Chapter Text
MAY 29, 2017. 10:20 AM
“I think he knows we’re going to spoil him rotten.”
“How about you?” Steve asks, finally tearing his eyes away from his son long enough to get a look at Bucky. His hair is a mess and his eyes are a little puffy and dark with exhaustion, but Steve doesn’t think he’s ever seemed this happy or handsome. “How do you feel?”
Bucky’s gaze wanders up to the screen on the wall. “A little over eight pounds lighter,” he chuckles, then reaches up to hook his arm around Steve, pulling him close and pressing their foreheads together. “I’m fantastic.”
“Yeah,” Steve laughs, thinking back to a text message he’d gotten from Bucky almost seven months ago, on Veterans Day, which had said the very same thing. Steve had read it while sitting on the dusty concrete steps of a bunker in Latvia where, in a way, Lincoln’s story had begun. At the time, it had broken his heart to read it, knowing that he was going to return home and ruin whatever sense of peace Bucky had finally found by dragging Hydra and Zola’s presence back into their lives. Sitting on those steps, with those files weighing heavily in his hands, he’d never have guessed that that they would eventually lead him here. He never had responded to Bucky’s message that day. Well. Better late than never. “Me, too.”
Bucky tilts Lincoln back to let him rest against his thighs. Only a moment ago, Lincoln had made his first real effort to open his eyes and look around. That first glimpse of the world and his parents must have piqued his curiosity; he’s awake and alert now. His eyes shift lazily from Steve’s face to Bucky’s, back and forth, blinking as his eyes adjust to the light. His curled fist is tucked against his cheek, giving him a hilarious air of bored contemplation as he studies them. Every few seconds, his tongue darts out lazily to lick his bottom lip. He looks ridiculous, but Steve thinks better of saying so in front of Bucky.
“He’s fuckin’ ridiculous,” Bucky scoffs.
Steve’s joy bursts out of him like a popped champagne cork. “Isn’t he?”
“Jesus, I’ve never seen anything - he’s - he’s so sweet. I don’t know what to do.”
Steve feels transfixed; staring at Lincoln is inducing some kind of full-body paralysis. He’s not sure if he’s awake or not. He’s not sure if a world exists beyond the little face in front of him. “Wow,” Steve sighs stupidly.
“I can’t believe we did this,” Bucky mumbles.
“I can’t believe you did this.”
“It was pretty easy.”
Steve would stare at Bucky in utter disbelief if he could. The best he can do is a faint, “ What?”
“Yeah,” Bucky confirms nonchalantly. “Didn’t even hurt.”
“Seemed like it hurt.”
“Nope,” he smiles, stroking his thumb lightly over Lincoln’s cheek and watching him react to the touch. “Not really.”
Bucky shudders and sighs as if he’s on the verge of tears. His fingers dance lovingly over Lincoln’s arm, rest for a moment against his tiny ribcage, trail down his leg to give his knee a gentle squeeze, and finally settle on Lincoln’s foot. It’s so perfectly small that it disappears completely when he wraps his hand around it.
There’s such profound, deep adoration in his expression that when Steve hears him take a breath to speak, he expects something ardent and impassioned. Poetry or prayers or an unbreakable promise.
“God.” Bucky exhales, overwhelmed and speechless. “I thought you were Italian food.”