Work Text:
His mother is singing softly in Gaelic as she stirs the pot. Steve is sitting at their small rickety table, swinging his feet as he waits impatiently for his mother to serve him his dinner. She looks at him over her shoulder and laughs at the indignant look on his face.
Another stroke against the paper, filling in an eyebrow.
He coughs harshly, and his chest burns and aches. He pants heavily as his mother dabs his forehead with a cold washcloth. Her eyes are empathetic and concerned. His are bleary and tired. The blanket doesn't cover up his feet.
His finger gently rubs against the charcoal, blending it neatly into a shadow.
His head aches and the scrapes on his knees hurt. The boy standing over him laughs, then stops abruptly. Steve turns his head slightly to look up at him from where he's lying on the wet concrete. The boy's face is flushed with anger, but his eyes betray his nerves.
“What do you want?” He asks, trying to sound threatening. Steve follows his gaze to the end of the alleyway. A small figure stands there, chest puffed out, arms crossed, and feet planted firmly apart in what has to be the most convincing power pose Steve has ever seen.
“I want you to quit pickin' on kids that ain't never done anything to anyone,” the figure answered in a thick Brooklyn way, acting all of ten feet tall.
“Why don't you scram, Barnes? I think I hear your little sister callin' you to braid her hair,” the boy sneered, seeming to have almost forgotten Steve. He would’ve believed it, too, if it hadn't been for the foot that was firmly planted into his back.
“Why don't you scram, Douglas? I think I hear your mama callin' you home so she can prissy up yours,” the figure- Barnes, Kyle had called him- retorted, and if Steve hadn't just had his face punched in and knocked to the pavement, he would’ve been properly shocked.
There was the sound of feet pounding the pavement, and then the heavy weight on his back was gone. He heard swears, grunts, and shuffling, the tell-tale sign of a fight, and then quickly retreating footsteps.
“And stay away, Douglas!” A voice called, not too far from his right. Steve rolled over, ready to fend off another punch, but instead, a hand was extended towards him.
“You okay? That doesn't look real good,” Barnes said, his face creased in worry.
“I…” Steve trailed off, awestruck. He took his hand.
A few quick and short strokes, rounding off the edge of the nose.
“Don't worry about me, Steven,” his mother whispered, the shadows under her eyes giving her a haunted look. Her frail and cold fingers clenched tightly around his own, until her grip went slack.
The lines faltered. There was the sound of gentle erasing, then the pencil passing back over the paper.
“I can take care of myself, Buck.”
“That's the thing,” Bucky said, handing him his key. “You don't-”
The pencil snapped.
“Steve?”
His eyes jerked up. Bucky had rolled over to face him, and his eyes were now open and attentive; watching him. “What are you doing up?”
Steve glanced at the window. It was pitch black outside, and deadly silent- not even the usual cheerful singing of the drunks out in the streets.
“I was drawing.”
It's an easy answer; Steve is almost always drawing, and he's obviously got himself set up to do it now. Bucky looks at where his sketchbook lays open in his lap, his hand still hovering over the paper with the broken pencil.
“Can I see?” Bucky asks innocently, and Steve swallows.
“Yeah,” he replies quietly, and gets up from the creaky and dusty chair he'd been sitting in. As he's pushing up off the armrests, his sketchbook slips from his grip and lands in the floor with a loud thwap!
“Sorry,” Steve mutters, before bending down to pick it back up. His joints ache and creak with the movement.
He crosses the room to where Bucky is lying on the couch, wrapped up in a thick and patchy quilt. Bucky takes the sketchbook from him and studies the page; it's a small sketch of their landlady, Mrs. Kellerman, an elderly woman who lives on the floor above them. Steve can't stand to be around her because of his allergies- dust and cat hair.
Eventually, Bucky hands it back to him.
“You should get some sleep,” he says, before rolling back over to his previous position, facing the back of the couch. Steve nods, even though Bucky can’t see him.
“Okay,” he whispers. He goes back to his room, disregarding the broken pencil, and lays his sketchbook on the small table next to his bed. He crawls under the covers, pulling the blankets tight around himself, and reaches over to shut the lamp off. He closes his eyes.
Half an hour later, the lamp switches back on, and Steve reaches towards his nightstand, picking up his sketchbook and sitting up in bed.
He flips it open to his most recent drawing; Bucky, looking over his shoulder with a smile- and a look in his eyes that he only reserves for his best girl.