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Bucky ( 7:31 AM ): Your chariot awaits, milady.
Steve ( 7:32 AM ): It’s warm enough to ride my bike.
Bucky ( 7:32 AM ): Come on, Steve, I’m already in the driveway.
Bucky ( 7:32 AM ): And I’m pouting. See?
[1 New Picture Message(s)]
Steve ( 7:34 AM ): Fine, but only because I’m sure that ugly mug of yours is killing wildlife at this point.
Bucky ( 7:34 AM ): You sweet talker, you.
“Good morning, Steve,” Bucky cheerfully greeted his best friend in what Steve had once called his Morning Radio Show DJ Voice.
Steve, who was not at all a morning person, scowled and grumbled, “Mornin’, Buck.” He made his usual old man noises as he situated himself and his backpack in the passenger seat of Bucky’s prized ’67 Corvette Sting Ray.
As Steve buckled his seatbelt, Bucky drawled sarcastically, “Oh, yeah, it’s warm enough to ride your bike, that’s why you’re wearin’ a turtleneck.”
“How’re you feelin’?” Steve asked. “You drank like a fish last night.”
Bucky let the painfully obvious deflection pass without protest, backing out of the Rogerses’ driveway and putting the car on the road to school. “Well, a certain best pal of mine poured a gallon of water down my throat before he let me go to bed after driving my drunk ass home,” he answered. “And because of that, I had to get up in the middle of the night to piss like a racehorse and took the opportunity to drink even more water, so I’m nice and hydrated today.”
“And how’re you gonna repay this best pal of yours for bein’ your DD and puttin’ up with your drunken shenanigans?”
“I’m drivin’ ‘im to school right now, ain’t I?”
Steve rolled his eyes. “Turn on the radio, ya jerk.”
“Your wish is my command, punk.”
The local oldies station didn’t have a morning show, so they got through Buddy Holly, the Ronettes, Lesley Gore, the Beach Boys, and most of a Bob Dylan song by the time they pulled into the school parking lot. Steve and Bucky both continued to sing the words of the final song even though the car was turned off, and when they finished they looked at each other, grinning like fools, and Bucky said, “Steve, promise me we’ll always be secret nerds together.”
Blue eyes soft for a moment, Steve said, “I promise,” and then he got out of the car, being sure to lock the door before he shut it behind him.
After hanging his parking permit from the rearview mirror, retrieving his bag from the back shelf, and locking and closing his own door, Bucky came abreast of Steve and slung his arm casually around his best friend’s slender shoulders as they walked toward the cafeteria to hang out until the first bell rang. “Hey, help me study for my econ test?”
“As if you need the help,” Steve snorted. “You’re making all As!”
“Yeah, because I study,” Bucky shot back. “We can’t all be naturally smart.”
“I study!” Steve asserted as if Bucky had insulted him.
“Ha! Calm down, kid.” Bucky ruffled Steve’s hair, grinning broadly when Steve shot him a glare and hastily fixed his honey-blond coif. He didn’t shove Bucky’s arm off, though, so he wasn’t really upset.
“So how much of last night do you remember?” Steve inquired, eyeing Bucky askance. “Aside from when I made you drink all that water, I mean.”
“Things started getting hazy after that shot contest with Stark. A couple more beers and I basically blacked out. I kinda remember talking to Natasha and then later I went looking for you, I think. Did I find you? Or did you find me?”
“You found me,” Steve answered, the tips of his ears inexplicably red when Bucky glanced down at him. Bucky wondered about it but said nothing. “That was when I decided it was time for us to go home.”
“Yeah. Thanks for takin’ care o’ me, bud,” Bucky said.
Steve responded by putting his left arm around Bucky’s waist to give him a brief squeeze. Bucky grinned and they continued on in silence, moving around buildings and through the central courtyard toward the cafeteria.
Inside, they made a beeline for their usual table. Bucky forked over his economics textbook and relevant notes and Steve got right to quizzing him. The two of them were lost in their own world until their friends starting drifting in and pulling them into different conversations.
When the first bell rang, Steve and Bucky parted ways with a hug as they did every day, Bucky checking that Steve had his rescue inhaler (he did) and Steve wishing Bucky good luck on his test.
“See ya at lunch, Steve,” Bucky said.
“See ya,” Steve echoed.
When Steve sat down in the seat across from Bucky at lunch, he was still a little flushed from the exertion of gym class. He fished in his backpack for two brown bags, one bearing Bucky’s name in Steve’s sprawling cursive. Making lunch for Bucky was the tradeoff Steve had insisted on when Bucky had insisted on driving him to school back when he got his license sophomore year.
“Snack Pack, woo-hoo!” Bucky cheered when he peeked into the bag Steve had shoved at him. Steve grinned helplessly at Bucky’s simple pleasure. “Ooh, and a turkey sandwich and a Pink Lady apple. You sure know how to treat a guy right, Rogers.”
Before Steve could reply, Tony Stark plopped down beside him, saying, “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you move that fast, glowworm. I just wanted to congratulate you; you didn’t have to run off like that.”
Bucky rolled his eyes. He didn’t much care for Stark, but the guy had latched on to Steve last year and Steve was too nice to tell him to buzz off, so Bucky tolerated him and the ridiculous nicknames he persisted in calling Steve.
Tony looked at Bucky, dark eyes avid. “Hey, Barnes, have you seen—”
“Tony, don’t!” Steve exclaimed.
“—the ginormous love bite Captain Purity Ring’s hiding under this fashion faux pas?” He gestured at Steve’s turtleneck
Red blazed up Steve’s neck to his hairline. He wouldn’t meet Bucky’s eyes and Bucky was frozen. “Love bite?” Bucky said faintly.
“It’s a good thing I like to check Steve out in the locker room or I might’ve missed it!” Tony declared. “God, I throw the best parties.”
Pepper Potts, senior class president and Tony’s handler/girlfriend, chose that moment to appear and rescue Steve and Bucky from Tony’s manic attention. Clint Barton and Jane Foster, two of their other friends, arrived soon after, engaging Steve and Bucky in separate conversations until the end of lunch.
When the bell rang, Steve and Bucky wordlessly fell into step on their way to the trig class they shared, but they didn’t look at each other and Bucky didn’t touch Steve at all. Steve drew breath to say something a couple of times but in the end stayed mum.
They had to sit alphabetically in trig, which was actually a good thing, since history showed that the two of them could not keep from socializing when they sat next to each other, but today the separation didn’t prevent distraction on Bucky’s part. He was distraught that someone had touched Steve like that, that someone must have kissed Steve, and that that someone wasn’t Bucky himself.
The thing was Bucky was in love with Steve. He had loved him from day one, back in third grade, but for three or four years now, he’d also wanted him. He didn’t want to spend one day apart from Steve; he wanted to share the rest of his life with Steve, his very best friend, the person he held above all others. He wanted to kiss Steve and make love with Steve and laugh and fight with Steve.
God, who had it been? And how could Bucky not have known there was someone Steve had his eye on? They told each other everything!
Except Bucky hadn’t told Steve he had feelings for him, so it only made sense that Steve had kept his romantic inclinations to himself as well.
An even more horrible thought occurred to Bucky: What if it hadn’t been consensual? What if someone had assaulted Steve and he was so scared and traumatized that he hadn’t been able to speak of it? Well, that settled it: Bucky was never drinking again. In fact, he was never going to another party. He and Steve would stay home every night and play pinochle or backgammon and never imbibe anything crazier than ginger ale.
When the bell rang, Bucky, still lost in thought, stayed in his seat. He only emerged from his trance when Steve shook his shoulder and told him he had to get going to athletics or he’d be late. Bucky stood up and glanced at Steve, who was gazing back at him and looking worried.
“Did you take any notes at all?” Steve asked as they exited the classroom together. When Bucky said no, Steve assured him Bucky could copy his. When they stopped at the door to Steve’s art class, which was on the way to the gym for Bucky, Steve said, sounding uncharacteristically tentative, “See you after school?”
Bucky swallowed and replied, “Yeah. Meet you at the car. Bye, Steve.”
“Bye, Buck.”
As he changed into his athletics clothes, Bucky chatted with Sam Wilson and Thor Odinson and tried to empty his head of thought. Thor moved off for practice with the other football players while everyone else went to the weight room. Bucky and Sam spotted for each other and kept up an easy stream of chatter until the end of the period. It helped Bucky keep his mind off Steve and whatever had happened last night.
Later, clean and still a little damp from showering, Bucky wended his way to the parking lot. Steve was leaning against the trunk, his expression morose. Bucky suddenly recalled that someone had given Steve a hickey, possibly in the course of assaulting him. That made him pick up his pace and speed over to his friend.
“Who do I need to kill?” Bucky demanded.
Steve’s expression showed his astonishment. “Kill? What’re you talkin’ about, Bucky?”
Bucky scrambled for the right thing to say. “Look, Steve,” he said, “you don’t ever have to tell me what happened if you don’t want to, but I know someone attacked you and—”
Goddamn it, the knowledge of the crime committed against Steve was really sinking in and Bucky was near tears. He cleared his throat and settled his hands gently on the small rounds of Steve’s infinitesimally uneven shoulders. Steve was looking up at him with obvious confusion and concern, his slender hands rising to loosely clasp Bucky’s forearms.
“Bucky, what’s wrong?” he asked softly. “No one attacked me. What’s goin’ on?”
“Last night,” Bucky managed to spit out before he mastered his emotions enough to continue. “Somebody—somebody hurt you, Steve. I know you don’t wanna talk about it, but all you gotta do is tell me the bastard’s name and I’ll make ‘em pay, Steve, I swear. Or we can go down to the police station so you can make a report. Whatever you wanna do, say the word and I’ll make it happen.”
Steve somehow managed to look touched, sad, and amused at the same time. He said, “Nobody hurt me. It—it wasn’t assault.” He was nearly whispering by the end, his eyes averted from Bucky’s and pink splotching his cheeks.
“Oh.” Bucky was frozen again just like when Tony had first announced the hickey’s existence; he felt like a feather could knock him over. “Then—why didn’t you tell me there was someone you liked? Shit, is that how I found you last night?”
“No, Bucky, you—,” Steve tried to say, but Bucky continued on like an extremely emotional steamroller, “Did I walk in on you and whoever? You coulda said somethin’, man; you know I wouldn’t judge you.”
“Jeez, Buck!” Steve exclaimed, faintly exasperated. “Gimme a moment to explain, huh?”
Bucky buttoned his lip and let his hands slip off Steve’s shoulders, sticking them in his pockets instead.
“Okay, so last night,” Steve started, sounding a little shaky. He lifted his fingers to fiddle with the fabric hiding his marked skin, seemingly unaware he was doing it. “I went around and talked to some people, watched you and Tony do shots, played Mario Kart in the game room with Darcy for a while, and then I needed some air, so I went out to the back garden and sat on one of the benches. Then a bunch of people kinda spilled out of the house all at once, so I got up and started walking down the flower alley.”
The Starks’ three-acre garden was the envy of all the rich snobs of NYC. Mrs. Maria Stark’s pride and joy, it had been featured in countless magazines and other media over the years. One of its most prominent features was the winding, 50-yard corridor of pink bougainvillea supported by a sturdy metal framework that arched up and over to meet an 8-foot-high, white adobe wall.
“I hadn’t gotten very far when I heard you call my name, so I called back and started walking out, but you met me halfway and—” Steve stopped, glancing up at Bucky, and suddenly the memory hit Bucky like a ton of bricks.
Steve was standing in the center of the corridor, illuminated by the orangey glow of the lanterns affixed along the wall on his right. His face was slightly inquisitive and his body language open. He looked so perfect in the fairytale setting, clad in straight leg jeans and a loose-necked, white T-shirt under the halfway-zipped crimson hoodie that Bucky, upon noticing Steve was shivering when they arrived, had doffed and insisted Steve wear.
There would never be a more perfect moment for his confession, Bucky’s drunken mind decided, so he stumbled up to Steve and stared into his eyes and said, “I love you. I wanna marry you.”
“Oh, wow, Bucky, you’re smashed,” Steve answered with an uneasy titter.
Frustrated by Steve’s avoidance, Bucky hauled Steve against his body and bent to press his lips clumsily against Steve’s ear and trail kisses down his jaw and his neck.
“Buck—!”
Nosing aside the soft material of the hoodie, Bucky opened his mouth and affixed his lips to the crook of Steve’s neck, sucking hard and worrying the captured flesh a little with his teeth. Steve gasped, clinging to him, and Bucky couldn’t help but grin. He spent some more time making his mark, but eventually he released Steve and said, “’Kay?”
Steve appeared rather dazed and Bucky felt immensely proud to be the one who put that expression on his face. God, yeah, he was gonna marry Steve. He had to propose right then, in fact. He tried to drop to one knee, lost his balance, and wound up on his back in the dirt, laughing uproariously. Steve’s lovely face appeared in his field of vision, brow furrowed with worry. Bucky smiled and let Steve help him up, and then he draped himself over Steve’s back, nuzzling behind one of his ears and humming in contentment.
“How about we go home?” Steve suggested in a subdued voice.
They should definitely go home, Bucky thought, so he could get Steve in bed and kiss him some more and curl up around him and go to sleep and wake up in the morning to see Steve still there with him. Numerous childhood sleepovers had proven that seeing Steve first thing after waking up was the best way to start the day.
Steve guided Bucky to the Sting Ray, unlocked his door with the keys Bucky had handed over at the beginning of the night, and maneuvered Bucky into the passenger seat, which was no easy feat because Bucky kept trying to pull Steve onto his lap. After successfully extricating himself from Bucky’s octopus arms, Steve got behind the wheel, adjusted the seat, buckled both their seatbelts, started the car, and smoothly pulled away from the curb. Bucky loved seeing Steve drive his car. Tons of people had asked to give her a spin, but Bucky always said no. The Sting Ray was a gift from his grandfather on his 16th birthday and only Bucky and Steve were allowed to drive it and Steve never asked to; Bucky always had to badger him into doing it.
Besotted in more ways than one, Bucky fumbled with the radio knob and managed to turn it on. “—has happened with just one kiss,” Dusty Springfield sang. “I never knew that I could be in love like this/It’s crazy but it’s true/I only want to be with you.”
Before Bucky knew it, Steve had parked in the Barneses’ garage and come around to help Bucky out of the car. Their progress from there to Bucky’s room was slow and occasionally wobbly, but they finally made it and Steve deposited Bucky on his bed before disappearing and reappearing with a tall glass of water that he told Bucky to drink. When he finished that, Steve refilled it and had Bucky down that as well. He seemed about to do it a third time, but Bucky forestalled him by grabbing his wrist and saying, “C’mere,” pulling Steve into the V of his bent legs where he sat on the edge of his bed. Steve had to catch himself on Bucky’s shoulders.
“Love you,” Bucky said into Steve’s sternum, his hands rubbing up and down Steve’s back. “You love me?”
“Yeah, I love you,” Steve whispered, his fingers gently combing through Bucky’s hair. “How about you lie down?”
Bucky did. He wanted Steve to lie down with him, but he fell asleep before he could say so.
“Holy shit,” Bucky muttered to himself. “Holy shit,” he said to Steve, his blue-gray eyes widening. Steve looked so vulnerable and Bucky was so unbelievably happy, but he needed to know what Steve was feeling, so he asked, “You love me?”
Steve nodded.
“Like I love you?”
Steve nodded.
“Will you show me the hickey I gave you when we get to your house?”
Blushing, Steve nodded.
Bucky beamed, leaning down and whispering, “Will you let me give you another one?”
“You’re cruisin’ for a bruisin’, Barnes,” Steve growled, red as a beet.
Laughing, Bucky unlocked Steve’s door before his own and they both got in the car. Feeling merciful, Bucky turned on the radio and they sang along to “California Dreamin’,” “Peggy Sue,” “You Keep Me Hangin’ On,” and “La Bamba” on the way to Steve’s.
When Bucky parked in the driveway, turned the car off, and followed Steve to the front door, Steve asked, “And just what do you think you’re doin’?”
“I’m hopin’ my fiancé’ll let me follow him to his room and kiss his pretty face some more,” Bucky answered, giving Steve his most charming smile.
“Your fiancé?” Steve said incredulously as he unlocked and opened the door. “You never asked if I wanted to marry you!”
Bucky mused on that statement for a moment. “Huh, guess I didn’t. Allow me to rectify that immediately.” He closed the door once they were both in the house, got down on one knee—successfully this time—and took Steve’s hands in his. “I was gonna do this on your birthday, but now’s good, too,” he mentioned.
Steve appeared uncommonly flustered. “Bucky, what’re you— Get up! I didn’t mean—”
“Steve Rogers, I love you. How about we do what we do all the time anyway, just with more kissing and sexing and we both wear rings and live together?” Bucky proposed with a wild grin.
Laughing helplessly, Steve said yes. Then he led Bucky to his bedroom to show off last night’s hickey and let Bucky give him another one, as promised.
Some time later, Steve asked, “Oh, hey, how’d your test go?”
Bucky laughed, cuddling Steve close, and said, “Your pillow talk sucks, Rogers.”
“That’s not the only thing about me that sucks,” Steve said, giving Bucky a significant look.
“Oh, my God, I am gonna marry you so hard,” Bucky averred before enthusiastically kissing Steve again.
“I’m talking about oral sex,” Steve clarified with mock gravity, almost shrieking when Bucky started tickling him for being a smartass.
Telling their families and friends that they were in love and going to get married turned out to be exceedingly anticlimactic. All their responses were variations of duh.
“Well, it’s exciting for us,” Bucky mumbled petulantly after Mrs. Rogers had giggled and said, “Tell me something I don’t know, boys,” before heading off to shower.
“That’s really all that matters, though, right?” Steve reminded him, giving Bucky’s hand a squeeze. “That we’re excited about it?”
Bucky lolled back on the couch and turned his head to look at Steve. “Yeah,” he said. “You and me, Steve. Forget all these jokers; we’ll elope to Vegas, get married by Elvis or somethin’.”
“A fat Elvis in a white jumpsuit?”
“A fat Elvis in a white jumpsuit with a cape.”
“Sounds like a dream come true, Buck.”
-fin-