Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

‘Going home for Christmas’ always brought images to people’s minds of small, snowy towns, ones with quaint small businesses and red pickup trucks and fresh Christmas tree lots. The kind of place where you’d find friendly neighbors that bring over cookies and wave to you as you shovel your driveway. Like what you’d see in a movie whenever you flicked on the TV around Christmas.

As Bucky headed out into the packed airport terminal, hot with body heat despite the blasting AC and snow he saw as they landed, and was promptly elbowed in the side as he tried to move towards the baggage claim, he couldn’t help but long for that fictional town.

Coming home for the holidays meant a lot of things for Bucky. It meant seeing his parents and sisters and baking cookies and wrapping presents and doing all the traditional holiday things in the picturesque brownstone that had been in his family since 1912. It also, unfortunately, meant traffic and noise and seeing what businesses he’d grown up with that were now replaced with minimalist overpriced boutiques and faux rustic cafes.

And, of course, having to fight his way through a crowd of grumpy strangers to get his luggage for the next week and a half.

He was very glad he’d told his family not to bother meeting him at the airport. He was the last of his four siblings to make it home that year, and it was already less than a week before Christmas, so getting them all to the airport would have required a bit of logistics. It took him twenty minutes on his own to get off the plane, get his luggage, and get outside to hail an overpriced cab.

With his luggage safely in the trunk, he slid into the backseat.

“281 Jefferson Avenue. Brooklyn.” Bucky immediately went to pop in his earbuds but was stopped when the man up front started talking.

“Heading home for the holidays?”

“Yeah.”

“I’m sure your family is excited to see you.”

Great. He was chatty.

“Yeah, they are.”

“Who are you coming home to?”

Well. At least it would pass the time in traffic. Bucky put his earbuds back in his pocket. “Just immediate family. My parents. And my sisters, and their families.”

“They all live around here?”

“My parents do. Everyone else is coming home for the holidays.”

“I’m sure you’re looking forward to seeing them.”

“Yeah, it’ll be good seeing everyone again.”

“You know, my family is all back in Minnesota…”

As the cabbie went on to talk about his family, Bucky nodded politely, occasionally nodding his head, or contributing a thoughtful noise. He was actually kind of glad that it lasted the rest of the way to the brownstone, and that the conversation didn’t come back to him after that. He really didn’t feel like talking about himself right then.

After about twenty minutes that Bucky suspected might have been a bit extended by a couple turns, they were pulling up outside of his childhood home.

“…And remember, you cherish that time you have with your family, understood?”

“Yup. Alright, thanks pal,” Bucky replied with a little half-smile as he paid. Hey, at least the guy was nice.

He grabbed his luggage out of the back and grabbed the handles of each of the suitcases in either hand, carrying it up the short flight of stairs to the front door. Before he could even put them down to knock, the door was being flung open.

“Mom! Bucky’s here!”

“Well bring him in!” his mom’s voice called out from further into the house.

Becca gave Bucky a huge grin and reached out to grab one of his suitcases. “Come on, you can put these in the living room. Mom’s been talking about how she needs you in the kitchen.”

“Thanks.” Bucky let her take one of the suitcases and followed her into the house, immediately greeted by the sound of Christmas music.

He tugged off his shoes and left them by the door before Becca led him upstairs to the living room. She set his suitcase down in the corner opposite the Christmas tree, and Bucky followed suit. The second his arms were free, Becca had her arms around him. Bucky hugged her back immediately.

“I missed you.”

Bucky smiled. “I missed you too.”

After a long moment, Becca pulled away, and his mom was sticking her head around the corner.

“James, dear, would you get the oven? The timer’s about to go off.”

“Sure, mom.” Bucky headed around the corner and into the kitchen, pulling off his gloves as he did so. A girl with cropped short hair and an old muscle tank dusted with flour handed him the oven mitts as he put them on the table.

“I’m Brianna,” she introduced herself as he took them.

“Bucky. You’re Becca and Taylor’s girlfriend, right?”

“Yeah, that’s me. I’d shake your hand, but…” She held up her hands to show the flour on them.

“All good. Nice to meet you, I’ve heard a lot about you.” Bucky didn’t both putting on oven mitts. He just grabbed the tray of cookies with his metal hand and pulled them out of the oven, setting them on the stovetop before taking a step back. He’d barely gotten them on the counter before he found himself in his second hug of the day, this time from his mom.

“Oh, you have no idea how much I’ve missed you.”

“I have some idea, it’s hard to breathe,” he laughed, and his mom pulled away with a quick apology. Then she was squeezing his left arm.

“Alright, show me.”

Well, this was going to happen eventually.

Bucky stepped back, pulled off his gloves, and rolled up his sleeve, exposing the sleek, silver metal of his left arm. He curled his fingers into a fist, relaxed them, then flexed a little, the plates in the arm shifting. Then he held his breath as he waited for the silence of the room to be filled with something, anything.

“Oh James, it’s beautiful.”

Bucky finally exhaled, smiling at his mom. He swore there were tears in her eyes. “Thanks.”

“Oh, I’m so happy for you.” She pulled him back into another hug, this one longer than the last. Bucky accepted it happily.

“Where’s everyone else?” he asked.

“Kate and Oliver are out doing some Christmas shopping, and Taylor is upstairs giving the baby a bath. I think Emily’s still sleeping off her flight. And your father is in the basement wrapping presents.”

“The UK to Brooklyn is a pretty long flight, I don’t blame her.”

Bucky’s mom pulled away. “Oh yes, that reminds me. You probably want to get settled in from your flight.”

“That would be nice,” he admitted.

“Alright, well, Becca, Taylor, Brianna, and Ava are sharing the downstairs bedroom- lord knows how they’re all fitting in there, but I suppose a three-year-old doesn’t take up much space. Kate and Oliver are in Kate’s old room, and Emily’s in her old room as well.”

“Mom’s trying to tell you that we’re all back in our old rooms.”

“Well, yes, but I thought he might like to know where everyone’s staying.”

“I appreciate it.” Bucky offered them one last smile. “I think I’m gonna go lie down for a bit.”

“Of course, honey.”

He waved a little at Brianna. “Nice meeting you.”

“You too.”

With that, he headed to the living room, picked up his suitcases, and headed upstairs to his old room.

He passed the bathroom, where he heard an exasperated, “No, you cannot eat Mr. Ducky. Mr. Ducky won’t want to be your friend if you try to eat him.” This was followed by a loud ‘splash’.

Bucky didn’t stick around to listen in on his sister’s wife arguing with their toddler, instead heading into his room and dropping his suitcases in the corner.

Once he was in, he felt like he could breathe again.

He loved his family, and he’d only spoken to three of them, but after the flight and the crowd and the taxi, he was exhausted.

It was strange being back in his childhood room, just as it was every year. His parents hadn’t changed any of their rooms from the day they left the house. They said that they always wanted them to feel like they had a place that was uniquely theirs to come back to, and that it helped remind them of their children when they were away. They were sentimental like that.

Bucky’s room still had his bookcase filled with fantasy novels, all untouched since last year. There were family pictures on the walls, along with a couple academic certificates. His desk sat in front of the window, a couple boxes of old trophies and awards that used to be on a shelf stacked on top of it.

He’d always meant to find something to do with them. They represented a massive part of the first eighteen years of his life, and he didn’t want to just toss them. But he couldn’t exactly bring them with him when he was deployed, and after those years had gone by, it had taken a long time to be able to find his footing again, and that wouldn’t have been aided by having to take boxes of old trophies with him everywhere. So in the box on his desk they stayed.

There was another box beside those, a much smaller one. ‘PICTURES – BUCKY’ it read. A few were spread out over the table. One was of him and Becca, showing off the fact that they were both missing a tooth. One was of him playing with baby Kate. And one was of him, age seven or eight, with his arm draped around a scrawny kid a year younger than him.

He approached the desk, picking up the picture.

As he did, something deep in his chest ached. He wondered what happened to him. The picture was from, what, twenty-two, twenty-three years ago? And he hadn’t seen Steve since he’d shipped off. He probably had a family now, maybe some kids. He’d probably left Brooklyn a long time ago, too.

Not for the first time, he considered trying to dig up the old number he’d had from over a decade ago. Maybe he’d get lucky, and the number would work, and Steve would remember him. Maybe not.

But he wasn’t the same person he was back then. And he was sure Steve wasn’t, either. That was just how the passage of time worked. Besides, how would he even explain everything that had happened in the last decade since they’d seen each other?

He set the photo back down on the desk. He needed a nap, not to reminisce about people he’d never get back into his life.

With a heavy sigh, he wandered over to the bed, collapsing onto it face-first. He turned his head to the side, staring at the nightstand with an old copy of The Hobbit lying open on it. He dimly thought about how that was going to ruin the spine, but now that he was lying down, all the energy was leaving his body. His eyes closed, and he didn’t fight to try to open them again.

Bucky sat bolt upright, his chest heaving. His clothes were clinging to him with sweat. His heart was racing, and his breath was coming in quick pants.

He had been back there again.

No.

No, he hadn’t. He’d been lying in bed in his childhood home. If he left the room there would be cookies on the kitchen table and everybody would be in the living room, sitting beside the Christmas tree, maybe with a cheesy Christmas movie on the TV. He was on the third floor of a brownstone in Brooklyn, and he was safe.

His breath slowed, and he managed to ground himself enough to push himself to the side of the bed. As he did, he caught a glimpse of his reflection in the mirror mounted to the wardrobe on the opposite side of the room.

He looked like a disaster. His hair was a mess and clinging damp to his forehead, his clothes were rumpled, and, despite the nap he’d just taken, there were faint dark circles under his eyes. His shirt was bunched up around where his arm connected to his shoulder, making it evident that he’d forgotten to take it off. It was clear his nap hadn’t been a very restful one. Fuck.

After a moment he got up to walk over to the mirror, messing with his hair to make it look a little less like he’d just lost a wrestling match with the loch ness monster and more like he’d had a nice, normal bit of sleep. He was grateful he’d cut it short again. The mess would have been a lot more difficult to sort out with his fingers if it were still down to his chin.

The clothes were resolved with a bit of fiddling, and for a long moment, he stared at himself in the mirror.

It was still weird looking at himself in the mirror. Five years in a POW camp with limited access to mirrors and unlimited access to psychological torture that heavily utilized depersonalization tactics would do that to a person. Looking at himself in the mirror felt like looking at a photoshopped image of a celebrity that you were vaguely familiar with most of the filmography of. Recognizable, but different, and with a whole bunch of half-formed memories as an accessory.

It helped, cutting his hair, and getting the arm. It made him feel more like the person he was before he shipped off. It didn’t solve the problem, but it helped.

Cutting through the muffled Christmas music from downstairs were three shouts of variations on, “Ava, no!” followed by a loud ‘thud’ and a toddler’s laughter.

He should probably go see his niece.

With one last glance in the mirror, he headed downstairs into the family room, where Ava was being talked to quietly in the corner by Brianna while Becca and Taylor went about re-piling up a stack of presents.

“…And that’s why we can’t just pull random ribbons. Sometimes that means a big mess, and then someone has to clean up that mess. Do you understand?”

Ava nodded solemnly.

“Alright, now, let’s go help your other mamas clean up the presents.”

“And that means, that means I’ll be on the good list, because helping clean up is good, right? And Santa will see.”

“Well, it might help you stay off the naughty list for pulling them over.”

Ava considered this for a moment, then, clearly deciding that this was sufficient, nodded again and ran over to help stack the presents back up.

“Someone remind me to unpack the ones I brought,” Emily noted from the couch.

“Same,” Bucky spoke up, leaving the staircase. Emily gave him a little wave. Unlike the rest of the family, she’d never been much of a hugger.

“Hey, Buck. Long time no see.”

“Well yeah, you skipped last Christmas,” Bucky reminded her.

“Yeah, because I was not flying in the storms we had.”

“Yeah, fair enough.” Bucky glanced over at Ava, who was very focused on stacking the presents while talking in circles about Santa Claus. “You think she remembers me?”

“Well let’s find out,” Brianna decided, waiting until the last present was piled beside the tree before tapping her on the shoulder. “Peanut, do you remember your Uncle Bucky?”

Ava turned around, looking Bucky up and down. He gave her a little smile and wave, hoping to be a bit less scary.

“You said Uncle Bucky only has one arm.”

Bucky laughed while Taylor flushed pink. “Well now he has another.”

“Did it grow back?”

“N-”

“Yes,” Bucky interrupted, earning himself a glare from Becca that was returned with a grin of his own.

“Whoa!” Ava’s eyes went wide. “How? How?”

“I ate all my veggies.”

Her wide eyes went narrow. “You’re lying.”

“No, I’m not. I ate lots of green veggies, and it made me so healthy my arm grew back! And now it’s all cool and shiny, too.”

Ava examined him suspiciously for a minute before looking over to Becca. “Mama Beh-ah, is that true?”

Becca nodded. “It is. Which is why you should always eat your veggies.”

“Whoa!” Ava took off running to the fridge, Taylor following close behind.

“Hey there, where are you going?”

“I want veggies!”

Bucky was grinning ear-to-ear, looking over to the couch where his mom, dad, and Emily were sitting, all sporting various levels of matching grins. His mom was barely holding back laughter.

“It’s good to see you smile like that again, Buck,” his dad noted, and Bucky’s heart panged a bit painfully. “Hi, by the way.”

“Hi Dad. Wrapping presents go okay?”

His dad held up his right hand, now sporting two baby shark band-aids that he was pretty sure his mom bought for Ava. “Only two papercuts this time.”

“That’s better than last year,” Emily remarked.

“How would you know?” Bucky asked, raising an eyebrow, and Emma shook her head.

“Dad was giving the group chat live updates on the process in the group chat, remember?”

He did not.

“Look, last year’s wrapping paper put up a fight. I can’t be held responsible for its carnage.”

“Sure, Dad.” Emily then had to dodge a shoulder-bump from him.

“Hey, I’m your father, show me some respect.”

“Better than the year he decided to try curling ribbon and nearly took all the skin off his finger,” Becca chimed in.

“And yet, he still insists on wrapping them every year,” his mom chimed in with an eye roll that was slightly undercut by her slight smile.

“Hey, I’m not gonna get better if I don’t practice.”

Taylor returned to the living room area with Ava in her arms, the toddler now taking bites out of a large floret of raw broccoli and very focused on it. “That’s the right attitude, at least. Not sure how I feel about the rest of it.”

“Hey, now. You wouldn’t want unwrapped presents now, would you?”

“I could wrap them, dear.”

“Over my dead body,” his dad refuted with a laugh, and his mom rolled her eyes.

Bucky noticed Brianna watching their conversation like a tennis match from the floor beside the presents and offered her a reassuring smile. “Welcome to the family, Bri. Making fun of Dad’s wrapping skills is a family tradition.”

She smiled back. “I think I’m learning that, yeah.”

Everyone’s phones buzzed within a few seconds of each other, Becca, Bucky, and Emily all pulling theirs out.

“Kate and Oliver are back,” Emily announced as she read the text to the group chat. “’Hands full, need some help here.’ Not it.”

“I’ve got it,” Bucky volunteered. A chorus of ‘thank you’s followed him down the stairs as he went to open the door.

When he did, he was immediately greeted by Kate and Oliver, each with shopping bags in hand, Kate holding her phone at an awkward angle as she attempted to see if there were any replies to her text. When she saw Bucky, her face lit up.

“Bucky!”

“Hey Kate. Hey Oliver. Here, let me-” He took a bag or two from either of them, earning himself sighs of relief.

“Thanks a ton.” Kate glanced up the stairwell. “Hey Dad, where should we put the presents?!”

“Just drop ‘em in the basement! It’s all set up to go, and I just finished mine!” he called back.

“Thanks!” Kate started heading down the stairs. “I know I shouldn’t have done all this shopping so last minute, but with finals the time just got away from me. So of course I end up doing it a week before Christmas, just like always.”

The three of them made their way down to the basement, Oliver and Bucky following Kate as she talked. When they got to the bottom of the stairs, they went about dropping the presents in a heap right beside the folding table set up with wrapping paper, ribbon, tape, scissors, and band-aids.

Once his hands were free, Bucky held out his hand to Oliver to shake. “Nice to officially meet you. I’ve heard a lot about you.” It was hard not to, Kate sent pictures of the two of them to the group chat constantly.

Oliver shook his hand with a little grin. “Nice to meet you too, man. Kate talks about you all the time.”

“Good things, I hope.”

“Oh, definitely. There’s a lot of old childhood stories about you looking out for her. I appreciate that.”

“No problem. I’ve gotta look out for my little sister, right?”

“Definitely.” Oliver pulled his hand back and put it in his pocket.

“Hey, can I talk to Kate for a minute on our own?”

“Yeah, sure thing.” Oliver pulled Kate to his side and leaned up to kiss her head, then headed upstairs.

Once he was gone, Bucky looked his sister up and down, taking in the long, winter skirt, the shoulder-length brown hair, and mascara. “You look…”

“Good?” she asked with a grin.

“I was going to say ‘happy’.”

Her grin softened a bit. “Everyone else said the same thing.”

“How do you feel?”

“Amazing. Like… Like I finally recognize the person in the mirror.”

“Well I’m proud of you.” Bucky wrapped his arms around his sister and pulled her into a tight hug. She hugged him back, just as tightly.

“Thanks, Buck. That means a lot.”

He held her tightly for a moment before pulling away. “Come on, I want to meet that new boyfriend of yours.”

“He’s not that new. It’s been almost a year.”

“Right, your New Year’s kiss turned romance.”

“Look, he kissed me drunk and then sent me about ten texts the next morning falling over himself to apologize and saying how pretty I was under the fireworks and basically being the sweetest guy alive. I couldn’t not date him after that.”

“You know what? That’s understandable,” Bucky laughed, heading up the stairs with Kate by his side. Various greetings rang out as she went around exchanging hugs with the family, and he sat down on the floor next to the corner beside the tree Oliver had settled into.

“Is this the part where you ask what my intentions are with your sister?” Oliver joked as he sat down with him.

“No, this is the part where I tell you that I have about eight years’ worth of combat training, own more knives than I’ve bothered to count, and that I’m not very forgiving to people who hurt my family.”

Oliver laughed, which turned a bit awkward when he saw Bucky’s dead serious expression. It died a second after that.

“I…” he started, but words appeared to fail him.

Bucky’s expression cracked into a slight smile, and Oliver’s body relaxed a bit.

“I’m messing with you. …Kind of. I’ll let you decide which parts I was serious about.” He patted him on the back, then stood up. Oliver seemed a bit nervous, but in his defense, Kate had a history of ending up hurt, and he’d missed the past few guys who’d mistreated her. He had to make up for lost time. Not to mention that this was the first time she’d dated since getting out of a particularly bad one before Bucky had gotten back in touch with his family, and he really didn’t want it to end the same.

Kate had finished saying hello to everyone and took the spot Bucky had just abandoned. Bucky, in turn, found a spot beside Brianna, who was now holding the broccoli-gnawing toddler.

“Why didn’t I get the shovel talk? Am I not as intimidating as a twenty-one-year-old about half a foot shorter than you are?” Brianna teased.

“If you hurt Becca or Taylor, Becca would kill you herself. She doesn’t need my help,” Bucky replied, and Brianna gave a barking laugh.

“And now you know why I love her.”

Bucky grinned and turned his attention back to the family’s conversation.

It was nice being back with his family. He remembered the first year he’d come to Christmas after getting back in touch with his family. At the time, he’d been back in the states for a year and had decided to finally take his therapist’s recommendations to reach out to them. He’d been terrified that they’d be furious with him for not having any communication with them since getting back, unless one counted a notice from the US government informing his next of kin that he’d been found and was alive. He’d spent the entire month of November drafting a message he could send to all the members of his family, typing out paragraphs before deleting them all, analyzing word choice, until finally just sending a simple, ‘Hey. This is Bucky.’ to all of them.

Much to his surprise, he’d gotten near instant replies, and was welcomed back to the family with open arms. They’d given him time and patience and a no-pressure invitation to Christmas, which he’d eventually taken them up on.

That first Christmas he spent with them he was quiet and awkward, still trying to figure out where he fit in with his family after being gone for so long. It was also strange, having so many forcibly repressed memories brought to the surface. But his family had understood. They’d been kind and patient and helped him through the whole thing, giving him space when he needed it and talking him through family activities. And slowly, he began to feel more at home.

This was his third year back with his family, and it felt… right. Like he had a space there. Like he could interject in the conversation at any time and be welcome. There was a toddler to his right, talking to him excitedly about what she’d asked Santa Claus for when they saw him at the store, with Brianna leaning in to whisper in his ear that it had just been an old man with a white beard who was willing to play along. And when Bucky laughed, it felt natural.

It may be a slow process, but after three years, he finally had a family again. The nightmare was far from his mind. Right then, the main focus was his dad telling a long-winded story about the childhood Christmas where he got a whistle that his parents immediately regretted buying him.

It felt like home.

Kate wasn’t the only one who had to do some last-minute shopping.

Bucky had decided that he’d actually see his three-year-old niece before buying her gift. He knew how fast kids changed at that age, and he hadn’t seen her in a year since they’d gone to Brianna’s family’s Thanksgiving that year.

So that meant that the next morning, after shaking off the usual post-nightmare haze and eating a somewhat chaotic and haphazard breakfast with his family, he ended up on the streets of Brooklyn on the hunt for… something. He wasn’t quite sure what he was going to get her yet, it was probably just going to be whatever caught his eye.

Bundled up in a thick jacket, gloves, and a deep red scarf he’d stolen from the coat rack by the door, he set off in the direction of where he remembered the shops being.

When he got to the shops, the crowd had thickened. There were people everywhere, all talking and carrying bags of Christmas shopping. Bucky was also freezing, so of course it made since that the first place that got his attention was a small coffee shop.

Without much of a second thought, he ducked into the shop, joining the line for the register. The chalkboard sign was done up for Christmas, with a snowy cityscape marching along the bottom and detailed snowflakes dancing along the sides. At the top, ‘Merry Christmas’ was written in a fancy script, the red and green letters looking strangely familiar for a reason he couldn’t quite place.

He’d planned on getting a black coffee, simple and hot, but when he got to the front of the line, he found himself placing an order for a peppermint latte instead. What the hell, ‘tis the season and all that.

The sign for the tip jar was done in the same intricate font as the ‘Merry Christmas’. The word ‘TIPS’ was written in green on top of a drawing of a red bauble that approached photorealism.

As he dropped in a couple dollars out of his pockets, he found himself asking, “Hey, who does your signs?”

“Oh, that would be Steve,” the barista said, instantly brightening as she replied. “He does the signs for a lot of these shops around here. He did that mural on the wall, too.”

Bucky looked over to his right, where the wall was painted with another city scape, this time rendered in browns, scarlets, and magentas that fit the warm atmosphere of the shop. Well, they certainly seemed to have a theme.

“He’s great, right? And he’s a super sweet guy.”

“Right,” Bucky answered a bit distantly. “Thanks.”

He stepped off to the side to wait for his latte. The Steve who did the art for the coffee shop definitely couldn’t be the same Steve he was thinking about. The art style was very familiar, if a lot more advanced technically than he remembered, and he had always said that Brooklyn was home...

No, Steve probably left a long time ago. What were the chances that the kid he’d left behind when he was eighteen was still around twelve years later?

And even if he was, what were the chances of running into him? There were two and a half million people in Brooklyn. He wasn’t going to end up running into one specific one of them when just out and about.

The barista called his name for his latte, and he went to collect it. He offered her a little smile and got one in return, along with a ‘happy holidays!’

He headed back onto the street, his latte now in his right hand. He could feel the warmth of it soaking through his thick glove. It was nice. Grounding. It kept him present, despite being surrounded by what felt like a sizable portion of the population of Brooklyn.

The next shop he headed into was an antique toy store. It was set up like a classic toy store, but with all of the toys being old and refurbished. It was quiet, no music playing, and seemed to be run by the old man behind the counter next to the door. He was in the process of fiddling with something wooden.

This store had similar signs to the coffee shop. The shop was sectioned off into various time periods, each labeled with a hand-painted sign hanging from the ceiling, where a neat font declared the decade the toys beneath it were from.

Bucky passed by a doll that seemed to be staring into his soul when he glanced at it and shuddered a bit. “Don’t like that,” he muttered to himself. The doll was labeled ‘1800’s’ and he decided it was definitely haunted. Or cursed. One of those. And if it was, he probably shouldn’t insult it.

“Sorry,” he added, nodding politely at the doll before moving on.

Nothing in the store looked appropriate for a three-year-old, but as he left, he stopped by the old man at the front counter.

“Hey, do you mind if I ask who did the signs for the store?”

The old man looked up, giving him a grin. He had a big white beard and hair down to his chin, and chubby, ruddy cheeks. He supposed it was appropriate that a man who looked like Santa made a living working with toys.

“Oh, that would be the Rogers boy!” he exclaimed brightly. “Such a nice young man. Did them a few years back, even gave me tips on touching them up when I need to. He does the signs for when we do our Santa days too!”

“Santa days?”

The man nodded to a sign behind the counter that said, ‘MEET SANTA – EVERY WEEKEND, DECEMBER 1-24TH’ in a script that was both intricate and easily legible, probably so kids could read it. Then he winked at Bucky.

“What’s more fun than meeting Santa in a toy store? Even grow my beard out for it. Of course, I get kids year-round that get excited to see me. Why not embrace that magic?”

Bucky found himself returning the man’s grin. Something about his joy was contagious. “Well. Enjoy those Santa days.”

“You too, my boy.” The man went back to his toy, which seemed to be some sort of model boat, and Bucky headed back out onto the street.

“The Rogers boy,” he echoed to himself as he stood outside the door. There was no way there were two sign artists who worked on this street who just so happened to have names that lined up with his childhood best friend.

He had to test this theory.

He took off walking down the street, and when he saw a shop with what looked like a hand-painted sign he walked in.

This one seemed to sell things like soaps and teas and fine china. It was a bit crowded, both by people and product displays, and he had to awkwardly make his way through them to get to the counter. He was very grateful for the stopper in his coffee, because otherwise it would have been everywhere.

“Hi, finding everything alright?” the middle-aged woman behind the counter asked.

“Yeah, I just wanted to ask who does your signs?”

“Oh, are you looking for a sign artist?”

“You could say that.” He was literally looking for a sign artist- specifically Steve Rogers.

The woman gave him an odd look but seemed to shrug it off. “Well, I have his business card. I think he’s doing signs for Bits and Baubles down the street. It’s the shop that’s selling all those little knick-knacks. They have some great Christmas stuff; I got a little ceramic tree for my kitchen.”

“That’s great. Can I have his card?”

“Sure thing!” The woman opened a drawer and shuffled some things around, then pulled out a blue business card and handed it over.

‘STEVE ROGERS’, it read. ‘ART, CALLIGRAPHY, SIGNS’. Below that was his contact information.

He must have been staring at it for a bit too long, because the woman spoke up.

“Are you okay, hun?”

“What? Oh, yeah. I’m fine. I just… Thanks.” Bucky stuck the business card in his pocket and headed through the cramped shop and back out onto the street. Once he was outside, he found a clear bench and sat down.

He sat there for a moment before pulling the card back out.

It said right there, ‘Steve Rogers’. How many artists were in the area of Brooklyn where he grew up that were also named ‘Steve Rogers’? It seemed unlikely that there were many. Besides, the art style looked so familiar. It had to be him.

But what if it wasn’t?

Bucky popped the stopper out of his coffee, put the piece of plastic in his pocket, and took a swig as he thought. The peppermint was sharp, and the coffee was somehow still hot, and it helped clear his mind a bit.

‘Bits and Baubles’ she’d said. He could always go there, just to take a look. Maybe he’d be there, and he’d get confirmation. He just needed that last bit of proof.

He stood up and headed down the street, reading all the signs as he went. Eventually, he found the store. ‘Bits and Baubles’. The sign looked newly painted in a familiar hand. It much be a relatively new store.

After staring in the window for a moment and only seeing a display of Christmas decorations on fake, fluffy snow, he opened the door and headed inside. A little bell jingled overhead.

A jaunty Christmas song was playing over the speakers. Mariah Carey’s voice carried through the various displays of decorations for every holiday possible, along with a decent selection of other decorative odds and ends that his grandmother would have found charming.

He slowly made his way through the shop, careful not to bump into and break anything, before reaching the counter. Despite seeming like the kind of shop that would be someone’s retirement project, there was a surprisingly young woman standing at the register.

“Hi! Welcome to Bits and Baubles. Is there anything you’re looking for?”

“Yeah, kind of. Is Steve Rogers working here today?”

“Yeah, he is! Hang on one sec.” The woman disappeared through a curtain behind the register, and he heard her cheerily inform someone, “Hey Steve, you have a visitor!”

“Huh? I’m not expecting…” As the man walked out, he stopped halfway through the doorway, curtain in hand.

For a long while, they stood there, just staring at each other. It was definitely Steve, that was for sure. A scrawny frame, a sharp jaw, and the bluest eyes he’d ever seen. He looked older than his memories of him, but that was to be expected, given that over a decade had passed.

This was Steve. His Steve. The boy that he’d met on the playground in first grade, getting into a fight with bullies twice his size, who Bucky had thrown rocks at until they ran away and he could drag Steve to the nurse’s office. The kid who he’d grown up with, been through thick and thin with. The one who always started the fights he finished. The one who he’d been head over heels for, always looking up to despite being significantly taller than him.

The one who’d kissed him on the day he shipped out.

Bucky blinked. He hadn’t remembered that part. Not until this exact moment. And suddenly he was really reevaluating if this had been a good idea or not.

But it was too late, because then Steve’s eyes were widening, and he was a bit breathlessly asking, “Bucky?”

Bucky raised the hand that wasn’t holding the coffee and gave an awkward little half-salute, half-wave. “Hey, Stevie.”

Steve stared at him for another minute, looking absolutely dumbfounded, before turning to the girl standing behind him. “Anne, I’m going to take a quick break. I’ll be back in a bit.”

“Sure thing,” she said a bit uneasily. They were probably making her uncomfortable, Bucky realized.

“Let’s go outside,” Steve decided, and Bucky nodded. He led the way to the door, and they headed out of the shop. The bell jingled again as they stepped out into the snow.

Once they’d moved away from the door, Steve turned to look at Bucky. And once more, they were just… staring at each other. In silence.

Steve finally broke it after a long moment. “You’re really here.”

“Um. Yeah, I am,” Bucky replied, unsure of where this was going.

He let out a breath that fogged up the air in front of him, and a familiar grin spread across his face. “It’s good to see you, pal.”

Bucky felt a significant amount of tension leave his body. “You too, punk.”

“Jerk.” And then Steve’s arms were around him, and after a second, Bucky was returning the hug, holding him tight. And for a moment, it felt as if no time had passed at all. His body felt so familiar pressed against his own, warm in his arms, and he never wanted to let go.

Eventually, though, Steve pulled away, and Bucky let him go.

“So where have you been?”

“Bit of a loaded question,” he admitted. “A lot’s happened since I last saw you.”

“I mean, same here. It’s been twelve years, some stuff’s gonna happen,” Steve pointed out.

“No, I mean…” he paused, biting the inside of his cheek. “…I really don’t know where I would even begin.” And he wasn’t sure he wanted to.

Steve nodded. “Alright, then let’s start with this. What are you doing back in Brooklyn?”

“Same thing a lotta people are doing. Home for Christmas.”

“Well, welcome back.”

“I’m actually around a few times a year, just for family stuff.”

“Still.” Steve huffed a little laugh. “So why haven’t I seen you around?”

“Well, I kind of didn’t leave the house a lot for a couple years. I’d just stay in the brownstone and only really leave if I absolutely needed to.”

He cocked his head, almost like a puppy. “So what changed?”

“I did.” Bucky shrugged. “Kinda goes back to where I’ve been.”

“Oh yeah, that mysterious ‘where you’ve been’.” Steve laughed. “Hey, I’m just about done with the last couple signs. There’s not much space back there, but you wanna sit with me while I paint? And then we can go… Well I would say get coffee or something, but it looks like you’ve already done that. So maybe lunch?”

“Sounds good to me.”

Steve headed back into the shop, and Bucky followed after him.

“Hey Anne, this is Bucky,” Steve said as they got back to the counter, gesturing to Bucky.

“Oh hey, I’ve heard about you!” she said cheerily.

So Steve had been talking about him, even twelve years later? The thought made Bucky oddly nervous.

He smiled a bit sheepishly. “Good things, I hope.”

“Oh, definitely.”

“He’s going to sit with me in the back while I finish up the last couple signs.”

“Sounds good to me. Have fun!”

Bucky followed Steve behind the counter, giving Anne a little wave as he followed him back.

The room behind the curtain was small, just barely big enough for two chairs and a table. There was a stack of blackboard signs laid out on the table, seemingly labeled with different holidays, along with a box of Posca markers of all different colors. There was a half-finished sign on the table with outlined letters that read, “SALE ITEMS – LAST CHANCE” next to a red marker.

Steve took a seat in one of the chairs, and Bucky took the other. It was pretty cramped, and their knees were pressed side by side under the table. For some reason, the little bit of contact was demanding most of Bucky’s attention.

“So, is this what you’ve been up to since I’ve been gone? Shop signs?” Bucky asked.

Steve uncapped the red Posca marker with his teeth and started working on neatly filling in the outlines he’d made. “Sort of. When high school ended, I knew I didn’t have the money for art school. Especially after Ma…” he trailed off.

“Stevie… I’m really sorry.”

Steve shook his head. “It was twelve years ago. But I knew I didn’t have the money for art school, but I didn’t know what else I could do. 9-5 jobs only let you take so many sick days, and I’m not exactly the picture of health. Never have been. So I started taking commissions online. It was pretty hard for a while, and I kept bouncing between jobs that got sick of putting up with my health issues. I applied for disability, but they decided I wasn’t applicable, so it was pretty difficult for a long time. I mostly assisted with art classes at the Y and did what few commissions I could get. I was pretty damn lucky that I ended up with a very forgiving landlord and roommate. I pretty much owe Ms. Jan and Natasha my life.

“Then I met Sam. He works at the VA here, and he knew a vet who was opening a shop here with his wife, and he showed him my work. Apparently, that convinced them to hire me on to do all the signs for their shop. I ended up doing those and some art for the walls and windows. Then word spread to the rest of the shops, and I ended up doing work for them. It’s been nine years now, and I still do sign work for these shops, but I also do art all over Brooklyn. I’ve even been hired to teach a few classes to teens, which is always fun.”

Bucky listened quietly, sipping his coffee and nodding along. When Steve finished, he spoke up. “It sounds like you’ve got it figured out.”

“Not really. But I’m good at pretending I do.”

“How did you meet Sam? Sounds like a lucky break.”

“It was. I met him through one of the art classes I was assisting with, and then when we had to move apartments, we ended up moving in with him. He’s great.”

“Sounds like it.” Bucky paused. This seemed like the time where he shared what he’d been up to, but following up Steve’s story of artistic success with ‘I shipped off, had the worst three years of my life, then lost an arm and was captured and tortured in a POW camp where they brainwashed me and attempted to make me into a killing machine they could bend to their will’ seemed a bit inappropriate.

“So you still live in Brooklyn?” That worked.

Steve nodded, finishing filling in the letters and then picking up a darker red marker to shade with. “Yeah, never left. What about you? Where are you living these days?”

“Oregon.”

Steve raised an eyebrow. “Oregon?”

“Yeah.” Bucky shrugged. “I took my backpay and bought a tiny, old cabin out in the Oregon forest, pretty far away from anything except a little town nearby. It was pretty beat up when I moved in, but I’ve fixed it up pretty well, and it’s nice. Quiet.”

“Sounds like it.” Steve smiled a bit. “I could definitely see you being happy there. You still read all those fantasy novels? Seems like the perfect place for it.”

“I do, and it is. I have a cat, too. Alpine. She’s never traveled long distances before, so she stays with someone in town for a couple weeks while I’m here. It’s this nice old, retired couple I do handiwork for. They have nothing to do but spoil her rotten whenever she stays with them. She loves them.”

“Got any pictures?”

“Of course I do.” Bucky pulled out his phone and opened his camera roll, picking the folder labeled ‘Alpine’ and pulling up hundreds of pictures of a fluffy white cat with blue eyes. “The vet thinks she’s an Angora. She just kind of… showed up one day and decided she lived with me. Like, ‘hi, I’ve decided to be an indoor cat now and your place seems nice’. And she’s never shown any interest in leaving. Not that I’d ever want her to,” he explained while swiping through the pictures.

Steve looked at the pictures with a huge grin. “She’s amazing.”

“She is, and I love her to death.” Bucky shut off his phone, figuring Steve would need to go back to focusing on his art pretty soon. “I think she’s one of the best things in my life right now.”

“I can see why.” Steve went back to shading the letters. “So, what do you do for work right now?”

“Just odd jobs around town, mainly.” And also receiving payments from the government that were heavily implied to be for his silence about his experiences. They’d never had him sign anything official, but it was made pretty clear that if he started telling everyone what happened that the payments would stop. They probably didn’t want people finding out that there was a formerly brainwashed killing machine just going about his life in the country.

“Sounds like you have a pretty peaceful life. Who woulda thought?” Steve chuckled.

“Not the word I would use. It is quiet, though.”

“Unlike here.”

“Yeah. Here everything moves a million miles an hour at all hours.”

“I love it.”

“…I think I do too.”

“So why are you living in the middle of nowhere?”

Bucky paused, trying to figure out how to phrase what he was going to say next. “…When I got back from… everything that came along with being deployed, I found it pretty hard to spend time around other people. Isolating myself somewhere quiet where I could be mostly alone seemed like the best option.”

After a little bit of silence, Steve gently bumped his shoulder against Bucky’s in a comforting gesture. “What about now?”

“I don’t know,” he admitted. “I miss the… everything here. My family, the city, the people… But I have a life there. People I know, a home I’ve fixed up myself… I chose that life for myself.”

“And if you could choose all over again?”

“I think I’d pick the same thing. It was good for me at the time, and I think it was the best choice. And I think it’s still pretty good for me now, honestly. Just… not all the time.”

Steve nodded, looking up at Bucky. “My number hasn’t changed in twelve years, you know. If you need to not be alone… I might not be able to fly to Oregon, but we can always talk.”

“Thanks, Stevie.” Bucky gave him a soft smile, one that Steve returned.

“No problem. What good are friends if you can’t talk to them?”

“We’re still friends?” Bucky blurted out without thinking.

Steve frowned. “I’m sorry, I didn’t realize-”

“No!” he quickly corrected. “No, I… That means a lot. I just wasn’t expecting that you’d still want to be friends after I fell off the face of the Earth for over a decade.”

“Of course I would. You clearly had your own reasons for that, and I’m not going to doubt that they were good ones. Honestly, I thought you would never talk to me again after…”

The kiss.

The unsaid words hung heavy in the air between them. The memory that Bucky had just recovered, immediately after seeing Steve for the first time. Getting ready to leave, saying goodbye to Steve for what might be the last time. And right before Bucky got in the cab, Steve grabbing his shirt and pulling him into a kiss, one that he was too stunned to return.

”I had to do that, just once.”

And then Steve was turning around and heading inside, leaving Bucky stunned on the sidewalk before he could call out to stop him. He never did reply. He didn’t know how. He just got in that cab and spent the whole ride thinking about texting him. Eventually, it seemed like too much time had passed. There was nothing he could say.

And then he got shipped off, and everything changed.

“I’m sorry.”

Bucky blinked. “What?”

“I’m sorry about that. By the way.”

Bucky shook his head. “I’m not mad. I never was. I just… didn’t know what to say. I was eighteen. I was an idiot.”

“We both were.” Steve gave a huff of a laugh. “I was just always more impulsive than you.”

“Not gonna argue about that,” Bucky laughed. “You still getting all those fights?”

“Actually, yeah. Never really grew out of not liking bullies.” Steve smiled softly at him. “I’m still the same person I was back then. I’m just a little older now.”

“I wish I could say the same,” Bucky replied before he could really think it out.

Steve was silent for a long moment. The quiet between them was filled with slightly muffled Christmas music, Michael Bublé singing about bluebirds in a winter wonderland as Bucky wondered if it was physically possible to vanish through willpower alone.

Steve finally spoke up. “If you don’t want to talk about it, I get it. I’m not going to push it. But if you do… I’m here.”

Bucky let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding and smiled at Steve. “Thanks, Stevie.”

“Of course.”

The silence that settled between them after that was a much more comfortable one. Steve went about working on his signs as Bucky watched, their knees pressed together under the table and Bucky finishing off his latte. At one point he sent a message to the family group chat- “I’ll be a bit late, ran into someone while shopping,” which was definitely one way to say, ‘I stalked an artist because someone said the name ‘Steve’ and it activated me like a sleeper agent’. He got a couple texts back with variations of ‘okay’, then put his phone back in his pocket.

Steve finished up the last sign- a small one reading, “Inquire about gift cards,” and then stood up. “Alright, well, that’s the last of ‘em.”

Bucky stood up as well, watching as Steve started packing up his paint markers.

“So, where do you want to go for lunch?”

Bucky honestly hadn’t thought about it. “Wherever you feel like.”

Steve mused over it for a second as he closed up the marker case and placed it in a messenger bag under the table, which he then grabbed and slung over his shoulder. “We could do that Mexican place down the street.”

“Sounds good to me.” Bucky followed Steve out of the small room and waved at Anne as Steve said goodbye to her. She gave him a cheery grin.

Once they were out of the shop, Bucky looked over at Steve. “Is she always that cheerful?”

“Not sure, but she definitely is at work.”

“Weird for New York City.”

Steve shrugged. “Well I’m not complaining. I’d rather have more happy people around than miserable ones.”

“Yeah, good point.”

Steve led the way to the restaurant, Bucky by his side.

“So, how long are you here for?”

“Just two weeks,” Bucky replied. “I’m here for Christmas, and then I’m heading back a few days before New Year’s.”

“I’ll have to introduce you to Sam and Nat while you’re here. You’re going to love them.”

Bucky’s stomach twisted a little at the thought. He wasn’t particularly good at the whole ‘meeting and interacting with new people’ thing anymore. He could handle basic interactions with grocery store clerks and baristas, but those interactions were all easy. There was a set of clearly defined expectations that he understood and could play along with. On the other hand, actually meeting new people always had a certain degree of unpredictability. He wasn’t really good at the whole ‘small talk’ thing, either. People usually expected you to talk about yourself and your life, and that was a bit of a minefield for him.

“Hey, Buck? You alright?”

Bucky blinked, glancing over at Steve, who was staring at him with a furrowed brow as they walked.

“Yeah, I’m good,” he replied, his voice coming out a bit strained. He cleared his throat and tried again. “I’m fine.” Better.

“You don’t have to meet them if you don’t want to.”

“No, I-” Bucky swallowed. “No, they’re important to you, so of course I want to meet them. I just… I’m kind of out of practice with the whole ‘meeting new people’ thing.”

Steve gently bumped his shoulder against Bucky’s right arm. “Hey, it’s okay. If it helps, they’re not gonna be judgmental or anything. Sam works with vets with PTSD, and Nat… Nat has her own past.”

He nodded, letting out a breath. “Thanks.”

“No problem.” Steve stopped in front of the restaurant, holding the door open for Bucky before following him in. The place was one of those restaurants that looked like it had been there for ages, clearly family-run, not big or polished or high-end, but somehow feeling more comforting because of it. And of course, the menu above the counter was done in Steve’s neat handwriting.

When Steve walked in, the man behind the counter, greeted him enthusiastically in Spanish Bucky couldn’t understand. Steve replied in kind, a bit awkwardly, and the man laughed, saying something else he couldn’t translate that made Steve grin. Then he switched to English as he glanced over at Bucky.

“Who’s this? A date?”

Bucky felt his face go hot and watched as Steve’s ears reddened at the same time.

“No, just a friend,” Steve corrected him a bit too quickly, and the man laughed again.

“Sure, sure. So, what do you want?”

Steve ordered tacos and Bucky got a burrito bowl, figuring he could eat that with a fork and not take off his glove, and then insisted on paying. He may not be rich, but he probably had more financial security than Steve at the moment. Steve fought him over it for a moment, but eventually decided to relent.

Once they’d ordered, they went to sit down at one of the tables.

“I like this place. The owners are great. Back when I was really struggling, I would do their signs for them, and they’d give me free food whenever I came in. They paid me, but they couldn’t pay a lot, so they made up for the difference with food. It helped a lot, actually.”

“It seems like the people around here really like you.”

A smile tugged at Steve’s lips. “Yeah. It’s nice, having this community.”

“I can imagine. I know it’s nice being close enough with the people in the town near my cabin that I can leave Alpine with them.”

“It sounds like they like you too.”

“Yeah, they do. And they trust me. I wasn’t expecting that. I thought I would just be the weird recluse that lives in an old cabin just outside of town, but people were… nice. One of the first times I went into town, I helped a lady carry her groceries when she had her hands full with her kid, and she invited me over for dinner that night. I didn’t take her up on it, but she wasn’t upset, she just told me the invitation was always open.

“It’s a pretty small town, too. Mostly old retirees. There’s just one school for everything from kindergarten to twelfth grade. It’s nice, not overwhelming. And it means that people remember you. You have a place there, even if you’re not always in town.”

Steve nodded along as he spoke, waiting until he was silent for a moment before saying something.

“You seem to really like it there.”

“I do.” Bucky paused. “I miss it here, I really do. But living here now? It would be completely different than living here when I was a kid. I’m a different person now.”

“You seem like the same person to me. Just a little… broodier.”

Bucky smiled softly. “That… actually means a lot. Thanks.”

“If you could do it all over again. Do you think you’d go back? Change what happened to make you a different person?”

“In a heartbeat,” Bucky replied.

Steve nodded. “I… don’t think I’d change what made me who I am now. There’s not much I could change, but either way. I like where I am now. I like my life.”

“…I think I do too,” Bucky replied. “Well, parts of my life. There’re definitely parts I could do without. But the cabin, my family, the town… I like those parts.”

“But you’d still change it if you could?”

“Yeah.” Bucky paused, trying to figure out what to say. “…Look, Steve. I… There’s a lot that’s happened in my life. And a lot of it’s been really fucked up, to put it mildly. I’m not the same person I was when we were kids, and not in the way people just happen to change over time. I-”

Their food came and was placed in front of them, Steve thanking them in Spanish and being replied to with a laugh and quick phrase Bucky couldn’t translate. The employee left, and Steve looked back to Bucky.

“You what?”

Bucky shook his head. “Never mind. Let’s just eat.”

Steve looked like he was about to say something, then changed his mind. “Alright.”

They ate in silence for a little bit, Bucky deeply regretting saying anything. He should have just left it at ‘yeah’ and not elaborated. But this was Steve. His best friend.

No. Steve was his best friend, twelve years ago, before he fucked it up by not talking to him after the kiss. He had his own friends now, and Bucky was just a childhood friend. Still a friend, but probably not on as high of a pedestal as he put him. To Bucky, Steve had been such a huge portion of his life leading up to his deployment, and the person he thought about every day during the three years he was in the army. And after that, whenever he’d reached back for a grounding memory, it was Steve’s face that came to mind- even when he couldn’t remember the name that face belonged to.

The man sitting in front of him had been everything to him for so long, but how much of that was due to the way his life seemed to freeze after those first three years? How much of it had been the fact that the last memory he had of home was the feeling of Steve’s slightly chapped lips against his own?

Steve had a whole life that had happened in the time they’d been apart. He’d made a career for himself, and found great friends, and had an entire life that didn’t involve Bucky. He’d kissed him before he left, but there had been twelve years after that.

To him, Steve was everything- his first real friend, the person who he’d looked up to, the one who’d been by his side through everything.

His first real love.

To Steve, he was probably a senior year crush that eventually drifted into being the friend he thought about occasionally, when he passed by their old school or an alleyway Bucky had dragged him out of after finishing off a fight he’d started. Maybe he saw the soda they always got from the bodega after school on Fridays and smiled to himself, then moved on with his day. Maybe he tried to avoid thinking about him at all, given how things had left off.

Steve was a vital part of who Bucky was. Bucky was probably just a footnote in his story.

“You keep doing that.”

Bucky blinked, pulled back into the present moment to find his plate of food finished off and Steve’s brow furrowed again.

“What?”

“You keep doing that. You kinda… zone out. Like you go somewhere else.”

“Yeah, my therapist is working on that,” Bucky tried to joke, but it seemed to only make Steve more concerned.

“Are you okay? Really okay.”

“Yeah. I’m fine.” Bucky noticed his phone buzzing and grabbed it, thankful for the distraction. It was just a simple text from Emily.

Home when? Mom wants to know

“My mom’s asking when I’ll be home,” Bucky relayed, then was struck by a realization. “Shit, I was supposed to get Ava’s Christmas present.”

“Who’s Ava?”

“My niece. I know I shouldn’t wait until the last minute to get presents, but they change so fast when they’re three.”

“Maybe I can help,” Steve offered. “What does she like?”

“Well, right now she’s convinced broccoli can help you grow back an arm.”

Steve frowned. “What?”

“Long story.” Bucky paused, thinking. “Becca mentioned this morning that she’s been going through a monster truck phase. I know nothing about monster trucks, and you can’t get hot wheels car for a three-year-old. Choking hazards and all that.”

“Well that’s something to go off, at least.”

“Yeah, but not much.” Bucky paused, thinking. “You think they make plush monster trucks?”

“No clue. But there’s a toy store a block away that might sell something she’d like. ‘Miss Abigail’s Toys and Gifts’.”

Bucky nodded, punching it into his phone for directions. “Thanks, I’ll check it out.”

“I-”

“Did the signs for there?”

Steve laughed. “No, actually, but I did the window art for the shop next door.”

“Brooklyn’s most prolific artist, everyone,” Bucky teased.

“Not by a long shot. Maybe the most prolific in a three-block radius.”

“Close enough.” Bucky gathered all his dishes together and placed them at the end of the table before standing up. “I should get going.”

“You still have my number, right?”

“Yeah,” Bucky half-lied. He definitely didn’t have the same phone and contacts he did from before everything went down, but he did have Steve’s business card. “I have a different number now, by the way. I’ll text you?”

“Sounds good to me.” Steve stacked all of his dishes with Bucky’s before standing up as well and heading for the door. Bucky followed behind him.

Steve exchanged goodbyes with the man behind the counter, then stepped outside, holding the door for Bucky again.

“Thanks.”

“No problem.” Steve let the door shut, then pulled Bucky into another hug. Bucky hugged him back without hesitation.

“I missed you,” he let himself admit, his voice quiet.

“I missed you too, Buck.”

They stood like that for a long moment before Steve pulled back. “I’ll let you do your shopping. But don’t forget to text me, I don’t wanna lose you again.” He said it with a laugh, but there was something a bit strained about it.

“You won’t.” Bucky gave him his usual half-wave, half-salute as he turned around to head for the toy store. “I’ll see you around, Stevie.”

“You too, Buck.”

“Merry Christmas!” Bucky called over his shoulder.

“Merry Christmas!”

With that, Bucky kept walking, a little smile on his lips.

Bucky walked through the door an hour later with a paper bag hiding a couple presents: a children’s picture book of monster trucks and a chunky plastic toy one. He was immediately greeted by the sounds of Christmas music and people talking in the kitchen.

He shut the door behind him, hanging up his coat and scarf, then headed down to drop his bag off in the basement. His dad had sourced a number of large cardboard boxes and had them set up in different parts of the room, each with a name sharpied onto them. They were also adorned with little doodles, from a Christmas tree to a bow to little stars.

Bucky found the one with his name on it and placed the bag alongside the other presents he’d brought. His dad had put a little doodle of a wrapped present on it.

He wondered if he should get Steve a Christmas present. What was the gift-giving protocol for someone you were once best friends with who you were now somewhat friends with again after a twelve-year hiatus and kiss you didn’t talk about and severe memory loss and-

No. He needed to breathe.

He’d cross that bridge when he came to it.

Bucky straightened up, taking a deep breath before heading back upstairs.

When he walked into the kitchen, he found a complete disaster.

Ava was sitting at the table, her knees on the chair as she leaned over the table. She seemed to be playing with a series of cookie cutters, all positioned haphazardly on top of a rolled-out sheet of cookie dough. She had a tiny apron on, but that was doing little from preventing her from being covered in flour. There were chunks of dough in her pigtailed hair as well.

The rest of the kitchen was being run by Taylor, Brianna, and his father.

Taylor was trying to clean up a flour-covered counter, wiping away the toddler handprints that decorated it. Spilled sprinkles seemed to be up next. Brianna was sitting beside Ava, trying to make sure she was using the cookie cutters safely and not eating the dough as she went. She also had chunks of it in her hair. And his dad was going back and forth, checking on the oven, greasing pans, and shuffling what appeared to be a real batch of sugar cookies onto a plate.

Bucky stood in the doorway for a moment, just watching the chaos unfold.

Brianna looked up, relief washing over her face. “Ava, look, it’s Uncle Bucky!”

Immediately upon spotting him, Ava sprung out of her seat and ran for Bucky, immediately starting to tell him all about the veggies she’d ate that day and that she was going to get a cool arm like him. As she did, she did a little half-bounce, half-squat that Bucky couldn’t help but grin at. The enthusiasm was adorable.

“Yeah? Sounds like you’re making pretty good progress.”

“Yeah! And, and- And Mama Bee said that it’s gonna take a long time, but- But I can do it!”

Brianna mouthed a quick ‘thank you’ as she began working on containing the mess on the table.

“Yeah?” Bucky knelt down to her level, figuring that his objective right then was to keep her occupied. Not to mention distracted from what seemed like a decoy batch of cookies. “What’s your favorite veggie?”

“Brog-lee!”

“Yeah? Have you been eating a lot of it?”

“Yeah!”

As Ava babbled about how she was going to get a cool arm like her uncle when she was older, he heard someone approaching from behind. He glanced over his shoulder to see Emily, curly brown hair piled in a messy bun atop her head, clad in pajama bottoms and a t-shirt that said “Naughty Nice Don’t Ask”. Despite it being around 3PM, Bucky figured there was a 50/50 chance that whatever was in her mug was caffeinated.

“Emma!” Ava immediately abandoned Bucky and ran over to hug Emily’s leg. Emily immediately put down her mug, scooped Ava up, and placed her on her hip.

“Hey there, Ava.” She ruffled her hair with her free hand. This was immediately followed by her wiping cookie dough off on her pants. “What were you and Buck talking about?”

“Veggies!”

Taylor ducked away from the counter to mutter something in Emily’s ear, and Emily gave her a little nod before turning back to the toddler on her hip.

“Hey Ava, why don’t we let Mama Bee and Mama Taylor do the boring stuff, and we can go play in the bath while the cookies sit in the oven?”

“I wanna watch them put them in!” Ava insisted, and Emily looked over at Taylor and Brianna.

“Alright, you can watch us put them in, but then it’s going to get boring. A bath is probably a lot more fun. We brought your bath toys, remember?”

“Yeah!”

Emily carried Ava over to the oven, letting her watch as the cookies were extracted from the mangled dough, then placed on a cookie sheet and slid into the oven.

“Alright, bath time now?”

“Okay.”

Taylor and Brianna both mouthed versions of ‘thank you’ as Emily carried her out of the room, presumably to the upstairs bathroom.

When she was out, the two of them seemed to relax. Bucky’s dad, on the other hand, was just as busy as ever.

“You know, she used to swear she would never like little kids,” he chuckled. “And look at her now.”

“Isn’t she a teacher now?” Brianna asked.

“Yeah. Third teacher in the family, if you count Becca and me being professors. And Emily teaches kindergarten, too,” Taylor laughed.

“She was the youngest for three years,” Bucky contributed. “And she used to demand that she was the last, too. She liked being the youngest and she didn’t want a little sibling. She would do this little foot stomp, too, and cross her arms, and tell Mom and Dad very seriously that they better not have another kid. She was not happy when Kate was born.”

The memory seemed to be forming as he spoke.

Truth be told, he hadn’t remembered a single thing about Emily’s little lectures until his dad spoke and stirred something in the back of his mind, and the words started flowing out. Details emerging, forming in his mind and on his tongue at the same time.

After he spoke, he found himself holding his breath, almost expecting his dad to contradict him and tell him that none of it ever happened. That it was just a trick of the mind.

But he didn’t. Instead his dad laughed, exclaiming, “Oh, her little foot stomps! She loved doing those. Used them like punctuation. It’s a good thing we didn’t have downstairs neighbors.”

Bucky’s shoulders relaxed.

“Amazing how things change.” Taylor passed Brianna in the kitchen, standing on her toes to place a kiss on her temple as she passed. By his estimates, Taylor was five-foot-nothing, while Brianna was nearly six feet tall. And as she leaned up, a part of his mind flashed back to Steve, standing on his toes to place a kiss on Bucky’s lips.

“I had to do that, just once.”

A firm, but gentle hand gripped his shoulder. “You’re drifting again, Buck,” his dad muttered, low enough that only he could hear it.

“Thanks, Dad,” he muttered back. Then, a little louder, “I’m going to head up to my room.”

“Alright, bud. You know where to find us.”

A smile tugged at the corner of Bucky’s lips. “Thanks.”

As much as Bucky’s appreciated his old room, there were times when it felt both too massive and too tiny all at once.

It wasn’t a large room- it was actually on the smaller side of average. But the space around him felt so… empty. All the items around him once held memories that were now hazy or, worse, stripped from his mind entirely. The box of trophies on his desk was covered in a thick layer of dust, as were a good number of other items.

At the same time, it felt like a cage. Like the walls were going to close in on him at any second, like the ghosts of his past were going to climb into his lungs and smother him.

Opening the window didn’t help much, but at least the circulating cool air in the hot room helped clear his head a bit.

As he stood by the window, staring out at the city below, he found himself wondering what always drew him back here. Not to his family, but to this room, this brownstone. He had the money for a hotel. He could just stay there. But every trip back home, he’d end up spending his nights in his teenage self’s twin bed, rereading a well-worn copy of The Hobbit and casting about for memories he’d mostly given up on retrieving.

It was odd, that hollow nostalgia. Echoes of memories that no longer lived inside him.

He wondered how he was going to explain that all to Steve.

Oh, right. He’d said he’d text him, hadn’t he?

Bucky leaned against the edge of the desk, pulling out his phone and the business card he’d taken earlier. Here went nothing, he supposed.

Hey Stevie. This is Bucky. New number and all that. Hi

He only had to wait for a couple moments before the little ‘typing’ symbol popped up.

Then disappeared.

Then popped up again.

Then disappeared.

It stayed gone for a long minute, then popped up again.

When he got a message, he let out a breath he didn’t know he’d been holding.

Hey Buck! Glad to have your new number :)
I should let you know that Natasha is reading over my shoulder and pretending not to, so conversations may be monitored for best friend reassurance purposes

Bucky smiled a bit at his phone.

Ha, hi Natasha. Nice to informally meet you.

He paused, staring at the blinking cursor. He wanted to make plans, to ask him to get coffee or something. But how exactly did he go about that? And what if Steve thought he was asking him out on a date? Not that he would be strictly opposed to going on a date with Steve, but it would be moving pretty fast, wouldn’t it? And why was the idea of taking Steve out making his heart beat a bit faster?

His phone buzzed again.

So Sam and Nat have NOT stopped asking to meet you since I brought you up. We’re going to go get drinks tomorrow night. Want to come?
No pressure, but they DO really want to meet the mysterious best friend I’ve talked about so much

Bucky felt like his head was spinning, which seemed ridiculous, given the mundane contents of the text. Normally, meeting his friends would’ve been the biggest point of anxiety, but right then he was focused on untangling the knot of implications that came with Steve calling him his best friend and talking about him so much that his new friends wanted to meet him immediately.

Before he could really think about what he was doing, he replied with an agreement. Steve responded with enthusiasm, listing a time and place that Bucky confirmed he’d meet them at.

Thanks, Buck. I’m sure you’ll love them. And I’m sure they’ll love you, too
You have no idea how glad I am that I ran into you :D

Bucky’s face was bright red at that point. He just liked the message and tucked the phone into his pocket, then stood stock still, trying to process not only the meeting, but also that his high-school (and middle school, and elementary school) crush might not have been as gone as he once thought.

The wind blew in a gust of snow that began to melt on the desk, leaving small, clear spots in the dust.