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When Steve left to go back to the past, put the timelines back in order, Bucky couldn’t help but hold his breath. His lungs filled and didn’t release. Five, four, Bucky shut his eyes. Three, two, Bucky turned away. One. Bucky let out the air and sucked in a new breath. He took a step away from the pad.
“Buck.”
He turned back, shock plastered clear as day onto his face. Steve was standing in the middle of the launchpad. Bucky took one shaky step forward after another, Steve met him in the middle. They stood toe to toe, not touching. Timid.
“Didn’t think I’d leave you here alone didya, jerk?” Steve whispered to him
His lips curled into a small smile, eyes searching Bucky’s face. The flicker of uncertainty, the quiet hope, the fear and the love.
“I wasn’t so sure, pal, I really wasn’t.”
“What do I have for me there? Peggy has her own family, I can’t take that from her. I have you here. I’m with you, Buck, ‘til the end of the line.”
“You know, I don’t know what I’d have done without you.” Bucky said with a watery smile.
“I love you,” Steve said, quiet but oh so sincere. Then he turned to face Sam.
Bucky pulled his face back around, pressing their mouths together in a desperate kiss. They moved together languidly, tongues and hearts intertwined. When they broke, Steve ducked in to kiss him once again. He pulled away finally, resting his forehead against Bucky’s.
“I gotta speak to Sam.”
Bucky smiled at him, “go on, then.”
Steve turned to Sam once more, picking up his shield.
“I think,” he began, “that this belongs to you now, Captain.”
Sam looked at him incredulously.
“Steve, I-”
“Seriously, Sam. It’s yours. And anyway,” he paused, looking back at Bucky with nothing but pure love and longing on his face, “I have something else to live for now. He was always my everything, but now- I can’t leave him again.”
Sam pulled him into a hug.
“Thank you. Take care of him, and take care of yourself.”
“I won’t leave you either, Sam, I’ll still be around but now I’m retired. We’re still going on our runs though.”
Sam laughed, “I should have known you’d never let me out of that.”
Steve grinned as he walked back to Bucky.
“Ready to go, Buck?”
Bucky hummed, pressed a kiss to his cheek, then his other cheek, and finally a kiss to his lips.
“Now I am.”