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Sam walked into the kitchen and then he almost walked straight back out again, because Steve was looking at a cookbook he'd bought specifically because his mom had had it and then speculatively at the oven.
It wasn't that Steve was a bad cook. He was pretty amazing at anything that got put on a stove burner and simmered for four hours, and he was weirdly good at making rice. But baking was a challenge.
By that Sam actually meant Steve was a super-perfectionist asshole who was very upset that he couldn't bake for shit and had once been defeated by "anybody can make these -- Clint can make these" cookies and spent a week sulking about it.
"That's not a hill you want to die on," said Sam, because he was genuinely a good person and a good friend. "Make like Elsa, man, Let it go."
"This cake only has four ingredients," said Steve, sticking his jaw out. "I can handle that."
"No," said Sam. "You know what you can handle? Putting your coat on and walking with me to Angel Food."
"I wanted to make him a cake," said Steve. "His ma always made him a cake."
Sam took a deep breath and did not suggest that Winifred Barnes probably did not have the magical ability to infuse everything she made with the taste of despair and homesickness, to the extent that even Clint Barton's dog would sniff at it and then just look up at Steve like 'why are you trying to murder me this time'. "You know what he'd like more than a cake?" he said instead. "Just a thought, but work with me here, Rogers: I bet JB would like it better if you bought twenty four cupcakes with dye-free organic ingredients and brought him back the ingredient list so he could do his thing" -- his thing, in this case, was check the ingredients against some mysterious, long buried list in his head, of things that would or would not kill Steve -- "and then spend the day with him on the couch, watching movies in your pjs and eating cupcakes."
Steve hesitated. "But--"
"You know they put little toys on top?" said Sam. "My nephew got a little robot ring last time and JB thought it was the illest thing he'd ever seen."
Steve sighed heavily. Steve hated relaxing, but there was nothing Bucky liked more than having Steve curled up beside him, watching something cheerful and uplifting on the television. Steve apparently felt like he didn't deserve it, but then -- Bucky did, his muddled guilt-thinking went, so what was he supposed to do?
Sam had not been previously aware it was possible to cuddle like a martyr, but he'd been over watching it in like, five seconds.
Also, Bucky loved squirreling things away; Sam was always coming across little caches of Jodi's barrettes, or Natasha's hair ties, or buttons, or little carefully wound balls of twine. They were always careful and tidy and small, but Bucky obviously loved them. He would probably lose his shit over a bunch of tiny toys to keep and gloat over.
"Hey," said Sam, more gently, "Let's try it like this. How about for JB's birthday, you let yourself enjoy his company without feeling like you don't deserve it? I think he'd like that. He'd like that a lot."
Steve was tense for a second longer and then slumped all over at once. "Okay," he said.
The lady at Angel Food Bakery had tattoo sleeves that Steve was always trying to look at without being rude about it; he was fascinated by their beauty and how much time they had obviously taken. Not that he'd ever said that out loud; Sam had a feeling Steve felt like if he'd tried he'd say something like "I sure do think your arms are pretty, ma'am" and have to sink into the ground and become one, at last, with the borough of Brooklyn to escape his shame.
She also was 50,000% percent committed to making Steve smile and blush at her, so it was probably just as well Bucky wasn't with them. Bucky had conflicting, inarticulate opinions about people making Steve smile and blush.
"What would you like today?" she said, leaning forward. She had a beautiful chest-piece of Victorian birds holding ribbons and flowers that Steve also admired and tried not to look at, and Sam bit his lip to keep a straight face. "Our special is the gluten free soy free dairy free dye free vanilla bean tapioca cakes with vegan cream cheese frosting. Or," she added with a conspiratorial wink, "we have organic vanilla cake with a egg custard filling and a buttercream frosting."
Steve's eyes went huge, like they always did. "Um."
"We have pink champagne with rose frosting," continued the lady ruthlessly, pointing at probably the prettiest cupcakes Sam had ever seen, pale, golden pink, with the frosting piped on to look like the top was one unfolding rose, with silver and pearl sugar balls balanced delicately on the petals to suggest early morning dew. "The frosting is made with artisanal small-batch rosewater sourced from a small family farm in Portland, Oregon and fresh organic cream. Or, of course, we have devil's food cake with organic, free trade cocoa and free-trade organic dark chocolate glaze."
Steve turned mutely pleading eyes to Sam, who took a step back and raised his hands.
Steve looked back at the lady, and somehow managed to look from under his eyelashes at her, which was kind of a trick, considering he was …. Steve …. and she was approximately five foot nothing. "I just want birthday cupcakes," he said. "For my friend."
The lady eyed him benevolently and reached under the counter. "I actually thought you might come in today." She pulled out a bakery box and set it on the counter, and opened it to reveal twenty four cupcakes, yellow cake, buttercream frosting, with small toys ranging from Captain America's shield to pink robots on top.
Sam and Steve both stared at them, and then at her.
"I guess my grandma dated James Barnes for a while," she said. "She said he really liked her cake recipe."
"Ma'am, I could kiss you," said Steve fervently.
"What's stopping you?" she said. Steve leaned forward and kissed her on the cheek, and she pinched his other cheek. "That will be $78.38, please."
Bucky ate half the cupcakes and slept for like three hours with Steve petting his hair, and Steve was so relaxed Sam was half afraid he was going to melt off the couch and take Bucky with him.
It was pretty great.