#28 ways

He’s sure he’s done all the right things: laundered his clothes, showered, brushed his hair, shaved, even.

Sam said to get flowers and hold the door. Make eye contact, share a dessert, pay for dinner, give the girl your jacket and be on the left side of the sidewalk. Follow the script and he’s home free and looking at another date in possibly a week or so— or if he’s lucky, Bucky scoffs internally, no date at all.

Perhaps he shouldn’t have showered.

Either way, he’s off to an awful start because the traffic was worse than anticipated and the taxi got a flat so and he had to walk the last five blocks. It’s 7:40 and he’s barely through the door, the box of chocolates in the crook of his elbow probably melted.

All the flowers looked ugly, Sam. It was either chocolates or a balloon and Bucky’s not It the Clown, so… chocolates it was for the lucky lady.

Bucky scans the room and groans— possibly his default sound for anything now. Leave it to Wilson to suggest this kind of restaurant—it’s all candles and floral centerpieces. There’s even a live orchestra in the corner. He’s severely underdressed.

The hostess taps her pen, “Sir, do you have a reservation?”

Oh. Shit.

He looks over her head, hopeful at a row of empty tables and booths. “Can’t I just, get put on a list or something? It’s two people. She might—already be here.” He surveys again, dodges the hostess trying to block his view, but can’t see anyone sitting alone.

Sam told him your hair color, described the little freckle above your eyebrow, something about your face being symmetrical and how sweet your smile was— but that could be anybody. People’s faces are naturally symmetrical, aren’t they? And Bucky certainly can’t make out a freckle from this distance.

“No sir, we’re booked all night—”

“Hey!” A hand unexpectedly lands on his arm. “Bucky! Oh my god. I’m so sorry I’m late.”

Bucky follows the hand to its wrist, to its arm, to its shoulder, collar, neck, finally, then, to its owner.

He remembers you now. A couple of times—dropping off packages at the compound, dossiers and flash drives, saying hello and goodbye but not much of anything else.

Your mouth hangs open tonight, sucking in deep breaths, baby hairs slick on your forehead. 7:45 and you’re off to an awful start, too.

“Tried to get a coffee on the way—spilled it—” a gesture to your blouse and the offending blotch glares deep brown from sky blue cotton. “Ran into a kid on a bicycle, made him fall. Scraped his knee. You wouldn’t believe how long a mother can yell until you accidentally tip over her kid--” You pause, looking at the hostess’ annoyance, then at Bucky’s bewildered face, and put two and two together.

“Ma’am, we’re booked all night.” The hostess’ pen taps after each word in emphasis.

You narrow your eyes and Bucky defensively reels back, expecting you might start yelling at him for forgetting to reserve ahead of time until you shake your head.

Sharon Carter is a Cotillion debutante and private nearly to a fault— she speaks carefully, keeps everything close to the vest, old-school formalities when it comes to courtship. So, when Sam said Sharon’s friend, Bucky expected someone similar. When he stepped into this extravagant restaurant severely underdressed, he expected someone similar.

Symmetrical faced, sweet smiled, freckled somewhere, but demure, maybe. Prim and proper.

But then—you groan, loud and annoyed, and ask:

“Do you like burgers? Do you mind the grease?”

And god, Bucky thinks. God bless Sharon Carter.

-

Hell, it’s a mess.

There are tears rolling down your cheeks. Bursts of gasping breaths, wheezing in-between shrill noises. The coffee stain on your shirt found a good friend in a diagonal line of bright yellow egg yolk and you’re laughing so hard people are starting to stare.

The burger you’d gotten—medium rare, double meat, bacon, fried egg, all toppings between—has completely fallen apart in a splat back onto your plate. The first bite was tragic—right into the yolk and it popped like a water balloon all over your chest.

He fumbles for napkins—for cold water? But you wave his worries away, licking your fingers before diving in to deconstruct your food.

“Sorry—I promise I have my shit together.” Another giggle, “Not making a very good first date impression. I hope you like the place, at least?”

“Yeah,” he grins, “I do. And, uh, I think you’re doin’ great.”

The words slip out before he can catch them and Sam’s slew of dating advice comes hitting him like a ton of too-late bricks. Keep it mysterious, Barnes. But what else should he say, he’s having loads more fun at this diner that smells like a thousand packs of stale cigarettes than he would have at that uppity potpourri scented Italian restaurant serving entrees the size of his thumb.

Around a mouthful of tater tots, you thank him, and then you take a breath, and he can literally see you winding up for another enormous bite.

“Sorry,” you pause sheepishly, “I had a really busy day at work—skipped lunch on accident.” You take the enormous bite he saw coming, and then, “Also doesn’t help—mm—I’m a nervous talker.”

Bucky chews on a fry and slurps his soda, entirely forgetting his courtship manners. “Nervous ‘bout what?”

“Aw, c’mon…” you roll your eyes emphatically as Bucky tilts into his straw. Another slow sip with his mouth around the plastic and you swallow a noisy gulp of tomato, “Come on.”

“What?”

The burger gets placed back on its wax paper, now small enough to return to its prior state, you rearrange it carefully on the plastic lattice bowl, staring at him the entire time.

A disbelieving scoff leads, “Imagine this, Sharon comes sashaying into my office—okay, not sashay, march—marching into my office and says are you interested in going on a date Friday?” You wiggle your head, tilt your head down and purse your lips staunchly. A pretend flip of hair over your shoulder and you whisper, “She’s perfect; this is what perfect women do, trust me.”

Bucky suppresses a grin at the sight. Steve would be jumping to defend her honor if he were here.

“She says, I know your last few weren’t the best… but this one-- And I’m drowning in paperwork, okay? Drowning. I’m stamping files, eating goldfish crackers, nodding along—anything to get her out of my office—”

“So you agreed…”

“Uh-huh.”

“…to go on a date…” he mulls it over, “… to shut her up?”

“Hell yes.” And then, “Oh!” You start shaking your head wildly, “No. No, no, no. No, not like that—I told you I’m a nervous talker—I didn’t know it was you until about fifteen minutes before I left the house! I would have never said yes if I knew it was you.”

Bucky frowns at that, but then you come full circle, rolling your eyes another time. A mustard-smudged hand points from the top of Bucky’s head down to his chest and back up again.

“Have I said ‘c’mon’ yet?”

“Once or twice.”

“Well, yeah. Come on. You’re—please don’t make me say it.”

He looks on, not quite sure what you’re going to say at all. It’s a toss-up between “a legend”, “an Avenger”, and “a murderer”. So it’s a pleasant surprise when you pop a French-fry into your mouth and mundanely announce, “Bucky, you’re handsome.”

He blinks.

You blink.

He blinks again.

“No, listen,” you urge, “You’re obscenely good-looking.”

His face is so hot that he thinks someone must have thrown a fire into him. Maybe he would have preferred being called a murderer?

“Is it some kind of superhero requirement, you know? Before you get green-lighted to save the world, you’ve gotta win America’s Next Top Model. Or in your case, an international season of ANTM takes … Soviet Russia?”

The reference is lost on him, but he gets the point well enough.

You place your hand in front of him like a running marquee, “I can see it now. Tyra Banks announcing, James Buchanan Bucky Barnes. Eyes: blue; hair: brown; height—” a pause as you consider his posture before continuing, shockingly precise.

“6 feet; 245 pounds; measurements: 42 chest, 33 waist; bicep circumference: 17 and a half inches.”

Bucky crosses his arms in embarrassment, and then uncrosses them because he’s thinking too closely about his biceps now. “Didn’t read that in a museum. You get it from just looking— look away, damn it.”

You quickly do, trying to suppress a grin and failing miserably. Bucky is too, shifting in his seat, opening his mouth to say something and then unable to get anything out other than a disoriented and amused, “Shit.”

Sam would never let Bucky live down that his first date in six months eyefucked him well enough to get his bicep measurement. The jokes would be endless. He can practically hear cackling in his ear.

A beat passes and he tries again, now at the end of the meal and the stain on your blouse starting to sink in and spread, heavy enough to dip toward the skin beneath. “Do you want to take your shirt off?”

You choke on soda and add another splatter down your chest, turning into a proper Jackson Pollock canvas.

“You can wear my jacket,” he clarifies. “Give it back next time. I mean, if you…” He frowns. “Uh. Um.”

Sam’s putting up tallies in Bucky’s head. Another scratch indicating he’s forgoing the mystery, which should have been easy for him since he’s an international assassin with at least one dead president under his belt.

“Of course, Bucky, I’d like that,” you say, saving him for tripping up over any more words, smiling slow and shaky. Different than the impish grins and all-teeth laughing, still lovely— but just, different. Like you’re pinching down a too-sweet thought about him with the corners of your mouth. It goes big and again when you tack on, “And I won’t even eyefuck you next time.”

It’s his turn to choke, sputtering as he blushes. 6 feet, 245 pounds, 17-inch circumference biceps, reformed murderer going napalm hot under a pretty girl’s eyes. Jesus wept, he really is hopeless.

-

He can’t believe it’s past midnight already, or that the two of you walked the length of Central Park and then looped back around about two more times.

You changed out of your shirt after dinner, ducking from the diner’s restroom bashfully, your old blouse in a crumple inside his pocket. His jacket hung a bit loose, but zipped up all the way and it was a good enough cover for a while.

The night cooled enough to where you weren’t too hot, and he wasn’t too cold, and neither of you seemed ready to leave just yet. Central Park was a perfect place to dodge the city’s unavoidable crowd and occasional sewage gust, so the two of you wandered aimlessly, stopping here and there to rest, even splitting the liquefied chocolates on a bench.

You get smudges of it on your cheek and Bucky figures it’s just a personality trait at this point. He laughs when you stick your tongue out, trying to find exactly where it is before giving up and asking him to thumb it off.

He shoves his hands in his pocket afterwards, thumb jammed inside his fist like a souvenir, keeping it there the rest of the walk, all the way up to the iron gate of your apartment complex before he wonders if he should have been trying to hold your hand instead.

Maybe not. It was only the first date, after all.

By the pin pad, you rock back and forth on your feet. “Thanks for dinner,” you say, looking up at him.

“Yeah, of course.”

“And the chocolates.” A beat passes. “And the walk… and jacket, too. It’s really nice… comfortable and, uh, smells... good. Like, motor oil and… a nice body wash and… trees.” You make a nauseated face and close your eyes for a second, pinching the bridge of your nose uncomfortably as Bucky looks on.

Oh, he realizes. You must be nervous.

Oh, he realizes. Should he kiss you?

He can’t remember if Sam mentioned this or not. Does mystery assume no kissing? Is it too soon for that? He thinks he must have kissed a few first dates in the past, but he’s not really sure if it’s too bold now. He’s really does start to sweat. Bullets.

The easy conversation and laughter from the past two hours is nowhere to be found. Bucky goes mute and you start fiddling with your phone, clearing your throat loudly and then pointing to the rectangular outline in his pocket.

He gives you his number immediately, tumbling over the area code and string of digits, so empty in his brain that when it vibrates in his grip after you text him, he almost jumps.

“Call me when you get home?” Your voice is small and hopeful, and you look like you’re biting your cheek.

“Sure,” he replies dumbly. You laugh, rubbing the back of your neck before turning and unlocking the gate. One final long look at him, his face, his mouth, his fingers, and you tug on his pinky shyly before heading through and toward your door.

Bucky reflexively makes a fist, entire limb tingling up to his elbow, the tiny gesture burrowing into his chest. Suddenly, he forgets entirely the modesty of first dates. He steps out of his body for a minute, staring at his still cupped palm like he’s holding a flame.

Rules be damned.

He taps the green icon next to your name, watching you suddenly pause a few meters away.

“Hey!” he blurts too-eagerly when you pick up, confused and turning to find him still where you left him on the other side. “Sam said I should wait to call. At least a day.”

“Oh yeah…?”

“Uh-huh,” Bucky nods, “Said it’s a bad look—guy being too excited. Gotta—I don’t know. Make the girl anticipate a little. Keep her interested.”

You retrace your steps, walking back, “What if the girl’s already interested?”

“Yeah?” He’s breathless, warmed up. “Not a bad look?”

“No. You look good to me.” Eyes travel up and down, peeking through diamond shapes of the iron gate, “Sharon told me something similar, since we’re on the subject of what’s good or bad.”

“What’s that?”

It should feel stupid that he’s been holding a phone call with someone who’s barely two feet away from him. Inches now, and you step slow, nose almost up against the frame. A metal clank and the gate slowly unlatches, opening up. You tuck the device into your back pocket, and Bucky does the same, barely registering the disconnecting click, heart racing with adrenaline.

Then, you smile.

Fuck. That smile.

“Said it’s not good to kiss on the first date.” 

Mischievously, you lean in, touch him soft on the lips and every beat of his pulse seems to be reaching out for the sweet breath in your mouth. “And I shouldn’t invite you inside, but we both seem to be … not good… at following dating decorum, so…” Your eyes light up teasingly, “You wanna come…in?”

Bucky makes a noise like a whimper. Wow. International assassin with a Kennedy under his belt and it’s a dirty joke that does him in.

You kiss him again, longer than the last, giggling softly and tugging on his bottom lip like you could pull his entire body toward you with just that. “I’m sure we could find a few more first date rules to break.”

“Yeah,” he says, ducking for another one, lips increasingly impatient. “I’m… in.”

You pull away with a laugh, yanking on his shirt, grabbing his hand. As Bucky’s towed along, he can’t help but think of two things:

First, god bless Sharon Carter.

-

It does again when Sam hosts a gathering. An informal affair, effortless comfort of good company before they leave the following afternoon.

His backyard is strung up with lights like lassoed stars. There are citronella candles on tables, the grill behind them fired up and smoking. Open windows stream out music and indoor laughter— silverware and bottles clinking and by the time you rap your knuckles on the screen hauling drinks and desserts, Sam’s devoured two burgers and making quick work of his third.

He yells from around a mouth of lettuce and pickles, “Door!” And you’re already grinning on the other side at the slur of his consonants.

“I got ya,” Steve calls, pulling, and immediately catching the box slipping from your arm. A twinkle in his blue eyes and he wonders with delight, “Blueberry pie?”

“Your favorite,” you confirm. “Before you ask,” you call down the walkway, “Bucky—I also made fudge brownies with cashews, weirdo.”

“Christ, he’s gonna make himself sick again.” Steve nudges at the 12-pack gripped in your hand, ignoring Bucky’s victorious cheer from the couch, “Lemme get that.”

Playfully offended, you rebuke, “It’s not heavy, Rogers. I’m stronger than I look.”

A second passes of peculiar light flickering over Steve’s face, softening his features. Convinced, he murmurs, “I know you are,” but takes it anyway and closes the door by reaching over your head.

-

The rule is: no shop talk. Drop the call signs, drop the spy stuff. They stay 24-hour free of work-related conversation because they can’t wear themselves out on it before it starts.

Instead, there’s food, beer, dancing, games—video or table or pool. Washer boards are in the back if anyone makes it out before sunset or if they have exceptional night vision due to genetic enhancements. Keep it carefree and fun and not. about. work.

You kick Bucky’s ass at cards with mustard on the corner of your mouth, cackling in glee when he accuses you of being a dirty cheat. Then, to avenge his honor, Natasha kicks your ass and steals the rest of your food. Wanda claps nearby, perched on the corner of the dining room table, shaking her head vigorously when Nat’s eyes turn her way.

“Oh no, none for me,” she says. “How about you, Steve?”

He peeks in, “Terrible poker face, but if anybody wants to get embarrassed at pool, just let me know.” She scoffs and waves him away, but Steve lingers a while, dawdling aimlessly until he spots the crumbs on your lap.

“Can I get you anything?”

Your empty plate stares back at you—blue-green ceramic like the color of his eyes, patient like how he’s waiting for your company. “Sure,” you decide, “Something sweet sounds good.”

To your left, Bucky snorts, “Bet it does.”

-

“You gotta tell me the recipe,” Steve pleads three slices later, hip against the kitchen counter, elbow next to the pie box. The damn thing’s completely gone, barely a smear of indigo left in the tin, looking like a vulture swooped through. You technically baked it for everyone, but it’s a running joke with the team how it’s always Steve’s pie—and maybe if they’re lucky, he’ll share.

Today, he decided to share with you—the baker of said pie—just one slice. Incorrigible glutton.

He digs inside, ransacking for specks of pastry. “Is it crack?”

“You don’t even process drugs that way,” you say. “And it’s love, okay? Love and my unwashed hands because I think you need a few germs in your life. You’re way too healthy.”

“Plenty happy to eat ‘em if it means more o’ this.” He gives another few stabs at his plate and then his finger starts exhuming the grooves of your own dish to prove his point. “Mmm—germs.”

With theatric astonishment, you stare blatantly at his abdomen, taut and sleek beneath his shirt despite the fact that he’s consumed more than enough to feed a small country. “Where does it go?”

“To his biceps!” Sam hollers, interrupting Nat in the middle of a retelling of one time in Belarus.

You nod, “Must be true, they’re looking awfully big today.”

Steve blushes hot, crossing his arms one over the other, stammering before he gives up and turns away from you, facing the fridge instead.  

“Nevermind!” Sam calls again, lifting himself up on his fists, leering over the bar counter. “It definitely goes to his ass. Steve, you flexin’ that thing? Buns of steel—look at it bounce! Whoo! Someone throw him a dollar!”

Bucky joins in, right hand over his heart patriotically, “I pledge allegiance to Steve’s ass, of the United States of—aw, Stevie—I was jokin’!”

Steve’s done a full body retreat behind the fridge, disappearing from his howling spectators and fiercely mouthing you started this, but you only follow Bucky’s lead. “And to the republic, for which it—”

He careens himself out the back door like a cannonball, scurrying so fast you swear there’s a trail of dust behind him. Puppy dog pouts are thrown back your way every few steps and even from the other side of the glass.

He’s mouthing all sorts of things back in—your lip reading needs a bit of work so you can only squint and respond with no idea, what are you saying? I can’t—come back in here— giggling the entire time and pretending not to.

Stubbornly, he keeps retreating until he’s a blurry shape of wide shoulders beneath string lights. A final fluttery laugh falls from your chest, delighted at his antics and how he’s still and might always be hilariously shy.

Clearing the accrued mess along the kitchen before you join him, you recall the last time he met you at work. A Thursday lunch break to split up the monotony of exchanging intel at the tower or your office. You drove him to your usual spot and after a bit of hemming and hawing—Steve’s old-fashioned approach on an outing meant that he wanted you to sit, let him wait in line for your order, and consequently take the chance to foot the bill.

You’d complained that it was like, twelve dollars, Steve, but he couldn’t be discouraged.

Can’t forget my manners just ‘cause it’s a new century, and what kinda guy would I be, huh, if I let you bus me around town and pay for me—all the way up until the barista slipped her number into his shirt pocket and in a moment of sheer panic, he’d thrown the entire order away— drinks and all. Ridiculous.

“Aw, look at you,” Nat coos from the couch, “All smiley.”

“What—” you whip up, shocked. “I am not! Don’t make me throw these dishes at you, Romanoff. Oh, shut up— I’m just—"

The living room bursts into a chorus of scoffs and unimpressed jeering. Nat throws a napkin at your head, then her arm around Bucky. “Denial’s cute,” she whispers into his ear. “Or stupid…” Bucky announces.

You grip the counter menacingly and mouth fuck you guys, satisfied that none of their lip-reading needs as much work as yours.

-

“No shop talk…” Steve warns when you make your way toward him a few minutes later, successfully shooed out by the peanut gallery inside. “Don’t deny it, you were sneaking by the relish earlier, and the pantry.”

The phone aglow in your hand is guilty and open on a string of data but you click it off. It’s just habit; when no one’s looking, you get a few seconds with the details.

“I obviously don’t do fieldwork.” You admit, conceding when he nudges your arm. “Alright, alright, bossy.”

“Captain. Did you forget?”

You smirk. “Never.”

He turns back to admire the hanging plants and trellis of vines, tracing coral petals of bougainvillea with his fingertips. Light bounces off his hair, the bridge of his nose, the plump slope of his bottom lip. You rub the corner of your phone, itching to read just one more thing, but bravely shoving it down instead.

“You wanna chuck some washers?” Steve attempts at being helpful, enthusiastic that he got you outside at all. He knows how you get despite the humor and frivolity. These nights witness the cresting of your agonies—weeks or months of secretly fretting and you put on the bravest face you can to send them off, never knowing if they’ll make it back in one piece, achingly distraught that you can’t go with them, either.

“I can’t keep score,” you confess, unexpectedly tinged with sadness, “Don’t know how the numbers work.”

You’re doing it again. Dipping into your own self-subscribed doubts, subconsciously disclosing how you feel inadequate in comparison to what they do.

“Keep a secret?” He pads through the grass, ducking to gather metal discs, “I just throw ‘em. Don’t know how they work, either.”

“Steve,” you breathe, your voice sounding desperate—scared. “I…” you change course. “I also just can’t fucking see.”

He stops walking, turning back sheepishly to you wading blindly in the indigo dark, fumbling increasingly the farther you get from the house, but persistent and trying to follow him regardless.

He latches onto your outstretched hand, quickly adjusting his grip until he’s secured at your wrist. “Got ya. Kay? C’mon. We’ll play on the same side.”

It feels a bit unreasonable, more than anything, he just wants to be close to you. Car rides and coffee and getting the door. Banter in the kitchen, the backyard, complimenting your cooking when he really wants to just compliment you.

These nights witness his own anxieties too; what if he doesn’t come back? What if he doesn’t see you again? What if he never gets to profess the obvious?

And it’s got to be so obvious.

Especially now with him standing close, leaning until his chin touches your temple, pointing ahead and saying, “A straight shot,” as if he really cares about the washers. “Easy,” as if he’s only assuring you and not himself.

A few clunks in the distance, neither of you caring much where they land, your breath so shaky he stops moving to listen for it, and you peer through the night at him.

“Don’t worry so much,” he interjects before you can voice what’s been on your mind all day. “It’ll be simple. Fly by before you know it. Just a couple weeks, right?”

It’s gentle deception—a softness he wants to give you to soothe the thrashing of your nervous brain and your leaden heart. For his own fears, too.

“Poker face, Rogers. Yours needs practice.”

It’ll take months before they come home; busied with infiltrating the kind of organization that has its claws in deep pockets and burrows across nations. Steve promised you they’d return at the end of a few weeks—but you were there, files spread out on the tables and floors, reading lightning-fast and mapping it out in your head.

No way it was that simple, and in the weeks following as you gathered more information, drew out plans and created false identities to plant them underground, you realized he was lying.

It must be so heavy. All that heft in your heart. How does he ease it from your shoulders?

The liminal space of expectation. The burden of unknowing.

Logic says there’s a house behind him, windows bright, safely containing all of your friends, but illusion—this gap, this time, this weight you grip so severely—forgoes all reason.

“Give it to me,” he whispers then, leaning until his forehead is nearly touching yours, fingers finding fingers, carefully grazing each other, untucking your clenched fist until it’s spread in his hold. “Your worry. I’ll hold onto it for now, bring it back to you later, and you’ll see that I’m safe.”

“Steve…” you’re wordless, blinking in concentration, heart swollen in your mouth, trying to make out the tender outline of where he’s touching you.

He raises your knuckles to his lips, and the distant light catches in the lines of his lashes, bowed downward like arrows pointing to where his mouth meets your skin. He carefully turns your hand over, tracing the lifeline in your palm with his nose, kissing one last time at the pulse point of your wrist. “You’ll see… promise.”

He’s so sweet—his lips so soft and warm. His eyes, earnest and true.

“Besides,” Steve says puckishly, still laid gently in your palm. “Can’t die until I get that recipe from you, anyhow.”

“Wh-what?”

“The pie recipe. Can’t die yet. Or unless the germs kill me.”

You grumble, pinching his cheeks and pushing him up until he’s tall again. “I hope they do. You’re such a smartass.”

One more comment, because he really can’t help it, because he likes it when you’re happy. “Second time you’ve mentioned my ass tonight—guess you got a thing for it.”

Although he wants to— really wants to— Steve doesn’t kiss you yet. Figures it’ll be the perfect thing to look forward to when he comes back— another incentive to work faster. 

Instead, he simply laces his fingers with yours, tugging you inside boldly in front of God and all your smug friends, plopping down in the sofa seat and audaciously placing you on his lap like routine.

Your neck heats up when he pulls you to his chest, embarrassment rushing to the apex of your cheeks and the top of your head, heart thumping with fondness and the nagging irony that maybe it’s you who’s become hilariously shy.  

“Sweet lord, finally,” Bucky declares even as you hide your face, determined to keep stirring the pot. “We sat in here and debated on shovin’ your faces together. Hardheaded, the both of you.”

“Be quiet—” you scold, but he doesn’t let up.

“Think we didn’t see you out there all gooey? Talkin’ about comin’ home and kissin’ each other’s hands—what is this, medieval times?”

Then, because maybe the universe just has your back like that, or because maybe you baked two batches of brownies knowing he’s a sucker for fudge, Bucky suddenly freezes, cut off in the middle of his barrage.

He knows how it grates on you, settling inside like terrible deposition, metastasized by the days until it turns to rot. A chafing wound bloomed open and hungry. So when he chases you down to your shared quarters, knocking the bathroom door open to find you scrubbing your face furiously, he tries to keep his calm.

But, like usual and always, and especially with you, he can’t.

“Go on,” Steve commands, “Why don’t you tell me what’s on your mind?”

You catch his gaze in the mirror bitterly. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

His lips press together, a miniscule raise of his brows enough to convey his entire train of thought. You move to towel your chin dry, patting quickly and grabbing your phone off the counter like you’re leaving—but he knows you won’t.

“Don’t you have another twenty sycophants lined up to kiss your ass?” Your anger is a roman candle, sparked up. “All those pretty girls falling to their knees—” your gut contorts in a twist of decisive pain. At others, for their veneration, at him, for simply existing. At yourself, for being unable to keep the hurt from exploding over your face.

At the truth, most of all.

He’s an ageless and aquiline, carved up and built as a withstanding monolith never eroded by the passing of time. Thirty last year and this year, and all the years to come. Nothing about his body changes like yours does. You’ll be in your coffin long before Steve Rogers will. And Captain America will live on even after that—your name nowhere to be found except on your own gravestone.

He’s a thing of wonder and exemplar. Timeless. Everlasting. And you… well, you’re a lonely firework, aren’t you? You’re a one-burn propulsion. A single-serve star.

“Stop it,” Steve pleads suddenly, taking your wrist, heart breaking when your glare turns watery. “Sweetheart, stop it.”

You gnash your teeth, spiraling violently like how you get after plummeting somewhere he can’t follow. But still, he tries, despite how you retreat like a frightened animal, he pads through dark to find you curled up in your grief. 

Steve knows where you go when you can’t sleep, when you look at him and the spark he loves dampens into tears. He knows at the core of all your rage, you’re scared of losing him to a thing beyond your control. So you do what all helpless people do—you ruin it yourself.

His strong girl. Dazzling girl. Spectacular like a flash fire, never a victim to circumstance, and you won’t start being one now. You fight everything, even him sometimes.

“Don’t cry,” he says when you claw at his back, sniffling angrily because you hate when the thought of mortality becomes too cruel. He noses the top of your head, voice quiet and crushed. “Don’t cry, sweetheart. I’m yours and yours only. You’ve got to know that.”

“I don’t know that…” you stutter, but finally yield to his hold, fists curling at the small of his back. “I—don’t.”

Steve sighs. “Well, I do.” He lets you fall into him, your warm face on his collar, chest to chest, “I know, and that’s enough for me. Come on... let me see you.”

He kisses you sweet and long, mouth lingering on your damp cheeks, your brow, every line and worry. He doesn’t stop until your tears do, peppering over your eyes and jaw until you give him a small smile, sad and ephemeral, but still beautiful and still singularly yours.

“Steve,” you say, wounded.

“C’mon,” he says back, mouth on the shell of your ear now, “Let me show you. Let me love you until you do.”

He takes you to bed, keeping you as close as he can so that you won’t run from him again. He pulls you out of that anguished foxhole behind your ribs, even if just for a little while. 

He touches your eyes, your face, your shuddering body until you forget yourself. Until you remember him again— in all his everlasting glory. 

Until you know his love for you is just as endless as he is.

Like usual. 

Slice of cake in hand, he sidles up next to you when the roar quiets, taking a small bite. Steve watches some foot traffic circle, congratulating you (on what?), toasting you (for what?), asking for selfies (Christ, Almighty!), and your awkward, tight-lipped thanks and grimacing for the ‘gram in response.

He wanders away to the bay window after a minute, a quick corner glance beckoning you along, saving you from more suffering.

In front of the glass, he shields you from the crowd, catching sunlight ruffling his hair, spilling beams like a halo you’d be happy to drink.

Steve tucks a hand into his jacket, digging around for something.

You’re suspicious. “What is it, you little shit?” And he laughs, fake-shocked, and bumps your shoulder impishly. “Alright, I’ll let that one slide today.”

Another rustle over his chest and he produces a slip of paper.

Unfolded, the journal page peers at you with tiny smudges around his handiwork. It looks so small between his fingers. Modest and effortless like an afterthought he scribbled out next to his morning coffee, but you know better. You’ve watched him draw next to the open window, brow furrowed in concentration, chewing lightly on the skin of his cheek, meticulous flicks of his wrist cross-hatching layers upon layers of graphite.

It takes him hours. Your throat constricts.

He’s rendered your likeness here—shoulders relaxed, eyes half-lidded, mouth in an easy smile. Delicately drawn and quietly admired and unlike a way you’ve ever seen yourself. But it is you.

Steve watches your fingers rub the half-crinkled edges, thinks for a second maybe he should have framed it but then he wouldn’t be able to see the way you touch it now. Softly, carefully, rolling the corners, reveling in the fine pressed grain sensation.  

Chin to chest, his signature move, and he looks at you, really, like he’s studying, tracing, keeping with his eyes the way his hand might later, wrapped around a pencil, committing you to memory and paper. He holds back the tickle in his belly at the way you’re stunned speechless and pins a little wish on how maybe you won’t hate it. Won’t think it’s silly and stupid and a waste.

“I hope you like it,” he says expectantly, unsurely.

You look back at him, at his pretty mouth and shy smile, his shoulders trying to roll back and ease but pulled together instead, waiting nervously, and so different from the Steve five minutes ago smirking at your discomfort.

You hold it to your chest like a fragile thing, attentive and gentle. With your other hand, you cup his cheek, warmth spreading from where the swirl of your fingertips touch his skin. His lids flutter close reflexively. He stutters out a breath.

Quick. Chaste. Perfect. And you punctuate the first kiss with one more— coy and teasing—to the plump, pink, softness of his heavy lower lip. Steve stands up straight when you pull away. Breathless and shocked, delighted all the same.

“So…” he grins, playful again, “You like it? I thought about drawing myself first, so you could finally put up something nice in your room.”

He’s blinding. Smile relieved and swollen with affection, tongue tracing the pressure of where you just were, of your lips sweeter than the linger of cake, committing it to memory, too. Steve prods the crumbs on his plate with his fork when you say, “Think it’d be too vain to put it in my room, Rogers.”

“What do you suggest, then?”

You shrug, pretending not to be elated. “Put it in yours and… draw yourself and I’ll put it in mine. You finally got a good idea; it would be nice.”

Steve laughs, licking his lips again instinctively, even though you’re stealing his joke, even though it was a joke to begin with.

The little wish he made turns true and then some.

Words like misguided currents, you babble good mornings, good to see yous, good nights. You duck inside glass elevators when he holds the door, skitter around like a loose sparkler when he quirks his head. You avoid isolated assignments with him, terribly afraid of yourself— of the possibility that your imbalance might ruin an objective.

But it’s unavoidable. On a skeleton crew of five against the world, it’s unavoidable.

Steve in Europe. Natasha in Asia. Sam slips two invitations across what you’ve jokingly dubbed the War Room table—polished wood where Morgan slapped heart stickers haphazardly across like locations of a campaign map—and says, “Suit up.”

It’s the most intimate time you’ve spent in his company. He’s dressed to the nines—and oh god—over his chest, midnight blue velvet melts black under shadows, shimmers lustrous under moonlight.

He walks like a silver screen movie star, poised like a sovereign. The thigh holster strapped to your left leg keeps brushing up against him, but he doesn’t seem to mind.

“Are you cold?”

“No, I’m—I’m fine.” But you could die on the spot because you are trembling.

“Take my arm, won’t you?”

He’s firm and controlled. Guides you up the stairs, onto the balcony, stops at the banister railing and gazes down at the crowd below.

Right away, you canvas—at least functional enough to do your job—and quickly sweep. One at each exit, three making rounds, another at the blackjack table. The bathroom attendant’s stance is barely awkward enough and when he fixes his jacket, dull leather peeks out from his hip.

Sam likes to say that you’re the real bird of the squad—eagle-eyed and sharper than Barton in his prime. More discreet than Redwing’s scan, critical now without Friday attached to Tony’s glasses. So it surprises you when Bucky tilts his head at the bathroom, landing on the same agent.

“He’s green,” Bucky confirms.

“You saw him?”

“I saw you see him,” he whispers, “Wouldn’t have otherwise.” Then, quickly, “Laugh.”

And you do, selling it effortlessly, palm on his elbow for good measure, tittering with one shoulder pulled to your chin when two men in matching black suits approach. Bucky chuckles too, grips your shoulder like a returned jest. Another quiet gasp of air and you stop, peeking over to watch them go.

“I didn’t--” Your brow furrows when they don’t glance back. Don’t move in any way except like civilians.

A poorly suppressed smile and Bucky turns back to the crowd, hand back at his side.

“Hm. My mistake.”

The Earth seems to lurch out of orbit. The blue of his eyes sparkle with delight—you’re shocked quiet—quieter—heart firmly jammed in your throat.

It makes its home there. Stays perfectly put after you split up, when you bend down fix your hemline, when you knock a champagne glass out of a young woman’s grip at the roulette wheel, when you take advantage of ensuing disorder to lift a keycard from a security guard.

When you meet him down the narrow hallway, his hair is tumbled out of its elastic, impressed grin on his handsome face. A flick of his thumb on the onyx button of his jacket and it opens. Then, down the path you go, shoes off, matching him step for step.

He moves like water, fluid and smooth, gliding through spaces you didn’t imagine could fit him, crashing into bodies with the kind of force that takes them to their knees. He’s remarkable. Trained. Seared with the skill they’ve inscribed into his muscles, his core, Bucky hits hard and deliberate. You swallow every time another drops—immobilized, still alive—reverential.

“Careful.”

Three paces ahead, Bucky looks back at you, hurtling over an incapacitated agent. It only takes a second, just the one, for a bullet to shoot from the corner of the next turn. You barely duck in time, momentum already taking you forward and onto his back, both of you crashing down.

A crack from your pistol. Miss. One more. Hit. Everything goes quiet.

Then, a muffled rustle that could possibly have gotten away if your skin wasn’t bursting with adrenaline, and you fire again without missing. It’s the first time your hands have been steady all night.

Bucky’s eyes are wide when you pull him up from the burgundy carpet. He stares as you tuck the pistol back into its strap, shoes still gripped under your arm.

Then, wordlessly, he steps back, deferring soundlessly to your lead, mesmerized the entire time.

Even after you pick the lock of the door, then the vault, after you replace the package inside with a replica and then thrash the room, meticulously arranging objects to mimic an unsuccessful rifling, Bucky can’t help it.

“Okay,” you say, suddenly shy now that your objective’s been met, remembering his presence so near. You brush stray hairs from your neck, smooth out your gown, and take a deep breath, releasing your heels with a clatter. “Alright. Think we can make it back out?”

“Y-yeah.”

“Okay. Let me just—”

But he’s dropped to his knees, taking your foot into his hold, guiding it easily into the cushion of the stiletto. A finger against your Achilles tendon, a soft nudge and your heel slips in. Bucky runs his thumb up the line of your calf, blinking distractedly before he repeats the same motion to the other side.

“Watch your step,” he breathes, fingers barely grazing the skin of your ankle, finally looking up. Your legs feel like jelly, the warmth of his touch burning and chilling in tandem, and you’re not sure if you remember what stepping means.

“Take my arm?”

A nod—damn, trembling again—and you submit to latching on lest you want to make a complete ass of yourself. A deep breath. You fall into his pace and finally reach the door.

One more look-over. You grip your hair, smudge your lipstick, tug one rhinestone strap off your shoulder. Bucky loosens his bowtie, bunches his collar into his fist and lets it go. Then, dramatically, you squeeze yourself through the crack of the door, sheepishly glancing at guests who spot you. An overt bite of your bottom lip and you fix your hair just so.

The ruse sells. Of course it does. The two of you exit without a hitch.

The hotel’s lights catch on the plush fabric, beams it blue before he steps into a shadow. Still not quite home free, he watchfully tugs you close to him.

Bucky’s giving his ticket to the valet boy when a hoard of footsteps and voices erupt from the lobby. Your heart flies up into your throat again, reflexively reaching for your thigh, but he grabs your wrist. The car is pulling out of the garage. It’s so close.

“Wait,” he commands. Automatic doors slide open behind him. You’re trying not to make eye contact with the first guy sprinting out.

“Quick—” he leans down, “Kiss me.”

And you do, fingers reach up his nape, tangle in his hair, other hand sliding into his tuxedo jacket, over his ribs. Your eyes close. You breathe deep. Bucky pulls you into him, torso against torso—so, so warm—and moans into your mouth. His tongue slips over your bottom lip. He pauses briefly, but grips tight, and you know he’s listening for movement.

The crowd passes, but Bucky lingers on. One more—soft, slow, restrained—and then he’s pressing his forehead against yours, licking his lips. A hiss of the automatic door again and his hand wraps around your waist, splayed over the small of your back. A low hum vibrates into your throat. A little bit less restraint chases it.

“Mm—” he shrugs, parting. Hardly trying now to contain his grin when you find no one around but the valet and the jangle of keys. “My mistake.”

The car slides onto the road. Bucky steers with his left, right harmlessly over the gear lever of an automatic. At each light, he looks over to you, inches his fingers closer, until you take the hint and place it over yours.

“Okay,” you mumble, face burning hot.

“Am I being obvious?”

“Just now?”

“Or, ever. Try not to be, I guess. Think I stare at you too much.”

You blink, astonished. Red flushes pink over Bucky’s eyes and they shine like sunlight. Iridescent. Magical. Then, it flips green and he’s releasing the break, gaze turned back to the road, still glittering like stars. He squeezes your hand, thumb brushing over yours, gentle and earnest.

So, you love him.

-

The Golden City is resplendent. Against the backdrop of sky-spiraling towers and illuminated technology, you are a singular beauty to behold. Bucky feels cracked open in all the ways he used to be: unstitched, untethered, barely holding on in a light breeze.

“Remember this, Sergeant?” You ask, leading him forward, pointing down a pathway, “Didn’t the children corner you once?”  

“Yes,” he remembers.

“And the mandazi cart? Didn’t you prefer the cinnamon sugar topping best?”

“Yes,” Bucky replies quietly, “Just a little. Not too sweet.”

“I remember you didn’t like anything too sweet.”

And the shudder that follows sends his blood straight to his head.

Bucky’s knees feel like they could give out as he coughs with a stammer, shoving his hands in his pockets, staring at his shoes scuffed up with dirt. Anything to distract himself from the memory of a mid-morning bruise growing on his collar and the subsequent teasing from Shuri.

A bite. A scratch. The way your face looked with the hot white streak of sun falling in your open mouth. Bodies still encased in free-flowing cotton, but it was enough to sear his entire being. That pretty, perfect, picture of you on his thigh.

Jesus fucking Christ.

He coughs again.

  You keep on coolly, stepping side to side and avoiding the crowd with ease as if your comment didn’t mean a thing. As if it didn’t trip him up almost physically through the street.

“Have any plans while you’re here?” You ask innocently, stopping at a booth of flowers and browsing through orchids. Daisies and irises peer back at you, beckoning your touch. Bucky reaches into his pocket, buys a violet that matches your dress with the intention of – he doesn’t know, tucking it behind your ear? Six years later and he still doesn’t know what to do with you.

But, of course, it’s been six years for you, and only one for him.

His stomach drops at the thought of a separation only oblivion can create between two people so damn close to a beginning. An irreconcilable distance of time that will never align and how could he be so naïve to think nothing has changed?

“No,” he replies a little dumbly as your hand jingles with change. “No plans. Just…” A melancholy look at the way you turn from him.

“Missed it?”

“Yeah.”

 The stroll continues. One violet in his hand, two Calla Lillies in yours. You turn them round and round, pressing your nose to the spathes, letting their soft points flick over your lips. He feels forgotten altogether until he hears your tepid voice, shaded with the slightest of sorrows.

“They’re a symbol of rebirth and resurrection. I thought it was fitting; you do look reborn, after all.”

Bucky runs his hand instinctively through his hair—cut short now, and he’s still trying to get used to it. His throat constricts. He suddenly aches all over.

“Thank you,” he says finally, after a long while. “For, uh, walking me.”

“We’re not there yet.”

“I just meant—”

“I’m teasing, Sergeant.”

Up the iron stairs you ascend, looking back at him every few steps with a grin. At the door, you pause, both hands coming together to grasp onto the waxy stalks of the flowers, turning them again. “Hope my teasing didn’t offend you?”

“No,” Bucky replies, watching the way you unlock the door deftly, reaching inside to turn the light on for him. “… I remember you liked to tease.”

The smack of the blooms against his chest is abrupt and it takes him by surprise when you laugh sharply.

“Oh! Is that right? What else do you remember?”

He stutters, a little eager, a little hesitant. “I remember—” a thick swallow and you trace the motion of his throat with gentle eyes, walking backwards, hanging your hopes on the bobbing of his Adam’s apple. Bucky presses his lips together.

“I remember us.”

“Yeah?” You take the violet and cross into the kitchen, grabbing a tall glass from the counter and placing the flowers inside, going quiet. “Remember us doing what?”

He’s no good at this— this game. This cat and mouse tension of your provocation. The heady atmosphere of growing closer together but somehow drifting further apart. Every question is a challenge, a play for something from him—an admission? An apology? A funeral?

You call him Sergeant. You hardly look at him. But then you stand, hip jutting, palms flat on the counter, chin on your shoulder and just the sweet shock of your profile is enough to cut him clean through.

“Lots of things.” Bucky steps on the eggshells because he might as well crush them now. 

Reaches the small of your back with his hand, palming the straight column of your exposed spine and counts all the goosebumps that break across your skin. Flesh on flesh, his lips on your shoulder and then neck. He remembers this. Remembers the way you sigh and lean into him. Remembers the heat. Remembers his heart, stitched back together by your loving fingers.

His right hand slips through the open space of your dress. All five warm fingers splay out, gripping your side and curling over your lower ribs. And god, he’s trembling head to toe, feet so unbalanced now he might fall completely.

Your head leans back onto his shoulder, weight of it holding him down, “You’re shaking.”

With a slow turn, you face him, fingertip trailing up his neck and along the curve of his throat to his chin. Tilting him up to the ceiling, you press a blazing kiss onto his neck, “Am I making it better or worse?”

He doesn’t mean to do it—or maybe he does, but the speed of it surprises even Bucky when he lifts you by the thighs and places you on the sink counter. He cuts off your sharp gasp and turns it into an exhilarated moan, presses your chest to his with frantic hands, nudges your legs open to nestle himself in between.

And hell, the way you feel in his arms—delicate but full of fight, softly pulsing with the strength he’s always admired about you—it feels safe. Steady. The kind of stable that’s always been taken from him too soon.

It’s been six years—or one—or whatever, and his entire being is vibrating with the magnitude of a catastrophic earthquake, but Bucky can’t be bothered to care about any of that now. Your mouth is open, tongue sweeping over his, teeth playfully nipping at his bottom lip, and it dashes away all his good sense.

When he breaks away, he’s overly aware of his erratic heartbeat and swollen mouth. Kissed tender, and it takes what’s left of his breath to see that you match him just as well. You lean forward again, and he meets you for another two, three, five kisses. He loses count after a few more, eager and fumbling and dizzy as he peppers them over your cheek, down to your collar.

“Don’t even think about it,” you warn, hand tugging him away by his hair, “Bite me and I’ll kick you out.”

Bucky pauses and snaps upright, confused at the statement and the way your eyes sparkle with amusement. Knowingly, you nod to the space behind him, “I live here, Bucky.”

“What?” He mutters. It takes him a minute, but he finally looks around and notices the simple decorations. The well-cared for plants, the soft blanket over the couch, the mug of coffee with a stirring spoon stuck inside. The small plate of—his heart skips a beat—half-eaten mandazi with cinnamon sugar on top.

“Oh, god.”

Bucky presses the heel of his palm to his eyes, doesn’t know if he might laugh or sob. Maybe both.

Still in the hold of his one hand, you twist halfway, moving the glass further in case either one of you might knock it over. The spathes of the lilies turn idly to look at him, draped over the tufts of violet petals. Two stalks in perfect symmetry. Symbols of resurrection for both him and you.

Smoothing the shorn chestnut strands gone a little awry from your grip, your eyes search his face, memorizing his lines. All things of his old and new.

“Welcome back to Wakanda, Sergeant.” Your mischievous mouth finds his again, holding him steady with familiar sweetness, “I missed you.”

-

-

Steve can tell when you enter the room.

Stepping with your shoulders back and spine straight, hips swaying easily into meetings. Grinning at Sam’s jibes, playing with Natasha’s hair, punching Bucky in the shoulder when he asks what you’re up to tonight, all dolled up—thassa nice color on ya, don’t you think so, Stevie?

He nods and hums and gazes on when you swivel to him, grinning. Immaculate, lovely. Long lashes and glistening doe eyes. You’re brilliant. You’re spectacular. You’re an award-winning actress and everyone is struck dumb by the performance.

When you leave, you smile again, and he returns it with one of his own. Wide. Open. Alight with the kind of rehearsed joy that never reaches his eyes.

I see you, it says. I see you.

-

Music is muffled through the door, but loud enough for him to hear—up-tempo drums, swinging bass line, buoyant melody. High, silvery voices. Celebratory, reckless, youth seizing the night. Loving life.

Quietly, he knocks. Once, then twice, and when there’s no answer, he lets himself into the darkness. Your room is empty and cold, your bed is missing your body. A sliver of yellow light cuts him in half from the bathroom door.

You’re curled up in the shape of a fist, nestled like a stone in the porcelain embrace of the tub. Knees to your chest, forehead pushed down, arms wrapped like ropes keeping yourself in once piece. Smudges of red and black stain soft wipes at Steve’s feet, turns cotton white into a canvas of tempestuous painter’s marks. Debris of various containers, waxy lipstick, crushed powder litter the floor, all broken apart. The mirror houses a small spiderweb crack at the corner.

Steve sits, carefully arranging himself at the edge of the tub. Carefully arranging the words inside his mouth. Fitted clever syllables assembled into a sparse and secret message.

“I’m not doing great.” You say curtly, muffled by your legs.

“I noticed.” He replies, just as short.

“Don’t look at me.”

“I won’t.”

You face slips sideways from the cover of your arms. Roughly wiped spotless, swollen at the curves of your cheeks, your eyes, your mouth, every line inflamed. Anguished. Fresh tears roll out, collecting at the sloped bridge of your nose before continuing their descent.

“You’re a liar.”

He laughs softly, never breaking his gaze, “So are you.”

The music fades away at the final track of the album as you watch him sideways, pale face of his seemingly suspended in the air, floating like an invented daydream.

Steve links his fingers through yours, splaying them open before squeezing tightly. Gentle warmth. Discreet care.

There’s not much more after that. The room returns to its clinical state, sheltered and encapsulated inside a ceramic tile and striped-wallpaper box.

Eyes and lips clean. Noise silenced. Armor fallen off. You feel lighter and lighter.

The fog lifts. The clouds part. Winter thaws a little earlier than you expect.

-