blinks. “Picked up?”
“I picked it up to clean under it, yeah. I didn’t know there was a trick.” He does have a disgusting amount of shitty vodka still in his system, he muses as he walks back over to the table with his best affectation of sobriety, leaning over and putting his flesh hand on the hammer. “I’m sure it was just a fluke, I didn’t solve your hammer or anyth—“ He lifts with the barest amount of effort and he’s holding the hammer.
Thor’s hammer. That Steve couldn’t pick up.
Thor makes a face like a dumbstruck fish and opens and closes his mouth a few times.
Bucky does the holding up his free hand and putting the hammer down routine again.
“If it’s any consolation, I’m pretty sure Natalia and the janitor both figured it out—“
“None but those worthy to rule Asgard may wield that hammer,” Thor objects, voice cracking a bit.
Raising his eyebrow again, Bucky shoots a look at Steve, who’s wearing his most helpless expression. “Yeah, not interested. I don’t volunteer for things.”
Steve snorts at that, because it’s a shared joke, and that’s normal. What they learned in the military: Don’t volunteer for things.
“It is not a matter of interest!” Thor kneels next to his hammer, picking it up and hauling it into his lap. “Mjolnir, what ails you?” When Thor starts petting it and mumbling about his father and trials and a bunch of other things, Bucky turns to Steve again.
“You wanna split before this gets awkward?”
He doesn’t wait for an answer before quitting the scene, Steve hot on his heels. “Okay,” Bucky starts on the way out of the room, “but if you put it in an elevator—“
Steve presses a kiss to his lips and shuts him right up. Worthy to rule Asgard, great, fine. Worthy to drunkenly kiss Steve Rogers in the communal kitchen in Avengers Tower, that’s something to brag about.