Work Text:
The first time Bucky Barnes sees Clint Barton he seriously considers shooting him in the head.
It’s a bank job. Bad guys have them all on the floor and they’re waving guns around like they think they’re something special. Now Bucky’s all in favour of guns, but they’re not magic wands, you don’t wave them in people’s faces unless you a) know what you’re doing and b) know that what you’re doing is shooting that person’s face off. Unless he’s very much mistaken, the main point of a bank hold up is to get money, not to shoot the hostages.
But maybe things have changed since the 1940s.
He doesn’t know Clint’s name then, won’t know it until later that very day when it will be shouted after him with irritation. What he does know is that one of the hostages is being a complete jackass, getting all up in one of the bank robber’s faces, making stupid insulting jokes and generally asking to be shot.
Steve is not going to be pleased if Bucky lets one of the hostages get shot. Even if it is a guy who enjoys flapping his mouth a bit too much.
It should have been easy. They’re two-bit thieves who barely have enough brains between them to work out which end of the gun to point away from them. They haven’t got any mutants with them, they don’t have any tech. Hell, Bucky’s starting to think they don’t even have a getaway plan. But then the blond idiot had to stand up and now everything’s going to shit.
He mutters about this over the comms to Steve.
“You’re one to talk,” is all he gets in response. And sure, maybe Bucky’s been the guy to deliberately piss off a bad guy or two in his time, but that was all for a reason. Bucky had a plan. As far as Bucky can tell all blondie down there’s got is a massive mouth and a lot of empty space where his brain should be.
When all hell does break loose, though, it’s not even blondie’s fault. It turns out that honour between thieves isn’t really in these bank robbers’ vocabulary, and one of them ends up shooting another in the head before Bucky can even see what is going on.
Hostages scream, bullets fly, the police outside are readying the raid, and it’s a fucking mess.
Bucky loses track of blondie until they both end up hiding behind the same counter. The guy has what looks like an arrow in his hand, and a biro in the other.
“Stay here,” Bucky says, but the guy just grins.
“You’re the Winter Soldier, right?” he asks. Bucky doesn’t answer. It should be obvious enough from his outfit and the mask across his face.
“Look, there’s a kid over there, you need to get her out,” blondie says, gesturing to the far corner of the room. He’s right; there is a kid, curled up in a ball, looking frozen in terror, crying her eyes out.
“I’m going to get you all out,” Bucky replies.
“Look, you go to her, I’ll cover you,” Blondie says, like he hasn’t even heard Bucky at all. Bucky’s metal hand clenches around the grip of his pistol.
“With what? An arrow and a pen?” Bucky asks, gesturing at Blondie’s hands. Blondie winks, he fucking winks. The arrogant ass civilian is going to get himself fucking killed and Steve’s going to be all understanding and ‘we can’t save everyone, Buck’ and he’ll have his sad face on, and Bucky will have to put up with it, and maybe talk to Sam, because Steve seems determined that Wilson’s Bucky’s counsellor or something now.
That all sounds terrible. That’s not going to happen. Bucky’s going to…
“On three,” Blondie says. Wait, what?
“One. Two. Three.”
“NO!” Bucky shouts, reaching for Blondie, but he’s already gone, darting out from behind the counter and hurling the arrow across the room.
Bucky runs for the girl anyway, shielding himself as best he can with his arm. It’s good to have a bulletproof body part, even if he can only wear it for superheroing or risk exposure.
He makes it to the girl, scoops her up and then turns to see where Blondie is.
Gone.
RIP Blondie, too idiotic to leave it to the professionals.
*
He gets the girl out, because that’s his job, then heads back in to look for the last robber, who’s still missing.
The robber finds him. It’s not Bucky’s finest hour. He hears one footstep, then the sound of a gun being readied.
“I’ll blow your fucking brains out, Soldier,” says the robber.
Bucky calculates the distance. He knows his speed. He knows the speed of a bullet. He knows that the guy will have approximately three shots at him from this distance before Bucky can get to him. At least one of them is bound to hit, probably all three. He’ll survive, but it will be painful.
Then someone appears at the far end of the corridor. Bucky hopes it’s Steve, but he keeps his eyes still to avoid giving the person’s position away. It doesn’t look like Steve’s uniform, though and-
“Hey, Brainiac, remember me?” an unwelcome but familiar voice calls and Bucky realises exactly who it is who’s standing at the far end of the corridor.
“Oh for fuck’s sake,” Bucky calls out. There’s a strange whirring sound as the bank robber turns around, and then he staggers back, something protruding from his shoulder, making him drop the gun.
It’s another fucking arrow.
Bucky rushes the guy, kicks his gun away, then turns to blondie, who’s holding a bow. An actual bow.
“Are you trying to get yourself killed?” Bucky demands, even while he’s tying the robber’s hands behind his back with a zip tie. “What do you think this is? A fun fair? Leave it to the professionals or I’ll shoot you myself.”
Blondie stares at him.
“I just saved your life,” he says.
“I had it covered,” Bucky replies.
“Right. He was going to shoot you.”
“I had it covered.
“A little gratitude would be nice,” Blondie says. “I mean just a ‘thank you for saving my life mysterious stranger’. “ He pauses. “Just a ‘thanks’? Not even thanks?”
Bucky ignores him. He’s had enough today, he really has.
He drags the robber to his feet. The guy’s still making sounds of pain, but he doesn’t seem to be too badly injured, so there’s that. Bucky can escort him outside and leave him for the police.
He pulls the man down the corridor, leaving Blondie behind to fend for himself. As he turns out of the corridor he hears the voice call to him.
“I’m Clint, by the way. In case you were wondering. Clint Barton… and you’re welcome, jackass.”
Bucky ignores him, but the name sticks in his mind.
*
The second time Bucky Barnes sees Clint Barton, Clint Barton does not see him.
He’s walking four dogs, three big hulking things and one tiny puffball that looks like it belongs in a handbag. He’s got a wool hat pulled down over his ears and he seems to be whistling to himself.
Bucky’s not sure why the face stuck in his head. Maybe as a warning for the future: if you see this man, beware. But his face did stick, and so did the name.
There’s no reason for Bucky to dart behind the wall to avoid being seen. Clint Barton has only seen him as the Winter Soldier, there’s no way he’d recognise him as Bucky Barnes. No one in the modern day even knows Bucky Barnes exists. His war record is redacted to hell and back, his name is lost to the ages. James Barnes was an unimportant Sergeant listed as MIA. As far as the world is concerned, these days he’s just another faceless citizen. With the holographic projection over his arm, there's nothing to give him away.
That should be it, really. Clint doesn’t know him, Bucky doesn’t know Clint. They should both just go about their days, never even caring about the other’s existence.
But Bucky follows him.
Clint walks the dogs to the park, does a couple of laps, almost getting dragged off his feet when they all find an interesting smell.
He stumbles over his untied shoelace, his legs get tangled in dog leads, if Bucky were going to trust someone to walk his dog, it would not be Clint Barton. But somehow, along the way, he finds himself smirking at the guy. It’s like watching a one man slapstick show, and the dogs all seem to adore him, tails wagging and happy doggy grins all over their faces.
It’s been an hour before he remembers that he actually has somewhere to be. Steve texts him to ask where he is, and Bucky realises that he’s supposed to be all the way across town.
He leaves Clint propped against a tree, guzzling hot coffee.
*
He is not stalking Clint Barton.
He just happens to like the same coffee shop.
That’s it.
Pure coincidence.
*
How’s he supposed to know that Sam knows Clint? What is the likelihood of that?
But apparently Sam’s dating Clint’s best friend or something.
He’s hanging out in Sam’s living room, drinking the guy’s beer and eating the last of the chocolate biscuits just to piss him off, when the doorbell rings.
“That’ll be Natasha and Clint,” Sam says. Bucky recognises the name Natasha. Sam might have mentioned her once or twice. Or maybe a couple more times than that, but it’s the other name that his mind sticks on.
“Clint?”
“Clint Barton – he’s her best friend. And roommate. You’ll probably like him.”
Bucky blinks and stares at him.
“You okay?”
“I’m fine,” Bucky says.
Sam leaves the room to answer the door and Bucky goes out the fire escape.
*
They end up living together.
Bucky has no idea how that even happened. All he knows is that Clint has no clue who Bucky even is, probably didn’t even know he existed until Sam told him that Bucky needed a place to live.
They don’t talk. Bucky finds himself watching Clint still. The guy’s not an idiot. Bucky can tell that much now. He hides it well, though, but living with him means Bucky picks up a lot of stuff.
And he’s also… maybe… quite attractive.
Bucky wouldn’t really have considered archery as a form of exercise that really built muscle, but apparently he was wrong. The first time he catches Clint as he’s just come out of the shower, the whole of Bucky’s mouth goes dry.
Clint glances his way and Bucky’s not sure what he sees in his face, but apparently it’s not anything Clint wants to see, because he speeds up, almost running to his room.
And Clint hardly ever responds when Bucky talks to him, just ignores him, so Bucky gives up trying.
Then it turns out there’s a reason for that.
“He’s deaf,” Bucky says to Steve and Sam. Sam blinks.
“Yeah… I thought you knew that.”
“No… no I didn’t know that,” Bucky tells him. “You didn’t tell me.”
“I… he wears hearing aids,” Sam says.
“It’s winter,” Bucky grinds out. “He’s been wearing a hat over them.”
“So you didn’t know…” Steve says.
Bucky glares at his beer, because all this time… shit. He has to do something to apologise, even if this is all Sam’s fault.
“Buck? You okay?” Steve asks. “Cause you’re glaring at that beer like it killed your dog.”
“I’m fine,” Bucky says.
*
It takes him all day to fix the doorbell. It requires extensive tutorial videos online and his knowledge of how to wire bombs comes in surprisingly handy. It also needs power tools.
People walk past him in the hall, peering in curiously, but he ignores them, this has to work, because if it doesn’t, then he’s just drilled holes in Clint’s walls for no reason.
It takes all day, but the look of utter shock on Clint’s face is worth it. The huge smile he gets the first time someone else uses the doorbell is more than worth it. It’s sudden and intense, spreading across Clint’s face with a hint of wonder, and Bucky’s chest tightens and he almost chokes on the mouthful of pizza he has.
Clint gets up to open the door and Bucky stares after him, his eyes lingering on the line of his back and the way his ass moves in those jeans.
Well, that was unexpected.
Bucky had known the guy was attractive, had known he was attracted to him.
But that slight fizzing in his chest, that’s not something he was expecting.
It’s Kate, from the archery range, at the door and she and Clint start talking business, leaving Bucky to puzzle over his feelings, and where exactly they came from.
*
“You really didn’t see that coming?” Steve asks later that night, when they’re trying to stop killer robots from taking over the mayor’s office.
“What? And you did?”
“Anyone with eyes could see you were sweet on the guy,” Steve tells him. “Just ask him out or ask him in or something. You used to be good at this.”
“I didn’t used to be over ninety years old with one arm,” Bucky points out.
“Like you’ve ever let that slow you down before.”
Steve will blame himself for weeks for Bucky’s lack of attention, because Bucky’s metal arm is raised to give him the finger when one of the robots gets a shot in and a laser (an actual freaking laser) slices into Bucky’s leg, leaving behind a hole.
Bucky looks down as the burning pain sears into him. The cauterisation from the laser isn’t doing much good, and it’s starting to bleed pretty nastily.
“Well fuck.”
He doesn’t remember much of the journey back to his apartment – which is closer than Steve’s. He remembers getting his key out at the doorway, Steve’s arm under his. He remembers falling forwards over the threshold and hearing Lucky’s worried whine.
Seared clearly into his mind, though, is the image of Clint standing in the doorway to the bathroom, bow in hand, staring at him in disbelief, Steve still in the full Captain America outfit.
This is it. This is Clint finding out, he thinks. Clint’s going to find out who he is. What he’s done. Because everyone knows that the Winter Soldier isn’t really a hero. Everyone knows he used to be on the wrong side.
Fuck he’s not ready for that.
But Clint’s not looking at him accusingly; he’s not looking at him with horror or realisation, or any of that stuff. He’s rushing across the room and he’s offering to help and…
The relief rushes back with the pain and Bucky drifts off again.
He wakes in the morning to Clint drooling on his legs and Lucky squashed up against his side, tail wagging gently, but hopefully.
Clint’s neck’s at a weird angle, and sleeping like that must be killing his back, but it’s strangely nice, hearing him snort in his sleep, seeing the slack line of his mouth. Bucky… he lies there and stares at the ceiling for a minute, then looks back at Clint again. He’s been sitting there all night. Did Steve ask him to? Did Bucky ask him to when he was out of it? Did Clint choose to do it because… because he likes him?
Bucky tells himself not to think about it, but every time he risks a glance at Clint’s snoozing face, his heart clenches a bit until he has to swing himself out of bed just to take his mind off it.
Lucky’s head pulls up, like he needs to check on him, but he settles back into the bed. Clint mutters something about mountain lions, but doesn’t stir.
Bucky starts scrubbing his own blood off the floor, losing himself in the mindless rhythm of it. Anything to keep his mind away from exactly what might be going on in his heart.