Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

There’s giggling coming from the porch. It’s only one in the afternoon, so it’s not Clint, and there’s the sound of scrabbling claws at the door, so Lucky has something to say about the situation also. And, with a groan of exaggerated annoyance, Bucky gets up from the couch to get the door.

Someone knocks on the other side of the door about a second before he opens it, and when he does, Simone is standing on the other side of the door, her two sons there with her. To Bucky, they seem so old now even though the younger is almost the same age as Peter.

What’s more surprising in this picture is that Pietro is standing behind Simone.

Bucky opens his mouth, but no, that's not how this works because Simone gets to talk first: “I'm pretty sure I found one of yours. And not the usual suspects, either.”

Usually when one of the kids ends up at Simone’s, it’s Peter just because he likes hanging out with kids more towards his own age or Kate because she got into a fight with someone. (That girl could pick a fight with a rabid bear, honestly.) Wanda occasionally babysat for Simone, but Pietro was hardly ever over there.

Especially not on a school day. During school hours. When he most definitely has class.

“Goddammit, Pietro,” sighs Bucky, running a hand through his hair because this is the fifth time this month that this kid has skipped school and his attendance record is starting to look spottier than a Dalmatian.

“James!” scolds Simone immediately, clasping her hands over her younger son’s ears.

Bucky’s eyes widen. “Shit, sorry.”

“Language,” Pietro says with a devilish grin because now he’s picked up Clint’s fucking sarcasm and as if Bucky didn't have enough shit to worry about, suddenly this kid has more piss and vinegar than usual. And is skipping class. And getting into trouble.

In Bucky’s defense, he only started raising Pietro a little over a year ago. This isn't his fault. Damaged goods. (That’s probably not the right way to think about children…)

“I will make sure he washes his mouth with soap,” assures Pietro with a smile that would probably some day make a girl’s heart melt, but today, he’s using that smile to get Simone to get him off the hook with Bucky— a tactic that will almost assuredly work because, yep, there it is, Simone is smiling and sighing and Bucky has immediately lost all credibility here.

The kid has his charms if nothing else.

“You should be in class, Pietro. Set a better example for my boys, please.” And Simone departs from the porch with a half-wave as she wrangles her own two kids back into her van.

And here it comes: a lovely sheepish smile from Pietro. The kind that says “I'm sorry but also I'm not guilty so you can try to say something bad, but good luck with getting it to stick”. Because this kid is essentially a snake. Except with legs. He can talk his way out of anything with a little circumlocution and some well-placed loving comments. If he weren't so suave, he’d be screwed.

Lucky for Bucky, he doesn't appreciate suave as much as the next guy. He married Clint, after all, and that man is anything but smooth. He’s probably about as smooth as the gravel driveway that Simone’s van is trudging along right now.

Pietro, on the other hand (Is that even an appropriate phrase considering Bucky only has one hand? He files this thought away to ask Clint later.), is about as smooth as butter and is about to slip into the house until Bucky grabs ahold of him. “Oh no, you’re not goin’ anywhere.” Bucky hates being the bad cop. Especially the bad cop without his good cop.

“I was going to do homework,” lies Pietro flatly, plenty aware that Bucky won't take his shit. Not the way that everyone else usually does.

Bucky pauses because now isn't the time for this discussion. “Chores,” he says. “You’re home early, you get a head start on chores.” It’s a diversion for now, at least until he can figure out what’s up with this one.

Pietro’s mouth flatlines, his smile wiped away instantly.

“Don’t skip school.” Bucky’s words are maybe sharper than he means, but goddamn, he has to manage it all somehow.

—

The rules were laid out plain and simple:

Rule 1) Go to school.

Rule 2) Don't skip any classes.

Rule 3) Make the best attempt possible in all classes.

Rule 4) Don’t argue with teachers.

And it applies to all the kids. It's an easy enough system.

Kate breaks Rule 4 like it’s nobody's business, and Clint takes those calls usually because Kate seems to like him more no matter how much Bucky tries to get her in his corner of the ring.

For the twins and Peter, Bucky’s usually on call. Wanda: not a problem. A dream, really. Peter has had his fair share of arguments with teachers over specific facts and miscommunication of information. Never anything more than a warning and a signature from a parent required.

Meanwhile, Pietro has a whole permanent record full of tardy slips, an attendance record to match, and plenty of detentions on top of that.

At least no one is breaking Rule 3. The kids at least put effort into their work.

Still, this is the sixth detention Bucky has had to pick Pietro up from in the past month. One of which was a result of him getting into a spat with a teacher about Sokovian history. (Bucky didn't have to lecture him for that. The kid was already upset. Instead, he had a nice long chat with the teacher. No more problems would come up with that one.)

When Pietro slinks his way into the car with a guilty look on his face, Bucky waits until the door’s shut before he turns off the car engine. As predicted, that causes Pietro to look at Bucky with slight alarm. “What is wrong?” he asks with a raised brow even though Bucky’s about ninety percent sure that this kid knows exactly what’s going on right now. Really, he’s just lucky that Clint isn't around for this conversation.

“Alright, you’ve gotta talk with me about this ‘cause this is a lil’ excessive, Maximoff.”

Fear flashes across Pietro’s face; alright, maybe he doesn't know what’s going on. “What are you talking about?”

And now Bucky has to do that thing where he explains why he’s worried that this kid is on the wrong path and that he’s slipping and that he’s concerned it's a mental health thing or maybe he’s in the wrong environment or something else altogether or—

Internally, Bucky sighs because this is not a problem he ever foresaw himself having.

“Pietro, you’re skippin’ class, you don't seem to give a crap-“ (Wow, good job filtering that one.) “-and your grades are slipping. You’ve been here less than a year and you’re hittin’ a landslide suddenly.” Bucky runs a hand through his hair. “I don’t get it.”

Pietro shrugs. Slumps down in the passenger seat some more. Folds his arms across his chest. He’s practically emulating Kate in her pissy mood right now. But less pissy. More nervous. His furrowed brow says as much.

A silence lingers for a few moments, and that’s normal. Pietro is the twin who always has to pause to get his thoughts together, usually it's a translation thing though. He’s said things poorly in the past and has learned plenty from his mistakes. Finally, he begins, “I do not think school is for me.”

(Bucky literally feels like Atlas and that Hercules has just taken the weigh off his shoulders. Maybe one less kid to put through college. Maybe he could buy himself a new gun. And Clint could get some better hearing aids…) (All of that feels incredibly selfish though. They should really keep their eyes on the kids’ futures.) (But also: guns.)

“I enjoy classes, but they are tedious. And I do not understand how I am going to apply historical facts to my current life? What does George Washington have to do with the current state of affairs of the country?”

Bucky bites his tongue because the political party system isn't all that important to the current track of this conversation. (Okay, maybe they should've homeschooled this one.)

Pietro continues, a little more boldly, “I do not want to be educated on anything more important than what is necessary to do good for people.”

It takes a brief pause of processing time for that sentence to make sense, but Bucky’s finally got it when he asks, “You just wanna help people?”

White hair moving as he nods, Pietro looks small in the passenger seat. He shifts uncomfortably and sucks in a deep breath; then he says quietly, “I would like to do what you and Clint do.”

After a second, Bucky’s stomach starts to churn because he knows that this right here is one of Clint’s biggest fears. (This and Loki, but the second one makes more sense at least.) But the idea that they led these kids into a lifestyle where they could put themselves on the line without a full scope of what risks that life entails. It's not just being on the news and having a bunch of heroic stories to tell— it’s coming home broken and bruised, and not just physically. It’s the emotional toll of not being able to save everyone. It’s the struggle of keeping yourself alive and knowing that might be at the cost of killing someone else.

“That…” He has to breathe for a second. He has to keep his mind from imagining this kid dead on the battlefield somewhere. (Bucky’s seen far too many dead bodies. It’s all too easy to imagine Pietro dead.)  “That doesn't explain why you don't wanna go to school.”

“It is not worth the time. I do not feel that the things I am learning are relevant. Not to me.” He shifts. He pauses like he has more to say, and Bucky leaves the air open for Pietro to speak, and eventually, he does: “I also understand that I do not have to attend school now that I am seventeen.”

Well, American history isn't all that relevant to a Sokovian orphan. But still. “You do realize that Clint won't be happy to hear that, right?”

“You also are not happy to hear it.”

Honestly? No, Bucky isn't happy to hear it. Back when he was a kid, school was one of his favorite things. He fucking loved school. He can only imagine how the education system today would’ve thrilled the shit outta his younger self. He wished he didn't have to drop school back then.

Now, Pietro has his eyes on Bucky. Reading him like an open book. He may not be the sharpest tool in the shed, but he’s street smart where the books may fail.

“I just know that school was more of a privilege back when I was your age.” As soon as it's out of his mouth, Bucky is mentally kicking himself for being the kind of guy who fuckin’ tells his husband’s kids the stories that normally start out with some “back in my day” bullshit.

Of course, back in his day, it was literally the 20s and the Great Depression was a thing.

Bucky tries to keep his train of thought: “What I mean is… you shouldn't write off school like it’s no big deal. There’s a lot to benefit from. Social skills, exposure to American culture, probably girls.” He’s grasping at fucking straws here.

And Pietro sees right through that shit. His expression is enough to let Bucky know that he isn't buying any of Bucky’s shit.

“Alright, so…” Barnes takes a deep breath. “What if you just get a high school degree?”

Clearly confused, Pietro strives to clarify, “But that would require me to go to school?”

Again, Bucky runs a hand through his hair. He sucks in a deep breath. “No, no, not exactly. It’s… I’ll have Clint explain it to you.” He then reaches forward to turn the keys; the engine grumbles to life, and Bucky cannot shake the awkward soccer mom feeling he always gets because he drives a motherfucking minivan. “But don't worry. We’ll figure somethin’ out for you, Maximoff.”

--

Clint Barton is smarter than he lets on.

Bucky is plenty aware of that. He knows now, after seven-ish years of dating and a few months of being married, that Clint is not the dumbass everyone thinks he is. He’s still a dumbass, but not in the same way.

Give him an equation that Tony Stark can solve in five minutes. Clint could solve it in a day.

Throw Natasha in a pit of mafia members and she’ll fight her way out. Clint will do the same thing, escape ten minutes later, and comment on how many good zingers he got in.

Let Steve read a book and comment on the literary style. Clint will read the same book and bitch about everything every character did wrong and poke holes in the writing until the book gets thrown across the room.

He’s a different kind of smart.

Bucky attributes half of that to Clint never finishing school. He never got the kind of formal education that society requires. Neither did Bucky ‘cause a fuckin’ war happened. But Clint watched and learned and took mental notes; he absorbed information.

Doesn't mean he never wanted to have a traditional education. Bucky helped him study for his GED twice. He failed both times, not for a lack of trying, just for a lack of time. And that was almost five years ago, before Kate and Lucky and the twins, back when Bucky could keep an eye on Peter so Clint could study. Back when it was all easier.

Clint’s quit on that dream now, so his freak out to Pietro’s request to quit school is entirely reasonable.

“You what?”

Bucky winces alongside Pietro. Hey, at least he was expecting this.

“I do not want to go to school anymore.”

And Kate then pipes up with half a sandwich in her mouth, “I don’t wanna go to school either.”

With a glare, Bucky’s got that one quiet because she is not a priority right now. He has to keep Clint and Pietro in check and make sure that nothing goes wrong between these two. Kate leaves after Bucky’s glare; she can have her own moment another day.

And Clint settles down (in an unsettled sort of way) at the kitchen table, hands already twitching. And Bucky wants so badly to take Clint’s hand, but he knows he can’t right now. He has to support Pietro here. He can’t let the kid stand alone here.

Clint’s teeth are clenched, but he seems kind of collected as he begins. “Pietro, I get that you don’t understand how the American school system works, but school is kind of important here. Just a high school degree is really important for jobs and—”

“I told him about the option of gettin’ a GED, Clint.”

Now Bucky catches a glare and nearly flinches under it. Nearly. Still, he watches his husband coolly.

“Barnes—”

“I explained it to him. He knows it’s gonna be hard.” Bucky holds it together, knowing very well he’ll probably get a nice round of bitching from Clint later. “And I said that if he wants to quit school, we’re gonna make sure he at least gets his GED. That’s the bottom line.”

There’s a quiet pause as Clint sighs. He runs a hand through his hair and now his eyes are watching the table. “Technically, we can’t make him do that.”

Pietro shifts in his seat next to Bucky. “But I will do it if it will make you happy to see me have an education. I just do not wish to waste my time in school.” He shakes his head and leans forward. “They are too slow for me anyways.” And Pietro laughs. The good kind of laugh. Still nervous, but good.

Clint rubs the back of his neck and sighs. (Bucky knows Clint has no idea what that feels like. Clint’s smart but slow.) He stays quiet for a long moment. “So I can help you with the GED process, if you want.” He takes a deep breath. “I’d still rather see you go to school.”

“Same here, but…” Bucky shrugs. “He’s at the age where he can make that decision. Not our call.”

“Yeah, yeah, I get it.” Clint looks to Bucky tiredly and then to Pietro. And to Bucky, Clint looks so old right there in that moment. Tired of everything. “I’ll start looking at all the paperwork and crap tomorrow to get you started.”

“And I’ll call the school,” assures Bucky, knowing he’s gonna have to be a part of this. He’s gonna have to work with Clint to make sure Pietro’s taken care of. And now he can hold Clint’s hand, and Clint wordlessly weaves his fingers between Bucky’s. “We’ll get it done. No problem.”

“Thank you,” breathes Pietro like he’s relieved. “Thank you.”

Bucky squeezes Clint’s hand, but he watches Pietro. “No problem, Maximoff. We’ll take care of you.”

Clint laughs. And Bucky knows why. Taking care of these kids is why they took them all in. Why they adopted the ones they could. To make sure they could do whatever they wanted with their lives. To support them.

“Just don’t let the other kids know that you can drop school when you’re sixteen.” Again, Clint is laughing as he continues, “I don’t think Katie was kidding.”

--

It’s past midnight, and there’s a knock on the door.

“Shit,” whispers Clint as he climbs off of Bucky and is quick to swing himself out of bed. (Honestly, Bucky’s just lucky that Clint keeps his hearing aids when they’re having sex. And the only reason he does is to make sure no one’s getting too loud with the kids in the house.)

Bucky pulls the blankets up over himself after pulling on his briefs again. (He’s also lucky that nothing kills an erection faster than the thought of a kid walking in on sex.)

The door cracks open and light spills in for a moment, which shines on the lube on the nightstand and Bucky shoves that shit in the drawer so damn fast—

“What’s up, Pete?” asks Clint, clearly trying to let Bucky know who’s on the other side of the door.

Apparently, Lucky was also sleeping outside the door and now takes this opportunity to sneak his way inside and sniff around the room.

“Pietro’s studying, and he’s got a light on, and it’s keeping me up.” Peter’s shadow moves and shifts the light that’s pouring into the room. Bucky can see from the kid’s silhouetted form that he’s rubbing his eyes; it’s childlike. It’s now strange to consider that the kid isn’t that seven-year-old that Bucky used to sit and watch while Clint was studying for his GEDs. He isn’t that little kid anymore. “Can I sleep in here?”

Bucky hears Clint softly chuckle. “Yeah, bud, sure, if you want to.”

The door opens slightly more, and Peter shuffles in with a blanket and pillow in hand. “He was twitching, and it was making the floor creak,” he mumbles while tossing his blanket onto the frumpy couch that sits under the windows in the bedroom. “I’ve been trying to sleep for like an hour.”

Still sitting up on his elbows, Bucky sighs. He lets his hand fall off the side of the bed so he can pet the top of Lucky’s snuffling head. “Yeah, he does that a lot.”

“Sorry for waking you guys up.” Peter plops his pillow on the couch and then crawls on top of the blankets. He wraps himself up like it’s a sleeping bag.

“No worries, Pete,” says Bucky, and Clint mumbles the same thing before crawling into the bed next to Bucky, who’s now laying on his side, facing Peter. Clint presses his front into Bucky’s back and wraps an arm around Bucky’s torso; it only takes a second for Bucky to relax into Clint and link their hands together.

“I’m glad he’s studying as hard as he is, but he should go to the kitchen to study,” exhales Clint, nuzzling his way into Bucky’s neck and pressing a brief kiss to Bucky’s exposed skin.

The couch creaks as Peter shifts to get comfortable. “This wouldn’t be a problem if we had our own rooms,” prompts Peter in a way that reminds Bucky that this kid is also a little shit just like all the others. (Okay, maybe all of them except Wanda; even Lucky is a little shit.)

Lucky hops up on the couch and curls up near Peter’s feet, causing it to creak more.

Clint sighs. “I’ll look into figuring out how to get you all your own rooms.” He hooks one leg over both of Bucky’s, trying to get as close to his husband as humanly possible. (Not that Bucky has any sort of problem with that whatsoever.) “But for now, get some sleep. You’ve got school tomorrow.”

For a moment, Peter seems like he’s ready to say something more but instead, he just reaches down to scratch Lucky’s ear. Then he says, “Thanks, Dad.” Then he curls up in a ball again, almost mirroring the damn dog’s position. “Night, Dad, night, Bucky.”

“Night, Pete” and “G’night” echo back at him in the darkness.

There’s a quiet that hangs in the air then as the four bodies breath in sync.

Bucky squeezes Clint’s hand. He can’t help but think back to when this was a regular occurrence. Except Peter was younger and would crawl into their bed and snuggle between them. Back when Bucky was terrified of hurting Peter. Back when Bucky would immediately crawl out of bed as soon as Peter was asleep.

Now, he knows he’s okay for the night. Worst case scenario, Peter knows what to do. He can defend himself. And Clint’s there.

They’re safe.

Everyone’s safe.

--

“So he wants to be an Avenger?” asks Steve, staring at Clint and Bucky like they’ve just turned into conjoined twins.

Clint’s basically pressed into Bucky as they wait for Natasha to tell them they’re in the dropzone for the target. “Yeah. As soon as he gets his GED, he wants to start working with you guys.”

“He’s been trainin’ with us and Katie and Pete for months. Or at least since he and Wanda moved in.” Bucky shrugs and watches the cockpit. “He’s good. Clever, too. The kind of shit you’d like, Stevie.”

“More or less annoying than Tony?”

Clint laughs. The good, hearty kind of laugh. The kind that Bucky doesn’t hear very often from his husband. And Clint eventually says, “Depends on the day and what’s going on.” And he’s still laughing.

Because it’s true.

Pietro is a little shit.

“He’d be a good asset, if nothin’ else,” says Bucky while rubbing circles into Clint’s back. “He’s a good kid. Dedicated to helpin’ people.” He watches Steve for a reaction. “All you’d have to do would be to teach him to take orders a lil’ better.”

Steve seems to contemplate it, but he’s also watching the cockpit for Natasha’s signal. “He’s still under eighteen though?”

“Yeah, yeah, so we wouldn’t want him in field combat quite yet.” Clint sounds like a protective parent again. The way he sounds when Peter wants to go to camp. The way he gets when Kate has to go to her dad’s for the holidays. Paternal.

“We’re thinkin’ it’d just be better to get him into higher level training, honestly. More than just a couples bows and arrows and a spider kid.” Bucky shrugs and runs his hand up Clint’s back and ruffles his husband’s hair, which makes Clint smile. His eyes focus back on Steve. “Just so he can be better prepared for when he is old enough to go into the field.”

The coms crackle in their ears, and Clint’s the only one who doesn’t wince against the sound. Natasha’s voice comes through. “We’re over the dropzone in twenty seconds, boys. Don’t forget your chutes.” The com stops crackling for a second but comes back to life a moment later just so Natasha can say, “Yes, Steve, that means you.”

Bucky laughs too hard at that.

“Shut up, Buck.” And then Steve jumps out of the plane.

--

The car isn't tense, it's just... quiet. And tense. Yeah, okay, so the car is tense.

Kate is twitching in the backseat, her fingers tapping away on her phone like she's writing out a goddamn novel. Her perfectly painted nails click against the screen. Really, she’s the only one making any noise in the car.

Other than her, Peter’s tried to strike up conversation twice but that wasn't about to go anywhere, not with the stress levels here, no way.

Bucky’s doing everything he can to keep from twitching. Meanwhile, next to him, Clint is wringing his hands like a housewife worried about her husband’s return from the war. (Bucky would know.) (And not just because he’s done that about Clint.) (Yes, it's because he was a kid in the thirties. He doesn't actually wring his hands over Clint. He cries. Like a man.)

Wanda is seemingly calm though. The eye of the storm, probably, perched in the backseat with her eyes on the doors to the building, waiting for her brother.

It’s a goddamn family event.

Might as well be, after watching the kid study for a month and a half straight. Aside from studying, the maniac only ate, slept, and trained. And they’d all helped about as much as they could: kept him fed and reminded him to rest.

His goal had remained the same: pass the damn test and then start the real training.

Staring at the parking lot, Bucky notices how the cars are all parked a spot or two away from each other, no two cars too near. Like the way that people sit in movie theaters and classrooms. He sucks in a deep breath and wonders how the fuck Pietro is holding up in there when no one is even holding up well in the car parked outside the building.

Again, Peter makes an attempt: “We could turn on the radio? Or, actually, I put a CD in the car a few days ago, the one I made for the wedding, if you’d rather listen to that.”

Neither Clint nor Bucky move to turn on the radio. Bucky at least glances at it, but instead of reaching for the dial, he reaches for Clint’s hand.

His husband looks tired. Worried. Almost afraid. And now more than ever does Bucky wish he could read Clint’s mind.

“You know he’ll be okay, right?” asks Bucky, scanning Clint’s face, watching Clint’s eyes, trying to figure out the best way to settle him. He just holds Clint’s hand gently, knowing they’ll probably have to talk later; too many kids in one van, not to mention the kind of tension that Bucky could literally cut through with the knife in his boot right now.

“He has finished,” says Wanda, tapping on the window.

Sure enough, there’s their boy, hopping down the stairs too fast but also too slow. He’s grinning, but that’s not unusual, nor is it exactly a good sign. That kid could find a reason to smile even in a nuclear fallout.

Kate pulls the door open for Pietro, and he hops into the van much like a dog that’s overly eager to go to the vet. Or maybe doesn’t realize it’s going to the vet. “Ice cream now, yes?” he asks, all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed like he hasn't been in a goddamn exam hellscape for the past eight hours.

(Because God knows that when Clint came out of that exam, he looked like he’d just seen World War II.)

Bucky starts the van and stammers out, “Yeah, yeah.”

And it’s Clint who asks first (of course it's fuckin’ Clint), “How did it go?”

And Pietro, that motherfucker, shrugs.

Bucky cannot drive and manage Clint and Pietro simultaneously. Murder five people at once? Sure. Micromanage the family affairs of five people? Fuck no. “Peter, what flavor’s your favorite again?” Bucky asks a little too loudly, hoping it’ll keep Clint at bay.

And that sweet little saint of a spider-child answers, “The best flavor is the fudge flavor, but if you get the peanut butter chips, it's even better.” What a goddamn champ, that one. Bucky’s gonna give him extra fuckin’ peanut butter chips on his goddamn ice cream.

And that dissolves that problem in no time ‘cause Peter’s rambling in the backseat and Bucky’s got the radio on real low now and the van’s engine rumbles softly. And Bucky has Clint’s hand.

And Bucky’ll manage it all when he gets home and doesn't have to drive the fuckin’ soccer mom van.

Three hours and four quarts of ice cream later, Pietro’s results are in.

He’s grinning ear to ear.

“How soon did Captain Rogers say I could start training?”

--

It’s weird to think that he’s only been with them for a year and some and is already leaving. Of course, Bucky kind of knew that when Clint adopted the twins. And when he married Clint and also sort of adopted them in a roundabout way. He knew Pietro and Wanda wouldn't be around long.

But hell, he thought they’d be here longer than this.

Pietro’s barely got a duffel bag full of his shit. Honestly, its contents are probably the same three shirts, two pairs of shorts, and three pairs of sweatpants that Bucky always washes for him every week. (Bucky’s so worried Pietro will forget to do his laundry.) And maybe he has a couple pairs of shoes packed in there. And the photo album that Clint gave him last night; it’s mostly full of pictures from the wedding and candid shots that Kate’s taken on her phone over the past months. A bunch of good pictures, really. Almost all of them with good memories attached.

“Tony says he’ll set you up with a room,” reminds Clint, sounding like the parent that’s about to send their kid to summer camp for the first time. Except he’s a parent sending his first kid off to live the rest of his life. (Essentially living with people who could be considered family but not quite because the first incident with Tony and Steve and the others was, oh, that’s right, a brainwashing incident that also almost annihilated the human race, but that’s no big deal.) “And you can come back whenever you want.”

“Yeah, punk,” says Kate from the couch as she flips through channels idly on the tv. “Door’s open for you to waltz back in here after the actual Avengers kick your sorry butt.”

It’s clearly not taken as seriously as it could be ‘cause Pietro just grins. “I will come home often. Probably more than you would like.”

“One less person to fight over the remote with,” sighs Kate in pseudo-content.

The door is open because Tony’s got the jet parked (or about as parked as a jet can be) a couple miles out (which is like nothing for the kid with speedy feet) and needs to get back to the tower for some meeting or other with Pepper that he probably won't even pay attention to—

But that’s not important because Bucky’s watching Wanda and Pietro embrace in the way that reminds him that, yeah, they’re very much their own goddamn people, but they’re still twins. Twins who walked through Hell and came out on the other side intact and together and stronger than ever.

It’s weird seeing them separate from the hug and to see them less worried than anyone else in the house despite the fact that they’re the two who have never been apart like this before.

Meanwhile, Clint and Peter have been separated for weeks before without any problems. Bucky has even been away from Clint for weeks. Katie goes home (against her will and everyone’s better judgment) for long stretches to visit her now estranged father. Pietro and Wanda are the only two without any serious separation from anyone, but also with the least amount of attachment, and Bucky can’t wrap his head around it because these two are already part of the family and watching Pietro resituate the bag on his shoulder somehow feels like leaving Steve behind all those years ago again…

Clint somehow is keeping his cool though and is going through some kind of mantra that sounds rehearsed. “You’ll get into training pretty much right away, still won’t be able to go in the field, but that’s to avoid red tape and other sh-stuff. Stark’ll get you set up with a room and anything else you need for basic living, and I swear he’s not usually as evil as the Ultron thing.”

Bucky scoffs at that. (Of all the gorgeous men in the modern day and age, Steve had to pick that one to date?)

Apparently, Clint ignores him because Clint is a good man who speaks nicely about Tony Stark because he’s the guy who helps Clint check the designs for new arrows.

“He will manage,” says Wanda at the same time that Pietro says, “I will manage.”

Bucky knows Pietro will be just fine.

And Peter’s still in school so he can’t be there to say goodbye, but those two said their goodbyes this morning when Pietro got Peter ready for school so that Bucky and Clint could get some extra shuteye.

“Then get going. Tony’s out where we usually land the jet.” Clint pulls out his phone. “Yeah, I have fifty texts from him. He’s just about as impatient as you, kid.”

“I will call when I am in the tower and safe,” Pietro assures, and no one doubts him for a second. “And I will visit when I have time. They cannot keep me busy all of the time.” He’s almost laughing by the end. (Bucky wonders if this is hurting him just as much as it’s hurting everyone else.)

“You’d better,” says Kate from the couch.

One last round of goodbyes and then Pietro’s out the door with a running start. As if anyone expected anything less.

--

Clint has his face pressed into Bucky’s collarbone, he’s got his arms around Bucky’s torso, and he has his legs entangled with Bucky’s. They’re curled into each other and wrapped up in the blankets. Bucky kisses Clint’s hair every few minutes to reassure him that he’s not going anywhere. But maybe he’s just doing it to reassure himself that Clint isn’t going anywhere.

There’s a knock at the door and Bucky’s the first to mumble, “I’ll get it,” before he climbs out of bed and shivering at the immediate chill he faces without the blankets to shield him. He almost wishes he had shoved Clint out of bed. (But he can’t do that, Clint’s fragile right now, Clint needs to stay in bed, Clint needs to rest.)

He opens the door and blinks at the bright light outside. He’s almost surprised to find Peter standing there, but at the same time, he doubted it would’ve been either of the girls. And it’s not like Lucky can knock.

“Can I sleep in here?” asks Peter, clutching his blanket again. He looks like he’s seven and has just had a nightmare. But he’s not. He’s almost twelve and won’t crawl into their bed anymore but he’ll always take advantage of their open couch.

“Yeah, yeah, bud, c’mon in.” And Bucky opens the door a little more, still careful not to let the light hit Clint too much.

Peter edges his way in and moves to the couch to set up his burrito-style bed.

“You good, Pete?” asks Clint, his voice so tired that it covers up the sound of it cracking.

“Yeah, Dad, I’m fine.” He pauses. “It’s just really quiet in there. And Lucky’s with Kate and Wanda tonight. So.” He readjusts his blanket and then says, “I miss him.”

Bucky wraps himself around Clint again, holding his husband close. He bites back from saying, “Me too.” Because he shouldn’t miss Pietro. The house was quiet all day. There was no one to help with dishes. There wasn’t the constant chatter in Sokovian between the twins or even just when Pietro would talk to himself.

Everything was just… off.

“Me too, kid” says Clint. He sounds brave right now. (Bucky knows Clint’s just pretending like this isn’t part of his laundry list of abandonment issues, but it is, and Clint is clearly not coping well.) “Me too.”

And then everything is quiet.

But none of them sleep.

--

Kate’s phone rings. It’s always ringing. Literally, if Bucky hears that snake song one more time, he’s going to crush that phone with his goddamn metal hand—

“Hey, bro,” says the teenager nonchalantly just as she licks cinnamon roll frosting from her fingers. She pauses licking her fingers for a moment and, after a few seconds, says, “Y’know, that sounds like a personal problem.”

She says that every fuckin’ time she doesn’t wanna deal with something. Bucky swears to God, he does not have enough coffee in him to be dealing with Kate right now. He has barely even been awake a half hour and Wanda is still upstairs getting ready for school and the only reason Kate’s down here is because the bathroom is occupado courtesy of Peter.

Plus, she and Bucky like to have their morning coffee together.

Then. Oh, and then…

“WANDA!” hollers Kate as loudly as she can, and dear God are they lucky that Clint is deaf because he would’ve woken up bitching and moaning the whole way down the stairs and then drank the last of their fresh pot of coffee and—

Bucky has never seen a girl get down the stairs that fast in heels. Eyes wide, he watches as Wanda holds her hand out for the phone. (This is despite the fact that she has her own goddamn phone around here somewhere, but it’s like one girl is attached to her phone and the other is constantly losing it in a black hole that apparently exists in the house.) She immediately takes the phone and starts murmuring in Sokovian.

“He tried calling her twice,” Kate says as she watches Wanda walk off with her phone. Then she goes back to picking at her second cinnamon roll. “Knew I’d pick up.”

“How long has her phone been missing?” asks Bucky, wondering where his own phone is so maybe he can try to ping her phone with that Find My Phone app that they got for the sole purpose of finding Wanda phone. (And Bucky’s phone, but he won’t admit to that and no one’s about to call him out for it.)

“For two days now,” says Kate with a shrug. She shoves a torn piece of food into her mouth. “Pietro called last night, too.”

Bucky stares into the living room, watching Wanda talk to her brother. He sees Peter at the bottom of the stairs.

“It’s tragic, isn’t it?” comments Peter like he’s frozen in time somehow. And then he’s moving mechanically, going to sit at the kitchen table, grabbing a plate, plopping a cinnamon roll on that plate. Then he says softly, “And it’s only gonna get worse.”

And then he starts to eat.

Chapter Text

Clint is fidgeting in the passenger seat. He hates long car rides. Loathes them. Would rather be in the middle of battlefield crossfire, probably.

Bucky doesn't mind. Better than planes, at least.

"Thank you for driving me," Wanda says quietly from the backseat as she also twitches, but for entirely separate reasons. "I appreciate you coming with me on the visit."

"No problem, kid," says Bucky. He forgets that he basically calls all the kids "kid" until he says it to Wanda. It feels weird when it's her. She's not a kid anymore. She's gonna graduate high school in a little under a year. She... She was never even a kid when he knew her. Pietro had-- has-- the personality to justify calling him "kid". Kate and Peter are still kids. Sort of. And besides, he's always called them that.

But it feels weird with Wanda. Maybe it's because he's sees too much of himself in her. Maybe it's because he can't get his head around the fact that she's technically his daughter by marriage.

Hell, he has goddamn three kids by marriage, now. And Kate. And a dog.

All in all, it's fucking terrifying.

What's almost more terrifying is that Wanda's getting ready to go to college.

Five days on the road has finally gotten them home from Stanford. They took the jet on the way there, but Bucky didn't want to get back into that after a little too much turbulence. Sure, he's got the endurance of... well, Steve, but he can't exactly survive a plane crash and neither can Clint, and Wanda might be able to with a little magic, but he doesn't wanna push his luck with that one. And Clint could manage in a car in spurts of a few hours at a time. And if he slept, he was fine, so it wasn't uncommon for him to toss back some sleeping pills and crash in the backseat of the rental van.

Overall, it hasn't been a fun road trip, but it hasn't been the worst road trip. (The worst road trip was that one time when Pete was young, and they took him to Disney World and then discovered that Peter gets carsick pretty easily. But no one can cancel a trip to Disney World once it's promised.)

As soon as they're home, Clint's out of the car before Bucky can even turn off the engine. He even stumbles on the gravel. And then over the dog because Lucky's enjoying his freedom to roam about the yard. And then Clint moves over to lay in the grass, which is closely followed by Lucky laying on him because obviously grass is for chumps.

"Can you get your stuff unloaded okay?" Bucky asks as Wanda slips out of the van's back door.

She smooths out her dress for a second before saying, "Yes, of course." The young woman's shoes scrape against the gravel as she moves to the back of the van, throws open the trunk, and starts to shoulder her bags.

If she were using her powers, Bucky wouldn't have even had to ask.

Still, he has other priorities. He moves to the grass and lies down beside Clint. "Hi."

"Hi." But Clint's response sounds more like an exhausted groan.

Bucky reaches over and swats Lucky's rump, which is enough to get him to scramble off Clint and decide to follow Wanda inside, wagging his tail and sniffing the girl's bags the whole way. Lucky probably hopes there's a snack in there for him, but the joke's on him: it's just dirty laundry.

"You okay?" asks Bucky as he puts the back of his hand on Clint's forehead, which is no warmer than usual.

"Headache" is the soft response Bucky receives.

"Stress?"

There's a pause. "Maybe. Mostly the car."

Bucky shimmies closer to Clint, probably getting grass stains on his shirt, but not like it matters, it's dirty anyways. He bought it two days ago at a rest stop because he'd run out of clean clothes. It's an ugly ass green shirt with some trees and the logo for some park on it that Bucky's never been to.

“Are you gonna go all therapist on me?"

Bucky laughs. Because sometimes it does feel like that, when he's trying to keep an eye on Clint. Making sure he takes his meds, making sure he's eating fine. It's the little things. "No," he says, after he shifts so that he's on his side, head propped up by his hand. "I was gonna say we could totally make out like a coupla school boys right now." He smirks at Clint. "Sun's out, kids're inside, dog isn't on top of you. And s’not like we have any neighbors to give a damn about."

In no time, Clint is smirking back at him. "I love you," he says softly before moving so he can meet Bucky's lips.

The sun is hot, but Clint's hotter as he moves to lay on top of Bucky, running his fingers through Bucky's messy hair, pecking his dry lips with sweet little kisses, making sure a little tongue gets in there every now and then. Some kisses even end up on Bucky's neck, some at the base of his throat; some even have a little teeth involved.

It's not exactly sexy, it's not even necessarily arousing. But it's good. And it's enough.

It only lasts a few minutes before the damn dog shows up again, barreling into Clint and deciding that he wants to also give kisses. (Fucking dog.) And the dog is followed by Peter, apparently, who only gets to the door before groaning loudly, "Dad, Bucky, you have a room for that!"

While also trying to shove Lucky away, Bucky manages to get out a general "Shaddup" in Pete's direction. And he eventually has to untangle himself from Clint and wrangle the dog to hopefully get him inside.

Clint stays in the grass for a little while even after Bucky gets the mutt inside. And he's still there when Bucky grabs their bags from the trunk. But on his way back to the door, he offers a hand down to his husband. "C'mon, we got shit to do."

With a sigh, Clint takes Bucky's hand and allows himself to be hauled up off his sorry ass. "I know, I know," he breathes. Then he takes one of the bags from Bucky, and they head inside just as the sun starts to hit the top of the trees that guard their little farmhouse.

--

"Do we even get regular mail anymore?" asks Kate in sort of an annoyed yell as she throws the contents of the mailbox on the kitchen table; the envelopes scatter, and a heavier one even dares to almost knock over Bucky's mug of tea.

"Yes." Bucky moves his tea away from the offending letter. "They're called bills. Y'kno, those things you don't have to pay?"

She sticks her tongue out at him.

"It's mostly college mail," says Peter, apparently carrying more. His face is twisted up in something resembling disappointment. "I was hoping my drone would come in today."

Bucky raises an eyebrow and opens his mouth, but it's Clint, who's standing by the backdoor, who beats him to the question that's probably on everyone's minds: "Peter, what do you need a drone for?"

"There probably wasn't enough room in the mailbox for it because of WANDA!" hollers Kate as she picks through the mail and sorts it according to what Bucky and Clint get versus what Wanda gets. (Much to Bucky's dismay, their own pile is damn near as big as Wanda's. Fuck bills.)

Footsteps on the stairs cause a thunderous sound which is only topped by the subsequent scrabbling of claws on those same stairs. "You called?" asks Wanda, looking like she just got in trouble with one of those old-timey school teachers who's about to take a ruler to her knuckles. (Bucky is very familiar with those kinds of teachers; the one set of knuckles he’s got left will never forget.)

Lucky dashes on past her to start sniffing around the kitchen for scraps.

"It was just Kate givin' you a hard time 'bout the mail." Bucky pushes the still-growing pile towards her. "You're popular, Maximoff," he adds with an encouraging smile.

There's some sort of hesitation in Wanda as she pulls her hair up into a bun with a hair tie that was around her wrist only a second ago. "I believe some of them might be the letters of acceptance. Or... unacceptance?"

"Rejection," clarifies Peter as he hands over a few more envelopes from his stack. He might be the one who is most patient about the language barrier. They all try, but Peter never gets frustrated about it. What a good kid. "But I'm sure you got into most of them. You're smart. And your essay was good."

"You read her essay?" asks Kate; her face makes it seem like she just got fucking stabbed.

"I did too," says Bucky as he moves his chair so that Clint can pull his closer now that he's done picking up dog shit in the yard. (Good thing he doesn't smell like dog shit right now.) "It was a good essay."

Honestly, her essay had been one of the corny and stereotypical variety, but it couldn't be helped. It's hard to write around having incredibly dead parents, HYDRA torture, and superpowers in a thousand word or less essay. Especially when she was trying to come across as a "normal" girl.

What's the next best thing?

Family values. Works like a charm.

But now Wanda looks nervous as hell because it must be like a teenager's version of Judgment Day. (Not like Bucky knows, but he can guess.) She picks up her pile. Some of them still look like the desperate letter to get a last minute application in, but some of them are full-fledged Manila envelopes. Bucky suspects those are good news. Hopefully.

But shit, Wanda seems to not even want to touch some of them. She starts to delegate her own piles, which causes Bucky to grab the pile of bills in hopes of not losing those and forgetting to pay them because that's happened before. Too many times. Late fees are a bitch.

The two piles Wanda's making are apparently by sender because some are small, and Bucky doesn't recognize the logos on those envelopes. The other pile are the big names that she applied to: Yale, Stanford, Purdue. Even University of Oxford. Just for shits and giggles.

He's almost surprised by how much of it came on the same day. And then something dawns on him: this is probably the mail for the past two weeks.

Everyone in the house is notoriously bad at remembering that the mailbox exists unless they've ordered something from Amazon. So the drone must've prompted this mail dump. Fuck. Now Bucky gets to pick through the bills and see which ones are more time sensitive at this point so the power doesn't go out or they don't lose water.

Across the table, Wanda is picking at the "important" stack of mail. (Of course, she doesn't have to worry about goddamn bills.)

"C'mon, open one," encourages Kate, now pulling up a chair on the other side of Bucky. Suddenly this was becoming a full-on family affair. "Anyone would be stupid to reject you. I'm sure you got into all of them."

She slides her finger under the flap of the first one, and the sound of ripping paper is suddenly the loudest damn thing in the room.

This is... a totally foreign concept to Bucky. He never saw college in his future, not since, well, "waking up", and definitely not before when he didn't have the money, let alone an excuse to escape the draft. College has always been elusive to him.

"I got into Stanford," Wanda says almost breathlessly. Her brown eyes are big and wide. The only school that mattered to that girl was Stanford.

Bucky isn't sure he could be any more proud.

--

The crowd cheers as yet another kid circles the bases. It's only recreational but yet half the parents are acting as if this is Major League Baseball, which is stupid, in Bucky's opinion.

But he can't judge too harshly because Clint got thrown out of the game about a half hour ago for getting into an argument with the umpire. Bucky's the black sheep in the crowd right now, and not just because his husband was just told to get the fuck out of here.  It's very clear that Bucky's the passive parent who claps and encourages only when his kid is up to bat.  Besides,  he hates half the other parents here because the dads are douchebags and the moms are gossips.

"Did I miss anything?" asks a familiar voice on Bucky's left, which causes him to just about smack the shit out of Pietro because that's one of like ten things these kids are not supposed to do, goddammit.

Bucky manages to lower his hackles and brush his hair out of his face. "Frickin' silent ninja kid," hisses Bucky as he watches the next kid go up to bad. His eyes slide over to his eldest son (technically his son) before he asks, "Which one of those punks at the tower taught you that one?"

"Your friend Natasha. Or, I guess, Aunt Natasha." Pietro shrugs before grinning even wider; his eyes are scanning the field for Peter as he adds, "She said I should use it on Clint."

"Except he's deaf, Maximoff. Not exactly the same concept."

"I know, and that is why I decided to try to sneak up on you instead."

This fucking kid.

Bucky points to Peter in center field, kicking at the dirt while the last batter walks his sorry ass to first. Fuck this other team, getting Clint thrown out of the game, being all good and shit; it's fucking recreational baseball. Peter only goes to get out of the house like twice a week. (Clint tried to be the assistant coach at the beginning of this season except he yelled "fuck" once too loudly during a game and was dismissed very quickly. Bucky was not surprised at all by this.)

"Are we winning?" asks Pietro as he waves to Peter, who probably doesn't see him at all.

"Not sure. I missed some plays 'cause I had to take Clint home."

Pietro pauses. "Again?"

Bucky can only shrug and shake his head. He squints against the sun before pulling his hair up into a bun to get it off his sweaty neck. "He figured he could help Wanda put together her list for school. Kate's already helpin', but y'kno, more heads and all. She’s all stressed ‘bout it."

"As long as she is happy." Pietro tries again to wave at Peter as his team, the Falcons (which Bucky constantly cringes at because fuck Sam), goes up to bat again.

"You gonna be okay with her all the way 'cross the country?" asks Bucky with a raised brow. He’s not watching the field anymore.

Pietro's face shifts slightly to something like uncertainty. "It will be strange to visit home and not see her. But I know I will be able to call her often." He cracks his signature smile. "As long as she does not lose her phone."

Bucky's about to smile back except the sound of a bat smacking the hell out of a ball brings the game back into focus. He's just lucky it's not softball; the sound of the metal bat would've rattled around in his head for hours after these games.

"Are you alright?" asks Pietro with a hand on Bucky's shoulder as the rest of the crowd is in chaos over this moderately good hit, which doesn't make any sense at all because it's just recreational baseball.

"Fine," Bucky lies, still on high alert. He's here to support Peter. He's here to watch baseball, like he did eighty years ago with Steve. He's not fine, but he's been plenty worse before.

--

Clint is loud as fuck as he argues the logistics of stealing the Declaration of Independence with Peter and Kate, which is just enough for Bucky to slip away as they hit a crescendo of something about extra lasers.

He goes to the fridge and pulls out a beer, his second and last for the night, so he has to drink it slow, otherwise he'll be desperate for a third.

"Bucky?"

"Yeah," (he runs a roster in his head of who's where in the house and comes up with Wanda's voice for the association), "Wanda, what's up?" His voice sounds distant somehow as he shuts the fridge and turns his attention to her.

"Can I speak with you for a moment?"

"I mean, I'm not missin' much aside from how many ways someone could steal important government documents, which is somethin' I've done a coupl'a times, so." He nods for her to go on as he cracks open his beer.

"I wanted to ask your opinion on changing my field of study," she says softly in her naturally nervous sort of way.

Literally, the wrong person to ask. Bucky is probably the least educated (half) human in this entire house. He went to school, sure, but he barely passed any classes. "Shoot," he says with a sigh.

"I know I am interested in psychology, but I was considering taking a few introductory classes to international relations and policies." Her brow furrows. "I feel like I can do more to change the world if I can reach out and facilitate peaceful conversations. I know these class paths are not exactly, uh, what's the word?"

"Intersecting?" Bucky offers. "Overlapping?"

Wanda nods and continues without a hitch. "I was thinking that I could take some classes in each field and see what is the most appealing."

Bucky takes a sip of his beer and has to take a second. Because back when she moved in, she would've needed Pietro at her side before making any important decisions. For the first months of being here, she was basically letting Kate dress her like a Barbie doll. And Peter could dare her to do just about anything: Bucky walked in on him trying to convince her to chug a gallon of milk once. (It was promptly shut down until Pietro tried it five minutes later and just about puked.)

But now.

She's very free-thinking, and it's even better to see that she's holding her own without Pietro. She doesn't need a reassuring look from him to be sure of herself.

Wanda's only coming to Bucky for his thoughts, probably so that he can offer suggestions. She seems pretty set on this. Bucky's only here to offer another opinion on the matter.

"Sounds good. Just make sure you get signed up soon." He wants her to get the best education possible. That's all that matters. And that she feels fulfilled and happy with whatever she wants to pursue. "And don't stress yourself out too much with school and shit. Not too many classes, kid, seriously."

She laughs. Shakes her head. "I will make sure I have time for fun, Bucky, I promise."

And that's when a very loud shout of "How dare you use Nicholas Cage's name in vain?!" rings out from the other room. Of course, it's Clint. Probably directed at Katie, although Bucky’s got no idea why.

"Thank you," says Wanda and it brings Bucky back. Back from where? He's not quite sure. But he watches her walk into the other room with renewed confidence, like a flower that keeps growing more and more each day.

And then he remembers: finding autonomy can do that to a person.

--

"Clint."

Clint doesn't move. Because he's fucking deaf.

Bucky reaches over and taps him slightly, which startles him awake. "Barton," he says again, more for himself now.

Clint rolls over and his half-open blue eyes watch Bucky. Even mostly asleep, he's still very analytical in a way. "What's up?" he asks, voice all groggy. He tangles their legs together as he breathes softly. "Nightmare?"

When Bucky taps his own ear, Clint groans and twists and stretches with that flexibility that Bucky loves so much, and this would all probably be incredibly erotic if it weren't four in the morning and a mild mid-life crisis wasn't in progress.

After slipping one aid in, Clint refocuses on Bucky, clearly awake now. "You okay?" he asks. And he's gentle, so damn gentle.

"Am I autonomous?"

There's a pause. And some blinking. Tired blinking but also confused thinking blinking. Then Clint brings one hand up to cradle the side of Bucky's face and leans their foreheads together. "You've been making your own decisions since the day I met you, James."

He grits his teeth because that's a dirty damn lie. "Have I?" he asks, and maybe it sounds desperate. "Clint, I didn't... I think you're the only decision I ever made for myself. I didn't ask SHIELD for a job. Steve got it for me. Assumed I'd wanna be doin' somethin' since I've got the metal arm and all."

Again, Clint is silent. Mulling it over.

"I can't think of a single damn thing I've done for myself."

"Got married," reminds Clint, kissing Bucky's nose, trying to be reassuring.

But it sounds patronizing as soon as Bucky responds, "The kids started it." He's got a desperate hand on Clint's hip, holding onto him like his life depends on it. "And we had that same damn conversation a dozen times, and it never seemed in the picture for us. But the kids mentioned it and we caved. Like--"

"Don't fucking say it, Barnes."

Bucky goes silent. Because he knows where Clint's head is. It's exactly where his is. And Bucky wants to say the worst part of it, but he can't. He can't bring it up. It would kill Clint.

(That they never had choices. That they did what they had to do.)

(Like how Clint had to take in Peter.)

(Like he had to take in Kate.)

(Bucky starts to shiver as he starts to realize that maybe taking the twins in wasn't even his choice. That Tony started to say shit about taking them to egg Bucky on. That Tony knew all along about the farm and--)

"Stop," says Clint as he hangs onto Bucky tighter. "Stop it, Barnes." He presses himself against Bucky so that they're chest to chest, their bodies so close together that Bucky can feel Clint shivering now. "We can't go back to this paranoia shit."

"I know." His voice quivers.

“This has been our choice all along. All of it. Everything." Clint's voice sounds stronger than it has in a long time. (But he's still shaking.) "You chose me and I chose you. And you chose to move in with me. You wanted to get married. And I wanted to marry you the whole time, you piece of shit. The timing was just never right." He presses a kiss to Bucky's lips that barely lasts a heartbeat. "And now we're choosing to be together, just like we always have since that time in the closet." He smiles, but it's forced. "We've been our own people for a long time now. And I've chosen to love you time and time again."

Bucky swallows hard before he kisses Clint. Just a little kiss. Short. Sweet. "And I chose to love you since that time I punched you."

"Well I tried to kiss you first, so-"

But Clint's cut off by a kiss, tired and happy. Stressed, but better than he was about ten minutes ago. Much better than their first kiss. Nowhere near their last.

And Bucky chose this man. This beautiful, broken, loving man.

--

"Not there," instructs Wanda sharply, which means Bucky has to freeze where he's about to put one of her boxes down. "Can you put it on the desk for now?"

He does as she says while hiding his smile. Yeah, she'll be fine in school.

"Do you just wanna do this yourself or what, kid?" he asks as he sits on her desk. "I can keep bringin' your things up if you just wanna focus on unpackin' it all."

"That would be helpful," Wanda agrees as she continues to go about her business.

Bucky looks around the tiny room and can't help but think that it looks a little like Kate and Wanda's room back at home before Wanda's half got packed up. It's gonna be weird to see Wanda's half here and Kate's half at home. Like the room got split in two and then one half was spirited away perfectly to the other side of the country.

It's weird to think that Kate's gonna be all alone in that room again.

Kate's not here because her finals didn't wrap up until late yesterday and the drive here took a little over three days. Clint debated bringing Kate and Peter over in the jet but decided better of it; too many people in a small room was recipe for disaster. Especially since Wanda was trying to keep a low profile and if one of the kids didn't slip something, surely someone would recognize Clint.

Meanwhile, Bucky has his heavy jacket on to hide the arm and his hair is tucked away into his hat. (Absently, he remembers he needs a haircut. Maybe he'll get one on the drive home and surprise Clint.) No one should recognize him. It's been a few years since he's been in the public eye, and it's not like he looks as young as he used to. Still, Clint tells him he wears thirty-six beautifully.

When Bucky refocuses his attention on Wanda, she seems to be thinking a little too hard. "Could I use my powers to unpack?"

Bucky stares at the cracked door. Then he quietly kicks it closed with the toe of his boot. "Go for it."

The whole room is glowing red as things move and float to what must be their rightful places because Bucky doesn't understand it except for the fact that his head is in the way at one point because he has to start ducking under shit. But it's faster than it would normally be. Shirts are automatically going on hangers and pants are folded into drawers effortlessly. Bucky's pretty sure she's even managing to color-coordinate the closet at the same time. It's impressive as all hell.

And a year or so ago, she would've been terrified to do anything on this scale. And the whole thing goes great right up until the door opens.

"Shit," Bucky mutters because Wanda didn't hear it, and--

"Oh, well this is a new one," says the girl in the doorway. Of course, fucking of course.

Startled, Wanda almost drops everything. "This is... not what it looks like," says the girl as her fucking eyes are glowing red and her hands are also glowing red and everything in the room is glowing red. Like no human being on this planet can figure out exactly what is going on in here despite saying "this isn't what it looks like" because it's exactly what it fucking looks like.

"Oh, don't worry, a lot of my friends are mutants," says the small blonde girl as she sets down a purse large enough to fit a kitchen sink in it.

And then, of course, of fucking course, Scott fucking Lang walks in.

Bucky's about to fucking scream.

And Wanda's startled. Overwhelmed, maybe even. Because she doesn't know these people. But Bucky does. And now he feels like he has to diffuse shit--

Everything in the air settles to the floor. Nothing is glowing anymore. "My name is Wanda," she introduces herself calmly to the girl who must be her roommate and apparently Scott's goddamn daughter. "Wanda Maximoff."

"Maximoff, Maximoff," Scott, who Wanda doesn’t know, says before he snaps his fingers. Enthusiastically. Like some kind of scientist who just solved the next number in Pi. Or a detective from some old 70s show. "I know your brother!"

Wanda opens her mouth, but Bucky wants this to go faster because now he's probably gonna have to help Lang move shit in and that's gonna be a pain. "Wanda, this is Scott Lang. Antman."

"And more importantly," starts the blonde girl who clearly needs to put herself into this conversation seeing as this isn't about to turn into superhero central, "I'm Cassie. Your roommate."

And Scott just says, "Well, this is convenient!"

Some time later, after Cassie pulls out a small bundle from her purse and unshrinks (regrows? enlarges?) her packed boxes and bags one by one, she's putting her stuff away and chattering to Wanda idly while Scott and Bucky stay in the hallway, out of the way. "I didn't even recognize you at first, Barnes," laughs Scott. (Bucky wants to comment about how that was the whole point of the hat and the gloves and the goddamn longs sleeves, but whatever.) "And honestly, I'm surprised Clint isn't here. He's always showing me pictures of you and the damn kids."

Bucky tries not to smile too much. "Yeah, he wanted to be here, but we still got two more at home to keep an eye on." He scratches at his stubble for a second. "'sides, he's not too worried 'bout her comin' home to visit. We'll see her plenty, I'm sure."

"I'll bet. Pietro's always talking about you guys when he's not trying to weasel his way into fieldwork."

"He's a conniving sonuva bitch," says Bucky sharply. "Don't let him in the field until he's damn good and ready."

Scott laughs. Hard and loud. It's an annoying sound. "Clint wasn't joking about you being a good dad." Scott shakes his head. "I don't know that I believed him until now, honestly."

"I'm not..." But he really can't bring himself to say it. (Because he is. By marriage.) He just shakes his head instead.

"We should start a club or something." Scott's still grinning like a fool. "Superheroes with kids. Or whatever. Like group therapy. But we just bitch about shit our kids do."

(Bucky doesn't want to bitch about his kids.)

"Dad!" calls Cassie. And almost simultaneously, Wanda says, "Bucky."

(And he almost flinches. Almost.)

"Can we go to Starbucks?" asks Cassie. "And maybe grab like a group dinner tonight or something? It'd be cool. And then you guys could like carpool home or some shit."

"Language," says Wanda sharply, like it's a reflex.

Bucky isn't sure he could be any prouder.

--

Who is your greatest inspiration?
An essay by Wanda Maximoff

Who is my greatest inspiration? I do not believe that it can be one single person in my life. With years of life experience, it is too difficult to say that only one person has inspired me.

Despite those years of experience, it has truly been the last year that has been the most inspirational to me. My older brother and I were recently adopted by a family who wanted to offer us more opportunities in life, such as an emotional support system and the chance to go to college. This new family is my greatest inspiration.

At first, I expected merely what they offered: shelter, food, conversation. But I now understand that what they have given me is much more than just a home.

I have a younger brother now. He was adopted by our fathers when he was very young and has grown up so much even since I met him, and I am enjoying being his older sister. Peter and I are very close, which I did not expect because I already have a twin brother, Pietro. I did not expect to have a bond so close as the one I have with my twin.

Kate is my sister now. Neither she nor I have had a sister before, and we were immediately sharing a room together. Living with her offered me more experiences than I would have discovered on my own in America. She reminded me to step away from my books and into the mall, and she is the best sister I could ever ask for.

I have two fathers now, both of whom are very kind and welcoming. One does not have an arm. One cannot hear. They are very supportive of me, not only in my collegiate endeavors, but also in helping me get my mental health back on track. They help remind me that I can stand on my own and challenge me to do more than I think I am capable of.

None of these people are related by blood except for my twin and I, and yet, we are all one big family. Becoming a part of this family has made me realize that as much as I am ready to leave my new home on my own adventure, I am in no way ready to leave my family behind. And that is what my fathers wanted to offer us when they took in my brother and I: a family to come home to.

Chapter Text

Bucky finds himself suddenly awake on the couch, and he checks his phone to see that it's four in the morning, and Clint is asleep, on his lap and about to fall. Bucky shifts slightly to balance Clint safely and gently before trying to figure out why he's not sleeping anymore.

There's a key shoving its way into the lock at the front door, which means that, yeah, Peter locked up before he went to bed, thank God, but it also means that Kate is just now getting in.

With a sigh, Bucky carefully pulls the hearing aids out of his husband's ears; the only response is a little mumble of "where's my sock" before Clint's out cold again, his face wedged into Bucky's neck. His warm breath on Bucky's skin is reassuring.

The front door is open, and Kate's jewelry jingles more than the keys she's holding. She closes the door and locks up again, but Kate freezes as soon as Bucky says, "Where've you been?"

It's like she has to comport herself as she straightens out her dress and stands a little taller, perfectly balanced in her impressive stilettos. "Out," she says calmly.

Bucky reminds himself that it's not his business where she is anymore, that she's twenty-one now and can be doing whatever the fuck she wants. He still hates the idea of her wandering around at all hours despite knowing very well that she could kick anyone's ass who dared to so much as look at her the wrong way. There's just the side of him that can't put away the idea of her being a little girl, the kid who showed up and stole his coffee and kept insisting that she could be Clint's partner.

Bucky hates nostalgia so fucking much.

"I took his aids out, he won't bother you," Bucky reassures, knowing that Clint's the one with the actual problem of Kate going out at ungodly hours.

She doesn't look half as defensive now, even goes as far as to lean against the doorway to the living room to start to take off her heels. (If Lucky weren’t asleep in Peter’s room, he’d make getting those heels off way harder because she’d be tripping over the damn mutt.) "I was just out at a club with my friends," Kate says, and she sounds exhausted. Also a little fake, but Bucky'll give her a hard pass for that. "Had some fun, had some drinks, didn't sleep with anyone."

Bucky almost laughs.

"I see you smirking, old man." Her face gets that snarky look that Bucky hasn't seen in a while. "Don't start to judge just because I'm getting more ass than you."

"I'm married so I only got the one ass." Bucky has to adjust again so Clint doesn't fall off. "And trust me, he's more of an asshole."

Kate grins as she pulls off her other heel and drops her keys on the table just inside the door. "Hey, as long as you love him, what does it matter?"

"It matters 'cause he keeps tryin' to fall offa me." Bucky rolls his eyes and wraps an arm around Clint to hold him in place. "Doesn't know how to go to bed like a normal fuckin' human."

"Language," Kate chastises quietly before her face says that she's just now recognizing full-well that she just said that. To Bucky. And she's well over the age to which the no swearing rule applies. And Peter isn't even in the room. "Anyways," she diverts, "normal is a relative term around here, Bucky."

"I know." He leans his head on the back of the couch and sighs. "You goin' to bed then, Katie?"

She looks like she's about to fight him on that because she hates being called Katie, hates being thought of as a little kid, but she apparently thinks better of it. "Yeah, it's been a long night. My feet are killing me."

"Consider not wearin' heels next time."

Her fake laugh is so fake that it could be the laugh track to a bad sitcom. "Hilarious," she says, punctuating it by sticking her tongue out like a nine-year-old.

"Get some sleep," Bucky says with a sigh before settling in himself on the couch, an arm still safely wrapped around his sleeping husband. He closes his eyes but still listens to Kate going up the stairs and heading into the bathroom. And he can relax again.

--

"Aren't you worried about her?"

This is probably the tenth time they've had this conversation in the past week. Frankly, Bucky's about to punch Clint in the fucking face.

"No." Bucky eats his cereal and continues to scroll through the news on his phone because sometimes Clint is fucking annoying.

Clint's a good husband: great for long walks on the beach, morning coffee, and phone sex during missions. Clint's a good father: protective of his kids and cares about them deeply, but also commandeering when needed.

That does not mean he's perfect by any stretch of the word.

"Is this you being passive about the kids again?" Clint asks with a skeptical sort of glare, and his face is wrapped up in frustration, which is sometimes cute but right now, it's definitely not fucking cute. "Or have you just not had enough coffee yet?"

Bucky drops his phone on the table, and it clatters, but thank God for the strongest phone cases on the market because that thing has been dropped from like twenty feet while Bucky was running after a mark one time. (He got the mark, thank you very much.) "Clint."

"It's a coffee thing, isn't it?"

He pinches the bridge of his nose and takes a deep breath. It's times like these that Bucky feels ancient-- like he's years older than he is, and not just because of cryo bullshit. He feels like he should be fifty-something and wondering about retirement, but instead he's barely forty and having an argument with his husband of almost five years over their twenty-one-year-old not-exactly-a-daughter who is always out until ungodly hours of the night.

(Although, yes, it’s also partially a coffee thing.)

Bucky is not equipped for this. He's a living weapon. He barely knew how to handle kids until he started dating Clint. The good news: he's got a pretty good handle on the whole "young adult" thing. He's not great; hell, he's a far cry from perfect, but he's handling it far better than Clint is right now.

Maybe because he didn't see them as his kids for so long. He wasn't attached to their childhood in the way Clint was, getting Peter, fighting for Kate, just catching some twins along the way. Clint sees them all as his kids.

Bucky exhales finally. "Clint, I love you, you know that. But sometimes, you gotta let shit go. Katie was livin' on her own last year, her own apartment and everythin'. Just 'cause she's back with us doesn't mean you get a say in every lil' thing she does."

"What if she's into drugs or something?"

"I was awake when she came in last night. I can promise you she's not on drugs."

"When did you become a drug expert?"

Bucky wishes he had laser vision so he could stare a hole right through Clint. But since laser vision wasn't a priority according to HYDRA, Bucky just stares a normal hole through Clint. He's too tired for this shit this morning.

"Besides, how did she even afford the apartment?" Clint's face tilts into almost a sad puppy look, but Bucky recognizes it for what it really is: helplessness. "Or pay for car insurance?"

"Hard work an' long hours." Bucky takes another bite of his cereal.

Clint's mouth is all twisted up in frustration.

Bucky swallows his mouthful and goes, "She came back to save money, so end of the day, she couldn't manage it on her own. Point proven. You're right, she couldn't afford it. Doesn't matter now."

But of course, of fucking course, Clint's still not satisfied. "What's she even gonna do with her life? Like, what if she lives with us forever?"

"She'll be fine," assures Bucky like he does every single time they've had this conversation because Clint doesn't know how to let this shit go. "We're here for her no matter what, and she knows that."

Clint twitches uncomfortably.

"Chill." And Bucky wishes he could smile and make a joke about cryo right now, but he can't because he needs more coffee and a decent sense of humor for that.

--

"You don't wanna go in there, Bucky."

Maybe a few years ago, Bucky wouldn't have taken Peter seriously, but right now, he's looking at his teenage kid, and he really, genuinely believes him.

Bucky runs a hand through his hair and has to look at the house longingly instead of just walking inside and crashing on the couch and spending the next hour deciding what he wants to watch on tv. "Is it really that bad?"

If Peter's face hadn't turned... almost melancholy, Bucky probably would've walked in. "Yeah. It's... It's not good. She's taking shots at everything."

"She needs to get it out of her system." He resigns to leaning against the hood of the minivan he doesn't need anymore. He could get a Jeep now. Or maybe something with better gas mileage.

It's been building for months now: Kate and Clint's final showdown. His helicopter parenting style has finally met its match with Katie. And the worst part is that she knows she holds all the cards, that she can sever the ties with the family and walk away right now if she wanted to, and Clint is all too aware of that. And terrified of it.

Kate Bishop is the only kid who has never been legally part of the family. Bucky and Clint barely managed to get legal guardianship, which still didn't get her far enough away from her father. Her biological one, anyways.

Bucky wonders if that's not part of this animosity-- that they didn't fight hard enough for her back then.

"Yeah, but I dunno if Dad can take it." Peter kicks at the gravel. "She's getting pretty savage in there."

shit

Bucky forgets how vicious that kid can be. She was rough and rowdy as a teenager, but nowadays, she can be downright volatile.

He pushes off the car, and he barely hears Pete's "Don't!" because he's got tunnel vision and a goddamn mission.

Clint can be ripped open wide and tortured for weeks and never crack because it's always just physical, and he's been dealing with that his entire life. But the past, what, ten years or so? He's gotten his emotional game together. Despite the depression, Clint's better mentally than he's probably been in his entire goddamn life.

Because he put himself together a family, a real good and true family. He created a safe space for himself.

And that safe space has turned on him.

The front door blasts open because fuck the door, Bucky'll buy a new one.

"-don't fucking trust me to do anything! You think I'm out there just sleeping around?!"

She's a small volcano. Small in terms of her physique, not in the amount of rage boiling out of her right now.

"I'm working three jobs right now trying to juggle shit!" Katie's screaming at the top of her lungs in the middle of the kitchen. "I'm working harder than you ever have in your goddamn life! And you think you're just handing out charity to some poor little girl you had to take in!"

"Kate, I was saving you!" Clint's shouting about as loud as his voice can go probably because his words sound raw and tired.

"Saving me from what?! From my psycho dad?!" She throws something, and Bucky doesn't even know what it is until he hears the clatter of arrow tips on the floor. "Heads up, Barton! You didn't save me from anything!"

Clint looks like he's about to say more but doesn't, biting his lip. His chest shakes with his breathing.

"Kate."

She turns to stare coldly at Bucky, and she's seething, and her make-up is running down her face, and she looks beyond pissed. Like a kind of pissed that says "I will fuck you up so hard". (She probably would. She’s fucked up people before. The lawsuits were fun.)

"Can we pause for ten seconds an' take a breather?"

"I'm sure you think I'm a whore or something too, don't you?" she hisses.

Bucky shakes his head slowly, arms out almost in surrender, but it's really so he can catch anything she else she might throw. "I don't give a flyin' fuck what you do in your free time. As long as you're safe and happy, Katie."

And she's back at screaming volume: "Don't fucking call me that! I'm not a little kid anymore! I'm not even your kid!"

"Technically--" But he can't remind her that none of them are his kids (which probably wouldn't solve the problem either) because she's yelling again. This time, Bucky isn't listening because he can see Clint behind her, a wreck, not sure what to do. Helpless.

He pushes past her to get to Clint, to make sure he stays upright, to make sure he's okay.

"I'm a goddamn adult, and I've been working stupid long hours! I just want to start my own life!" She sounds tired and desperate now. "I wanna start a business, I wanna do something to help people! Just because I don't explain my life to you doesn't mean I'm into drugs or some stupid shit! You guys always assume the worst of me!"

Bucky can't focus on her right now because Clint's struggling. Kate's mad, and she has every right to be, Bucky knows that. If this were directed at him, Bucky'd let her shout until she was blue in the face. But Clint can't take this.

"It's like you don't even realize who you raised! I'm not a great person, but I'm better than either of you!"

Pressing his lips against Clint's ear, Bucky whispers, "It's okay." He loops one arm around Clint's waist to keep him upright, the other is on his wrist to check his pulse. "It'll all be okay, I promise." (He has no idea if it’ll be okay.)

"You're both fucking assholes!"

Kate could probably keep going all night, which Bucky realizes. And he raises his voice just enough to say, "I think you should go, Kate."

She stops.

"Stay with a friend tonight and we'll talk tomorrow," he instructs calmly, knowing he needs to pick the lesser of two evils here. Protect Clint and give Kate some space. That's the only way this can happen. It's like war. No one wins. And they can't have a discussion when she's only hurling bombs. "Text me so I know you're somewhere safe, please."

As if mulling this over, she stays frozen for a few moments longer, trying to piece all this shit together. And then she grabs her purse off the kitchen table and walks off, but not after yelling, "Fuck you!"

Bucky can hear her car start up and Peter yelling to her, something like "where are you going?!", but he can't be sure because he needs to focus, which seems impossible right now.

Back before he gave a damn, Clint was his whole world, and Clint would've been his only priority right now. And still, yes, he focuses on Clint because of the urgency. He'd like to be standing outside with Peter and making sure he's okay because God knows it hasn't been easy on him since Wanda and Pietro left, and now with Kate going after Clint? It's gotta be chaos on the one who only knows this kind of life. The big family. The togetherness. The love.

And Bucky'd like to be chasing after Katie and asking her what the fuck even happened because, yeah, okay, sure, Clint's a fucking moron sometimes and doesn't know when to stop running his mouth, but he's a man of good intentions. The easy guess is that Clint stepped on Kate's toes again without necessarily meaning to and caused her to snap.

The hardest decision in all of this is that Bucky wanted to stand by Clint and hold him up and keep him together. Especially when Bucky knows that there’s a 90% chance that Clint started this.

Now it’s obvious that Clint clearly now regrets whatever he said to start all this.

"I told y-"

"Don't say it."

Bucky breathes sharply and kisses Clint's forehead. "I'm sorry," he murmurs and cards a hand through his husband's hair. "I shoulda been here sooner."

Clint's shaking and leans on Bucky, needing the support in more ways than one. "I just. I didn't think. She's-"

"Reckless? Yeah, sure." Bucky keeps his breathing even. "And so are you. But you're also smart, and so is she. You raised her to be a person with big dreams, Clint."

"We raised her," corrects Clint quietly.

"Point is," he carries on, "that she's not 'bout to throw her life away." Bucky has to keep his head level, he can’t get at Clint’s throat either. He just needs to keep the peace—something he wasn’t particularly good at a decade or so ago. “You don’t need to worry ‘bout Kate. She’ll spend tonight with America, probably, and then we’ll talk everything through tomorrow.”

“Yeah,” murmurs Clint as he tucks his face into Bucky’s neck. “Yeah, we’ll talk tomorrow.”

--

They talked long enough for Kate to say, roughly, this: “I’m moving out to California. It’s something I’ve wanted to do for a long time, and I had the opportunity last night to assess my financial situation, and it looks like I can do it.”

Clint was not prepared for this.

Neither was Bucky, but hey, one of them had to have a poker face.

“Look, I know it’s a crazy idea and California’s rent is absurd, but I called Wanda and just… I didn’t tell her about everything that happened yesterday-” (Bucky’s not sure if that’s because Kate sees her own fault in the matter or if she’s embarrassed that it got as heated as it did.) “-but I asked if I could spend some time with her out there, and she said it was fine.”

With Wanda in her last year at college, Kate could just sublease the apartment when Wanda figures out her job situation. Bucky doesn’t see the problem with any of this. Really, he’s impressed that Kate thought that far ahead.

There’s a noise from Clint, and Bucky thinks it’s a deep breath just before he’s about to say something long-winded, which is not a good idea, and Bucky just about cuts him off except Clint speaks first.

“Okay.”

Bucky was not prepared for this.

He had calculated the situation of Kate wanting to move out. California was a little out of reach for what he had anticipated, but it was manageable. Then Bucky had expected Clint to get agitated about this and plead for her to at least stay in town.

But Clint agreeing?

Shit. Shit. Bucky’s about to lose another daughter.

“Katie, are you sure about this?” he asks patiently, trying to hold onto his poker face the best he can.

She doesn’t argue with him calling her Katie. “Avocado prices will be lower there.” Kate shrugs and then tucks some loose hair behind her ear. “I’ve just… I’ve wanted to get out of here for a while. Not because of anything with you guys, you know I love you. It’s just… I know both sides now. I’ve been in the city, I’ve been in the country. I love that I have a family and a warm bed and a dumb dog, but I can’t stay here forever. I can’t.”

The farm isn’t for everyone. Peter’s been here his entire life. Pietro still comes home fairly regularly, usually after wild adventures so he can tell the tale and watch Peter smile at the chaos of the story, especially when Pietro slips away from speaking English. Wanda comes home when she can manage it, and it’s particularly nice because her still-developing powers now allow her to teleport, so airfare is non-existent.

But Kate has known life outside of this static environment and has craved it for years. She’s the one who had to go home until Clint and Bucky got their legal guardianship squared away. She faced big crowds and lavish parties and cars for miles.

Of course she’d want to be free after all this time.

“We know,” Bucky manages to breathe. He scratches at the inside of his flesh arm’s elbow; the metal against his skin is settling. He isn’t quite ready for this.

The silence hangs there, and Bucky wants to lean on Clint for support now, wants to hold onto him. But his poker face is more important right now. He doesn’t want to make it seems like he wants to guilt Kate into staying. He’s better than that, dammit.

“I’ve got a plane ticket for tomorrow,” she says slowly. “So if it’s okay, I’d like to stay here tonight and spend time with you guys and Peter and Lucky before I head out.” It sounds like she’ll be gone forever. (Bucky’s chest hurts.)

“This is your home, Kate,” says Clint at the same time as Bucky says, “Of course.”

Her smile is tired and sad.

Bucky is also tired and sad.

--

It’s dark, and there’s no good reason Bucky should be awake at this hour. There isn’t even any moonlight coming in because it’s a new moon tonight, so it’s darker than usual. It only feels appropriate, in a way.

He rolls over so that he’s facing Clint. Unsurprisingly, Clint is still awake.

“Can’t sleep?” he asks.

“When can I ever sleep?” Bucky responds.

It’s an instant reaction, for them to start shifting under blankets and moving so that their legs are tangled up and arms are carefully wrapped around each other and the metal arm doesn’t pinch either of them. It’s taken a few years to be able to do this thoughtlessly in the darkness. (There was a lot of pinching in the past. The arm was not designed for cuddling.)

Quiet lingers for a few minutes. It’s a soft quiet at first, like the quiet of waking up at the first sign of dawn for gentle kisses and slow, tired words. But after a few minutes, it’s a deafeningly empty silence, filled with nothing but their mutual ache.

Clint is the first to break. “I did save her, Buck.”

“I know.” He kisses the top of his husband’s head and stays there, his nose tickled by Clint’s choppy hair. It’s reassuring. Clint isn’t going anywhere.

“No, I…” This is Clint in his most reserved form, trying to figure out how much to say. If it weren’t something sensitive, he would’ve said it a long time ago. He’s quiet for a long time, the quiet only punctuated by his quiet breathing and the occasional kiss against Bucky’s bare chest.

He won’t push. He hasn’t before. He won’t start now.

There’s a sigh that results in a puff of hot air on Bucky’s chest. “Back when I got her out of there, I did surveillance for three or four days before I could do anything else. I got to listen in on the guards and watch the house. Kate was easy to keep an eye on, she hardly ever left her room because no one paid attention to her.”

Bucky cannot imagine Kate not being loud and obnoxious and everywhere at once in their little farmhouse.

“But one of Bishop’s guards was paying attention to her. Too much attention. I could hear him talking with the others on the comms about the things he wanted to do to her.”

He feels fucking sick.

“And I was only supposed to be surveillance, so I couldn’t swing in and straight up kill the guy.” Clint’s hand is on Bucky’s back, and his fingers are tensed, pushing harshly against Bucky’s skin. “I wanted to though. I’m not proud of it, but I wouldn’t have been upset to see him dead.

“But when she was almost kidnapped, it was… It was like the perfect opportunity to come up with a damn good reason to get her the hell outta dodge. And I took her away from there. From that guy. And any of the others who could’ve come along.”

Leveling out his breathing takes a moment. Bucky brings himself back. Kate’s safe. There’s no need to get angry like this.

“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you before.” Clint shivers in the darkness, pressing himself closer to Bucky; whether it’s for warmth or comfort, the world may never know.

“Does she know?”

Bucky can feel Clint shaking his head. “No. I never needed to tell her.”

He’s right. There’s no need to tell her. The kidnapping was enough of a reason to get her out. But she never wanted to go back once she came to the farm.

It feels like forever ago, mostly because it pretty much was forever ago. (Bucky feels ancient. He always feels ancient when he thinks of the kids when they were younger. It’s gross.) But Kate was happy when she got here. Figured out proper form with a bow and arrow. Learned how to make coffee on her own. Ended up going to school without a body guard at her side all the time. It was a quieter life than what she would’ve gotten otherwise.

It’s been a better life with Kate in their home.

“Good point.”

Clint hooks his foot around Bucky’s ankle as he nervously fidgets. (He’s a fidgety guy when he sleeps, too. Doesn’t stop moving until he’s out cold. Bucky found it endearing for the first ten years. Now? It depends on the night.) He mutters, “I just wish she knew that she was better off here.”

So Clint does want her to stay. To keep her safe. To keep her away from what the world has already threatened her with. But that’s the problem with having a daughter. The world is scary, and you can’t just tell the world to stop being scary. Sons aren’t taught consent; instead, daughters are taught caution.

However, Kate was taught endurance and survival.

“We raised a good kid, Barton.” Bucky rubs the back of his husband’s head, gently scratching his scalp. “Me and you both know that she’ll kick anyone’s ass.”

Clint is quiet. His feet still twitch. Agitated. Worried. Scared.

“You had to save her back then, but now she can save herself.”

Bucky knows that Clint knows. It just doesn’t make it any easier to accept that Katie’s leaving tomorrow morning, and only God knows when they’ll see her again. (Bucky misses her already.)

--

“I am planning on coming home after my finals are finished,” Wanda says as she washes her dishes; her phone is propped up somehow in the kitchen so that they can see her face mostly in shadow, but it’s good enough for the video call. “I was hoping to go spend time in Florida with Cassie and her father after our exams ended, but her mother is taking her to Mexico for a Christmas vacation instead.”

“Sounds good, sounds good.” Bucky listens for the most part, but he’s also busy trying to get his and Clint’s bedroom cleaned up. Clint got back from a mission late last night and ended up shedding his bloody clothes all around the room and doing a half-assed patch job on a couple wounds. Their bed ended up bloody, there was another patch job at four in the morning, and Bucky ended up having to change their bedding in the dark. Now, he’s got to get everything that took shrapnel from last night sorted into laundry baskets, soon to be washed. He’s holding the phone so that Wanda can mostly see his face, but he’s constantly moving. “So you’ll just, y’kno, teleport home after your last test or whatever?”

“Why? Do you miss us?” asks Kate in the background on Wanda’s end of the phone; he hadn’t known she was there.

Bucky laughs. “Never,” he says as he tosses a red-stained pillow case into one of the baskets he’s got set up around the room.

“You’ve gone soft on me, Barnes.” Kate appears over Wanda’s shoulder with a make-up brush in one hand as she then starts to use her sister’s phone to finish the job. “What happened to the murder-y man who couldn’t wait to get rid of me?”

Murder-y is one of the nicer adjectives she’s used to describe him. “Oh, I still got rid of you. It just took longer.”

She cackles as she brushes on foundation on the other end of the line. “Fuck off, Barnes.”

“Yeah, fuck off, Barnes,” agrees Clint as he walks into the bedroom. He drifts past Bucky to kiss his husband on the cheek. “Hi, girls,” he says to the camera nonchalantly as he goes to get a new shirt on since the one he’s wearing is apparently stained in blood. Again.

“Hey, Wanda, Wanda,” Bucky says, trying to get back to the daughter he actually called, “have you heard anythin’ ‘bout when Pietro’s comin’ home for the holidays? I wanna make sure we have your Hanukkah stuff outta the basement so you can decorate.”

“No.” Now Wanda sounds distant, but at least Kate angles the phone so that she can do her make-up in the foreground while Bucky can see Wanda washing dishes in the background. “But surely if you call him, he will give you an estimate.”

“I’ll call him next,” Bucky said, hoping that he could get everyone’s holiday plans squared away and sloppily scribbled on a calendar just so they could do presents and everything. At least Peter is still easy to keep an eye on. “Katie, you comin’ home with Wanda?”

“Yessir,” she affirms as she put down the phone back where she found it and heads off, probably to finish putting her face on. “And then I’ll get to see your ugly mug.”

Again, Clint comes through with his perfect timing and a fresh shirt. Again, he kisses Bucky on the cheek. “Too bad I’m always stuck with his ugly mug.”

“Sucks for you.” He says it through a grin, which lasts about ten seconds before he sees that Clint’s already bleeding through his new shirt. This is what happens when trying to sew up your husband at four in the fucking morning. “Girls, I gotta go, Clint’s bleeding again.”

Clint groans.

To Wanda and Kate, this is no surprise. It’s basically a routine to go through the house once a month and try to scrub out any blood stains that got missed before. Most of them are in Clint and Bucky’s bedroom, but still, they have habits of ripping out stitches or bleeding through bandages in other inconvenient places around the house without realizing it. Honestly, it’s just a casual concept now of “Oh, your parental guardian might be bleeding out, hold on a second” because it’s so commonplace.

“Bye,” the girls chime practically in sync (Kate draws the “e” out just a bit longer) just a second before Bucky hangs up on them.

And now he has to go to work on his husband. “C’mere, ya idiot.”

Chapter Text

It’s cold. The sky turns purple. Bucky pulls out a pack of cigarettes.

He hasn’t smoked in years, not since before the fall, really. He never had to wean himself off it, either. HYDRA took him. HYDRA never gave him cigarettes. Withdrawal wasn’t even a concern compared to having lost his sense of self.

Maybe when he was under, when he was alive on the outside but dead on the inside, his brain knew he was craving something and recognized the smell of smoke on the scientists around him. Maybe his fingers still knew what it felt like to lift a lighter. Muscle memory or some shit.

Right now, it feels foreign and familiar all at once.

He slits open the pack with his pocket knife out of sheer laziness. (It’s the knife that he keeps in his boot on missions but keeps in his pocket at home; it’s been in his pocket a lot more recently.) He pulls out a cigarette and slips it between his lips. It tastes different than it used to, but he isn’t upset. (Bananas also taste different than they used to. He’s definitely upset about that.)

Bucky doesn’t even remember why he picked up the pack to begin with. He was at the store earlier to get milk and dog food, but after stepping up the counter of the convenience store, he asked for a pack of cigarettes, whichever ones were easiest to grab, and paid in cash. The receipt was in the trash before Bucky even left the store.

Smoking hasn’t even been on his mind in years. It was just an impulse earlier in the day that he’ll indulge now. Although he wonders why he hasn’t thought of smoking, especially since it used to be a thing back in the war—a pack of cigarettes and a gun in hand and everything else was alcohol, alcohol, and more alcohol.

Those vices seemed miles away for so long and are just now seeming to hit him again. The gun has always been in his hand. There are more firearms in the farmhouse than there are plates, probably. The cigarettes were an afterthought to his recovery; he considered picking them up once upon a time right after he’d gotten his shit together but then ended up distracted by Clint. And then after Clint, there was Peter, and there was no way Bucky was going to be smoking around a kid.

But now Peter’s older. And Bucky’s outside. And Clint doesn’t need to know.

He lights up the end of the cigarette and gets used to the feeling of smoking again. It’s a weird feeling because the taste is different, he doesn’t remember what his brand was before the fall, he just remembers that he smoked and that he kept the pack in his breast pocket and that Steve used to rip into him about quitting.

And now, he’s starting.

He blows smoke into the air and coughs. Yeah, there was probably a reason that Steve had wanted him to quit.

Lucky comes around the porch from the side door. He had to be let out by someone. Hopefully that someone, whether it be Clint or Peter, didn’t notice him. Or smell the smoke.

There’s a layer of guilt on him. And a layer of the tobacco smell.

It’s dark out now. The cigarette turns dark and gray as it's stamped into the ground. Bucky goes inside.

There are many things that can be casually walked into. A bar. A store. A boiler room. An ambush, apparently.

There are probably twenty men here, and it's not like that's the worst they've ever stood up against, but Clint's already got a bad shoulder from last week when they took on a KGB sleeper agent in Taiwan, so his aim's a little stiffer than normal today, and that's not good for missions.

And on top of the twenty men, there are also probably twenty (or more) guns.

So that's fucking great.

Thanks, SHIELD.

When the bullets start flying, there's only so much Bucky can do with his arm to block most of the shots, so he watches Clint to make sure his husband's made it to cover behind a giant water heater before pulling out his own sidearm.

There's a lot going on, Bucky's leg is clipped by a bullet, but he winces and makes sure he gives the guy a bullet right back, this time in the shoulder. (It's not vengeance if you're just a badass.)

Some bodies drop fairly quick as arrows are slung from the shadows. They look like they're shivering as the soar through the air, but they still find their marks alright. Clint's older, but he's still got the best shot Bucky's ever seen.

Chaos still fills the space when Clint hollers, "Cover me!"

Suddenly Bucky has to make sure his shots land while still being non-lethal and also keeping an eye on Clint, who may or may not be more injured if he had to leave his cover. Sure enough, when Bucky looks away for a few seconds, there's Clint, limping away with his bow in one hand.

In that same span of a few seconds, Bucky hears rushing footsteps a little too close for comfort, and he has to turn, but only fast enough to catch a fist right in his face, not fast enough to dodge it.

He keeps his footing, but he takes another fist in the gut—that's at least easier to swallow as his metal arm swings with lightning speed, and his opponent is on the ground just as the rain of bullets starts up again.

Cover. Bucky finds himself tucked behind a pole just thick enough to prevent a torso shot, but it's still not exactly what any person with common sense would consider appropriate cover because the bullets are causing dust and pebbles to fly everywhere around him.

But he can see Clint, who has somehow, despite being injured, gotten to the next level up and is sniping the best he goddamn can. And Bucky can hear the results because there's so much screaming.

That's when the gunfire stops, just for a moment, and the rubble stops flying and getting all in Bucky's hair and getting dust in his lungs. When he peers around the corner, he can tell their guns are pointing upwards now. "Get down! Get down!"

"I need a little more firepower outta you," pants Clint over the comms. "I've got a couple more arrows, so if you can at least lay cover fire, I should be able to handle the rest." The sounds of pinging metal are like elevator music behind Clint's words.

"Got it." Bucky puts in a fresh clip in and counts in his head before turning from around the pole and laying down shots at the feet of the men, causing most of them to scramble and run-

-until there are no more bullets. He tries again to shoot, looking between his gun and their opponents for a moment. It's fucking jammed. It's fucking jammed, and now there are fucking guns pointed at him, and it's fucking jammed.

"Fuck, Clint, Clint, I'm jammed, I need-"

"Out of arrows," came the breathy response.

He pulls the clip out and sees the lasers on him. In one motion, he tries to position himself so that his arm will take the brunt of it at least, and his heart is racing a thousand miles a minute. Bucky tries to finagle with the bullets for a second, but they end up on the ground because he and Clint are both so fucked, so intensely fucked that Bucky wants to just snap his gun in two and run at these guys.

The laser dots are all in his eyes now, and his arm is fucking useless to block everything. It's just not how that works. There isn't enough coverage against three guns. No way in hell.

Bucky turns his head so that his hair blocks his eyes from the red light, ready to fucking give up, he's too fucking old for this, he's fucking tired, he doesn't want to fucking die here.

And just under his curtain of hair, he sees one body drop, and he looks up to see Clint on top of the grounded man as he plucks two arrows out of a wounded man nearby and immediately use them to take aim at the other two, putting holes right through their hands.

Bucky let out a breath that had been pent up in his chest. "Fuck."

Clint just looks to him and nods tiredly, struggling to get up on his injured leg. "I second that motion." His face bears a grimace.

Reaching out a hand that Clint quickly took, Bucky stabilized his husband, trying to get them both the fuck outta there with their lives still intact. 

They didn't talk about it.

Peter stirs the pasta as the radio blares on about some furniture sale in town with “OUR LOWEST PRICES OF THE YEAR! THIS WEEK ONLY!”

Bucky’s managing to get meatballs rolled up the best he can without using his metal hand because cleaning ground beef out of the metal is absolutely disgusting. He’s missed pieces before for a few days, and Clint is not a fan of the smell.

“It’s so quiet all the time now that Kate’s gone,” Peter muses in the most casual of ways.

Goddammit, where’s Clint?

He’s in the other room on the phone with Tony. There’s chatter in the distance about fletching and the importance of the pull length. (Honestly, Bucky knows very little about archery even after all these years living with Clint and Kate.)

“It’s like back when it was just you, me, and your dad.” Although that was over a decade ago now. Back when Peter was barely up to Bucky’s thigh. Now the damn beansprout is well above Clint and catching up to Bucky fast. “Except we got a dang dog this time around.” He almost says damn.

Peter laughs because the aforementioned dog is currently trying to mooch food from both of them by poking his nose at their hands and hips and knees and anything else he can reach without jumping up; he gets yelled at for jumping. “He’s a good dog.”

“Uh-huh, sure, whatever you say, kid.”

The radio advertises a medicine with an unpronounceable name that has more side effects than it does benefits.

“I know you and Dad have been fighting more lately.”

That’s… not false.

“Should I be worried?”

Bucky’s stomach drops. He stops rolling lopsided meatballs. Turning, he sees that Peter is too intent on stirring the pasta.

“I didn’t want to ask Dad because he’ll only say what’ll make me happy, but I know you’ll tell me the truth.” His voice shakes just in the slightest. Like he’s afraid to know the answer.

There is nothing so wrong in their relationship that it threatens their marriage. There have been more fights, that’s true, but only because missions are fewer and further between, which means there’s more exposure to each other and more opportunity for conflict, but it also means there’s plenty of time for apologies when spats get too far.

But since Peter is his father's son, he rambles on, “If you guys got a divorce, I just- It’d be awkward, y’know? Like who would I go with for the holidays? And what about Kate and the twins? Would it be two Christmases? How would the twins do Hanukkah?” He shrugs vaguely, still staring at the boiling water.

“Pete.”

When he looks up, his eyes are glassy.

“Peter, we’re fine.” It’s the vaguest, most out-of-his-ass answer Bucky could ever give, but he doesn’t know what else exactly to say. So he tries to justify, “It’s just weird right now, without Kate and the twins.” He shrugs and sighs, leaning against the counter, staring at the floor between them. “I mean, think about it, kid. Last time it was just the three of us, you were, what? Nine?”

Peter sniffles. It’s no less pathetic now that he’s older. (Which only makes Bucky feel worse.)

“I still love your dad and would go to the ends of the earth for him, and I'm sure he’d do the same for me and prob’ly keep goin’.” Bucky bites his lip. None of this is probably all that reassuring, but it’s all he’s got. His Parental Comforting Toolkit is really just a half-assed collection of excuses and ideas that sometimes end up in word format. “We’re just in a rough patch right now, Pete. It’ll all be fine. I promise.”

How does Bucky know it’ll be fine? He has no idea. What he does know is that they’ve been fine up until now. They’ve made it through too much other shit to not be fine. There have been kidnappings and months away on missions and fights that have threatened to tear the household apart.

And if they’ve held shit together this long, there’s no way that just a rough patch will ruin anything.

There's footsteps in the doorway, and Bucky looks back to his meatballs as Clint walks in, saying, "Can you believe that Tony doesn't believe in the merits of a boxing glove arrow?"

Bucky smiles and continues to make dinner. Yeah, he sure as hell knows he'd go to the ends of the Earth for Clint. (A nagging part of him wonders if Clint would do the same.)

It used to be routine to hear from the school about Kate. Pietro, too. Wanda, yes, maybe, but often that was just because the teachers were worried about her social skills.

Peter had never been the problem child.

God, even since he was little, Bucky remembers that he was a good little shit. Back when Clint was busy studying or just on missions, Peter would go to bed without a fuss and eat whatever was put in front of him and only argue against what he felt wasn’t fair. It was like his favorite words were “That’s not fair”, which has now been supplemented with the occasionally “fucking” in there when arguments do arise. (Clint and Bucky have been synchronized on “Language!” for about five years now.)

So now, sitting in the dean’s office at the high school, Bucky’s not fucking sure what happened.

Clint crashes into the seat next to him. He’d been at the store, and Bucky spent fifteen minutes just trying to get ahold of him to be here. After all, it was better to have both of them there. (And not like Bucky had any intention of doing this alone. For Pietro, sure, maybe. Wanda, no big deal. Kate, hell no, he needed to walk into that room with a sidearm and Steve’s fucking shield.) “Usually I have to ask which kid.”

Bucky snorts.

“Any idea what the deal is?”

A sigh. “Maybe he’s valedictorian?”

“I don’t think the dean deals with that shit.”

“You’re prob’ly right.”

This scene here, of the two of them sitting outside the dean’s office, would probably be funnier if they were in high school. Bucky somehow can’t imagine a young Clint in high school. Of course, Bucky knows his husband never actually went to high school and that, yeah, Clint’s younger years were a wreck, but it’s a nice thought: the two of them being high school sweethearts.

Twenty-some years too late, but it’s still a nice thought.

The office door opens and the dean, Ms. Shea, sticks her head out. “Mr. Barton? Mr. Barnes?” She knows their faces, it’s really just a formality. She’s called them by their first names before, too.

“Yep,” sighs Clint as he rises to his feet, reaching a hand to haul Bucky out of the seat.

Bucky needs no help, but he takes Clint’s hand anyways.

The office doesn’t seem to have enough space for Ms. Shea, a desk, Peter, and his dads, but yet, they all somehow fit in there, each settled into a chair. “So, Peter, would you like to tell your fathers what happened?”

Peter is not looking at anyone right now.

Bucky wants to reassure Pete, but saying something along the lines of “I’ve killed dozens of people, don’t worry, you can tell us anything” in front of the dean will probably throw up red flags and then cause even more problems. So it’s a good thing when Clint uses his dad voice: “Peter.”

“I hit someone-“

Oh, okay, so like nothing-

“-which then accidentally caused a small explosion in the science lab.”

There are so many things to unpack here, and Bucky can’t stop grinning. He actually has to hide his face behind one gloved hand so that no one judges him for enjoying the idea of Peter doing the kind of shit in school that he and Clint do in other countries. Punching. Explosions. It’s… It’s priceless.

Still, he catches an elbow from Clint, who is only trying his hardest to be a good parent, but when Bucky looks up, Clint’s wearing a smirk that hides in the corners of his mouth, trying so hard not to show.

God, they’re awful.

“Why did you hit someone?” asks Clint in his most professional parenting voice because, God, there’s no way they get out of this without outright laughing. And to think, they used to have a good relationship with the dean.

“He was harassing Mary Jane, which was uncalled for and he needed to back off!” Peter defends, his face going red. One hand grips the arm of the chair tightly, like he’s expecting the worst. (After all, he’s seen what happened between Clint and Kate. He knows what the good, the bad, and the ugly look like.)

Bucky recognizes the name. Peter had told Bucky about her years ago, and he’d even met her once. She’d seemed nice, and she and Pete were friends, close friends. They studied together sometimes but never at the farmhouse—there were always too many people around before now.

He feels like it’s his turn to step in and pretend to be a good parent. “That doesn’t mean you can hit someone, Pete.”

“I gave him a black eye.”

Oh God, Bucky’s so fucking proud.

“And a bloody nose.”

Peter isn’t looking at anyone again.

Clint’s dad voice comes out again: “Peter.” 

Ms. Shea clears her throat. “The nurse said he’s got a broken nose, two missing teeth, and possibly a fractured eye socket.”

Bucky’s smile falters.

Shit. Shit.

Clint groans and buries his face in both hands now, not smiling at all. “Fuck.”

No one says anything about that.

“And that’s not to mention the science lab,” adds Ms. Shea, “which will need some new supplies and repairs.”

That’s an entirely different problem because their son being excessively violent is a little more concerning.

Exposure is a big part of learning, right? (He thinks he read it in a parenting book once.) Bucky can only imagine that seeing his dads waking up with bruises, a sister with weapons, and twins from a battle-ravaged country would affect him. But he didn’t think it would swing this way.

(He remembers one time when Clint was having flashbacks or hallucinations or whatever the fuck was going on inside his head, and he tried to kill Peter. Shit like that reminded Bucky why neither of them were suited for kids.)

They fucked him up.

Bucky runs a hand through his hair, struggling to focus. “Are the other parents pressin’ charges?”

With a sigh, Ms. Shea answers, “No because Miss Watson threatened to press sexual assault charges if they pursued anything against Peter.”

So the worst of it was handled. It didn’t solve anything, but it made it slightly easier.

“I will have to suspend Peter for two weeks, however,” she adds softly. It almost seems like a part of her is sorry to have to say it. “Violence at that level will not be tolerated here, you know that.”

(They do know that. Kate broke some guy’s foot once for groping her. She was suspended for a week, but the other guy was expelled, so.)

“Yeah, yeah, we understand.” Clint rubs at a spot of skin behind his hearing aid. “What about the damages to the lab?”

“I’ll get you an invoice once the damage is fully assessed. The worst of it looks like a few ceiling tiles and some broken beakers.” At least Ms. Shea is to the point, which is something that makes this at least a little easier. This is already hard to swallow since this is the one kid who hasn’t been a problem up until now. “But I’d prefer to focus on finding out what’s wrong with Peter right now.”

A lot of things, apparently. A lot of things that Bucky suddenly wishes he had been more aware of before now.

"We'll... We'll handle it, don't worry." Clint says "don't worry", but he sounds worried. Because after all, wasn't this his greatest fear? That he would ruin his kids?

And to think that Peter was just about to turn out alright...

There are a lot of conversations that aren’t happening.

Peter has been hiding up in his room for the extent of the suspension. Clint’s been gone for the better part of a few days on a mission. Bucky’s trying to get the farm decorated for Thanksgiving.

It’s easier to dodge the scary stuff.

Bucky knows he’ll have to talk with Peter about this. He’ll need to remind him that with that kind of power comes with a damn lot of responsibility. He’ll want to explain why he and Clint sometimes have such a hard time handling their own abilities, and that could lead into so many other conversations that Bucky dreads having without Clint by his side. All the times they could’ve killed the kids on accident, all the times they’ve almost killed each other.

And worse, he has to talk about Clint, who slept on the couch the night after meeting with the dean just to avoid having these conversations. Clint, whose biggest fear was being a bad influence on the kids, putting them in danger, allowing them to put themselves in harm’s way. There’s no doubt in Bucky’s mind that Clint’ll be a fucking wreck to talk to.

So he’s outside smoking again, knowing that it’s about the time that Peter would come downstairs and grab dinner, meaning there’s plenty of room to ignore each other. At least until Clint gets home. Then they can all start talking.

For now, he’s content to hide in the darkness with a cigarette and look at the silly faded turkey decorations in the yard.

God, he’s dreading everything that’ll happen when Clint gets home.

But at least Lucky’s still normal, or about as normal as an old one-eyed dog can be. He pees on one of the posts near the steps leading up to the house. He wags his tail and barks at nothing in the distance.

Bucky stares at the treeline where Lucky barks, and there’s nothing there. Sometimes deer pass by, and Lucky’s tried to chase them before to no avail because he’s a dog, not a wolf, and he’s not as skilled as he thinks he is. Other times, he barks because someone’s pulling up the driveway.

Sure enough, the car’s rolling up along the gravel, and it’s now that the crackling sound meets Bucky’s ears. He drops the cigarette quickly and stamps it out before Clint can see, but it won’t be soon enough for the tobacco smell to clear out.

The headlights click off, and Clint steps out, shoving his keys in his pocket and grabbing a duffel bag from the backseat.

“Hey there, hot shit,” calls Bucky, his voice a little raspier than usual.

Clint says nothing as he walks up the steps, doesn’t even seem to acknowledge Bucky until they’re standing practically shoulder to shoulder with Bucky still looking out to the trees and Clint facing the house. His voice is severe when he says, “You’d better quit that shit by next week, Barnes.”

And that’s all it takes.

Clint heads inside, leaving Bucky alone in the rising darkness.

It’s over dinner because it’s almost always over dinner.

The fried rice isn’t steaming anymore, but it’s warm and on all the plates and the table has the six seats around it. Only three of them are filled. Lucky’s under the table by where Kate normally sits. It still feels strange.

“What’re you gonna do, Pete? What’s the plan here?”

Clint’s question is too pointed and also too vague. He’s a concerned father, as he should be, but he’s… After Kate, it’s like he’s losing his touch. (It’s painful for Bucky to watch.)

“I don’t know.” Peter pokes at a shrimp on his plate and moves it off to the side. (Bucky forgot that Pete’s the one that doesn’t like shrimp, shit. He thought it was Wanda.)

“How do you not know?”

Bucky sits quietly and drinks his water. This isn’t his gig. Peter isn’t his kid.

Peter sighs and swallows hard, setting his fork to the side, perfectly parallel to his spoon. “I know school, school’s familiar, but this?” He looks to his hands with a confused grimace. “The weird spider powers? I got them for a reason, for the same reason you’re a cyborg and you’re a perfect shot. And… I want to do something with them, but I don’t know what yet.” He shrugs, and it’s a full body shrug, the kind that isn’t a surrender but rather just an utter lack of direction.

“I’m a perfect shot because I didn’t have a home so I trained myself so I could have some kind of a life and he’s a cyborg because—"

“Because there are bad people in the world.” Bucky doesn’t want to say more than that. There’s a lot there to say, but Peter doesn’t need to hear it all.

“The point is, you don’t need this if you don’t want it. Just because you can climb walls and shoot webs doesn’t mean that you need to go around doing it. Look at the kind of hell the twins went through with their powers.”

Bucky clears his throat. “The twins were kind of experimented on like I was. Bad people taking advantage of good people,” he reminds before taking a bite of the fried rice.

Clint purses his lips and stares past Bucky for a long moment before focusing back on Peter. “They’re in danger because of their powers sometimes, and I don’t want that for you if we can avoid it.”

“But Dad, just like Bucky said, there are bad people in the world. There’s too many of the kind of people that left you guys messed up and hurt the twins and harass Kate and leave Lucky to die. Those are the people I want to stop with whatever this is.”

(Bucky can practically see Clint’s hackles rising as his stress level begins to elevate.)

“And that doesn’t mean I’m gonna dedicate my life to it like Pietro,” clarifies Peter, “but I’m also not gonna let this go to waste. I think I still wanna go to school, but maybe I could, like, have a costume and do a little good on the side?”

Bucky chews a little slower and spends the next several moments trying to analyze Clint.

Because his own reaction is probably null and void at this point, doesn’t mean much because he’s not the one helping Peter decide his future. Bucky just wants to play intermediary here so that they don’t run into another Kate situation.

Clint’s brow is furrowed as the wheels are slowly churning in his head. He’s taking a drink of his water as he finishes whatever thoughts are being processed. He seems pretty calm, or at least he hasn’t done a spit-take yet at the idea.

Meanwhile, Bucky’s trying not to nervously rub a groove into a fork from their nice set of silverware. (They’ve lost a few sets from Wanda just bending spoons as a party trick.)

“You’re talking, like, helping little old ladies crossing the street?” asks Clint slowly.

“Yeah, like easy stuff. Finding a lost kitten or maybe helping people rebuild after fires, stuff like that. Nothing like what Pietro’s doing, at least not for a while. I’m still kind of adjusting to everything I can do since I haven’t had the chance to really flex it all that much around here.” He casually moves his hands under the table and lifts it a few inches off the ground without any trouble. “Like, I didn’t know I could do that until I beat up Flash the other day. If I’d known, I would’ve stopped after one punch.”

Just hearing that settles Bucky’s nerves, but he still feels on edge because Clint hasn’t quite settled into the idea.

“If you wanted to upgrade to the bigger stuff, you promise me and Bucky you’ll go through Steve or Pietro or Aunt Nat for proper training?”

Peter scoffs. “Of course, I’m not stupid. I know what you guys come home like after a mission, I’m not about to start doing that as a rookie.”

Bucky’s stomach churns. They hadn’t taught him how to be a force of violence. They taught him what violence did to good people. It bruises, breaks, and ruins good people. He’d watched his dad and Bucky get torn apart for years, inside and out.

(That was a bad feeling.)

“Then how about, as a graduation gift, we’ll work on getting you some kind of costume, but for now, you focus on picking out a college.” Clint seems calmer as he drops a chunk of carrot on the floor for Lucky.

Peter’s face is lighter than it has been for a few days. “Sounds good.”

Bucky’s head is entirely somewhere else.

They had a small fight over whose turn it was to take out the trash that devolved into a bigger fight about whose turn it was to pay the electric bill that spiraled into a nasty whispered fight in the confines of their bedroom about how they actually tried to kill each other just last week until Bucky went downstairs to sleep on the couch like any sane man would. (After all, Clint couldn’t sleep on the couch after the last time, it messed up his back too bad.)

However, Bucky can’t sleep. His husband’s upstairs, which is entirely too far away, and Peter had probably heard them fight, so that was a nagging guilt that wore too uncomfortably on his shoulders. He couldn’t tell Clint that Peter was worried about their marriage. That would make him go into ultra-dad mode to try to fix everything, and that would end up solving absolutely nothing.

The house is eerily quiet, and Bucky can hear the fridge clank in the kitchen as it makes ice cubes, and he can hear the soft hum of the dishwasher as it cleans their dinner plates.

He can also hear footsteps on the stairs. Too heavy to be Peter and not quick enough to be Lucky.

Clint’s silhouette drifts into the living room as he circles to the back of the couch, climbing over. “Scooch,” he whispers.

“This thing ain’t big enough for the both of us,” mumbles Bucky as he obeys, sliding to the edge of the couch.

Carefully, Clint slides down into the little crevice left by Bucky so that he can be the big spoon, wrapping one arm around Bucky. He presses a gentle kiss to Bucky’s metal-jointed shoulder and rests his face there, not saying anything for the longest time. Eventually, he does ask, “What’s goin’ on, Barnes? You’re really just not yourself lately. You’re more quiet and broody than usual.” Again, another soft kiss ghosts against the scar tissue.

Bucky reaches up to hold one of the hands that’s wrapped around him. His metal thumb rubs across the back of Clint’s hand. He’s quiet for a long time. “I know you worry that you messed up the kids, but… what if I messed up the kids?” He pauses and stops rubbing Clint’s hand for a second. “I mean, if I weren’t around, they wouldn’t see us hurting each other and maybe you would’ve retired sooner to take care of them right or—”

“Hey, stop that.” Clint presses his forehead to the back of Bucky’s neck. “If you weren’t around, I don’t think I could handle four fuckin’ kids. Hell, I don’t know if I’d’ve made it through just the one.” Bucky can feel Clint’s breath against his back as he talks oh so quietly.

There’s a pause, but it feels like Clint’s not done talking so Bucky doesn’t say anything either and just focuses on how close he is to Clint and how much he needs that closeness right now.

“I know it’s a sensitive thing when I call them our kids, but… they’re ours, Buck. And as much as I wonder if taking them in was a mistake, I wouldn’t change a damn thing about it. And I especially wouldn’t want to do it all over again without you.” Clint pulls Bucky in even closer, and Bucky feels his eyes get a little wet. “And even though we’re- we’re dangerous and stupid and all kinds of fucked up, there’s no way I could’ve raised such great kids on my own. You’ve been such a good dad to them.”

Bucky opens his mouth—

“And don’t you dare fucking say you’re not their dad, Barnes. You are.”

(He’s kind of glad he didn’t talk. His voice would’ve broken.)

Continuing, Clint goes, “You’re the level head, you’re the rock when I need you, you’re the support system when I can’t be. The good cop to my bad cop.” He shifts his hand to interlace his fingers with Bucky’s. “You’re a great dad and an amazing husband. Just look at the kids. They’re all a little messed up, but overall? I think we did a pretty damn good job.”

Bucky doesn’t say anything for a long moment. It’s a lot to process. His finger goes back to rubbing Clint’s hand. Eventually, he brings Clint’s hand to his lips for a kiss. 

They settle into the couch comfortably with Clint sandwiched between the back of the couch and Bucky. Their legs tangle together naturally, and Clint presses his nose right against Bucky’s metal joint, occasionally giving it a soft kiss. (Bucky loves it. Somehow, it makes him feel normal.) 

The fridge churns out more ice. The dishwasher beeps softly to indicate it’s finished the final rinse.

After a while, Bucky says softly, “I’ll stop smoking.”

“Thank you,” Clint murmurs, his voice sleepy. “I don’t like the weird taste when I kiss you after a cigarette.”

“Alright, let’s make sure you know your own strength.”

The thought of buying boxing pads had occurred to Bucky, and then he proceeded to ignore that thought. Mostly because it was a waste of money, but also, he had fought professionally for most of his life. He could take a seventeen year old kid.

Okay, he isn’t going to fight Peter, actually, not really.

The sun is what’s keeping them both warm right now (Bucky doesn’t feel cold so much these days but that’s a different problem), and Bucky takes a moment to square up.

Peter looks less than enthused, maybe even nervous. “Bucky, is this- is this a good idea?”

There’s a good reason they’re doing this when Clint isn’t home. Clint’s primary use of punishment during Peter’s two week suspension was chores and making sure he understood the rules of being a superhero if that was really what he wanted to do.

That didn’t cover his powers. That didn’t teach him how to hold back. That didn’t help him learn the kind of thing that changes a man.

Bucky doesn’t answer and instead puts his hands down for a second. “I can tell you that the other guy won’t wait ‘til you’re ready, but you already know that.”

“I just mean…” Peter hesitates again and then thinks better of it. He sucks in a breath and squares up, too, and suddenly he looks a lot older and a lot younger in all of the same moment.

He’s not a kid anymore.

And if he’s not careful, Bucky’s terrified he may lose his innocence, too.

(It’s so hard not to think of the little boy he met who just wrapped himself around Clint’s leg-)

“Keep your hands up, always try to protect your face.” Bucky mirrors his own instructions best he can. “Elbows down, keep your balance at your center.”

There’s a few seconds of Peter resettling himself in his stance and clearly getting a different feel of his body.

“Now I’m not gonna be the best test subject ‘cause I’m also super strong, but I’ll also be one of the few people you can go a little overboard with on this. If you punch too hard, it won’t hurt me.”

“Bucky-”

“Peter.”

(He used to be so fucking small and now he’s strong enough to kill Clint if something went horribly fucking wrong.)

With a steeling sigh, Peter actually squares up now. And he seems so goddamn uncomfortable, but Bucky knows. Bucky knows how bad this can go if he’s not taught right-

“C’mon, Pete, do it.”

There’s hesitation. There always is. He’s soft, like his dad, but he’s strong, like Bucky, and that’s a combination that has to be so fucking delicately balanced or else Clint and Bucky would’ve killed each other so many goddamn years ago-

“You won’t hurt me, I promise.”

“But what if I do?”

“You can’t- I’m-” Bucky drops his guard, and it’s impossible to express all his fucking fears for this kid right now. The world is cruel and wicked, and it only takes one wrong move to take a man’s life without realizing the power behind your actions or your words. “Peter, you could’ve killed that kid.”

“I know.”

And Bucky can see it. That Peter knows . The guilt. The shame. The self-doubt. The fear.

Because Bucky knows that feeling.

He knows it too fucking well.

“It’s not easy. It’s not. An’ it doesn’t always get easier either.” Bucky looks at Peter and sees Clint’s little boy. “I’ve almost killed your dad more times than I can count, and I’m sure you know that better than anyone. So you have to trust me when I say you need to control your strength.” His eyes flicker between Peter’s, somehow trying to desperately communicate all these fears without needing to put them into words. “‘Cause I never want you to deal with the feeling of… of holding someone’s life in your hands and then just- just taking it. Because it sucks, Pete. It fuckin’ sucks.”

Peter’s a smart kid, one of the smartest goddamn cookies of the whole batch, and he understands with absolute clarity, even if it’s hard to stomach. And Bucky knows.

After almost twelve years, it feels like Bucky’s imparting something on this kid.

And god he wishes it wasn’t this.

As the cold sinks into Bucky, he watches Peter square up: balanced stance, elbows low, hands up to protect his face.

They fight. They train.

Neither of them tell Clint when he gets home.

There’s too much gunfire, too fucking much, and there’s not an escape route for another two hundred seconds because that’s how long it’ll take the quinjet to get here at top speed, Bucky knows that, and Bucky knows Clint knows that.

“Stay down, stay the fuck down!” hollers Bucky as he tries to keep himself in front of Clint the best he can, using his arm to block some of the fire. The building’s piping they’re hiding behind collects the different bullets, causing fumes or smoke or steam or whatever it is to burst out into Bucky’s face.

“Move your foot,” hisses Clint as he edges himself a little further along the ground and with his bow flush to the ground, takes a quick shot. A second hiss passes his lips, and Bucky knows that Clint just took a chunk of flesh off his arm. Close quarters shooting is not the best because they forgot to pack Clint’s arm guards at the last second. However, that shot sinks right into someone’s shin and fucks him up real bad, dropping a body in writhing pain to the top of the roof.

There was a fight. There always seems to be a fight. And it’s never fun, there’s often yelling, there’s sometimes keys shoved in a pocket as someone leaves the farmhouse. But there’s always a place to come home to.

Bucky ducks the rest of the way behind the aluminum piping. He sees a smattering of blood on the gravel ground next to him as Clint half sits up. “Why the fuck—"

“I stayed down, didn’t I?” Clint challenges with a furrowed brow, going to nock another arrow. As his arm rises just above the pipe, a bullet slices across his arm, and he pulls it back down, now bleeding in two places.

Bucky grimaces.

This looks bad.

“We’re not doing this now,” groans Bucky as he reloads his gun. “I’ll cover you, take your shots.” The cartridge clicks into place, and Bucky pulls the safety off. He keeps his arm in front of him as a cover and takes a few shots, leaving just enough space for Clint to get up and take some cleaner shots to disarm and disrupt further gunfire.

“Get back, I’ll cover.” Clint’s voice is sharp, and it’s normally sharp on mission but it’s more pointed, like he’s trying to establish control, but this whole thing is too out of control right now.

Bucky doesn’t argue, doesn’t have it in him to argue anymore, it’s too exhausting, so he drops back and rushes behind some other larger piece of rooftop décor and lays cover so that Clint can get back.

Sure enough, his husband is right by his side a tense heartbeat later.

“Fifty seconds ‘til pick up,” says Bucky, putting another clip in his gun. “Let’s just keep our shit together.”

“We rarely keep our shit together,” Clint huffs as he rotates his quiver for a minor explosive. “I can lay us enough cover to get in the ship, but this is my last shot here, Barnes. Last useful shot, anyways. Other than this, I’ve got some sonics and a boomerang, but then I’m empty.”

“Last clip,” Bucky responds curtly.

They sit in the quiet for ten more seconds, hearing no gunfire exchanged, biding their time, panting heavily and just looking out at the empty horizon of ocean and clouds and at each other and wondering if this is gonna be the last time, because lately? Every time feels like the last time.

“Love you,” says Bucky softly, pulling back the safety on his gun.

“Love you too,” says Clint without hesitation, looking over to Bucky with those blue grey eyes. (Those eyes have looked at him in much worse situations than this.)

It’s them. It’s always been them. Life and death, together to the end, always on the brink of something dangerous and wonderful and familiar.

And the humming of the jet is audible, and it’s time to leave.

There’s a little buzzing panic in Bucky’s head that he’s too familiar with. Like a Clint-sense, like something’s about to go wrong. It buzzed when Clint was in a coma. It buzzed when Clint was away for the night during their fights. It buzzed when Clint was having nightmares.

Some of those Bucky could fix. (Not the coma. He’s a spy, not a doctor.) But when he and Clint were apart, he could at least send a text and say ‘sorry’ without punctuation because it was too firm. And when Clint was having nightmares, Bucky could roll over and just hold him quietly until the buzzing stopped in his own head and he knew Clint would be alright.

This? This he can try to fix.

“Get up, let’s go!” he hollers as he lays cover fire that the quinjet matches. There should be enough to make sure Clint’s safely in the jet, but Bucky wants to be sure, needs to be sure that Clint will be okay.

(For the kids.)

Bucky takes a shot from one of their assailants, these fucking Russians (fuck the Russians), and staggers backwards, trying to get towards the ship and up into safety because they’ve got the goddamn missile codes they were after and it’s time to go.

Clint’s already halfway up the ladder despite his fucked up arm slowing him down a little. “Buck, c’mon!”

Bucky’s starting to pull himself up the ladder and lays a few more shots as cover fire at the bottom rungs until Clint is safely in the ship before he holsters his gun and starts to haul ass up the ladder.

The return fire: one shot frays the rope.

“C’mon!” shouts Clint from the ship, laying an explosive arrow at the feet of the Russians. “Hurry!” 

There was an adrenaline rush that didn’t last as long as Bucky wanted it to. The quick rush got him almost to the top—

—and it faded with the snap of the ladder.

“Fuck—”

“Barnes!”

A hand is around his forearm, and it’s bloody and it’s messy and there’s a pained yell, but Clint’s got him, Clint’s always got him. Bucky grabs his wounded forearm in return as he watches the recurve bow fall from the quinjet and smash to bits on the rooftop below.

“Don’t you dare fucking let go,” hisses Clint. It’s quickly followed by a cry of pain as Bucky feels himself being hauled up into the quinjet. It’s slow and brutal, but Bucky finally finds himself safely inside with the missile codes tucked in a pocket. He’s covered in Clint’s blood and quite a bit of his own, but they’re there. They’re together.

Clint’s not crying, but his face looks like he should be, his skin is torn to shit and his body has a couple holes in it, but he’s in one piece.

Wordlessly, Bucky pulls him towards the side of the jet as the hatch closes up and carries them away from the shitshow below. He leans up against a seat and then pulls Clint in close, holding onto him desperately.

Clint buries a grimace into Bucky’s shoulder.

A few moments of quiet pass. Then a few more.

“Can you—"

“Yeah. I’ve got you.” And Bucky kisses Clint’s temple before getting up to grab the first aid kit.

Moving Peter feels… odd.

Leaving the farm was a quiet ordeal. Just handing off the keys to Simone so she could check on Lucky. No withheld tears. No long heartbreaking goodbyes.

Three people - no, three men - in a mini-van off to New York.

(Bucky took the backseat. He wanted to give Clint as much time to see and talk to Peter as he could. After all, they’d see each other plenty after this.)

And pulling up to the school was even odder.

After losing Kate and Wanda to distant lands (California), there was something that felt… okay. Pete was only a few hours away. He had Pietro nearby. He had an entire network of Avengers ready to help out at a moment’s notice.

Bucky sits in the backseat still, turned sideways, looking at the front steps of Peter’s dorm building. There’s something about it that’s got the old New York feel. Tall bricks. Dirty windows. City charm.

He turns his head as he hears the trunk slam shut and watches as Pete and Clint pull a couple roller bags and duffels and a backpack that’s about half Peter’s size around the side of the vehicle. “Did you have to bring the whole kitchen sink, Pete? What am I gonna do dishes in now, huh?” he tries to joke (while thinking about how few dishes there will be to do when they get home).

Peter pretends to laugh. “Be glad I didn’t try to pack the fridge, too.”

Now Clint pretends to laugh, too.

(Neither of them are funny, really.)

“Alright, I know you packed your new super suit,” Clint says in a low voice before continuing, “You gonna be okay to set up your room on your own?” After all, it’s a battle against traffic to get back to the farm, and Peter’s already an independent kid, and it’s not like he needs them, and there’s gonna be so many people-

“I’ll be fine,” he says, hiking his backpack further up onto his shoulder. And his eyes flicker between the two of them, and Bucky feels worried for a second that this is gonna turn into tears, and none of them want there to be tears here-

“Are you guys gonna be okay without me?”

Bucky is… taken aback by that for a moment.

And then isn’t.

Peter watched them through the good times, through the bad times, through the really bad times, and through, well, everything else in between. He was there before Bucky was. His question wasn’t unwarranted.

And Bucky looks to Clint only to find Clint looking right back.

It’s just a question with a surefire answer.

“Yeah, we’ll be fine, kiddo,” answers Clint with his signature half-smile, the kind that just quietly curls the edge of his lips. “We’ll miss you like hell, though.”

Bucky looks at his boots for a long moment, trying to hide his own smile. (And all the other emotions whirling inside. They needed to stay quiet for now.)

And there’s a rustling sound that causes Bucky to look up, and Peter’s hugging Clint. Hugging him so tightly. Because before anything else, they had each other. And that’s an unbreakable kind of bond.

Bucky looks down again, feeling like an intruder.

Only a moment later he sees Peter’s shoes directly in front of him. And he knows it’s time for something he’s not ready for: saying goodbye.

He gets up a little slowly and wraps an arm around Peter, realizing for the first time in a while just how damn tall the kid is. “I’ll make sure to take good care of him,” says Bucky under his breath. And after a long moment of holding Peter close, he turns to kiss Pete’s temple. “Make sure you stay safe.”

“I will, I promise,” he says back just as quietly. “I love you, Bucky.”

“Love you too, Pete.”

It’s not the last time they’ll hug. It’s not the first time they’ve hugged.

But something about it hurts like a bitch nonetheless.

And Peter goes to his bags again, and Clint offers to help carry them, and they do. Bucky watches as they carry his bags (with Clint struggling just a bit) up a flight of stupid New York City stairs into a world that’s just gonna open up for a kid as smart as Peter.

And Bucky closes the minivan’s side door. And he takes a long breath of the city air. And he gets in the passenger seat to wait for his husband to come back.

It takes a few moments before Clint returns, getting settled in the driver’s seat. And he looks past Bucky to see that Peter’s already gone, and they both sigh in an unplanned unison.

On instinct, Bucky reaches for Clint’s hand and finds that Clint is reaching right back.

“We’re getting too old for this, y’kno?” says Clint softly.

Bucky nods and lets out a slow breath. “Didn’t think I’d ever have four kids, let alone see ‘em all off.”

“Yeah. Yeah.”

And they’re quiet together again as more parents hustle around them.

“Do you wanna go visit Pietro?” Clint asks.

“Yeah, sure. I’ll text Simone, see if she can keep an eye on Lucky in case we get back late…”

It’s gonna be alright.

They’ll always be alright.

Chapter Text

“I think the dog’s deaf.”

“That makes two of you.”

Bucky can feel Clint’s glare. And he just relishes in it with a smirk.

“No, Buck, I’m serious.”

“He’s an old dog.”

Clint makes a disgruntled noise that definitely sounds like “he’s an old dog” in a mocking sort of way.

“You’re an old dog now too, Clint.”

There’s more mumbling mockery.

It’s been years, and as much as there’s an odd point where Bucky started to notice, well…

Clint’s not going to live forever.

And Bucky, well…

He’s going to live a lot longer.

(The loneliness was hard enough the first time.)

Clint grumbles some more in the distance before crashing onto the couch next to Bucky, and he’s followed quickly by Lucky. The mutt jumps up on the couch and proceeds to step on both of them before settling into a spot on Clint’s right.

“Good boy, Lucky.”

The dog’s tail doesn’t thump at the encouragement, but he lets out a content sigh nonetheless.

“I think you’re right, Barton.”

“I don’t think you say that enough.”

When he looks in the mirror, Bucky can see his own wear and tear. Years of butchering people and anger and sadness and the recovery from that? It’ll give a man a few frown lines.

It’s more noticeable in Steve, actually. Which is hard. If they both got the same serum, or at least similar ones, Steve’s spry as a spring chicken still.

It’s hard to think that their bodies are similar but their lives have been so different.

And now it’s starting to show more.

But then Clint appears in the mirror behind Bucky, shirtless. Mostly bandaged from whatever the fuck happened this week or last week or whatever stitches got torn from bending the wrong way while pulling weeds in the yard…

“What’s got you spooked, Barnes?” Clint asks, placing a few gentle kisses on Bucky before resting his head on his husband’s shoulder

“Time.”

Clint checks his wrist as though he wears a watch. He doesn’t, but his internal clock is pretty solid these days. “Got a couple hours before our reservations. Shower, get handsome, do whatever you want. Do me, if you want.”

Bucky tries to mask his grin. (It is unsuccessful.) And as he looks up in that same mirror, he sees Clint. He’s worn down. He’s got frown lines and smile lines and scars that’ll never heal and the dark circles under his eyes that only get deeper every day.

The grin fades. “Not what I meant, Barton.”

Clint leans down to kiss Bucky’s bare shoulder some more. It’s to hide his own face from the mirror, and Bucky knows it.

(They know each other too well after almost two decades of falling in love over and over again.)

“Don’t think about it,” Clint says, finding a spot at the crook of Bucky’s neck to kiss at a little more. “We’ve got better things to worry about.”

Bucky meets Clint’s eyes in the mirror, and they’re full of something. Fear? Love? Understanding? It’s mixed, that’s all he knows.

“Besides,” continues Clint softly, “we can’t change it. So why should I worry? Why should I-”

Bucky reaches over and gently smushes Clint’s face into his shoulder again. “Please don’t sing the Oliver and Company song at me. I may be from New York, but I don’t give a fuck about Billy Joel. He was after my time.”

Clint laughs into Bucky’s shoulder.

And for now, everything’s alright…

…yet time passes.

The coffee’s hot, the mission papers are on the table, and weapons need to be cleaned and put back together. Bags are packed. Almost everything is ready.

“We should retire.”

Clint says it, and Bucky pauses mid-reach for his coffee.

“...what do you mean “ we” ?”

The tension in the room certainly exists now. (It’s fucking suffocating, and Bucky knows he caused it. Somehow, that makes it worse.)

Clint opens his mouth a couple times before closing it again. And then with a renewed opinion on it (or at least renewed courage), he says, “I know you’re gonna last a while, but I don’t wanna be left at home wondering if you’re okay. I know you’re, like, actually okay to be out and cleared for duty without me, and Nat and Steve can take care of you or whatever, but-”

“Clint-”

“-I don’t want to be alone either, and I don’t wanna make you some kinda fucking caretaker or whatever, I just always thought I’d go out in combat-”

“Clint-”

“-but then I got Peter, and then you and me, and I had to be careful to make sure you were careful and Kate and Pietro and Wanda and-”

“Barton.”

This time, he seems to snap out of his stressed monologue and makes eye contact with Bucky.

“Okay.”

Clint squints and seems alarmed for a moment. “What do you mean “okay” ?”

Bucky shrugs and takes a sip of his coffee. “I’ll probably get bored, but we can take the time to visit the kids, harass Pete and MJ more than we already do. Set a good example for Pietro or some shit.” He shrugs again. “Maybe visit Wanda in Sokovia. Like an anniversary trip or somethin’.”

Clint squints harder. Slowly, almost analytically, he says, “I was expecting a fight.”

More coffee. The click of a sniper rifle piece snapping into place. “I’m not much of a fighter these days.” Another shrug. “I guess I’d just prefer to be your lover for as long as we have.”

There’s a little wind blown out of Clint’s sails as he no longer has to convince Bucky of anything. (He wouldn’t have had to in the first place. Bucky knew this sacrifice would come eventually. He just thought he’d have to be the one to bring it up.)

(He’s very glad he didn’t.)

It’s not a horse and pony show to retire.

It’s not a celebratory circuit to visit all the kids either.

It’s unnervingly quiet.

Except for Lucky, who barks at nothing at all. The odd wall. A dandelion. The sun, once.

“Can you get hearing aids for dogs?” Bucky asks after having bribed Lucky to stop barking with a treat or seven.

“No. I looked.”

Bucky heaves a sigh and scratches Lucky behind the ear. “He’s a good dog.”

“He knows.”

“I’m glad you’ll be around longer.”

Bucky opens one eye to see Clint laying there with his eyes closed. “Whaddaya mean, Barton?”

Clint huffs a bit as he links a leg over Bucky’s. He always needs just a little bit of contact. It’s grounding. Settling. “For the kids, mostly. They’ll have a dad, like, forever.”

There’s a very small part of Bucky who wants to fight the idea of being their father. It’s an old instinct, but Clint’s right. (He’s been right about that far longer than Bucky would ever admit.)

“You’re not wrong,” Bucky agrees with a sigh. He reaches to place a hand on Clint’s face. Runs a hand through Clint’s hair.

“I know they’ll be taken care of, y’kno?” He shifts his face to kiss the soft flesh of Bucky’s palm. “They’ll be loved forever. They’ll have someone to go to for help or advice or to just grab drinks with, if they want. And they’ll always have a designated driver ‘cause, well-”

“Yeah,” Bucky says. And again, quieter, “Yeah.”

(Because it hasn’t occurred to him until now that he’d basically be a single dad at that point. Sure, the kids would be adults, they’re all already adults but… Bucky’s not exactly the best person to get life advice from, and he’s highly aware of that .)

“You promise you’ll take care of them?”

Bucky leans forward to press a kiss to Clint’s forehead. “Of course, Barton,” he whispers. “Forever and always.”

“Bucky?”

“Hey, Pete.” Bucky holds his phone tightly, pinching the bridge of his nose.

“Is everything okay? It’s- It’s like three in the morning, I think? Are you okay? Is dad okay?”

It’s definitely three in the morning, and Bucky feels shaky. Anxious, mostly. He knows Clint’s asleep in the other room with Lucky snoring at his feet. “Yeah, we’re fine here, Pete.”

There’s a yawn from the other end of the phone. The long kind. “That’s- That’s good, I guess?” Peter sounds confused and after a few more seconds where Bucky can only imagine he’s rubbing his eyes, Pete asks slowly, “Do you need something? I did my taxes the other day after you texted to remind me, if that’s what this is about.”

Bucky snorts a laugh, realizing how ridiculous it is to call him at such an ungodly hour. But it’s just a thing he needs to get out, even if it’s stupidly early in the morning. (God, Clint would kill him for waking Peter up like this.)

Bucky takes a small breath and says, “Just wanted to tell you I love you. That’s all.”

“I love you, too, Bucky.”

He feels better. Soothed. Not at hearing it in return, just to know that he said it.

Sometimes there isn’t always time.

“Alright, don’t, uh, don’t tell your dad I called. But go back to bed, get some rest.”

“Alright, Bucky. Goodnight.”

“Night, Pete.”

(He calls the other three.)

(Wanda is far too awake for him with the timezone difference, and they end up talking for almost an hour. About work. About love. About the sandwich she’d made for lunch. Just like how he packed them for her for school.)

(He loves them all.)

(They all love him.)

(And everything will be alright.)