#second helpings

“Want to try a piece?” I asked. “I can cut this last little bite in half.”

Bucky shook his head and looked down. I shrugged and ate the rest of it, and turned my attention to Steve, who was smiling at me. The sandwich had been pretty spicy, and my mouth and lips felt pleasantly hot still, so when he leaned closer, safely hidden in our little corner table in the relatively quiet off-hour, I couldn’t help but grin as I leaned in to meet him.

About an inch away, he suddenly realized his impending mistake and held me back. “Wait– no!”

I tried so hard to get to him, but I had no chance. “Spicy kisses! Spicy kisses!”

“No! No spicy kisses,” Steve said, but he laughed even as he fended me off. “Have you been drinking hot sauce? I can smell it from here.”

“Hhhhhhhow dare you,” I said, trying to breathe on him on the first word so hard I lost my breath. I stopped pushing at him and folded my arms as I sat back. “I didn’t love the sandwich, but the jalapenos were still good.”

“Did they double layer them?”

“Nah, the spread was spicy too. It was all right.” I noticed Bucky was staring at me, and I looked right back at him. “What?”

He cracked a small smile, and dragged one of his French fries around the plate. “You are so weird.”

I made my eyes as big as I could and clasped my hands together under my chin. “Thank you,” I said like it was the sweetest thing in the universe. I then got a fry to the face. I picked it up and ate it. “Yum.”

“Asshole,” he said, but he still had a little smile.

“Do you like hot sauce?” I asked.

He turned blank. His ‘thinking’ face, I assumed, because it came out fairly often and never seemed bad, unless he immediately followed it by leaving. Right now, he just sat and mulled the question over. “I…don’t know,” he said and squinted suspiciously at the condiments.

“It’s okay; Steve’s got no taste,” I said and took a ketchup packet, a hot chili sauce packet, and mixed the contents together.

“Gross,” Steve muttered. I rolled my eyes. Mr. No-I-Don’t-Need-Anything-To-Go-With-My-Aioli could shove the hypocrisy.

I pushed the very basic spicy ketchup towards Bucky, and nodded at his fries. “Just try one,” I said. “You’ve got a nice big soda to wash it down with if you don’t like it, but it’s good.” I snaked a fry bit, dipped it, and ate it just to show him it wasn’t poison.

Bucky stared at it for a few seconds, looked at me to make sure I wasn’t dying (and I strongly resisted the urge to fake poison because I was still figuring out what his buttons were, even though it would have been so funny), and tentatively dipped a tiny corner of his fry into it. He chewed way longer than was necessary, waited, then dragged a full fry through it and ate the whole thing.

Bucky looked at Steve. “Wimp,” he said.

“Hey!” Steve said but I could barely hear him over my own laughter. The experiment was a success, as Bucky smugly continued eating his fries with his new ketchup concoction.

Amused and dodging Steve’s half-hearted attempts to take a swipe at me, my mind started to wander. I’d gotten Steve into some new things. What else did Bucky have yet to experience?

~

Food was– well, not safe, but probably the easiest thing to be adventurous with. It felt a little silly in some ways– Bucky had listed off at least ten countries as some of the places he explored while he was off finding himself– but also, Bucky was a guy who, at least at this point in his life, only lived on the bare minimum, so how much had he explored really?

Today I had a bag of candy while I was hanging out with Steve. Steve had had his own bag, a big one at that– and had devoured about all of it as soon as he sat down. Tony could joke about Werther’s all he wanted, but I didn’t know anybody who could put away peach rings like Steve did.

Bucky sauntered in just after the sun had gone down, paused only a moment in the connection point where he could have easily gone for the bedroom, and chose to come in and sink into a chair across from the couch. Willingly spending time with me around– someday I was going to stop being surprised by that, but for now, I’d take the compliment.

“Hey Buck,” Steve said with a soft smile. “How was the time out?”

Bucky shrugged, and glanced at me. I held up my candy assortment, and picked one out. “Want some candy?”

He stared at the piece in my hand. And then blinked several times. Then he scrunched his nose. “Why’s it look like that?”

I almost made a smart comment about how he had been in the world for a while, surely he had seen candy in passing, but then I thought– I didn’t actually know that, I didn’t know what it meant to put your brain back together and what you did and did not notice or remember, so I stowed the sarcasm for the moment. “You’ve never had blue raspberry?” I held the piece and the bag closer towards him. “This is a travesty that must be rectified.”

Bucky looked at the itty-bitty little piece of totally unthreatening candy and grimaced. “I think anything calling itself “blue raspberry” is probably the real travesty,” he muttered.

I couldn’t actually argue that. “Are you sure you don’t want to try one?” I asked. He hesitated, but after several seconds, shook his head. “Okay,” I said, and ate the piece. “If you change your mind, let me know before the bag is gone.”

“What if I want one after the bag is gone?”

“I could try and feed you like a baby bird, but I don’t think any of us would enjoy that.”

He crinkled his nose, but his lips turned up with it. “Gross.”

I laughed and almost threw a candy at him– but thought better of it and popped it into my mouth. Steve snorted, and I leaned back and dangled a piece of candy next to him. He recoiled like it was radioactive.

“Wanna be adventurous?” I asked, knowing the answer.

“No,” he said, and even scooted away.

Bucky was by my shoulder in a second. He hesitated, but held his hand out. I tried to stifle my smile, but I placed the one single tiny piece of candy in his massive metal paw, and after several seconds he still didn’t budge.

“Hey, was cough syrup still laced with cocaine when you two were kids?” I asked, filled my hand with candy, and put all of it into my mouth.

Bucky gave me a glare, then lightened up just in time to say, completely deadpan, “I don’t remember,” before tossing it back into his mouth.

I cackled so hard I started choking and thus completely missed his reaction, while Steve tried to figure out how to pound on my back without breaking it.

~

“Hey losers,” I said, not looking up from my game as the door opened and two familiar treads came in and stopped at the entry. Bucky grumbled something under his breath and, while I couldn’t hear it, I could imagine what it was. “Steve texted me so calm down mother.”

“Still should check,” he grumped.

Suddenly a package was tossed in my lap. I jerked back– thankfully after I had escaped virtual death, so I was able to pause and investigate. It looked like a bag of mixed candies, with a name I had never heard of. I looked up and Bucky was standing nearby, looking around the room.

“They’re citrus,” Bucky mumbled, keeping his eyes away from me as he sat down in the chair.

“Neat. Thanks!” I said, and as soon as the game stopped saving, I exited out for the main TV menu. Steve came back from the kitchen with several drinks, handing one off to Bucky and then one he slipped into my lap before he moved to sit on my other side. I popped the tab. “Hey, Bucky– do you like music?”

He grimaced. “Some, I guess,” he said nonchalantly. “Some of it’s just a lot of…noise.”

“Hm,” I said as I took a sip from my drink.

Bucky suddenly had eyes on me like he was a hawk. It was kind of freaky, but I didn’t flinch. “What,” he said flatly.

“What?” I asked. I picked up the remote and turned my head towards the TV. “You guys have anything you want to watch?”

Bucky kept staring at me, I could feel it. Unfortunately for him, it only made me want to smile so big. Steve did, in fact, smile. He also rolled his eyes and stole the remote right out of my hand. “Knock it off Buck,” he said as he started navigating menus like a man on a mission. “You’re only encouraging her.”

“Shush; let him fuel my mischief,” I said and snuggled in next to him.

Bucky rolled his eyes, but when I peeked again, he looked relaxed. “Your nonsense, more like,” he said, crossing his arms over his chest.

“Same diff,” I said, and chucked one of the candies at him.

Over the next few days, I made three new playlists that I then shared selectively with Steve. The first one was “B – Calm, Easy, Quiet”; the second was made after a little hemming and hawing and titled, “B – All the Noise (To Drown Out Thoughts)”. The third one was made without any hesitation, but shared with a little– “B – If He Has A Sense of Humor”.

All of them were a mess of genres and traversed across multiple eras. The first was a collection of slower, quieter, deeper songs. The second was full of frenetic, screaming, and otherwise super messy songs that might be the exact thing he had grimaced about…but also might come in handy. You never knew who needed a little metalcore, and sometimes neither did they. The third was just me being a little shit. Who knew so many oldies were about memories? I threw in a few about how swell fellas are too. For the romantic in him.

Bucky: You think you’re funny do you

I sent back a lot of emojis full of obnoxious smiley faces, flowers, suns, and kissy faces. A few days later, he sent me a link to a playlist. I listened dutifully to the whole thing, and every single song was just a bunch of machine grinding noises masquerading as EDM.

My boyfriend had great taste in men, I had to admit.

~

“Hey, look at this,” I said to Steve as soon as I got inside his apartment. He backed away, giving me room to set my bag on the counter, and belatedly I realized he had been coming to greet me with a hug. “Oh, hi,” I said and kissed him quick before turning back to my goodies. “Hey– check this out.”

“Should I be afraid of how excited you are, or excited too?” he asked, slipping one arm around me as he leaned in to look.

“You can be both,” I said and pulled two packages out of the bag. They were gift sets, one an assortment of tiny shampoo bottles, and the other an assortment of tiny liquid soaps. Steve squinted at them, which was not unfounded– the packaging was very bright pink and more geared for the girliest teenager you knew. However.

“Why?” he asked, tone loaded with suspicion, and gave me a stare to match. Maybe he was spending a little too much time with Bucky. Normally I got at least a minute to lead in to my shenanigans.

“I remembered you have that stupid interview in a few days,” I said, and indeed, he winced at the mention. Some right-wing douchebag masquerading as a “centrist”. What else was new. “So I got you these.”

He kept looking at me, even though his lips twitched a little. “Still doesn’t explain.”

Because I was trying to find a suitably dramatic and hilarious way to explain it, but all I could do was shrug. “Well, I know you hate that guy, and I found out he has some thing about men smelling ‘feminine’ or whatever,” I said. “Apparently he went off on it for like, a half-hour on some trash alpha-male podcast or something, so this–” I held up the package of shampoos, “Is gonna make your hair smell so girly.”

He definitely looked more intrigued– just as I knew he would. “I got the soaps just in case– I know you’re fussier about that, but they’re all super frou-frou, so if you can stand the smell, it’s a really easy way to get on his nerves right from the get-go, before even shaking hands.”

I set the package back down and waited for, at the very least, faint praise for my thoughtfulness. But when Steve looked at me, it was with that sort of melting expression of adoration that made me so soft, but seemed way too much for something this small. Poor thing must have been more stressed about this stupid interview than he was willing to say. “I love you,” he said earnestly.

“I know.” I gave him a quick kiss. “And I love you too.” But when I went back to the bag, I hesitated.

“What else?” Steve asked and put his chin on my shoulder. “If you want to dress me, we’ll have to discuss that a little bit more.”

“You are a grown-ass man who can dress himself.” I played with the bag handle. “How’s Bucky with scents and stuff?”

Steve chuckled and kissed the side of my head. “He mostly sticks with the basics. What’d you get him now?”

“Well, for one I thought he might like to try some of those.” I gestured at the stuff I gave Steve. “He isn’t super macho tough guy, and he might genuinely like them. But I also got…” I pulled out three more gift sets. Shampoo, soap, and also lotion, because fuck it, why not. “He doesn’t indulge on his own. But I don’t want to be pushy, you know? I just think…”

“You’re overthinking,” he said, quiet but firm. “They’re great. I’ll tell Bucky you got them for me to try and that I’d appreciate the help in working through them.”

“You don’t have to lie.” I leaned back into him. “He’ll see right through you anyways.”

“Yeah.” He kissed me. “But it’s the thought that counts.”

~

We never talked about it. I had no idea if he even bothered to try the soaps, but that wasn’t really the point. They were for him, not for me, and if he liked them, great, he could talk to Steve about it to get more, and if not, no harm done.

We were out again, at a pizza place this time, late one night. Or early in the morning– I wasn’t really paying attention to the clock anymore. Bucky was quieter than usual, but he hadn’t ditched us yet, which I took for a good sign, even if I did want to kick Steve under the table for the way his eyebrows kept creasing. I didn’t know what was going on with them, but if they didn’t want to bring it up, then I was perfectly happy to let it rest. Bucky and I were friendly enough, I thought, but I was nowhere near nosing in to all his various moods.

So while I wasn’t as obnoxious as I could be, I still behaved like myself. I ordered all the food while Steve was distracted, and made sure Bucky had a lot of fun things to try, with a few safe standbys just in case. He picked at his food quite a bit, and every time he finished eating a slice he would wait until Steve gave him another one– until Steve got really into telling a story about Clint, and Bucky waited and waited and waited, his eyes flicking towards the remaining food. Steve didn’t notice quick enough, so I took a chance and put a slice on Bucky’s plate, not sure if he would take it from me or not. But Bucky relaxed his shoulders, gave me a short nod, and started eating again while listening to Steve talk.

He ate quickly enough that I was able to slip him three more slices without Steve noticing, all of them different. The fourth one though, Bucky put his hand out. “Not that one,” he said, making Steve stop, blink, and look around in confusion.

“You’ve had it before?” I asked and started sifting through the other pizza boxes. Most of them were empty– a hazard of eating out with two men who could chow through food in ways even competitive eaters could only dream of.

“I’ve tried some things without you,” Bucky muttered.

It didn’t sound like a dig, but it did make me pause. “You don’t have to try everything I give you,” I said.

“I know,” Bucky said. “But I…like it.” He frowned and looked focused in a way that let me know there was something else there. But he shook his head. I was curious, but didn’t press. Hopefully he’d tell me someday. “And you think of things sometimes Steve doesn’t.”

“So it’s okay to keep doing?” I said. Bucky nodded. I grinned. “Excellent.”

Bucky’s eyes widened. He looked at Steve, and then at me. “Maybe I take it back,” he said cautiously.

“Too late!” I said and picked up a piece of pizza. He’d drop that ‘maybe’ eventually, but for now, I wondered what it would take.

~