Chapter Text
Bucky will never, he knows, have children of his own. Not the way he is.
He grew up the eldest of four, one of the three girls resting on his hip or climbing up him like a tree, Bucky Bucky Bucky, clamoring for him when he gets in the door after school, curling sleepily in his lap, asking him to spin them around or pick them up to throw them in the air. Babysitting them and a couple of the other little ones on his block. "You're just a natural with kids, James," some of the neighborhood moms would murmur after watching him play with the little ones, the unspoken thought in the curve of their smile: you'll make a great dad someday.
So, yeah, there are regrets.
It would have been nice, he thinks sometimes, to have had that kind of life, that sort of future instead of the one he ended up with. Walking in the door after a day at work and hearing the cry of "Daddy!" as he drops to his knees to receive a milk-sweet embrace and a flurry of sticky kisses. Packing everyone in the car for church on Sundays, patent-leather shoes and pink dresses rustling. Crayon drawings pasted reverently to the fridge door. Sunday dinners with the whole family, listening to the littlest one say grace with a lisp he secretly loves. Late nights rocking a fussy baby till they finally fall asleep, long dark eyelashes resting on cherubic cheeks. Maybe they'd have his eyes but her nose, her smile but his laugh.
But then there was Steve, and then there was the war, and then. And then. And then.
Nowadays it's not something he even thinks of much anymore. There's Natalia, and there's Steve, and there's the team, the world to save, a life in which he's never really secure and rarely home, if you can even call it a home, anymore.
His home's not a place, anyways, it's people. The curve of Steve's smile, the scent of his skin, the call-and-response of "jerk" and "punk". That night in Paris, with Natalia. Just some lost soldier who forgot he ever had a home, he'd told Nat, until you gave me one. She'd flushed and smiled prettily at that, for a half-second, before scrunching up her face and swatting at him playfully. She's so beautiful, and he loves her so much, but in this life, in this line of work, what they've made him and what he's become, there is no happily ever after. There is no place for the white picket fence, no quiet suburban home, no children.
There would be no children.
That's what they'd told her. The serum they'd given her as a reward for successfully completing her training in the Red Room as a Black Widow agent, it enhanced her strength, sped up her healing, made her reflexes faster, her cognitive processes accelerate. It also effectively rendered her sterile, her body rejecting implantation of any fertilized eggs in the lining of her womb. Permanent birth control. Black Widow agents have no need and certainly no time for pregnancy, birth, mothering.
No children.
They'd framed it as a reward, not as a punishment.
Sometimes, she'd find herself sitting on the terrace of a cafe somewhere, idly people-watching under dark sunglasses. The ladies in yoga pants and carefully messy ponytails pushing jog strollers down the street. The ones trying to hold a cellphone conversation and holding a toddler's hand. One with a newborn in a sling curled against her chest, humming softly to it, the entire rest of the world shut out of the mother-and-child bubble she'd created. It was fascinating. She'd observe, and make mental notes, and so what if she wondered what it might be like?
Once, in the grocery store, while its mother was absorbed in selecting condensed soups, a toddler grinned at her and said "Hi!", its blonde hair sticking up every which way. Its chubby hand opened and closed in a wave. "Hi hi hi." Something felt like it crushed in her chest and she said "Hi!" back with a bright smile just as wide, and the baby laughed and she laughed and the tail of it sounded like a sob. It wasn't till the next aisle, where she was pretending to study different brands of spaghetti sauce, that she took several deep breaths to get control of herself.
It was disturbing. Where had that come from?
There would be no children, and that was okay, that was all right, not everyone had children and those people lived their lives just fine, long, fulfilling, happy lives, and they never felt as if anything were missing, not even once.
Steve is pretty sure he's seen a kid or two on TV, or in the park, maybe? On a USO tour when he was handed one or two for a photo op with an adoring mother, and he took it, unthinking, grimacing at it like it might bite him. Chins covered in drool, weird smells, faces red and wrinkled, high-pitched crying and big fat tears streaming down puffy cheeks.
Yeah, 1944 was the last time he'd willingly come within fifteen feet of a child.
Bucky had had sisters - a whirlwind of them, three younger ones, and they were okay, he supposed, for as much as he'd spent time avoiding them - but as an only child, Steve had always felt uneasy around the little ones. Buck was aces with them, though. Suppose he had to be.
The baby in the carrier that had been deposited in the lobby can't be more than a couple weeks old, he figures, but it's hard to tell. It's so tiny. At least, Bucky observes, whoever it was who had left it here wasn't in total disregard of its safety. It looked clean and warm, at least, bundled in a sleeper with little ducks on it interspersed with the words "quack quack quack", accented by a soft-knit yellow hat and booties.
"Are you serious? This is so cliche. Who would even do this." Natasha sounds equal parts irritated and concerned, the question coming off flat.
"I hear you can leave 'em at fire stations nowadays. No harm, no foul," Steve says hopefully, as if he would like to do exactly that, immediately. "Maybe they thought this was a fire station...?"
"Steve, there's a giant damn 'A' on the side of the building and etched into all the glass on the first floor," Bucky hisses. "There's a giant gold-plated sign on the entryway that says 'AVENGERS TOWER' and Tony keeps it all lit up 24 hours a day. There is no fuckin' way."
The baby's face scrunches up and begins fussing, so Bucky leans down and scoops the little squalling bundle out of the carrier and up into his arms, careful to place a hand behind her neck as he moves it. "Ssh shh shh shhh," he hums at the baby, tucking it into the crook of his right arm. Immediately, she starts squirming restlessly and rooting at his chest. "Oh hell," Bucky groans. "I don't suppose they left a bottle...or diapers. Steve, can you-"
Bucky looks over, and Steve is staring at him as if he is cradling a live grenade. He rolls his eyes with a little smirk. "It's a baby, Stevie, not a bomb."
"Well, you never know," Steve huffs nonsensically, and takes a look inside the basket. "Just a single bottle. And this note. Says..." he glances at it, and then he chokes. "BUCKY. Says...it's yours."
Natasha snatches the note from him, her eyes narrowing...and then widening in stunned shock. "Not just his," she whispers. She stares at the paper, shaking her head, her eyebrows furrowed in disbelief. "Ours."
Steve says WHAT at the same time Bucky yelps HOW and the baby, startled, cries even harder.
Project Homebirth File No: 165674392
Place of Birth: Facility 97b
Date of Birth: September 10
Sex: F
Height: 18 inches
Weight: 6lb, 7 oz
Name: EV-1719
Father: Sample E-1745 (Barnes, James Buchanan)
Mother: Sample V-1929 (Romanova, Natalia Alianovna)
Gest: 37w
Apgar: 8
NOTES: Subject appears healthy and normal despite slight prematurity, all vitals strong. Post-natal test screenings have been given clearance to begin at six weeks, wherein subject will be placed with host family thereafter if it is deemed viable to continue with project. Subject is first of five potentials with this specific genetic makeup.
"What do we do with it?"
Bucky turns his head towards her slowly, like he can't believe his ears. "Whaddya mean, what do we do with it? We can't just leave it here."
"We don't have time for this, James-" she has to almost shout, now, to make herself heard over the crying.
"Natalia. I'm not leaving it -" he stops, examining the squalling bundle more closely, "- her, here. She's ours." The words feel weird leaving his mouth. Ours. It circles around in his brain. His and Natalia's. Their baby. Their daughter. He has a daughter. They have a daughter. And they'd said there'd be no children. He suppresses a wild burst of hysterical laughter. "Can you just - Steve, be useful and hand me the goddamn bottle."
The vaguely horrified expression has still not left Steve's face, and he looks as if he is seriously contemplating putting his hands over his ears to muffle the noise. "Uh, here," he says, handing it to Bucky as if it contained a deadly poison. Bucky sighs and snatches it from him, putting it to the baby's lips. Immediately, it stops crying and starts drinking hungrily. As he watches the baby, he can't help but smile at it. Once the bottle is gone, he swings the blanket over his shoulder and shifts the kid up, patting its back lightly to burp.
When he looks up, both Nat and Steve are staring at him, Nat looking panicked and Steve looking uneasy. "Jesus Roosevelt Christ, you two, I swear. It ain't gonna bite ya." The baby burps, and Bucky looks down at her, pleased. "First things first. Kid needs diapers, kid needs formula, kid needs some clothes. 'S gotta happen before we start trying to figure out any more of this mess. C'mon."
She is, of course, unquestionably the most beautiful baby he's ever seen. Despite Steve's insistence that all babies look like Winston Churchill, Bucky thinks she's the most gorgeous thing he's ever set eyes on.
Her eyes are Nat's - big and sea-green and almond-shaped, pretty as a picture. Her mouth, though, even with its little rosebud bow, he's pretty sure that's close enough to his. When no one's looking, he pushes back the yellow knit cap and there's a shock of dark hair underneath it - same colour as his. The nose, well, it's hard to tell, looking like a little button, but he's pretty sure it's Natalia's, too, it looks more aquiline than his does. Except for the hair, he figures she's the spitting image of Natalia, mostly.
When she looks at him serenely and grasps his finger with her tiny hand, it almost takes his breath away. It's love, yeah, okay, full-stop, and he's all in.
Minutes later the three of them stand, staring, in the diaper aisle of the local big-box department store.
"Um," Bucky says intelligently. "Wow." For the first time, he starts to feel a swell of panic himself. There were too many choices, too many options, and what if he made the wrong one? He looks over at the carrier, strapped onto the shopping cart, where the kid was sleeping. Long dark eyelashes on cherubic cheeks. Everything he'd never dared imagine. His daughter.
Steve bites his lip, and looks between several brands of wipes. "Sensitive skin? All-natural? I don't..."
"Cloth...or...disposable...?" Natasha murmurs, assessing the diapering choices before them with all the gravity of a delicate wetworks operation.
Bucky doesn't hesitate before making that call. He remembers what it was like to help his ma with the laundry. "Disposable, for sure. If I never wash another diaper as long as I live, I'll be a happy man."
In the carrier, the baby shifts in her sleep. "She's moving. What do I do?" hisses Nat. Bucky doesn't say anything, just raises his eyebrow at her.
Two hours and an obscene sum of money later (thank God for the Avengers Black credit cards that Tony had insisted upon securing for everyone), Bucky declares them properly outfitted. At least, as far as he knows. Kids were a lot simpler when he was growing up. Now there was all this...stuff you had to buy. Special creams and flame-retardant sheets and developmentally engaging toys and organic disposable diapers and wipe warmers and convertible car seats and baby swings and BPA-free plastic bottles and pacifiers and bouncers and cribs with safety bars and... He looks over at Natalia, who's darting subtle nervous glances around the store and worrying her bottom lip with her teeth, one of her tells that she's close to reaching her breaking point.
"Hey. Tash." She glances over at him, pressing her lips together in a tight line. He tips her a wry grin, filling it with confidence he doesn't exactly feel. He leans in towards her, his voice low. "Listen. 'S gonna be okay. Promise. We'll figure it out." To his relief, she manages to return a wan smile.
"Oh, look at this sweet little one!" a voice in front of them croons. A grey-haired little old lady is leaning over the carrier, looking at the kid. "How precious. What's the little dear's name?"
Bucky blanks out on any and every given name on this earth. Name? He recalls the note that had come with the baby. Name: EV-1719. "Uh, Evie-" he starts, at the same time Natalia blurts out "Rose." The grandmotherly woman tilts her head at them, confused. "Ah...Evelyn Rose," he corrects, and the woman's perplexed expression smoothes back into one of delight.
"Oh, how beautiful. I do love that the classic names are making a comeback. My sister's name was Evelyn." the woman hums, stroking the baby's cheek.
"Mine too," says Bucky, without thinking. "One of 'em, anyways."
The grandmotherly woman strokes the baby's cheek gently. "How old is she?"
"One month today," Natasha says smoothly, and flashes a proud new-mom smile at both her and Bucky. Bucky can't help falling in love with her a little more, at that.
"Evelyn?" hisses Natasha, once they get back into the car.
"Yeah. Evie for short. 'S her name, according to the file. EV-1719." Bucky winks at her and looks back down at the kid. Evie. He can't take his eyes off her. "And it was one of my sisters' names. That part wasn't a lie." Evelyn, he doesn't need to add, had passed back in 1998. Pancreatic cancer.
When Evelyn was a baby, she'd had his ma's blonde hair, like everyone on the Buchanan side. Looked like corn silk. He'd learned to braid it when he was seven and she was three. She'd always sit so patiently for him, and it became one of their favourite things: Bucky getting her ready for school, Evelyn basking in the few minutes of undivided attention from her only brother. Evelyn who'd loved horses and sassafras candy, Evelyn who'd beg him to read to her at night, Evelyn who was the boisterous baby of the family, full of energy and always smiling.
"Evie," he croons at the baby, "Evelyn Rose, yeah." The little girl looks at him, and Bucky swears she smiles.
Nat had always dreamed of a baby named Rose. A perfect, tiny little thing, who she could hold and sing to late at night, lullabies in Russian in an old rocking chair, the warmth and the weight of her a kind of tranquilizer in and of itself. Rose, who she'd teach how to read in six different languages, Rose whose laugh would sound like music, Rose that she'd spend rainy afternoons colouring with. Maybe Rose would have red hair, just like her, or green eyes, just like her. Serious and somber, intense and focused, silly and sweet would be little Rose. Smart as a whip, fierce as a dragon, and a smile as beautiful as the sunrise. These were the daydreams Natasha had kept to herself, way down deep, in her secret heart.
And now there was a baby, and the baby scared the hell out of her. She didn't trust it. Bucky was obviously, irredeemably in love with it, that much was obvious. He didn't stand a chance, especially since the words "it's ours" had left her lips. But that child hadn't spent nine months resting next to her heartbeat, that child wasn't expected nor particularly welcome, that child she had spent most of her life pretending would never happen to her, not ever, and that that was fine.
And yet.
She was gorgeous, that she had to admit. She looked so much like James it was astonishing, like a little clone (minus the three-day stubble). When James was off carefully selecting onesies, she'd brushed back the baby's hat and seen the fine black hair underneath, her suspicions confirmed. Nat had smiled at her even though she was sleeping, leaning in for just a moment to brush a kiss across her forehead. The scent of her was intoxicating - sweet and spicy and warm and delicious.
Mine. Ours. My daughter. I have a daughter. And they said there'd be no children.
"I guess Evelyn Rose will do." Nat cracks a half-smile at Bucky, pretending to be put out, and Bucky grins back at her. God, he loves her so much.
Steve rolls his eyes and puts the car in gear. "And here I thought you guys would have had baby names all taken care of ages ago."
"Hush, you." Nat turns to Evie, who's started fussing again. "Who's mama's pretty girl?"