Chapter Text
When Bucky stepped into the room, Steve was making coffee. “Am I supposed to apologize for waking you up?” Bucky asked. He knew JARVIS had told Steve he was coming down, even though he hadn't heard the words. Once he'd scanned the room and decided there was nobody waiting to attack him, he walked around the bar separating the living room and kitchen. Rather than delivering the question challengingly or defensively, he felt genuinely curious about human behaviour. The kitchen was floored in tile, unlike the rest of the room which was carpeted, and he stood at the dividing line.
Steve needed a moment to think his answer over. “I guess most people would, yeah.” A yawn distorted his last few words and he blinked several times. “You don't have to apologize to me, though, Bucky. Whenever you need to talk, I'm just a floor above you.” One side of his mouth twisted up into a smile but he still looked tired. “Besides, some nights I'm not sleeping much anyway.”
“Stop treating me like I'm going to break, Steve.” Bucky had been standing at the edge of the kitchen but now he walked to the counter and hopped up, leaning back to put his weight on his hands. “I'm not as fragile as you think I am or HYDRA would have actually gotten around to murdering me sometime in the last seventy years. The fact that I'm here, alive and in the Tower, means I'm a damn sight stronger than everyone thinks I am. Getting out from HYDRA took a hell of a lot. I still get nightmares most nights. Haven't found much that keeps them quiet so I just deal with them, so-”
Steve interrupted him. “I'm sorry, Bucky. The train... I never should have... You trusted me and I let you down.”
Bucky's teeth clenched and he swallowed, but he pretended not to notice the way his body reacted to Steve's words. “You don't have anything to apologize for. If anyone owes me an apology, it's HYDRA.” He pursed his lips then sighed, rolling his head across his shoulders to look at Steve. “As long as you don't apologize, I won't. I get how you feel, Steve. You don't have to keep telling me every time we have a conversation. I understand the way you think.”
“You do?” Steve sounded and looked unbelievably hopeful.
“You want to blame yourself for everything while you save the world. Ever since you were a kid, you were like that.” Bucky's head tilted forward and he stared at his kneecaps as he thought over the memory he hadn't remembered having until he spoke it. “I-I don't remember it, or know it, but it's in my head. I know the way you are the way I know how to brush my teeth. Somewhere along the way, back in my past, I knew how, and it's coming back. Like I can't forget you even if I wanted to. And I like that. I don't want to forget again.” Rather than getting emotional, Bucky simply let his voice grow quieter. He was holding steady, keeping his emotions in check, and he was relieved that he wasn't going to get emotional over talking with Steve. After seventy years of screaming, sobbing, and torture, he was over letting his feelings show. It only got him into trouble. That's what he had always told himself, from the day he'd staggered away from the river and hoped somebody would find Steve before he bled out into the water.
“Whatever happens, you can come to me,” Steve promised. “I'll always be here for you. Till the end of the line, just like I said on the helicarrier. Doesn't matter what happens, or happened. You're still my best friend.”
Bucky hummed noncommittally, a quiet noise under his breath. He let the silence lay between them as Steve poured a cup of coffee for himself and turned down a similar offer. “What did you think about John F. Kennedy?” he asked suddenly, gaze moving to Steve's face. “Did they tell you about him?”
“I never met him, but he seemed like a nice guy. Kind of a tragedy that he died when he did.” Steve had a pretty good idea of where Bucky was going with things and he mentioned the president's death calmly. “Guess they never knew for sure who did it.”
“I'm pretty sure that was me.”
“Hmm.” Steve knew better than to ask Bucky to elaborate but he also didn't want his friend to think he couldn't talk. "Want a Pop-Tart?"
Bucky blinked at him, looking almost owlish in the dim lighting. "Sure." He watched Steve get the box out of the pantry and reached out for the tinfoil package. They both opened the packets in silence. "I could never figure out why you had so many boxes of these things in your pantry until I tried one."
A smile quirked at the edges of Steve's lips. "You liked them?"
"I don't think Rumlow will ever stop teasing me about the noise I made."
Steve laughed. "I can throw away the wrapper for you." After coming back from the trash can, Steve leaned against the counter opposite Bucky.
Bucky shifted his body back so that he could sit normally on the counter. He put his hands in his lap and picked at a seam in the plates of his left hand with his fingernails. “I remember shooting him. There was a team working with me that gave cover fire to distract the feds. Once I shot him I was supposed to go back to the extraction point, but instead I ran off. I don't remember where to, now that I'm thinking about it. But it was my first mission in America, and I guess it broke through some of my programming. Took almost a month for them to get me back. Can't remember what I did, but the files said I was found in the northeastern states. Didn't say which one. Guess I was looking for you or something. I don't remember. The mission I met you on was the next one I had in America. They kept me in other places after that. Didn't want me running away again.” His metal fingers clenched together and he winced briefly as the metal scraped against his skin. “Didn't want to lose their trained killer, or should I say their goddamn lap dog.” He clenched his hands angrily and immediately yanked them apart, hissing curses under his breath at the wound he'd accidentally self-inflicted.
“You don't have to talk,” Steve offered instantly. “I mean, it's not that I don't want to hear. I'm okay with hearing whatever you want to tell me. It's okay that you assassinated JFK. But I don't want you to hurt yourself because you're sharing more than you're comfortable with. Physically or mentally. Take things slow. Let yourself deal with things before you shove it all out into the open. Be careful with yourself.” He probably sounded a lot like Sam, but he doubted Bucky knew that, and it was the only thing he could think to say.
“I didn't even notice it until it started bleeding,” Bucky confessed, tilting his hand so his shadow didn't fall on it and examining the cut on his finger. “It'll be fine by morning.”
“You're bleeding?” Steve instinctively stepped forward but stopped himself. “I can – Are you okay with me coming over?”
Bucky snorted. “Steve, please. Unless I'm near fugue or don't know you're in the room, you don't have to ask. Just don't rush at me like the ceiling's on fire and I'll be fine. Treat me like a person, not a wild animal.” He fixed his friend with a stern glare, feeling the Winter Soldier persona simmer in his gaze. “Okay?”
“Okay,” Steve agreed, seemingly undaunted. He approached Bucky and reached slowly for his friend's hand. When Bucky didn't draw back, Steve took his friend's hand in his own and examined the cut made by Bucky's left hand moving sharply against his right-hand fingers. “It doesn't look deep. Do you want a Band-Aid?”
Bucky was about to tell him that a Band-Aid would be stupid and unnecessary, but he caught the look in Steve's eyes just in time. He struggled with the words for a second before he replied. “Yeah, that would be great,” he said, hoping against hope that he'd settled on the right words. “Thank you.”
Steve grinned and Bucky knew he'd made the right choice. “I'll be right back, okay?” He disappeared into his room, which Bucky knew connected the bathroom and living room, and came out a minute later with a box of Band-Aids. While Steve rarely used them himself, after a sparring session they were often needed for whoever he was fighting with. Natasha or Clint sometimes dropped by to borrow one, but such occasions weren't common.
Bucky held perfectly still as Steve opened the Band-Aid package and wrapped the bandage around his finger. “Good job, Dr. Rogers.” He spoke with a teasing lilt to his voice but meant every word. “It'll be good as new by morning, I'd say. You've got quite the medical skill, it seems.”
“Well, my professional Dr. Rogers opinion is that you should go easy on that hand for a couple days,” Steve answered, deepening his voice and adopting a no-nonsense tone. “No heavy lifting or scrapping in alleys. Your trouble-attracting friends will have to go without you for a little while. And find someone to hold those hands for you. They need some tender loving care.” He grinned for a moment, and Bucky understood the concept of mischief dancing in someone's eyes. “Doctor's orders.”
“Oh really, doctor?” Bucky's eyebrow quirked up. He held his hands out, palms up, and wiggled his fingertips. “Got anyone in mind who can do the job?” A corner of his mind screamed at him not to get close to Steve because it wasn't in the mission parameters, because it was dangerous, but it was the HYDRA corner of his mind and he pushed it into silence.
Steve's faint smile slipped from his face, replaced with a look of caring and hope, and he reached his hands out cautiously. Bucky let his hands hover beneath his friend's until Steve took them, laying his thumb across the back of Bucky's hands. “Yeah, I got someone in mind.” Unlike his previous words, now he was completely serious, and perhaps a little bit afraid. “Nice guy, doesn't mind how old you are or the baggage you've got. He'll take you just as you are. Any way you want to be.”
Bucky's voice was quite and hollow. For the first time the shadows cupping his eyes were darkly visible, and he dipped his head to let his hair hang over his face. It was hard to see either Bucky Barnes or the Winter Soldier in his actions; instead Steve saw a little boy hiding pain behind a scrappy grin. “Do you see it? The way I'm smearing red all over you?” He withdrew his right hand from Steve's grasp, fisted his hand, and rubbed his knuckles gently across Steve's palm. “Seventy years' worth of blood. Kind of hard to miss, even when you don't want to think about it.”
Steve leaned forward and pressed his lips against Bucky's forehead. “I see someone who's perfect.”
Bucky leaned back, his bright blue eyes shimmering with pooled tears. “No, you don't,” he protested, but his voice was weak and shaking.
“Yeah, I do,” Steve replied, his voice soft but just as unsteady.
Bucky was seized by an impulse and decided to act on it. He shifted away from Steve just enough that he could look his friend in the face and asked, “Will you listen to a song for me? Right now?” Steve nodded in affirmation, his head tilting sideways in curiosity. “JARVIS, can you play Bring Me The Horizon? The song name is Can You Feel My Heart.” He'd found it on YouTube while exploring modern rock genres and had listened to it on repeat all night long. By morning he was crying and exhausted, and he'd felt like he'd both found and lost a part of himself in the music. Steve focused his gaze on Bucky's hands as they listened. When the song finished Steve looked back up, as close to crying as Bucky was.
“I can feel your heart.” Steve whispered the promise solemnly, his voice breaking on the words as he reached out to touch his fingertips to the stretch of fabric over the left side of Bucky's chest. Bucky let out a muffled sob and slid off the counter. He pressed himself against Steve, hands grabbing fistfulls of Steve's shirt as he cried into the fabric. Steve wrapped an arm around Bucky's shoulders and placed his other hand on the back of Bucky's head, stroking his hair. His voice was low and soft. “It doesn't matter if you fugue, or wreck things, or run away. You're my friend. I'll always be here for you, 24/7. Whenever you want to scream and cry, whenever you have nightmares, you won't be alone. It's okay to be broken as long as you want to heal. I'll wake you up from your bad dreams and keep you safe and healthy. You're still my best friend. I'm with you till the end of the line.” Steve realized he was crying himself but he didn't particularly care.
“You Punk,” Bucky murmured. In the quiet between their words he could almost hear Steve's heartbeat.
“Jerk,” Steve countered with a short, shaky laugh. Bucky would be willing to bet it was a fifty-fifty chance whether his friend started crying again or not. Steve's hand moved absentmindedly over Bucky's hair, carding through the dark locks as they stood there. “You okay?”
“In a minute,” Bucky murmured. His answer seemed satisfactory, as Steve was content to continue standing there. “Steve?” There was an inquisitive humming noise in reply. “I think I trust you. And it scares me, scares the fuck out of me, because the last time I trusted someone HYDRA made sure they almost killed me.” He felt the arm tighten ever so slightly around his shoulders, practically saw the look of pain and horror on Steve's face. “But I think I trust you. Which counts for a lot more than if I said I actually did. Can... Can I do something?”
“Yeah.” Steve's voice was soft and quiet, appropriate for the moment, and his breath moved like a warm ghost across Bucky's hair. He didn't get a reply for several moments and pulled back to look Bucky in the eyes. “Buck? What did you want to do?”
In answer Bucky cupped the back of Steve's neck with his right hand and kissed him. When he pulled away he forced a small smile onto his lips. “That, maybe?” His voice sounded quiet and shy, but his walls were already built up because he was sure Steve was about to pull away from him and tell him to get out.
“Yeah,” Steve repeated in the same soft voice, now with a dreamy note in it. “That.” He moved his hand from Bucky's shoulder to rest on his hip, leaned down, and kissed Bucky back.