Chapter Text
It started innocently.
“Yeah, my boyfriend Sam makes the best eggs,” Bucky said Monday morning while making aggressively bad coffee.
Nobody blinked. Not even Yelena, who was halfway through a protein bar and threatening to throw it at Bob if he said one more word about team nutrition.
Then it happened again.
“My boyfriend Sam hates this brand of toothpaste,” Bucky muttered that evening in the locker room, holding up a tube like it had insulted his mother.
Still, no big deal. Just casual possessive gushing. They’d been worse.
But by the next day, it had evolved.
“My boyfriend Sam and I went jogging this morning.”
“My boyfriend Sam is allergic to this kind of detergent.”
“My boyfriend Sam once said ‘don’t touch that, Bucky, you’ll break it,’ and I did, but I was trying to prove a point.”
By the fourth declaration, Bob stood up, walked to the whiteboard in the briefing room, and—without a word—wrote in big block letters:
BUCKY SAID ‘MY BOYFRIEND SAM’ TALLY
He added four hash marks under it.
Yelena stared. “What are you doing?”
“Science,” Bob said solemnly.
Bucky squinted. “Wait, what?”
“Five,” Bob said, adding another tally.
Yelena rolled her eyes so hard it was audible. “God, this is going to be worse than the time you tried to graph his smiles.”
“That was important data,” Bob muttered.
By Wednesday, the tally hit nineteen.
Sam walked into the room, caught sight of it, raised an eyebrow, and said absolutely nothing. But there was a twitch at the corner of his mouth. The tiniest, smuggest little smirk.
Yelena clocked it immediately. “Oh my god. You know.”
“Know what?” Sam asked, radiating fake innocence.
“He’s doing this on purpose.” Yelena rounded on Bucky. “You’re—weaponizing him.”
Bucky had the gall to look confused. “I’m just speaking my truth.”
“Twenty-two,” Bob announced. “And I haven’t even had lunch yet.”
Bucky just smirked
During a mission briefing, while reviewing schematics, Bucky casually dropped:
“If we approach from the south, my boyfriend Sam could provide cover—he’s got the best aim under pressure.”
Sam didn’t look up from his coffee.
Yelena threw her pen at Bucky’s head.
Bob added another tally mark.
Yelena grabbed a different marker and scrawled:
SOMEONE MAKE HIM SHUT UP COUNTER
She added a furious 1.
By Thursday evening, it read:
MY BOYFRIEND SAM: 41
SOMEONE SHUT HIM UP: 12
BOB’S WINS (GUESSING IF HE’LL SAY IT): 7
YELENA’S BLOOD PRESSURE: Immeasurable
By Friday, the board was full.
Yelena was developing a facial twitch. Bob had turned it into a spreadsheet and was tracking usage patterns—“He averages one ‘boyfriend Sam’ every 2.3 hours,” he told Ava, who looked both impressed and terrified.
And Sam?
Sam waited until they were all seated at dinner.
Then, casually, smoothly, he said:
“Hey, has anyone seen my boyfriend Bucky?”
Yelena screamed into her napkin.
Bob dropped his fork and whispered, “It’s spreading.”