Chapter Text
Rock Creek Park
Washington DC, USA
Is that—
No.
Sure, he and Steve talk about their favorite running locations but this is a weird coincidence.
Has to be a coincidence between the fact Sam literally flipped a coin this morning to decide where he would run and Steve told him he’d be out of town for the week.
The closer Sam gets, he is certain he recognizes that silhouette. Just yards away, Sam calls out, “You’re running slow today, Rogers!”
Steve finally stops and turns around—
The guy isn’t Steve.
“I’d say don’t insult my cool down lap,” The guy says in a surprisingly deep voice and with a blinding movie-star smile. “But I think you go the wrong guy anyways. Name’s Jack.”
Holy shit, this guy is out of the same mold as Steve, same broad shoulders and ridiculously thin waist. There are subtle differences; his hair is more straw blond than Steve’s darker gold and Jack would look pale even next to Steve. He looks ridiculously young, like fresh out of college and new to the world. Sunglasses hide his eyes but Sam’s going to bet they are blue.
Sam finishes the jog up to him, taking pride in the fact he’s not gasping for air. “You sure you don’t have an older brother? Like way older one who also is crazy good at this running thing.”
Sam can’t just say like Captain America, that sounds too much like a line. And trying to explain that he actually knows Captain America doesn’t get taken seriously. Hell, his mom didn’t even believe him the first few times he mentioned running with the guy, even before Sam started describing him as Steve Rogers aka the frustrating idiot who may or may not be hitting on me.
Jack laughs. “No siblings, thank god. My parents barely knew what to do with me .”
His accent is like Steve’s too, flat like a newscaster but missing that hint of Brooklyn Steve lets slip.
Someone needs to tell Hollywood there’s a dead ringer for Captain America running around D.C. and sign him for a series now that Steve’s decided to give living a try between all that James Bond shit. “Seriously, man, I know a guy who could be your brother.”
Or grandpa.
“He live around here?” Jack asks, amused. “I’ll have to tell my husband that I apparently have a twin so he doesn’t end up scaring the poor guy.”
Of course, the version of Captain America that definitively states he’s into guys has already been snatched up. Kudos to the lucky guy.
“He lives here, and tends to run in the Mall area.”
“If I run into him, who should I say said hello?” Jack holds out his hand.
“Wha—Oh, I’m Sam.” Sam shakes his hand. This close to that smile sends butterflies through his stomach and Sam reminds himself the guy is married.
“Nice to meet you.” Jack pulls away and stretches his arms over his head. “But if you call me slow again, I’m going to have to challenge you to a race.”
Sam lets his gaze wander over his arms—looking certainly doesn’t hurt and Jack has the same taste in ridiculously tight shirts as Steve—and grins back. “I could take you.”
“Race you to the next mile marker?”
“Sure—”
Jack twists around and takes off sprinting.
“Hey!” Sam is after him a second later. “Cheater!”
“Slowpoke!” Jack throws over his shoulder, and damn, he wasn’t kidding earlier about running a cool-down lap or whatever; Sam is no slouch but with each step Jack widens the distance between them.
This is too much like running with Steve. Sam pushes himself for an extra burst of speed; surely the guy has to be a little tired if he was getting ready to finish.
(When Sam finally catches up, Jack is leaning against the mile marker with a smirk. Sam would pay good money to see Jack go up against Steve and see how Jack feels getting left in the dust. It wouldn’t be quite fair to set Jack up against a supersoldier, but Sam is tired of getting outpaced by gorgeous blonds.)