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James Barnes meets Steve Rogers at a funeral, an aunt who he’d never met. Steve is not actually invited to the funeral; he just so happens to be passing by the street when the eulogies have finished being read and most people are simply gazing emptily at a broken casket with nothing in their hearts or eyes or heads. Bucky isn’t one of them. He’s looking around, kind of bored but feeling bad because someone’s dead and he never really knew them.
He catches the eye of a boy on the street; skinny and lanky with streaks of dirt in his blond hair. There’s blood running down his neck, and even at the age of eight, Bucky knows that’s not a good sign.
He takes one step, then two, then three, until he’s staring at the other boy.
“Are you alright?” He says, and the other boy jolts as Bucky puts a hand on him, like he hadn’t expected anyone to touch him. He blinks. “Yeah, of course, don’t worry-”
Bucky feels something in his knees go weak and he hits the ground, pain burning up his wrist and twisting in his chest. He thinks, ow.
When he looks up the other boy’s kneeling next to him, a hand on his shoulder and a concerned look on his face, which morphs into something of a smirk when Bucky looks up and he says, “Are you alright?” And Bucky says, “Yeah. My name’s James, but everybody calls me Bucky.”
The other boy grins. “And my name’s Steven, but if you call me that we’re never gonna be friends.”
“Steve, then,” Bucky says, and thinks, Steve and Bucky.
He likes it.
.
His parents don’t tell him about soulmates until he’s eleven. Sometimes they whisper about it at school, in between lessons and the sharp snap of a teacher’s stick to anyone who talks too much.
His parents are awkward, stilted. “Your soulmate is someone who will love you, James,” His mother says, because his father is in the kitchen and doing his best to pretend he’s not a part of the conversation. “It’s a name written on your wrist, and when you meet them a flash of pain goes up your wrist-”
“Oh,” Bucky says, and because he’s eleven and doesn’t know any better, rolls up the cuff on his wrist and shows his mother his wrist. “Like this?” he says, and his mother’s eyes go wide, because Bucky has known that name was there for the last three years, his best friend’s name on his wrist.
His mother swallows, looking down. “Oh, James.” And she reaches over and rolls his cuff back on. She shakes her head, smiling sadly.
“You can’t tell anyone,” she says, and at the time he listens, but he doesn’t understand.
Of course he loves Steve. What’s wrong with that?
.
He knows what’s wrong with him by now, of course, when he’s eighteen and in the army and about to be shipped off to Europe to fight in the war, the war that should end all wars.
He knows what’s wrong with him, because instead of saying goodbye and leaving it at that, he tells Steve, hey, I got a gal who might wanna see you, if you know what I mean, and lets himself pretend, just for a half-second, that in some alternate reality, it’s him on a date with Steve, not a constant string of failed double dates.
But it isn’t real, of course. He knows Steve’s wrist is blank (you’d be surprised how many times his cuffs get torn in fights); he knows what the world thinks of fairies, and he damned well knows what the army thinks of them.
He leaves and says goodbye with a hug, his fingers curling into the fabric of Steve’s shirt for maybe a second longer than necessary.
.
When Steve comes to rescue them, he has a strange, sharp thought that pushes to the forefront of his mind, through the haze and fog of drugs and malnutrition and captivity.
He thinks, this could be real.
And then he thinks, liar.
.
“What’s your name?”
“James Barnes.”
“Incorrect.” A knife slices the tip of his pinky finger. He tries not to wince.
“Where are you from?”
“New York, United States of Ameri-”
“Incorrect.” His palm now, cutting through tendon and bone and dear God it’s the worst pain in his life, worse than being short, worse than when he met Steve-
“Who is your soulmate?” Because his wrist is bare now, a sin for all to see, they know what he is-
“Steve R-”
Something cold and sharp and metallic presses into the joint on his arm this time, and he passes out with the slight thought of, uh, that’s the arm with my soulmark on it.
.
“Who are you? He says, looking up to the man with the shield, who’s smiling even through the pain, trying to put his best foot forward although the Winter Soldier has no clue why. He winces a bit as he opens his mouth, and he says, “Steve Rogers. I’m your friend.”
And the Winter Soldier has no idea why, but he has the strangest feeling this man is forgetting something- something vital.