Work Text:
Before the war, when all they had was each other, two boys fell in love for the first time.
Brooklyn in the summer was sticky heat rising off pavement and the smell of bread from that little bakery on the street corner that the poorer teens often hang around in the hope that leftovers would get tossed their way after a long day. Steve sat on the steps of his apartment building with his sketchbook balanced on his knees, fingers already grey from his pencil. The younger kids of the neighbourhood shrieked and laughed somewhere down the street—probably playing in the square as usual—but Steve ignored them. His best friend had claimed the spot beside him, sprawled out like he owned the place.
"Drawin' me again?" he wondered, leaning in just enough to peek at the page Steve was currently working on.
Steve angled the sketchbook away from prying eyes, shooting Bucky a half-hearted glare. "Wouldn't waste the paper."
"Yeah yeah, whatever." Bucky knocked their shoulders together, making sure to keep the contact gentle so that he didn't send Steve into an attack of any kind, his playful intent still clear. "Just pretend I haven't seen the whole stack of portraits you keep under the bed."
"Dunno what you're talking about."
Bucky smirked. "Gotta say, Stevie, if you put this much effort into courting some dame, you'd have them fallin' at your feet in no time."
Steve huffed, exasperation tainting his tone as he answered. "Ever considered that I don't want girls falling at my feet? That's kinda your territory, Buck." No, he didn't want girls to want him, because Steve had only ever had eyes for one person—the boy currently stretching lazily beside him. He'd never been able to hide the way his gaze and his pencil lingered longer than was considered proper over the curve of Bucky's mouth, the line of his jaw, the mischievous shine in his eyes…
And Bucky, damn him, had always been able to see right through him.
Steve was genuinely surprised he hadn't been confronted about it. He was surprised Bucky still wanted to be around him.
A car horn blared across the street. The sound of a radio drifted through someone's open window, the latest news about Europe being read out. Steve caught the momentary flicker of anxiety in Bucky's eyes for just a second before it was forced back, smoothed over with that casually cocky smile from earlier.
They weren't going to be able to ignore the war for long. Soon they'd start drafting, any boy of age and fit to fight would be recruited to help with the effort. It was all most people had been able to talk about. Mrs Hendrey from the diner had pulled Bucky aside one evening as he and Steve walked home, trying to engage him in a hushed discussion about the importance of serving his country and how he couldn't let his friendships stop him from doing his duty.
His friendships. Yeah, right. Steve knew full well that the only friendship that would ever hold Bucky back was him. He shook away that thought as quickly as it appeared, not comfortable dwelling on it. For now, Brooklyn was still theirs. They still had this moment, the stairs they sat on, the sketchbook, the soft touch of shoulders in the summer heat.
Almost 80 years later, two men fell in love all over again.
The city outside was louder now than Steve remembered it being all those years ago. A lot had changed. The sound of passing cars had been rare before, back in the version of Brooklyn he grew up in, but it seemed that now everyone had one, and that made them a lot louder than he was used to.
But here, in his small apartment, the world seemed to still. Steve sat at a small table by the window, sketchbook laying open on the table before him, pencil balanced lightly between his fingers.
There was not a single line on the page. His hand hovered above the book, not making contact, drifting as though memory alone could get the image he wanted down on the paper.
The soft creak of a door broke the silence. Steve didn't have to turn his head to know who was lingering there. He'd know the soft rythm of boots on hardwood anywhere with no need to look.
Bucky.
Without a word—he didn't say much, not anymore—he crossed the room and slid into the chair beside Steve. He shifted it slightly so that he was right next to him, lightly brushing against his shoulder, taking Steve's mind back to that afternoon on the stairs what felt like a lifetime ago.
Steve's hand twitched, the pencil jumping in his gasp. He let out a slow breath and allowed his gaze to flick sideways, at the man who'd just sat down next to him. He seemed… calm, in a way he hadn't been in a while. His hair was falling into his eyes slightly as it came loose from the band that had previously been holding it up. He wasn't smiling, not quite—he hadn't done that in a long time—but there was a light curve to his mouth that tugged at Steve's heart in the same way it did almost 80 years before.
Even after everything the pair had been through, the feelings Steve had carried with him never quite went away.
The pencil tip grazed the paper, but still refused to move. Steve tried to steady his hand, but everything blurred in his head. He saw Bucky at sixteen, head tipped back as he laughed at something stupid Steve had said; Bucky when he got deployed; Bucky as the Soldier, barely able to recognise him; Bucky now, more tension in his body than before but still that glint in his eyes that was just so him. All these versions of the same man, the man who meant the world to Steve, layered and impossible to separate.
Bucky hummed, shifting slightly so that his shoulder pressed harder into Steve's, the contact deliberate and grounding. "You waiting for that pencil to do all the work for you?" he wondered, voice low.
Steve let out a soft laugh, shaking his head just slightly. His grip on the pencil tightened. When Bucky leaned just a little closer, trying to get a look at the paper—though why was beyond him, because it was just as empty as it had been when he'd first sat down—it was almost like no time had passed at all. A strand of hair fell loose across his cheeks, and Steve ached with the urge to reach out and push it back. Instead, he angled the sketchbook away in an almost instinctive motion.
"Wouldn't waste the paper," he muttered. The same thing he'd said all those years before, when Bucky had been teasing him about his drawing. The words came without much thought, a natural response even after all that time.
Bucky paused, then let out a quiet huff of breath. It wasn't quite a laugh, but it was the closest he'd come to one since the pair were reunited. "You're still sayin' that?" He voice was rougher than the boy on the steps, but the slight tease was the same.
Steve didn't answer. He twirled the pencil between his fingers, attention fixed on it like it was the most fasinating thing in the world.
After a pause, Bucky turned to try to meet Steve's eye, metal fingers tapping against the table briefly. "I always knew, you know. Back then. About the drawing." He spoke like every word cost him, carefully considering what he was going to say.
Steve dropped the pencil. "You… knew?" he echoed.
Bucky's mouth pulled at one corner in a not-quite-smile. "Hard not to. You weren't exactly subtle, even when you were tryin' to be." His eyes went down to the book, then away again. "I… forgot everything, for a while. You, my old life… but one of the first things to come back was seein' that stack of drawings of me you kept under your bed."
Steve swallowed hard, a lump suddenly forming in his throat that felt like it was choking him. "You never…"
"Wasn't exactly somethin' you could talk about back then," Bucky pointed out quietly. "And then after… well, like I said, I didn't remember. Talking wasn't exactly in the cards for me at that point, was it?"
Steve picked up the pencil, then almost immediately set it back down. He didn't look away from Bucky the whole time.
"You're right," he said eventually. "I wasn't subtle. And it wasn't just drawing, not really. I didn't want anyone else. Not then. Not after."
"You wanted Peggy." There was no accusation in those words, just a simple statement of fact. Steve nodded.
"Honestly, she reminded me of you."
For a moment, Bucky just sat there, expression unreadable as his real hand brushed through his hair. Then he gave the smallest nod.
"Same here," he admitted. "I never wanted anyone else, I just. Didn't have a name for it back then. Didn't know how to… say it."
Steve smiled, though it didn't quite reach his eyes. "You just did."
That earned a little more of a laugh from Bucky. He shifted in his chair again, shoulder pressing deliberately into Steve's.
Neither of them moved away.
They hadn't needed to say much to know that they were going to rebuild a life together that had been ripped from them all that time ago. They didn't need much conversation to know that all they'd ever wanted was each other, was to be together. They just knew.
In another time, with the threat of war looming over the streets of Brooklyn, two boys fell in love for the first time. And right here, in the quiet calm of a modern Brooklyn apartment, two men fell in love all over again.