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“Buck! Put me down!” Steve squirmed, throwing a soft punch straight down towards Bucky’s face.
Bucky flinched backward. “Woah there, tiger,” he laughed, shaking Steve back and forth even more. Bucky was lying flat on his back in the grass, and he’d managed to wrangle Steve into his arms, holding him high above him by the armpits and jostling him around, occasionally tossing him in the air and catching him.
Needless to say, Steve was not having it.
“I’m not a baby, asshole,” Steve huffed. The venom in his voice was half-hearted, but still genuine. He tried reaching down to tickle Bucky’s neck, but Bucky only lifted him higher.
“You’re not uh baby, Stevie, you’re my baby. Mmm—mwah.” Bucky threw him slightly and then brought him down close again, making a goofy kissy face and cooing. Steve took his chance to strike, reaching down and getting his fingers right under Bucky’s chin.
“Now who’s the baby, you big jerk?” Steve smirked down at him as he continued his merciless tickling spree.
Bucky squeaked, dropping Steve onto his lap, the two of them erupting into a fit of giggles. “Well now who’s the asshole, bud?” Bucky leaned up and planted a kiss on the end of Steve’s nose. Steve smiled back at him, bringing his arms up and folding them over Bucky’s chest, resting his cheek over Bucky’s heart, listening to his deep, steady breathing as he peered out over Central Park.
It was a sunny afternoon—late summer in Manhattan—and Bucky had awoken him that morning with a swarm of kisses and the suggestion of a train ride and a picnic in the park. Now they were lying beneath the sunshine, what was left of their sandwiches tucked away in reusable canvas grocery bags strewn about at Bucky’s feet. Steve watched as a group of children ran around in the distance, screaming and laughing as they tumbled barefoot down hills and climbed up rocks, conquering them like they were mountains. For all that had changed over the past hundred years, Steve often found that some things never really did.
As Steve settled deeper into Bucky’s chest, Bucky lifted his metal arm to the dip in Steve’s lower back, rubbing gently up and down against the soft cotton of Steve’s t-shirt while pulling his body closer. His right hand travelled even further up, his fingers tangling in Steve’s hair, gently pushing it back from Steve’s face in an almost rhythmic motion, slowly lulling him to sleep—
“Buuuck…” Steve moaned softly, “Stop making me sleepy.” He adjusted his hands and nuzzled deeper towards Bucky’s sternum.
Bucky let out a soft chuckle and continued stroking Steve’s hair. “‘Think it’s the food that’s making you sleepy, bud, or maybe all this sunshine.” He let out a low yawn. “‘Sure got me good…”
Steve mumbled something in response that wasn’t quite real words. The two fell quiet, taking in the sights and sounds and smells of the lively park surrounding them, thankfully left alone by the knowing and courteous city dwellers they shared it with.
Steve could tell by the way Bucky was laying that he was cloud gazing, like they used to do when they were kids, sprawled out on the fire escape together. Bucky would point up at the clouds and ask Steve what he saw up there, and Steve would always ask coyly “Why would you wanna know?” And Bucky would always reply in that smug way about him that Steve was an artist and he wanted to see his artistic vision. And Steve would laugh and get all warm inside his chest, and the space between their arms and legs on the hot, rusty metal floor would suddenly become noticeable. And he’d tell Bucky to shut the hell up, and he’d respond by going off on some tangent about the castles, and the sea creatures, and the men from mars, and all the other fantastical things he saw up there, in the skies above Brooklyn, pulled from his own mind and from the pages of the pulp sci-fi novels he always had his nose in back then. And Steve’s eyelids would start to flutter closed, and he’d let Bucky’s words pass over him like the clouds above them did, being pushed along by the wind to far-off places they could at one point only imagine.
Now they were in the present, and they’d seen all those things and more, and even then, Steve still had to ask:
“Whaddya see up there, Buck?”