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Steve was laid out on a towel underneath the beach umbrella with sunblock on and swim trunks and one perfectly chubby baby sleeping on his chest.
Bucky took a picture because the sight was too good to pass up, but somehow since he’d taken the last picture, he’d walked with Natasha and Sam down the beach a bit and come back a while later to two more towels laid out beside Steve’s and two more children curled up sleeping beside him.
“I thought the beach was supposed to be fun for kids,” Sam laughed.
“Looks like fun to me,” Bucky replied, pushing his sunglasses onto his head and pulling out his phone from his pocket. He snapped another picture before Scott inevitably showed up to steal back Cassie, or T’Challa showed up to steal back Azari, or Tony showed up to ask Steve to please keep Morgan.
“Steve,” Natasha whispered as she knelt down on the other side of a curled up Azari. “You have an extraction plan?”
“Shh,” Steve replied in a whisper, never opening his eyes. “I’m busy.”
Natasha smiled and stood back up, sand on her knees as she walked off toward the waves.
Sam followed, but Bucky lingered a moment and bent down, running his fingers in the wisps of baby soft curls around Morgan’s head.
“Don’t you wake her up,” Steve whispered, cracking his eyes open at Bucky.
Bucky smirked. “I’m gonna go swim. If you get relieved of your babysitting duties, feel free to join us.”
Steve gave a half nod and Bucky slid his phone in between the folds of his towel so it would be out of direct sunlight.
“Have fun,” Steve mumbled and closed his eyes again. Bucky imagined Steve was probably back asleep before he had even made it halfway down to the water.
“Make you want some?” Sam asked Bucky as he waded out into the waves to which Bucky’s eyes immediately widened and he shook his head.
“Nooooo,” he laughed. He made it far out enough to easily duck under a wave and get all of his hair wet, forgetting he’d pushed his sunglasses onto his head.
Sam grabbed them as a wave tried to take them off and Bucky came up from the water cursing and splashing around for the things. Sam handed them over with a disappointed look.
Natasha waded closer, no doubt holding her tongue about the sunglasses thing.
“You think this is a sign that Steve maybe wants uh-“ she waved up toward where he was on the sand.
Bucky shrugged. “He hasn’t talked about it.”
“Looks like Cap’s a kid-magnet,” Sam added. “Maybe he doesn’t know how to bring it up with you. You are hard to talk to.”
“The fuck?” Bucky skimmed his hand across the top of the water and sent it all splashing Sam’s direction. “I am not. I. Am. Busy.”
Bucky motioned toward the shield setting up on the beach near Steve to make his point. He had been filling in for Steve more and more lately on their missions.
“Maybe Steve’s getting lonely at home,” Natasha shrugged.
“He could-“ Bucky made a whining noise that wasn’t really dignified enough for someone who regularly wears a Kevlar suit and takes down world threats. “He could just babysit them. I mean, we can’t have a kid. We don’t live kid-friendly lives.”
“What do you think those other parents do? You really think Stark is kid-friendly?”
“He’s figuring it out.” Bucky whined again. He was concerned he was beginning to sound like a child himself.
“I’ve gotta say,” Natasha said as she swiped Bucky’s wet sunglasses and placed them on her own face. “I never imagined the World’s Greatest Threat’s greatest threat would be tiny people in Pampers.”
She peered out of Bucky’s water droplet cover lenses and then propelled herself up out of the waves and onto Bucky’s back and then shoulders.
Bucky just made a slightly put-off noise and then brought his metal hand up to help her balance like she needed any help balancing herself on a man’s shoulders.
“Your sister’s got kids,” Sam commented, actually looking at Natasha, but Bucky knew he wasn’t talking to her. Natasha’s sister wouldn’t have kids even if she could.
“My sister’s kids are grown. She has grandkids. And the youngest one is thirteen.”
“He’s not scared of them once they’re old enough to kill a man,” Natasha responded, bending down over his head to look into Bucky’s scrunched up face.
“Hey, don’t do that,” he warned. “I’m not steady. I’m on sand.”
Natasha sat back up and they all three looked back at Steve. He hadn’t budged from his spot under the umbrella. None of the children had moved either and so they all stood there, letting the waves break at their backs.
“You know, you could just bring up kids casually in conversation. See how he feels about them.” Sam tried.
Bucky looked at him. “What if he thinks that means I want them? What if he takes it all wrong?”
“Then your communication skills need a lot of work.”
“You’ve known him since the Middle Ages,” Natasha reasoned. “Surely he’ll be able to tell how you feel about them.”
Bucky rolled his eyes.
“Cassie,” Natasha mentioned and all of their eyes darted to see Cassie getting up from the towel she had been curled up on.
Down the beach, Hope turned from where she was playing volleyball with some of the others from the team and spotted Cassie. She called to her and the little girl took off toward them, flinging sand up from her feet as she went.
In the distance the other direction, Carol was jumping over waves with Maria and Monica. Thor was with them, Torunn on his back, laughing and splashing in waves as he picked her up and tossed her a distance only for her to swim back and ask for him to do it again.
“Are we getting old?” Sam asked. “Are the Avengers getting old?”
“I mean, maybe?”
Natasha replied. She sounded skeptical.
“I’m gonna stay out of this one. I am young and will be till I’m dead.”
“Which if you pull anymore stunts like you did on Jeju, you may be very soon.”
Bucky cut his eyes at Sam. “We agreed not to talk about it.”
“Noted,” Sam flicked water at the other man. “You’d be a bad example for kids anyway.”
“What’s your excuse, Wilson?”
“For what?”
“Where are your kids? Or your significant other for that matter? You flirt with everyone and take no one out to dinner even. Don’t you want a kids one day? The whole family thing?”
“How can I when I have to constantly take care of your and Steve’s reckless asses?”
Natasha made a noise that told Bucky she agreed. And then the sound of a baby crying far away reached their ears.
They looked to see Steve and Azari both sit up and then within minutes they’d both made it to their feet and were headed toward the water.
Steve had Morgan bouncing in one arm while he reached his other hand down to hold Azari’s. The smaller Maximoff twins showed up just in time to spot Steve and the children and went racing toward them despite Wanda yelling at them to come back and get sunblock on.
Natasha, Sam, and Bucky watched as Steve let go of Azari’s hand to ruffle the Maximoff boys’ hair and send them back to their mother. Morgan’s crying picked up even louder, and little Azari raced for the waves.
Natasha handed Bucky back his sunglasses as she dove under the waves and came up in the shallow area where Azari was charging into the water. She pulled him up into her arms as he shivered and huddled into her side for warmth.
“La manzi abanda kakhulu!” he shrieked.
“English please!” Natasha reminded and the little boy laughed again.
“Cold!”
“It’s not cold!” she tickled his sides and carried him back toward where the group was as Steve caught up with Morgan in his grasp.
“How do I know if this is a swim diaper?” he asked, holding the baby out in front of him.
“You’re asking me?”
“Surely it is, right?”
“Is it reusable?” Sam asked as Steve reached the group. “Like a plasticky fabric?”
“Uh, looks like it.”
“You’re good then.”
Sam reached and snatched Morgan from Steve’s arms, swishing her playfully through the tops of waves until she forgot what she was crying about.
“When did you become a kid expert?”
“When my brother and sister both had handfuls of them,” Sam reminded.
Natasha passed Azari off to Bucky when the child spotted Thor and Torunn a ways off and demanded to be tossed into the waves as well.
Bucky gripped the boy’s slippery sides, reminded him to hold his breath, and tossed him over the waves to the spot beside Steve. He’d barely splashed before Steve swooped him up, told him to hold his breath again, and tossed him back to in front of Bucky.
Natasha had taken Morgan and Sam had joined on tossing the Wakandan prince when Billy and Tommy could be heard laughing and squealing as they made their way into the waves. They had floaties on their arms that meant the waves kept carrying them back before they could reach the depths where the adults were standing.
Maria saw T’Challa and Nakia returning from their walk and followed their gazes to see the three men all tossing Azari back and forth while the child held his arms out for more and more. Maria grabbed Monica’s hand, nodded for Carol to follow, and waved Thor and Torunn over. T’Challa and Nakia made their way up behind the Maximoff twins and swished them up, carrying them out into the higher waves.
By the time everyone had assembled into one large group, their was a working line of Avengers tossing children into waves. Everyone was laughing, even Morgan, who was just watching with Natasha and probably didn’t even know why she was giggling and shrieking along.
*=*=*
Steve flopped face first into bed that night with a groan and then turned his head to look at his husband.
“Do you want me to put more aloe on you?” Bucky offered from where he stood by the bedside setting his alarm.
Steve declined. “It’ll be faded by morning anyway.”
Bucky hesitated, looked at his red-faced idiot of a husband that he loved with every fiber of his being, and swallowed thickly as he set down the phone on the charging dock.
“Steve, do you want kids?”
Steve sat up very quickly and tried to read Bucky’s expression.
“Is today getting to you?” he asked. He held his hand up and felt Bucky’s forehead. “Sun poisoning maybe? Secret skrull swap?”
He moved in closely on his knees to look at Bucky as if trying to discern if he were the real Bucky, but the man pushed him away with a metal hand flat against his face so he had no doubts then.
“I just,” Bucky shrugged as he climbed into bed, Steve moving back to his side to give him space. “You seemed really peaceful and content with them when you were napping. And then you seemed to love playing in the waves with them. I just-“
Steve looked back at Bucky in confusion.
“Buck, you’ve known me my whole life. I wanted that at one point, sure, but now?” he shrugged. “I don’t even know how we would handle a child. I mean, I think we could manage loving them without a problem, but we aren’t the types to get a nanny or whatever Tony and Thor and everyone do. We don’t have parents to watch them. And, like, we live full time lives. Did you know you can’t just leave a toddler at home with a clean litter box and enough food for the weekend?”
Bucky laughed and Steve caught the sound of relief in it.
“Besides, I feel like I’ve been on a four day assignment and all I did was toss children in the water for like an hour or two.”
“It was great for teaching both balance and getting in a good workout without having to be in the gym.”
“It was preferable to the usual routine, but it hasn’t given me some baby fever or anything. You don’t have to worry.”
Steve hesitated and then looked at Bucky concerned. “You weren’t thinking about us having kids, right?”
Bucky laughed fully. “No, no. Just worried about you was all.”
“Well don’t,” Steve assured. “The only crying I wanna hear around here is you whenever you have to wake up in the mornings.”
Bucky rolled his eyes. “And you whenever you watch The Notebook,” he retaliated.
“Or you whenever the coffee maker takes too long.” Steve pulled a face.
“Or you,” Bucky responded, “Whenever you see another Pret a Manger shop go up.”
“Or you whenever Sam gets the upper hand against you in absolutely any way.”
“Hey!” Bucky cried indignantly. “This bed is a Sam-free zone. He is not allowed to be mentioned here.”
Steve laughed. “Point proven, you big baby.”
Steve moved in close to Bucky with a grin and Bucky rolled his eyes, but he let Steve kiss him goodnight anyway.