Chapter Text
The sunlight streamed into the room and hit Bucky square in the face, prompting him to begrudgingly leave his comfortable position on his left side and turn to his right, where he came into contact with someone else.
“Whuz?” He groggily asked, still half-asleep but wakefulness rapidly approaching as his mind tried to process if he went home with anyone last night. What was last night even? Did he even go out? His brows furrowed deeper when he finally opened his eyes, and had to blink them several times as if trying to change the reality before him which was a sleeping Steve Rogers in the nude. Well, half-nude, as the blanket covered him discreetly up to the waist, but only just. Okay. So, this wasn’t the first time him and Steve crashed on the same bed. But a buck naked Steve in the same bed as him was... hm. Not even in the army where they all took showers all together in the altogether did they crash in the same army issued cot sans vêtements.
This was sobering, and as such Bucky was now fully wide awake.
And now, in his awoken state, did he come to realize that he too was, ahem, buck naked.
“Jesus, what the hell?” He exclaimed, and his voice might have been somewhere near a panicked scream since it made Steve’s sleeping face frown and turn into the pillow. Bucky bit his lip and sat up, looking around for his clothes and that’s when he noticed something else. His left arm. It was flesh and blood. He stared at it all agog, raised it to the light and flexed it this way and that, opened and closed his hand and wiggled each finger as if in a trance. He noticed ink, and turned it so to see the tattoo of a stylized red star on his bicep. Shit.
Now in a true panic, he reached out without turning and nudged Steve roughly by the shoulder. He heard an irritated grumble but didn’t stop nudging until the grumble turned into a mumbled “whaddahell?”
“Fuckin’ wake up already Stevie!” He stopped staring at his arm and finally looked around to catch Steve blinking and looking up at him in confusion.
“Babe?” Steve asked. Bucky straight up goggled at him and asked back, “Babe? Stevie, what the heck did you call me?” This made Steve’s confusion deepen and his brows furrowed even more. He pushed himself up onto his elbow and looked around the room he was in. “I... I dunno? Why did I call you babe?”
“Why’d you call... fella, I don’t know, didn’t I ask first?” Bucky replied, exasperated. He ran his left hand through his hair, and he couldn’t recall the last time he was able to do that. This was freaking him out. “Listen, let me catch you up: we woke up together on this bed, both of us.. erm... naked. I don’t have any idea how we ended up like this, and I bet you don’t either.”
“We’re naked?”
Bucky rolled his eyes. He had to. Sarcasm was the only thing stopping him from lighting up the whole room with a red face full of embarrassment. “We’re a little slow on the uptake this morning, are we?”
Steve shot him a hurt look, and Bucky rolled his eyes again. “All right, well come on and let’s get dressed and figure this out already, okay Stevie?”
“Okay. Why am I looking for a white Stark-tech suit, though?” Steve asked as he got up and walked around the room, with nary a care. Well, why would he? It’s not like he knew about his best friend’s long, long, longstanding feelings him. “Somehow I feel like that’s something I should be seeing on the floor? But here’s... well I’m guessing this plaid shirt and khakis are mine.” Bucky almost drew blood from how hard he was biting the inside of his cheek as he watched Steve bend down and retrieve said clothes. He turned his head and focused on trying to remember anything from last night to stop a natural reaction from happening below the waist. He conjured up an image of... a white Stark-tech suit. And the word quantum?
“Its... its not all white though? There’s some black and red mixed in?”
“Oh, yeah. Why do we both know this suit?” Steve asked back as he put on the clothes he assumed were his. Bucky was still avoiding looking at Steve that it caught him off guard when he got hit in the face with a red henley shirt and black jeans. “Those are yours I’m guessing” he heard Steve through the clothes cover his head.
“Gee, thanks.” Came his muffled answer. “Could’ve handed it over like a decent person but I guess we’re throwing around stuff now.”
He pulled the clothing in time to see Steve smirk at him. “C’mon, grumpy-pants. Get into those pants so we could figure this out already.”
As Bucky put on his clothes he watched Steve inspect the room they were in. It was a a bit of a small bedroom, at least for two men over 6 feet, and the king sized bed took up most of the room. There were closets and a dresser next to a door, and bedside tables with lamps and books and... Steve was staring at the framed photo on the table on his side of the bed. Bucky watched him pick it up and give it a closer inspection.
“Hey, Buck?” Steve asked, distracted by the photo, Bucky craned his head to try to get a look, gave up and just walked around to the other side of the bed to look at it over Steve’s shoulder. It was a black and white photo of the two of them in tuxes, arms around each other and smiling like they won the lottery. Some white stuff littered the picture- confetti or some such.
“Huh. We won something at a fancy party?”
Bucky couldn’t see Steve’s face, but the other was silent as he placed the photo frame back on the table as it were earlier.
“Buck, that’s a wedding photo.” Came the quiet answer.
It took a moment for it to sink in, and by the time it did Steve was already halfway out the door and Bucky was still staring at the photo. It wasn’t confetti falling, rather it was rice thrown at them. And there in graphic detail was his face smiling wide and looking in naked adoration at Steve, who had his eyes closed and face etched with pure joy.
“Jesus H. Christ on a stick.” Bucky blasphemed breathlessly. He didn’t even get to tell Steve about his arm. Bucky frowned. Why did he want to tell Steve about his arm? There was something about it, a thought that kept slipping through his mind like some slippery thing through his hands, and in a slightly confused state of déjà vu Bucky finally moved from staring at the wedding picture and left to follow Steve into what he assumed was the rest of their apartment.