Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The very first time Bucky met Clint (as himself, not as the Soldier), he thought Clint was a little
odd. Not in a bad way. Just odd. Bucky was passing through the last town before reaching the Barton Farm and spotted Clint in the McDonald’s drive-thru. On a horse.

At least Clint wasn’t boring…?

The second time he met Clint, he decided Clint just had no sense of self preservation, as he was attempting to break into a vending machine with a wire coat hanger of all things. Apparently, his snack had gotten stuck, as did the candy bar he purchased to dislodge the bag of chips. Obviously, the giant warning sign saying not to do that, and to go to a desk and ask for assistance, didn’t apply to Clint, who gave up, picked the lock, and got his food.

Then Clint showed up after a mission taking out a powerful mafia boss involved in all sorts of smuggling: weapons, drugs, even people. And apparently this included exotic animals, as he returned to headquarters with a sedated tiger in the backseat, sleeping peacefully, tongue protruding slightly.

“She was in this tiny cage! She just looked so sad. She reminded me of the big cats the circus had growing up. I couldn’t leave her.” The tiger ended up at a very reputable zoo, and Clint visited her regularly.

So Bucky decided Clint was a harbinger of chaos and was completely insane. He was proven right when Clint asked him to hold a horse’s lead rope while he put new horseshoes on said horse. He had a portable furnace to heat and shape the new shoes and everything. He trimmed and filed the hooves, made horseshoes, and hammered them on.

After that, he quit trying to understand Clint Barton and just accepted that he would be dragged along with Clint’s nonsense.

Which is how Bucky ends up on the Barton Farm, standing in front of a horse. Again.

“I thought you said this was therapy,” he says, dubious.

“It is. Horses are very therapeutic.” Sam has a shit-eating grin, already in the saddle of a reddish horse, but his tense hands make Bucky suspect he has little practical experience with equine therapy.

“I figured we'll let you get comfortable riding before we bring feelings into it. C’mon, it’ll be fun,” Clint cajoles from his own perch on a golden brown horse with a jet black mane and tail. He’s holding a rope attached to a third horse, already saddled and ready to be ridden.

Sam gives him a thumbs up.

So Bucky approaches the horse. “What am I supposed to even do, let it sniff me?” Bucky sticks out his right hand, like he’s greeting a dog.

The horse nudges his hand inquisitively. The nose is soft, save the long, coarse whiskers. It exhales sharply, breath hot and damp. But it isn’t stomping on him, so Bucky decides it doesn’t hate him yet and chances patting its muscular neck. It’s a rich brown, with a sleek black mane and tail.

This close, the horses are bigger than he imagined. He knows, logically, that he could overpower one, but he has to crane his neck to see over the back of the horse he’ll be riding.

It makes him feel small, but in a positive way. He can forget about being enhanced and the Winter Soldier or White Wolf or whatever other mantles have been thrust upon him. See doc? I can define my emotions. His government-mandated therapist isn’t here, but she agreed it was a good idea. Which had been the only excuse Bucky could find to not spend time at the Barton Farm. It was Clint's idea originally. Something about horse therapy and how it had helped Natasha. Natasha, who at the moment is effortlessly steering a horse over jumps and making it look as easy as she makes everything else look.

So he pets the horse a while longer before grabbing the saddle horn and pulling himself up, swinging one leg over the saddle. And he’s on a horse.

He thinks he rode one before, the first time his unit was captured. He had stolen one during his first and only escape attempt.

Germany, and by extension HYDRA, had most of their machinery on the front lines where they’d be seen, but most of their transportation was horses and mules, not gas-powered vehicles. Not that they wanted their enemies to know. So the horses were as far from the fighting as possible. He thinks a horse may have dragged him back to civilization after his fall from the train. But those memories will always be fuzzy, doctors had told him. Head trauma, blood loss, and dipping in and out of consciousness during that time had affected his memories, too, along with the Memory Wipes themselves.

“Hold the reins like this. Loosen your knuckles up a bit and relax your arms.Squeeze with your legs. Seat first, then thighs. And if he doesn’t move, add knees, all the way down your leg until you're using your heels.”

Bucky adjusts his body minutely, putting more weight on the balls of his feet and squeezes.

The horse walks forward.

“Now, turn and face the way you want to turn,” Clint instructs. “That may be enough sometimes to get them to turn. If it's not, you ask ‘louder,’ using the reins. You don’t want to pull the reins, per say, just maintain contact and hold. Shorten the rein on the side you want to turn towards. A horse can only go the way their nose is pointing.”

Bucky walks the horse in large circles with Clint occasionally calling out tips. Mostly “Keep your heels down!”

“To stop, you tighten your abdomen, not your back; relax your lower leg and move your feet forward a bit. Sit deeper in the saddle. If he doesn’t stop, tighten your grip on the reins— that adds some slight pressure and lets him know what you’re asking. If he still doesn’t stop, gently pull the reins towards you. You shouldn’t need much, just an inch or two. All my horses are trained to immediately stop when you say ‘Whoa’ whether they’re being ridden or not, but not every horse is, so it’s important to learn how to make them stop. The other important way to stop is an emergency stop, or one rein stop. It’s helpful if your horse spooks or tries to take off. You just grab one rein, down further towards the nose a bit, and pull it towards your hip. Like I said, a horse can only go where their nose is pointing. The most they can do like this is spin in a circle.” Clint demonstrated, bringing his horse (Cracker Jack, he said the name was) from a run to a spin and finally to a halt. “Emergency brake. I don’t let up until he stops moving, and he makes contact with his nose. Either to your boot, or the stirrup, just something.”

Bucky tries it and the horse is responsive, nosing the toe of his boot.

Natasha passes alongside the fence closest to them.

Clint shouts, “Do a backflip!”

And Bucky shouldn’t be surprised, he really shouldn’t. But Natasha does, landing behind the horse who never slowed. She runs up alongside her to get back on.

“Wanna stay in the arena for a bit or hit the trails? He’s solid either way, and you’re as safe as you can be when working with horses, so he won’t let you get hurt unless something is majorly wrong. At the end of the day, though, horses are still animals and no one can guarantee anything. But he’s bombproof.”

“How can a horse be bombproof?”

Natasha and her horse pull up to a stop next to them. “It means you can shoot an RPG off him and he doesn’t care.”

“What are you doing with your horses?”

“He’s a retired police horse,” Clint says, as if that explains everything instead of creating even more questions. Bucky decides he doesn’t want to know.

Barton and Romanoff are completely convinced the horse will behave, and that’s good enough for him.

“We can leave the pen. I’d like to look around.” The Barton farm is a massive property, sprawling over fifty acres, and Bucky just hasn’t had the time to sweep the entire place yet. It should go faster on horseback.

“Nat, you coming with?” Clint asks.

“Of course I am.”

Clint opens the gate with one hand without dismounting, his horse walking sideways like a crab to help swing the gate open and closed without getting in the way, and Sam follows him through it, on a reddish horse named Cinnamon.

“What’s this horse's name?” Bucky asks as they leave the corral, Natasha and Sam following.

“Samson. He's a Percheron and Quarter Horse cross. He’s built big but sturdy. Good for carrying people who are hauling extra metal. Cinnamon and Cracker Jack are both full blooded Quarter Horses. Cinnamon’s color is called sorrel, or chestnut, and Samson is a bay. Jack is called a buckskin.” Clint’s knowledge and passion for horses is palpable, eyes lighting up at rambling about the horses. He’s got an excited grin just at sharing this with his… friends? Is he friends with Bucky? Or is this some pitying thing?

“What about Nat’s horse?”

“Storm’s an Irish Sport Horse.” Natasha pats the horse’s neck. “They’re athletic and smart, but honest.”

Bucky’s not exactly sure how a horse can be honest, but she’s a pretty grey horse with a dark mane and tail, a sharp contrast to Natasha’s fiery locks. There’s something attention grabbing about the pair, whereas Clint’s horse is much more unassuming.

They enter the woods on an easy, well-established trail. While they ride, Clint and Natasha talk about the horses, the farm, the history of the horse breeds. Bucky thinks Clint has probably forgotten more horse-related knowledge than Bucky will ever learn.

The horses are calm and quiet, clearly knowing this path well. Natasha and Storm periodically veer off the path, and the group catches glimpses of the pair in between the trees. She rejoins them for a bit, looking more alive than she had ever looked in the Red Room.

Clint hasn’t stopped grinning, pointing out different types of plants. It’s clear to Bucky he knows this place well.

They come upon a dead tree fallen across the path. Natasha gives them a confident smirk and her horse runs to it— a canter, Bucky thinks she called it while discussing horse “gaits” or speeds.

Storm halts without warning, turning her body sharply away from the log and nearly throwing Natasha off.

“Nat?” Clint asks. “You okay?”

Natasha sits up straight. “Yeah, we’re good. I don’t know why she balked.”

“Huh. Try again?”

Bucky thinks about the definition of insanity when Natasha approaches the log head on again. And again, the grey mare slams on the brakes. She rears slightly and tosses her head as she backs up.

Natasha dismounts. “What’s wrong?” She pets her neck. She tries leading Storm to the log, but she digs her heels in and refuses to budge. “I don’t know what’s up.”

“I’ll walk her up there. Maybe it’s just a shadow or something.” Clint rides Cracker Jack alongside Storm, escorting her to the log. Something rattles. “Whoa! Back up, back up!”

The horses don’t have to be told twice, anxiously stepping away from the log.

“Rattler,” Clint says. “And he’s huge. Thank you, Stormy.”

It takes Bucky several seconds to spot the rattlesnake, even after it’s been pointed out.

“We’ll just go around. Usually they’ll leave you alone if you leave them alone. Pretty much all the wildlife out here will.”

“What sort of wildlife?” Bucky is intrigued, having grown up where the only wildlife was pigeons and rats the size of purse dogs.

“Coyotes, mostly. We’ve got a bobcat that lives in the woods we see occasionally. Foxes, deer, raccoons. Red-tailed Hawks and Barn Owls. We saw a black bear out here a few years ago.” Natasha talks about this place easily, like this is her home, too.

"We have somewhat of a Wolverine problem,” Clint adds, sounding vaguely annoyed at the thought.

Natasha shakes her head. "Is this about the—"

"Yes, this is about the Thin Mints!" Clint interrupts. "He ate all of them. I don’t even know how he found them all. Nose like a damn bloodhound, I'm telling you."

“Clint. That was seven years ago!”

“Yeah, well, I’m still upset,” he gripes. “Homewrecker.”

“Okay, I'll give you that one,” Natasha concedes. She turns to address Bucky and Sam. “He stole the best horse vet in a hundred miles, the asshole.”

Bucky and Sam are beyond lost, but don’t question it.

The rest of the ride is uneventful, thankfully. The forest is pretty and all, but Bucky is a city boy at heart and can handle only so much potentially hostile wildlife. They walk alongside a stream that cuts through the woods for a while.

“This is where we get our firewood. We use the Percherons for that, too. And in February we can start tapping the maple trees for sap.”

“Is there anything you guys don’t do here?” Bucky finally asks. They have chickens, goats, sheep, horses, rabbits, hay, vegetables, logging, and a few cows… Seasonally they even raise pigs and turkeys.

Clint and Natasha both have to think for a while. “No, I think we dabble in just about everything.” Clint shrugs.

“We only got sheep because someone brought home a sheepdog and decided that meant we needed sheep.”

“She was bored,” Clint insists. “And she’s great at herding!”

“But sheep are dumb,” Natasha argues affectionately.

“But they’re so cute!” Sam sounds appalled at the sheep slander.

“Thank you, Sam.”

“I think the rabbits are my favorite though, so far,” Sam says.

Clint looks at Bucky with that keen glint in his eyes. “What’s your favorite animal we have?”

Bucky thinks about Storm protecting Natasha the way he couldn’t protect Natalia; the quiet peeps of a yellow chick in his metal hand; Natasha’s cat, Liho, aggressively headbutting him for attention; and the rambunctious litter of border collie puppies discovering the world. “I think I like the goats.” They’re full of personality, a bit troublesome. They remind him of Steve. “But the puppies are a close second.”

Clint dramatically grasps his chest like he’s been shot. “You don’t like the horses?! You hate Cracker Jack?! Jail! Jail for Bucky for a thousand years!”

Bucky gives a confused half-laugh. Clint is weird and always says the most unhinged things, and it never fails to throw Bucky for a loop. “Does seventy years with HYDRA count?”

“Bucky, no,” Sam says, looking concerned.

Clint, laughs, thankfully. “Only if my weekend with Loki counts. We can be mind-controlled buddies!”

“Clint, no,” Sam repeats, still looking disturbed.

“Hey, it’s our trauma, we can joke about it however we want,” Clint says, mock defensively. “Right, Bucky?”

Bucky still isn’t entirely sure what was going on, and says as much.

“Okay, so there’s this god named Loki, and he was kinda a dickhead and hijacked my mind for a weekend, and that’s how the Avengers started.”

“That answers exactly none of my questions.”

Natasha sighs. “Norse god tried to take over the world, and only got a few blocks of Manhattan—"

“—and used me to do it,”

“And used Clint to do it,” Natasha nods. “SHIELD decided to do something about it, Fury rounded us up to fix it, and we became the Avengers. Then you and Steve sorta… broke SHIELD.”

“Sorry.”

“Don’t be. It needed to be done.”

“I’m just surprised I didn’t get thawed out for an alien invasion,” Bucky says.

“We had it handled. Although you might have been more subtle.”

“Bucky is about as subtle as a grenade launcher to the face,” Sam interjects.

“And Stark flew a nuke into a wormhole. So I think they’re even.”

They’re quiet for a while, Bucky finding something akin to peace in the horse beneath him and the people around him. It’s different from the down time within Hydra facilities.

“There’s a fork in the trail up ahead. We can take the next left. That path loops pretty close to where we started, so we can give the horses their dinner,” Natasha says. “Later in the year, it’s a great spot to get wild blackberries, if we can get to them before the animals.”

Bucky’s a bit disappointed that they’ll stop soon. He’s gotten used to the creak of leather from the saddle and the steady thud of hooves. The horses are quiet, and there’s something calming about the occasional snort or tail flick. He likes the horses, and he thinks, with time, they'll be his favorite.

Chapter Text

They finish the ride and untack the horses. Clint shows Bucky how to brush them, what tools to use and in what order, while Nat does the same with Sam.

Bucky gently rubs the curry comb, surprised at how much dirt is hidden, and how much loose hair comes out, billowing around them. He spits out a mouthful.

“Yeah, they’re all shedding.” Clint doesn’t sound at all sorry. “And Jack is gonna be shedding the longest; he has Cushing’s.”

Bucky has never heard of it. “What does that mean?”

“Oh, Cushing's disease is a hormone imbalance because the pituitary gland is all screwy. It’s not painful by itself, it just causes them to not shed right, and they tend to lose weight but drink more. His isn’t very severe yet. We’re able to manage it with diet, so he doesn't need meds yet. We just have to watch for skin infections, laminitis, stuff like that, because he’s more prone to them. And maybe shave him once it isn’t so rainy.”

Bucky nods. He didn’t know that Clint was so smart, but he understood what Clint meant. He was good at explaining it to a person who didn’t know the first thing about horses. “So what’s the lamb thing you mentioned? That he might get?”

“Laminitis. It’s inflammation of the inside of the hoof, the stuff between the hoof itself and the foot bones. It’s really painful, so we keep a close eye on him for signs he’s uncomfortable.” Clint runs his hand down the horse’s leg and picks up the foot. “The sole of his foot looks normal, but a horse with chronic laminitis will have physical changes.”

That sounded painful. “But he’s okay now, right?”

“Yeah, for now. We know what to look for, and we do regular bloodwork on him to monitor things. We have a good vet and a farrier we use if a horse needs specialized shoes that’s beyond our knowledge. We can do routine stuff, but laminitis is complicated. Sure would be nice if Logan hadn’t stolen our last vet, but if we really needed him, he’d come out and give us his opinion.” Clint still sounds a bit sore about their regular vet running off, and Bucky deduces that Wolverine must be the code name for this Logan, and not an actual wolverine, which explains some things.

“He?” Bucky asks. The vet running off with Logan or Wolverine or whatever made it sound like they were romantically involved. But Logan was a man’s name. For him to be with another man in that sense… “That's an option?”

Clint freezes like a deer in headlights, realizing he just outed two people he considers friends who also happen to be incredibly dangerous and the type who engage in recreational murder. “Right, well. Uh, yeah. Yeah, it's an option. Lotta people aren't straight, and it's getting more acceptable. Especially compared to your time. Gay marriage even just got made legal.”

Bucky lights up. “Wait, really? It's… allowed? Like men can just… hold hands with other men? Publicly?”

“Eh, there’s always ignorant assholes. But it’s better in most places.”

Natasha goes inside the tack room and comes out with a bag of horse cookies, giving a few to Storm. She offers a handful to Bucky and Sam. “Just hold your hand out flat so he doesn’t bite your fingers on accident. And if you stick around, we’ll bring you to a Pride event. Tony always goes all out.”

Bucky does as instructed, surprised at how gentle such massive creatures can be. Samson must enjoy the treat, because he nudges Bucky’s hand, exhaling warm, moist air over his bare skin as he sniffs for another treat. “Pride?”

“Well, it started as a bunch of riots. And now it’s a party. Not sure when that changed. Or why.” Clint shrugs.

“Because after the riots, there were marches to fight for rights, and we got together to honor those that came before. And as things got better, it became a happier event,” Natasha explains. “Oh, and businesses realized that they could make money marketing to queer people and acting like allies.”

Sam stares. “Do you just know everything about everything?”

Natasha gives that alarmingly innocent smile. “Yes, thank you. I do, actually.” She doesn’t, that much Bucky remembers. But oh, can she act like it. “Just ask your third grade teacher. Mrs. Stephenson, right? I bet she still remembers Baby Puppy. You know, that stuffed dog you took to school hidden in your backpack until you were…” She pauses, pretending to think. “Eleven, right?”

Sam looks more and more horrified as she talks. “You scare me. You’re an evil lady, you know that?”

She looks flattered. “Aw, thank you,” she says sweetly, as if Sam paid her a sincere compliment.

Clint shows them how to lead a horse safely next before Natasha can terrorize Sam more. “Traditionally, pretty much everything is done from the left side. That’s the side you use to mount and dismount, and that’s the side you stand on for most things. But it’s just that: tradition. Which is dumb, so our horses are trained to accept being haltered and tacked up and led from both sides.”

“They can tell the difference?” Sam asks. “Like if you only do stuff on the left side, it doesn’t carry over to them letting you do it from the right side?”

“Sometimes. Horses are simultaneously really smart and really dumb. A steady horse might not care. But an anxious or high strung or inexperienced horse may care. But a well-rounded horse should be okay with both.”

“How come?”

“Well, in the real world, there might not be room to mount or dismount or lead on the ‘correct’ side.”

That makes sense, and Bucky nods. He finds he likes listening to Clint talk horses.

They walk the horses back into their grassy pens. Bucky figures there’s a specific word for it, because there seems to be a special word for everything horse related; he just doesn’t know what it is.

“Where did you get all these horses, anyway?” Bucky asks Clint and Natasha.

“A lot are rehomes. People selling. We picked up a few at auction. We sometimes get cheap horses with issues. We fix them up and sometimes keep, sometimes pass them on to a home that’s a better fit long term. We’ve bred a few of our own, and Storm was imported from Europe. And Samson can’t be a mounted patrol horse anymore, it’s too hard on him considering his age—” Natasha explains ways they’ve acquired the herd.

“And he committed treason,” Clint interrupts.

“—but he still has so much to offer a rider. As long as he enjoys working— and can do it comfortably— he’ll be ridden,” Natasha finishes.

“He— what?” Bucky stares.

“Kidding. Samson didn’t commit treason. Misdemeanors only.”

“Oh.” Bucky still tended to miss jokes. “So what about when he can’t work anymore?” Bucky is thinking about when HYDRA’s “assets” were no longer useful enough to justify the resources it took to “maintain” them.

“He retires. No work, no concerns. We’ve got most of our old retirees in a pen together since the younger horses get on their nerves or try to bully them away from the feeders. Most old horses need extra care. More feed, special kinds so they get enough nutrients, and soaked so it’s easy to eat. Sometimes an old horse that can’t carry an adult can comfortably carry kids. The old ones are nice to teach people how to handle horses because they’re calm and experienced, and they appreciate the extra attention. We take them on walks rather than rides so they still get time with us.”

Bucky nods, appreciating that the old horses aren’t forgotten about. He didn’t really expect the same guy who rescued a tiger to abandon animals that had outlived their use, but still.

“How’d you get into horses, anyway?” It’s Sam’s turn to ask.

“Circus. I did a lot of mounted archery and stunt riding. Horses… saved me. So I taught Nat to ride. And we ended up teaching a few SHIELD agents. So then we had to bring the rest of the Avengers out. Then we started working with the X-Men, so they started coming by…” Clint explains how a simple farm turned into a place of healing.

It was nice, if a bit idealistic.

Bucky stays for dinner, somewhat unwillingly, coerced with promises of steak and chocolate cake. He ends up across from Clint at the dinner table, Natasha to his right, covering his weaker side. Not that he thinks there's any real threat here. But still.

A dog, Lucky, visits everyone, hopefully gazing at forks loaded with steak and potatoes. Clint shoos him away. “No begging. No. You know better. And the vet said no more table scraps.” But Clint slips him a piece of steak anyway, and Lucky perks up.

He wags his tail at Bucky, hoping to con him out of his food.

“Wow, Clint. Feed your dog,” Natasha deadpans.

Bucky chuckles. “Yeah, he's so unloved.” In truth, Lucky is quite possibly the most loved creature Bucky has ever seen, besides the horses.

Sam cracks next and gives Lucky a small piece of steak, so Bucky follows suit.

He sits next to Natasha, tail swishing hopefully and giving her a pleading look. Natasha stares right back, immune to his big, brown eyes. “Absolutely not.”

Lucky whines.

“I said no. It's not good for you.”

Lucky sighs dramatically and begins to slowly limp out of the room.

“Oh, you faker,” Natasha scoffs.

The dinner is strangely normal, or at least what Bucky assumes is normal. It's been a while since he had a normal family dinner.

Bucky offers to help clean up afterwards and is put to work washing dishes in the kitchen while Clint tries to find room in the fridge for leftovers, saying something about “Being a master at Tetris.” Bucky doesn't question that, either.

Natasha dries dishes and puts them away. Bucky keeps an eye on her to figure out where things go. He likes the Bartons’ farm, and he wouldn't mind spending more time here.

“So… movie?” Clint asks.

Honestly, Bucky is tired of socializing, and he's more sore than he thought possible. He's active. How is riding a horse for a few hours enough to leave his legs feeling like jello?

But Clint looks so hopeful, and he doesn’t always have the need to fill any silence with pointless chatter. Clint is tolerable. Same with Natasha. And a begrudging part of him can admit that, yes, he even likes Sam.

So Bucky sighs. “Yeah, alright.”

Clint beams, and Bucky goes breathless like he’s been punched in the stomach. For a moment it’s like staring at the sky for the first time after a decade in cryo.

Yeah, he can stay for dinner and a movie if it gets Clint to smile like that.

Movie night apparently includes puppies, too. They all carry the puppies inside from the outdoor yard, and Clint sets up baby gates to confine the puppies while they run amok in the living room. The puppies make way to the toys scattered across the floor.

Bucky sits between Clint and the arm of the sofa, Natasha on Clint’s other side and Sam on the end.

Sam scoops up one of the puppies that had wandered away from the pack to chew on his toes. The puppy enjoys the attention, being redirected to a soft chew toy when he playfully nips Sam’s hands too hard.

Bucky eats some popcorn when it's offered to him, enjoying the butter and salt, and pets the puppies as they run by the couch. He's wholly unsurprised that Clint is making them watch an animated retelling of the story of Robin Hood where he’s portrayed by a fox, but Bucky is surprised by how much he enjoys the film. He's almost disappointed when the movie ends. Almost.

They round up the puppies, now much calmer after playing with each other inside for the duration of the movie. They take them back outside, to a small fenced yard.

“They don’t sleep outside, do they?” Bucky asks, slightly concerned. What if it gets cold? Or a puppy escapes?

“No, no. They sleep inside. But they’re old enough to start housetraining. And the best way to train them is taking them outside often enough to avoid accidents inside, and then praise them when they get it right. People are a lot like dogs: you can’t just yell at them when they mess up and expect them to know what you want. They learn best when you reward the behaviors you want to see.”

One of the puppies squats, and Bucky thinks Clint has a brief bout of insanity.

“That’s right! Good job!” He gives the puppy a dog biscuit. “You’re so smart! Who’s the best puppy? You are!” The puppy bounces around at that, delighted with the impromptu party.

Natasha and Sam do the same, petting the puppy and gushing over how perfect it is. “I remember trying to housebreak my first puppy I got as a kid. I begged and begged for a puppy for Christmas. And she was great, until she needed to be let out at two in the morning in December. And on school nights. And in the rain.” Sam picks up one of the puppies. “I’d do it all over again for one more day with her.”

Clint looks sympathetic. “What was her name?”

“Alli. It was short for Alligator.” Sam smiles fondly. “She was a yellow lab.”

“Cute. I bet she was a good girl,” Clint says understandingly.

Sam picks up the wriggling Border Collie and holds her to his chest. She wiggles and squirms and tries to bite his face. He’s reluctant to put her in Clint's room with Oreo and her siblings so they can sleep.

Natal— no, Natasha points down the hall. “Spare rooms are that way.” The door to her room has a woodburnt sign with her name on it in cursive and her hourglass symbol below it.

The guest rooms are open, a few beds made.

Bucky tries laying on the bed and finds it uncomfortably soft, even though it’s been years since he was last under HYDRA’s thumb. The idea of using furniture, like a real person, is still difficult. He can fake it, like sitting at the table and couch with everyone for a family dinner and movie night, but that’s exhausting and he doesn’t have the energy for that right now. He sleeps better anyway when he knows he’s following the rules. When he’s not doing anything that would have earned him a beating a few years prior.

He drags the blankets and pillow to the floor. He’s at least able to allow himself to use bedding now. He got over that mental block in his first shitty apartment in Bucharest. It was drafty and miserable, and he learned to allow himself to use blankets quickly. He packs himself into the corner where he can easily see both the door and the window, giving himself a clear exit. Should he move the dresser in front of the door? No, that might make Clint mad. Or sad, which is arguably worse. It would mean Bucky didn’t feel safe here. Which is true, but he’s keeping a tight lid on it.

Despite being in a new location, the day has exhausted him, and Bucky actually manages to fall asleep within a reasonable timeframe.

His rest rapidly devolves into nightmares. Because screw him, right universe? Because heaven forbid he actually gets a night of rest.

He wakes up with a twisted scream in his throat. The fingernails on his right hand have left indentations in his palm.

The downside to being surrounded by traumatized assassins is he can't hide the battle fatigue. PTSD, his therapist said it's called now.

The upside is no one does anything stupid, like shake him awake, because everyone knows better. They all come into his room, unable to give him the dignity of pretending the nightmare never happened. At least they don't say anything about him sleeping on the floor.

He blinks several times as he fully wakes up. He can't even pretend he's fine, but he doesn't want to deal with people. He lays down, back towards them. “I'm fine. Go back to bed.”

Natasha and Sam reluctantly leave, knowing he's stubborn and he means it. Pestering him about his nightmares won't lead anyway tonight. Clint hovers, Lucky standing behind him, either trying to out-stubborn him (it won't work) or he doesn't know Bucky means it.

Bucky rolls over, half a snarl on his face. “Would you leave me alone already?”

“You can come hang out in my room. If you… uh, don't want to be alone.” Clint rubs the back of his neck nervously, and at Bucky's blank stare rushes to continue. “I won't make it weird!”

“You make everything weird,” Bucky points out, too confused to stay in a bad mood.

“Yeah, probably. It's the ‘tism,” Clint tries to joke. “Look, I'll leave you alone if you want, but I was already awake. So you wouldn't be bothering me if that's what you're worried about. You'd be doing me a favor by keeping me company, really.”

“You're a really bad liar, Barton.” Bucky sits up. “But fine. What were you doing that was more important than sleeping?”

“Checking on Nadia,” Clint says.

“Another assassin you imported from Russia?” Bucky guesses.

“Close. That tiger I found. That's what the zoo called her. She's out of quarantine and is on display. The zoo has cameras and Tony hacked into their security system so I can watch her.”

“You're watching a tiger. At a zoo.”

“There's official animal cams online, but I like mine better.”

Bucky decides he can tolerate Clint's company, especially if it includes Lucky.

Bucky follows Clint to his room, which is simultaneously bare and utterly chaotic. His bed is unmade and covered in dog hair, his laundry basket is overflowing, and there's three dirty mugs half full of old coffee and an empty bowl and spoon on the bedside table and dresser. But there's a purple pin board of photos and notes and postcards, along with several partially completed to-do lists and such.

“Sorry about the mess.” Clint's face is red as he realizes how messy his room really is. He kicks a pair of sweatpants under his bed, as if that will magically make his bedroom presentable and make him look like a functional human being. It doesn't. But it's not like Bucky minds. He's been in worse places.

Lucky jumps up on the bed and paws the blankets into a pile as a nest. He lays down, somehow taking up half the bed. Clint and Bucky have to squeeze together. Clint opens a beat-up laptop covered in stickers. There's a camera feed open of a tiger sprawled out in a man-made cave with a dirt floor.

“It's a good zoo. They do a lot of conservation work. And most zoo animals aren't taken from the wild. The ones that are wouldn't survive in the wild for one reason or another,” Clint says. He finds himself self-conscious, that perhaps Bucky remembers zoos from the 40s (he doesn’t) and thinks Clint condones keeping animals or people in cages (he doesn’t).

The tiger stretches and sits up slightly to lick a massive front paw a few times before flopping back down. It's not the most riveting thing Bucky has seen, but there's something calming about the big cat resting.

Clint cycles through the animal cams he has saved.

They watch an eagle sitting in its nest for a while before switching to a room of sleeping puppies.

“Any particular reason you picked animal cams as a distraction?” Bucky asks as Clint searches through the video feeds, likely looking for a specific animal, or one where the animal is actually doing something.

“Why not?” Clint shrugs. “Everyone likes cute animals.” That was true enough, but Clint’s answer seemed too generic to be sincere. He stops at a fox.

Bucky doesn't pry, but he’s curious. The fox in his enclosure scampers up a ramp to a platform in a tree, changes his mind, and scurries back down.

“Why does the zoo have a fox anyway? They're everywhere, aren’t they?”

“Oh, he was being kept illegally as a pet. And surprise! Wild animals don't make good pets. He’s too friendly around humans to live in the wild, so now he's there. Because people are stupid.” Something in Clint's voice feels like he's taking this deeply personal, as if one person trying to keep a fox as a pet had somehow hurt him personally.

“Didn't know you cared so much about laws…” Bucky remarks dryly, knowing Clint views most laws as suggestions at best.

“I don’t care about the laws themselves,” Clint corrects. “I care about people raising animals in abusive conditions and then taking them away from their family and everything they’ve known to be used for someone’s entertainment like they're just a toy that can be thrown out when they're too much trouble to justify keeping them around for some rich asshole to show off. They killed his mom and sold the kits as pets.”

Oh.

So Clint is the fox.

Bucky just listens awkwardly to Clint being uncharacteristically vulnerable. It seems that Clint has no idea that he identifies with the fox.

Bucky isn't sure how to respond, what reaction Clint is looking for. He listens through until Clint stops for breath. “But the fox is safe now, though.”

“Yeah, he's one of the lucky ones. So many aren't,” Clint says, thinking of brothers and coyotes that chew their own leg off to escape traps.

“Sucks that we can't save them all.”

Clint just nods, lost in thought, staring at the computer screen but not seeing the fox gleefully rolling in the dirt. Lucky puts his head on Clint's leg.

“Look, sorry to drag you in here and bug you. I should let you sleep.” There’s no reason for Clint to keep talking Bucky’s ear off when he should be sleeping.

“‘S fine. Wasn’t gonna sleep much anyway.”

“I don’t think I actually know anyone who has a healthy sleep schedule.”

“You included?” Bucky guesses, thinking maybe Clint had more to get off his chest.

Clint shakes his head. “I sleep great with enough coffee. But you should go back to sleep.” He seems to have shut down, unwilling or unable to share more personal information about his life.

Bucky takes the hint and goes back to the guest room he was sleeping in, wondering what went wrong, why Clint had shut down so abruptly. He somehow gets back to sleep, fitfully dreaming of chasing a fox through an abandoned laboratory.

Chapter Text

When Bucky wakes up, he decides to find Clint first and see if he needs help. There’s got to be something he can do to make himself useful.

In the kitchen, two men he doesn’t recognize are talking to Clint over coffee. No, wait. He does recognize one, the shorter man. If he had hackles, they would be raised. An old instinct, from his days as the Winter Soldier, screams danger. Danger. Put distance between them, he’s most dangerous up close. Guns only slow him down. Susceptible to head trauma and can't swim. Unfortunately, there’s no nearby body of water to push him into. Lure him to the pond? Or incapacitate by severing the tendons in his arms, and run.

Why his arms? Who is he? He isn’t a mission. None of Bucky’s missions had been left alive.

The man briefly sniffs the air and turns to look at him. His eyes widen slightly, and he immediately adopts a fighting stance, fists up, with three claws extending from his knuckles, teeth bared and a low growl in his throat.

Clint nonchalantly sprays him with the spray bottle.

He rounds on Clint, looking even more hostile, and Bucky moves in to keep Clint from being skewered, but the hostile man backs down, growling out, “Really, Barton? Fuck you.”

Clint bats his eyes obnoxiously. “I’m not really into threesomes, but I’ll make an exception if you buy me dinner first,” The man scoffs, rolls his eyes, and storms outside. “You know, Frank, he has really mellowed out over the years.”

The other man, Frank presumably, puts his head in his hands. “One of these days, he’s gonna kill you, and I’m going to let him.”

“Nah, you’d miss me.”

Frank scoffs.

“Okay, you’d miss my dogs and the horses.”

Frank makes a noncommittal noise.

“And Bucky wouldn’t let Logan murder me.”

Frank looks at Bucky, sizing him up. Something makes Bucky’s skin crawl, the idea of being pitted against Frank and Clint’s friend. The image of a blood soaked room flashes in his head. The man, with claws extending from his knuckles, butt-naked and unkempt, with a strange helmet covered in wires and probes.

Bucky shakes his head and goes outside. He knows the clawed, vicious stranger. Somehow.

The man is outside, in the puppy yard, rolling around in the dirt with them, wrestling and play growling. He pauses for barely a moment, brief enough that Bucky thinks he imagined it. The man seems harmless enough, considering who they all are and what they’ve done. Clint wouldn't let him with the puppies if he would hurt them, and Oreo is more than content to let him babysit her rambunctious puppies so she can sleep.

“You have claws.” It's not a question, and they both know it. Bucky isn't sure of much in his head anymore, but he knows he was on the receiving end of the claws more than once.

The man sits up, disheveled, one puppy hanging off the collar of his shirt. “Last I checked,” he says in a forcedly even tone. “And you’ve got quite the left hook. But I won't start nothin’ if you don't.”

“Alright. Truce, then.” And Bucky enters the yard.

The puppies rush to him, and the man mutters something about them being “fuckin’ traitors.”

They jump up on him, whining and yelping, desperate for another human chew toy.

Bucky gently manhandles them, using only his right arm, not trusting the left with something so precious and fragile. The puppies are much less careful, climbing and pawing and biting.

Bucky has questions; questions about who he is and who the man is and why their handlers made them fight. But this is simple. The important thing is that Clint and Natasha and Oreo clearly trust him, and he's gentle with the puppies.

“Hey, alright. Easy, runt. Most people can't play as rough as I can. You can't go around bitin’ everyone you come across.”

The back door opens, and Clint comes out with Frank, probably to make sure they aren't killing each other.

“Figure that out all by yourself, Logan?” Clint rubs. “Only took you two hundred years.”

Logan shoots Clint a look, then goes back to preventing the puppies from eating his boot. “You know, some people are into biting.”

Clint looks especially scandalized, considering his joke about a threesome. “I didn't need to hear that. So I'm going to go tack up for a ride, where my innocent ears won't hear such a thing.”

Logan rolls his eyes. “Oh, bullshit, Barton. Don’t go clutchin’ your pearls. Your ears have been turned off all mornin’. You've been lipreadin’ this whole time.”

“Not the point.” Clint waves his hand dismissively. “I'm going out for a ride, and you three can only come along if you all behave.”

“I wouldn't hold your breath,” Frank says.

Bucky stands up. He’ll confront Logan about their shared past another time. Going for another ride means delaying a conversation that is sure to be unpleasant.

Logan detangles himself from the puppies and brushes dirt off his clothes. “You takin’ care of my girl?”

“‘Your girl’ has a drinking problem. Wonder where she picked that up,” Clint says pointedly.

“His girl” turns out to be a mule, and he coos and baby talks to her while he brushes and tacks her up with experienced hands. It’s jarring, seeing someone capable of great violence be equally capable of kindness. Clint’s friends seem content here, like they’re at peace with the cards they’ve been handed.

Bucky rides Samson again, and Clint has Frank ride Cracker Jack. The mule is named Whiskey.

Clint’s friends are experienced riders, at ease in the saddle. The ride is uneventful. Logan keeps to their truce and stays quiet for the most part, rarely adding to the conversation. To Bucky's surprise, Clint is more quiet, less rambling. He points out deer and the odd bird.

Natasha and Clint occasionally jump a small log. They take a different trail than they had yesterday. Clint points out a rock pile. “We’ve seen a bobcat up there once. And down at the river. Probably the same one. They’re territorial. It’s been a few years since we’ve seen it in person, but we still see signs. Tracks and claw marks on trees, that sort of thing.”

Bucky has to admit, that’s pretty neat.

And Bucky stays. He stays and learns to ride. Frank and Logan go back to New York the next morning. Natasha leaves on a mission in the following days, somewhere in Slovakia. Bucky stays. Sure, this is some sort of house arrest from the government until he’s deemed stable, but he likes to think he would have chosen to stay a little longer, anyway. He learns about helping Clint run the farm. He even gets added to the regular rotation of daily chores as he learns what needs to be done and how.

It isn’t long before he knows each horse by name. He usually rides Samson and starts learning his quirks. The rides are more structured than aimless trail rides, but Bucky takes to training based on patience and cooperation, more than he ever did the violence and cruelty under HYDRA’s control.

Samson is an enthusiastic lesson horse, one of the first at the gate, lowering his head to be haltered. Bucky considers him more a friend than a beast of burden. Clint feels the same, it seems. Bucky catches him multiple times venting to the horses while he cares for them, about anything and everything. The government, the weather, the other animals, and people Bucky doesn't know. Kate and Barney and Bobbi. Trick Shot and Swordsman. Coulson. Clint spends a great deal of time complaining to the horses about Tony. And SHIELD.

So Bucky tries it, venting to the animals while he completes tasks. The feeling of being productive and helpful grounds him. Having a predictive, but flexible schedule gives him stability without feeling confined. He usually gets eggs and feeds chickens after breakfast, weeds the garden in the morning and evening when it isn't as hot, but checks on the rabbits during the hotter parts of the day. Clint says they're prone to overheating if they don't have shade and water and good airflow. Clint and Bucky freeze water bottles to function like an ice pack that the rabbits lie against to cool off, switching them out when they thaw. Large ceramic tiles in the shade of the outdoor rabbit yards also serve as a place to cool off.

Clint happily lets him bring hay to the horses, content to let the super soldier do all the heavy lifting. Bucky doesn’t care for cooking much, and doesn’t find much satisfaction out of things like making cheese. Clint has him try it after a flashback, but the repetitiveness without something to focus on mentally doesn’t ground him the way it does for Clint. Clint says it gives him time to untangle his thoughts. So Clint usually cooks meals, and Bucky cleans up after. It works for them. Bucky discovers he doesn’t dislike the living situation. Clint is good company, and Bucky likes feeling useful, but appreciated.Getting used to the farm is slow, so slow he doesn’t realize he considers it home until one morning on the back porch with Clint, watching the sunrise over coffee. Clint has a leftover slice of pizza the night before.

“I miss the Brooklyn I grew up with. I miss the skyline. But it’s not so bad here. I like the view, and how open it is.”

“And the horses.”

“And the horses,” Bucky repeats.

As if on cue, a horse whinnies loudly from behind the fence.

“Alright, fine you walking gluestick.” Clint huffs fondly and gives the horse the rest of his pizza slice.

“I thought horses couldn’t eat meat..?” Bucky says slowly.

“Yes and no. A little bit won’t kill them, and they will opportunistically eat meat if given the chance.

And horses became 100x more terrifying. No wonder Natasha got on with them so well.

Chapter Text

Clint invites Bucky to the zoo of all places. To see Nadia. Because Clint insisted that Bucky needed to get out of the house.

“Oh, and the woods don’t count?”

“Your therapist said no. Said you needed sunlight and more socialization.” That was actually what Clint’s official (and unnecessary) counselor from SHIELD told him— and that he needed less caffeine and a more routine sleep schedule, which Clint was electing to ignore.

“I thought I wasn’t allowed to leave your property,” is Bucky’s next objection.

“A, when have you ever known me to follow rules, and two, don’t worry about it.”

“Alright, fine. Zoo it is.” Bucky could vaguely remember seeing a lion in a cage with thick metal bars and metal lid and bottom with Steve once, but Nadia’s cage on the camera looked more like her native habitat. According to Google, at least.

“We’ll make a day of it, leave early tomorrow.”

After an hour of driving and being in the absolute middle of nowhere (they didn’t have cell service, and Bucky hadn’t seen a single building in at least twenty minutes), Bucky finally asks, “Where is the zoo?”

“Just over another hour,” he says nonchalantly.

“It’s over two hours away,” Bucky asks incredulously.

“Yeah, it’s not too far. It’s nice having a decent zoo so close.”

“Close? You call that close?”

“You realize the nearest Walmart is almost an hour away, right?”

Bucky stares.

“Welcome to the Midwest,” Clint says flatly.

The zoo is big and bright and crowded, and should be miserable, but Clint happily takes a map on the way in and hands it to Bucky. “I know where everything is, but look through that. There should be a schedule on the back if there’s anything you really want to see. The keeper talks are cool. I’m partial to the bird talks and training demos.”

Bucky peruses the list of shows. “I don’t even know what some of these animals are. ‘Cinereous Vulture’? ‘Diamondback Terrapin’?”

“So we go see those. Throughout the day, they’ve got this spot where they bring out an animal for a meet and greet. You can get up close and the keepers tell you about them, maybe do some tricks. They’re called ambassador animals.”

“Might as well start there, then,” Bucky decides, wondering what made them choose an animal as an ambassador.

A keeper steps out with a vibrant blue and yellow parrot on her hand. The bird is wearing a small harness that’s clipped to her belt.

“Blue and gold macaw,” Clint says quietly.

Within minutes, there’s a crowd gathered around them. Bucky is in awe of the macaw, and Clint is standing slightly behind him as a slight buffer.

“Morning, everyone!” the keeper chirps. “This is my friend, Buttercup. I’ve been one of her keepers for 5 years now, and she’s one of our ambassador animals. Our ambassador animals are the ones that are safe to bring out to public events and have the right temperament for it. Buttercup was raised in captivity and enjoys the spotlight, so she enjoys doing these meet and greets.” Bucky listens, entranced as the keeper tells them about wild macaws, where they live, what they eat, and what threats macaws face in the wild. She cues the bird to do some tricks, explaining how, while the behaviors look cute, they help them take care of her. “And big wings!” Buttercup spreads out her wings and is given a piece of fruit. “This lets us check her over and make sure she’s healthy without force, and she’s used to being examined and handled so visits with our veterinary team aren’t so stressful.”

She spends the next several minutes answering questions. Bucky waits, and when nobody asks his question, he does. “What happens when an ambassador animal gets scared during an interaction?”

“Great question. First, we try to identify what’s causing the fear and address that. Maybe it’s the wind or a loud noise or people getting too close. We try to redirect their attention back onto us with positive reinforcement like a treat or asking them to perform a behavior as a distraction. If they’re still stressed, or if they try to escape, we end the interaction early. I would take Buttercup back inside, take her harness off, and put her in her crate, and we'd go back to her enclosure. If something repeatedly makes an animal uncomfortable, we focus on that in training sessions to help them get used to it. We look at body language a lot to see what these animals are trying to tell us. If Buttercup continually tries to escape, or starts refusing the harness, we may look at retiring her from the ambassador program.”

The consideration for Buttercup’s happiness made something in Bucky’s chest ache. It was unlike anything he had seen in HYDRA’s “training”. It was…gentle. Buttercup wasn't forced.

The zookeeper winds down her talk and the group disperses. Bucky follows Clint down a meandering path, stopping to watch otters swimming and splashing. Bucky reads the informational sign.

“C'mon, the aviary is down here, right before the Australian exhibits,” Clint says, trying to hide his excitement.

The aviary is essentially a giant, walk-in bird cage. Bucky hears them chirp and flitter overhead, moving too quickly for him to have a chance at getting a clear enough look to compare to the signage. A big, pink bird with a large beak waddles across the path.

“Is that a flamingo?” Bucky looks at Clint, figuring he's been to this zoo enough to know.

“Scarlet ibis. Similar looking, but different species. And that one,” Clint points to a black bird, “is a myna.”

Bucky checks the sign. Sure enough, it's a Golden-Crested Myna. Whatever that is. “Bird nerd.”

Clint laughs at that. “You haven’t seen a bird nerd until you’ve met one of the teachers at Xavier’s school. She studies them. Hawks are my favorite, but you just pick up stuff around her. Like, you know those people that get talking about what they’re into, and it can be dirt, but they get excited so you get excited and they just light up an entire room?”

Bucky thinks of Clint’s eyes, squinted shut in laughter at Samson using Bucky as his personal scratching post, talking about horse care and equine sports and the genetics behind coat colors. “Yeah. Yeah, I’ve seen that.”

They walk alongside each other through the rest of the zoo and begin challenging each other to see who can spot each animal first.

“Snow leopard, ledge on the left. Just the tail,” Clint says.

Bucky spots it shortly after, the tail hanging off the ledge swaying separately from the surroundings leaves. It’s nice, challenging each other like that. “Guess that’s why they call you Hawkeye.”

“Can’t hear worth shit, but my eyesight is phenomenal.”

Bucky finds himself staring at Clint’s eyes, bright blue and keen. He nods. “You’re an archer, right? I haven’t seen you fight, really. But Natasha mentioned it.” He’s in the habit of calling her Natasha, rather than Natalia, but doesn’t feel close enough to her anymore to call her Nat.

Bucky had noticed the callus pattern on his right hand, but decided ‘Yeah, I felt the calluses from your bowstring when we accidentally brushed hands moving hay bales’ sounded weird, even by their standards.

A tiger in the next enclosure launches itself out of a pool. “Hey, sweetheart!” Clint coos, attention rapidly redirecting to the big cat charging the fence. It headbuts the fence, huffing. “Yeah, Nadia! I came to see you!”

Bucky sizes her up. She’s grown since he saw her, and her coat is shiny. “She looks good.”

“Yeah, this is a good zoo. They had space and were able to take her in. Unfortunately, since her background is unknown, she didn’t qualify for the captive breeding program. Species Survival Program or something like that.”

There’s a sign by the fence with information about the tiger cub petting industry, explaining where Nadia came from. She rubs along the fence a bit longer, still chuffing and grumbling happily. “Now this right here is why you couldn’t go back to the wild,” Clint mock-scolds as she hops on her rear legs to paw at the fence.

Eventually, they move on and meander through the rest of the zoo. On the way out, Clint stops.

“C'mon,” he half reaches for him, but doesn't grab him. “I've always wanted to do one of those dumb photo booths.”

Bucky takes Clint's offered hand, and allows himself to be pulled into a tight booth with a bench. It's narrow, and they're practically in each other's laps. Clint navigates the screen, setting up an animated jungle background, elbowing Bucky every time he moves.

“This would probably be easier if you just sat in my lap,” Bucky says after narrowly dodging an elbow to the nose.

“I didn't want to make it weird,” Clint admits.

“You can make it a little weird.” The joke is well-received, as Bucky hoped. “My sense of normal is a bit skewed. I probably wouldn't notice.”

Clint happily throws his long legs over Bucky's thighs. “Now stare at the screen and make a funny face.”

Bucky does, there's a bright light, and the screen displays them, Clint sticking his tongue out, and Bucky just squinting at the camera.

“You wanna screw with Nat a bit?” Clint asks.

“As long as it doesn't result in my death or dismemberment.” Because Natasha can probably dismember someone without killing them.

“Nah, not much.”

That's as good as can be expected, so Bucky nods. “How?”

“Nat is convinced I'm sweet on you, and I'm pretty sure she's spreading rumors.”

Bucky can't tell how Clint feels about these rumors. “Then let's give them something to talk about.”

Clint clearly had the same idea, because he slings an arm around Bucky’s shoulder and kisses him enthusiastically on the mouth. Bucky closes his eyes, the light flashes.

Clint finally pulls away first, looking as breathless as Bucky feels. “Wow. Where did you learn to kiss?”

“Probably 1930s dance halls? It's fuzzy. But HYDRA skipped over my Red Room seduction practice, I know that.”

“You don't need practice, trust me.”

They take another picture, more serious, but they still come out looking flustered. The booth prints out two strips of photos, and Clint hands Bucky one.

Bucky tapes it to the wall of his room when they get home.

Chapter Text

Bucky finds Clint in with the goat kids one morning. “C'mere! C'mere, Little Shit. Stay still!”

Bucky leans against the fence, enjoying the show far too much to help deworm the kids.

“Bucky! A hand!” Clint calls as he pulls Steve the goat into a headlock. Bucky slowly claps. If his arm was easier to detach, he'd offer that as well. Maybe he's spent too much time with Clint. Steve, aka Little Shit, wriggles free. “Oh, come on!” Clint throws his hands up in frustration.

“Say please.” Bucky drags out the last word.

“Fine, please. And tell Tash she's a bad influence on you.” Bucky takes pity on Clint and enters the pen without any goats slipping past. “Alright, grab one and hold it, and I'll give the dewormer.”

Bucky corners the nearest goat against the fence and holds it still. As soon as Clint's back is turned, Little Shit rams into Clint, bowling him over. Bucky doubles over in laughter.

Clint is less amused. “I'll castrate you, you Little Shit,” he threatens.

One of the smaller doelings jumps onto Bucky’s back as he's still hunched over. She mouths at his hair briefly. Bucky slowly rights himself to dislodge her, so she neatly jumps off his back and over the fence.

Clint swears in at least six different languages. He vaults over the fence and Bucky follows suit. “Go grab grain,” Clint orders.

Bucky quickly retrieves a small pail of grain and finds Clint and Oreo trying to herd her to the gate. She approaches Bucky, tail wagging slightly, but darts away when he tries to grab her.

Bucky shakes the pail, and the doeling bounds up. Bucky lowers the bucket and she starts eating. While she’s distracted, Clint scoops her up and they carry her back to the pen.

They still haven’t talked about kissing at the zoo, but Natasha smirks everytime she sees them together. When he asks Natasha later where Clint is (he hoped to go riding through the woods with him later) she just says he’s off being stupid. Which could mean absolutely anything, honestly.

Bucky finds Clint is leading a small horse on a lead rope, with a clearly ecstatic little girl in the saddle. Nearby, Frank leans against a fence post with his arms crossed, watching them attentively.

“Clint. Who is that?” Bucky asks, slightly concerned.

“Oh. This is Laura. Logan’s kid. I think. That part wasn’t actually super clear.”

“Right. So what are you doing with her?” Bucky asks, more concerned.

“I’m getting Logan back by taking her riding.” The girl pets the horse’s neck. “Aaaaand now he’ll have to get her a pony.”

“Alright, you…have fun with that.” Bucky doesn’t even bother asking what Logan has done now to earn Clint’s revenge. He goes to get Samson and work on roping a training dummy instead, because Clint has decided to coerce Bucky into entering a small, local rodeo with him.

“So Frank,” Clint said as soon as he thought Bucky was out of earshot.

Frank pinched the bridge of his nose. “Coffee first.”

“What’s it like? Dating Logan.” Clint wondered if Logan’s quirks would be similar to Bucky’s, or if learning how Frank had won Logan’s trust and affection would somehow translate into earning Bucky’s.

Frank downed the rest of his coffee. “Have you ever had a cat?”

“Yes? But I don’t know how that translates to brainwashed super soldiers we pulled out of labs.”

“You touch him and he doesn't want to be, you’ll get scratched. You wake up to him sprawled across you. But then he ignores you as soon as you wake up because he doesn’t want you thinking he’s soft. And he sometimes brings you dead things and you have to deal with it.”

Clint had a feeling that dead things could both be referring to dinner, or actual dead bodies.

Meanwhile, Bucky rode nearly every day in preparation for the upcoming rodeo. Sometimes with Clint, sometimes without.

The rodeo itself is simultaneously more and less chaotic than Bucky expects. It's small, limited to enhanced people and the few weird humans who can keep up. Like Clint. One of the first events was saddle bronc riding. The point is to stay on for eight seconds while the horse does its best to buck you off. It further solidifies Bucky's opinion that Clint is somehow immortal and crazy.

The horse throws its weight forward and kicks out with its hind legs. Clint stays on and whoops, hand up in the air, as his hat goes flying. The rear hooves barely touch the ground before its back tightens like a spring and it bucks again and again. Bucky clenches the reins until the knuckles on his right hand turn white. It's the longest 8 seconds of his life. The horse spins sharply, and Bucky involuntary gasps. He can see how things play out before they do as the horse sends him flying off. Bucky is moving before Clint’s even properly airborne. He heads for Clint and Steve goes after the horse to move it away from Clint and get the flank strap off.

Clint slams into the fence and Bucky is dismounting before Samson has even stopped moving.

“Clint!”

He doesn’t respond but Bucky can see the paramedics waiting close by in case Clint doesn't get up.

Clint doesn’t, and Bucky can see a trickle of blood at his temple. He looks at the emergency team, helpless. They immediately enter the arena, and all anyone can do is move the horses out of the way and let them work. Clint regains consciousness and is put on a board and made to wear a neck brace to keep his back straight. In case of spinal injury, Bucky thinks. Which seems impossible. Clint’s been through so much.

He doesn’t even hear Nat come up to him. “You go ahead with him. We’ll take care of Samson. We’ll be right behind you.”

Bucky feels guilty leaving someone else to tend to Samson. They all have their own horses to care for and they all care about Clint and will want to be with him at the hospital.

Bucky decides very quickly he hates ambulances. Clint regains consciousness as they load him in, and Bucky feels a burn in the corner of his eyes as he cracks jokes during the line of questioning from the paramedics.

Clint is hauled off for testing. Radiographs and a CT scan. Evaluating his reflexes and balance and memory.

The nurses eventually get Clint in a room for observation and Bucky still can’t get a moment alone with him. By then, nearly everyone had arrived at the hospital.

“Immediate family first,” Bucky hears someone say, trying to sort through everyone concerned about Clint. Chaos breaks out, and at least four people insist they’re married to him. Natasha wins, from the sound of it, and Kate claims to be Clint’s daughter.

“So what have we learned from this?” Natasha crosses her arms.

“I’m immortal?” Clint offers.

“Try again.”

“Good thing we have Stark health insurance?”

“How about ‘Wear a helmet’, dumbass?” Kate snaps. “Do you know what we would do if something happened to you?”

“Uh, I’m exempt from emotional vulnerability while injured. So. Come back in three to five business days, or however long concussions take to go away.”

Bucky sighs. “You know head trauma is cumulative, right?”

“So eventually I’ll develop an immunity to them.” Clint grins, and for a horrifying moment, Bucky thinks Clint might be serious.

“Buck, I’m joking. It’s gonna take more than a rank horse to kill me.”

“A brain bleed might. Or a broken neck.” Bucky was so concerned about Clint’s well-being, he didn’t notice the nickname.

“But I vaguely recall the doctors saying that wasn't a concern. Or was that my last concussion..?” Clint looks vaguely unsure.

“No, that was this concussion. You got a CT scan, and you’re good there,” Natasha says.

“Oh. I don’t rem’ber that.” Clint sounds too nonchalant about that, despite slurring his words.

Bucky glances at her and Kate, wishing they would leave so he could talk to Clint. They didn't, instead staying until visiting hours were over, and they were (tactfully) told to leave by hospital staff. He could’ve lost Clint. He didn’t and it feels like a second chance. He just can’t stand the thought of one of them dying without one more kiss.

Clint is sent home the next day, and Bucky suspects it’s because Clint tried to climb out the window and walk home. Because despite a concussion, he’s still an agent of chaos. Or maybe it’s because of the concussions.

Bucky sees him hobbling up the driveway with crutches, Natasha at his side. Bucky flung open the screen door, letting it bang closed behind him. He ran down the steps and all but launched himself at Clint, kissing him hard before he lost the nerve.

Cling stumbles back from the impact, but as soon as he realizes who's kissing him, the warm metal against his face, he kisses Bucky back just as enthusiastically. Because Clint doesn't do normal or slow or hesitant. They know they'll have to talk, eventually, put a label to whatever this is. But being safe and together and in one piece is enough.