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Steve Rogers is a creature of habit.
He’ll deny it to his dying day, of course; he’ll point out how he’s acclimated to life in the 21st century so well that most of the time, people forget he hasn’t always lived in it. He’ll demonstrate how adept he is with modern technology; how he uses modern slang and socially accepted speech for things without ever slipping into old terminology; how never, not once, has he ever started a conversation with “back in my day” or ended it with “as was the style at the time.”
(Okay, maybe he did the style reference once. But only because Tony dared him to do it, and it made Pepper laugh.)
Steve Rogers is still a creature of habit. He has routines, formulated both before and after being frozen, and he likes keeping them. He likes waking up in the morning and going for a run before breakfast. He likes going to art shows with Pepper and crashing in some diner afterwards, eating pie and drinking mountains of coffee (for him) and tea (for her) arguing about what pieces they like best. He likes going to Tony’s lab at lunch and throwing pencils or outlandish demands for jet packs and flying cars while Tony pretends to ignore him.
And after a mission, he likes walking down the Quinjet’s gangway with Bucky, laughing and talking smack about something on their way to the Armory to drop off their gear before heading into debrief or Medical.
Walking down the gangway, leaving Bucky still strapped inside the Quinjet… it grates.
It grates hard.
“I’m fine,” he tells Clint.
“Not a scratch,” he assures Dr Cho.
“The intel’s already uploaded to the servers,” he says to Natasha, who doesn’t look like she believes him.
And then he gets into the elevator and heads straight to Tony’s labs, because he’s not the only creature of habit in the Tower, but he’s left her strapped to the Quinjet along with Bucky, when normally she’d be heading straight to Tony, full of adrenaline and talking a mile a minute, already planning the next ten steps with whatever they’ve brought back.
There’s only one person in the Tower who is going to understand how Steve’s feeling right now, who’ll probably be feeling the break in routine as strongly, who’ll be worried about one of the people strapped aboard the Quinjet. Steve’s heading straight for him.
The labs are blazing with light, the music turned up so loud that Steve can hear it before he even steps off the elevator. The glass partition between the elevator doors and the lab itself vibrates along with the music. Steve doesn’t recognize it, but he does recognize the way the sparks fly from the corner where Tony does most of the welding. The way Dum-E rocks back and forth on his wheels, frantic and fretful.
Steve knocks on the glass.
Tony doesn’t respond. Probably doesn’t even hear. Steve knocks again.
“Jarvis,” he says. “Can you tell Tony—”
“Ah,” says Jarvis, apologetically. “I’m afraid—”
The crash makes Steve jump. It’s happened in a blink; one moment, Tony is welding, and the next, he’s thrown the tool onto the table, and is striding across the lab, straight to the doors.
He looks furious. There’s grease stains on his fingers and a smudge of ash on his cheek, and the arc reactor is a faint glow under his shirt. There’s no reason for him to come to Steve; Jarvis could open the doors for him.
Steve tenses. Just a little.
Tony opens the door, lips pressed tight together, eyes blazing, and doesn’t say a word. He just glares at Steve, as if waiting for an explanation that Steve had no idea how to give.
It’s a long moment. It’s probably only a few seconds.
“Great,” says Tony finally, biting the word out. “Fantastic conversation. Glad we talked.”
He starts to close the door.
“Tony.”
Tony whirls on him. “You promised me. You promised he wouldn’t hurt her—”
“And he hasn’t.”
“Do you know what I did this afternoon, Steve? I filled one of my empty guest suites with water and energy bars and quick-cook meals. I made sure there’s extra linens and towels and soaps and a change of clothes. And you know what I also made sure of? Condoms, Steve. Condoms in every fucking drawer and corner.”
Steve slumps against the wall. “Tony—”
“So don’t fucking tell me that he’s not going to hurt her. He’s going to spend the next—how long did you guys say? Oh, right—twelve hours hurting her.”
Steve’s head snaps up. “She chose it, Tony,” Steve says shortly. “Whatever happens between them, they both decided on it.”
“You think I don’t—” Tony steps back and runs his hand through his hair, which sticks up on end. Steve wants to step forward, pull Tony in, smooth it back down again. “I can’t do this. I can’t… just… go. I’m fine. I’ll be fine.”
Steve watches him for a moment. “She’ll be okay, Tony. She’s strong, she’s smart—this wasn’t on her.”
Tony huffs a laugh. “I know you’re not saying it was him.”
The fact that Tony’s not pulling a nickname for Bucky… Steve’s not sure that makes it better or worse. “I’ll stay if you want company.”
“No. I’m fine. I need to recalibrate the suit anyway, there’s some do-hickey Barton wants on his quiver, I’m thinking of giving Dum-E a grenade launcher. Go find Pepper, she’d like to see your face.”
“You don’t?”
“Not really, now that you mention it,” retorts Tony.
“All right.” Steve pauses. “Tony. She’ll be okay.”
“Yeah, you said. I heard you.”
“Tony.”
Tony goes still: too still.
“I’m sorry.”
Steve can’t see Tony’s face, not with his back to him. But he sees the way Tony’s shoulders rise and fall, hears the slow exhale of breath.
“Just because she chose it, doesn’t mean it won’t hurt,” Tony says, before his entire body gives a shudder, like he’s trying to shake off the brief moment of empathy. “Go on, get out of here. Go find Pepper. I’ve got work to do.”
A moment later, the door closes again, followed by the blast of music.
Steve’s chest twists, watching Tony return to his welding, hiding behind the face shield.
He watches for a moment; it’s not the Iron Man suit he’s working on, or a grenade launcher for Dum-E. Or a quiver, or anything else Steve recognizes. It might not be anything at all. Steve’s willing to bet on nothing.
*
He finds Pepper in the main penthouse. She’s curled on the couch, bare feet tucked under a blanket and the fire painting her skin with a glow as she reads. Either he’s quiet when he comes in, or she’s concentrating too hard to really hear him, because it’s not until he’s standing at the far end of the couch that she looks up and sees him.
“Steve,” she says, pleased, a smile brightening her face. And his heart sinks, because she’s so pleased, she can’t possibly know what’s happened.
Tony’s punishment, to tell her, probably. Or a task he couldn’t face himself, more likely.
“Oh, love,” she says, sitting up and setting her book to the side. “What’s wrong?”
Steve sits next to her on the couch, and leans in to rest his head on her shoulder, face pressed to her neck. Her arms wrap around him automatically, turning to him, pulling him close.
“It’s okay,” she whispers, as he wraps himself around her, breathing in her skin, finding as close to center as he can get, when Tony’s banging out his frustration in the lab, and Bucky’s…
Well. Steve doesn’t want to think about Bucky or what Bucky’s doing right then. How Bucky’s going to deal with the fallout on the other side.
All he can really think about is the warmth of Pepper’s skin, and the scent of her perfume, and how Tony sent him here, to her, as punishment or reminder or because he just knew what Steve needs and he can’t be the one to give it to him now.
“It’s okay, Steve,” Pepper murmurs to him, fingernails scratching lightly on his scalp, settling into his arms. “Whatever it is, it’s going to be okay.”
“I know,” says Steve, shaky, and kisses her until it is.
*
Steve’s eyes spring open somewhere around four in the morning.
The bedroom’s dark, Pepper’s asleep beside him, back rising and falling as she sleeps curled on her stomach, one hand stretched out to him, fingertips grazing his arm. Steve watches her sleep for a moment.
Tony’s nowhere to be seen.
Quietly, Steve slips out of the bed, dresses, and scratches out a note to leave on the side table, where Pepper will see it when she wakes in a few hours. She’s used to him slipping out early anyway; even if she doesn’t see the note, she won’t think anything of him not being there.
And she’s well-used to Tony pulling all-nighters, too.
It’s too early even for frost, but Steve can see his breath as he runs laps around Central Park. The city’s never quiet, but there’s a hush in the pre-dawn hours that Steve likes. The only audible noise is the sound of his breath and the slap of his shoes against the path. He’s not alone, either; there’s a few other runners in the park, more the closer to sunrise it gets. A few cops on horseback by the corners, watching and giving him a wave as he passes. Undoubtedly keeping an official time of his laps; they’ll use it later in the police gym, throwing his times at each other like a challenge.
He thinks about running a second circuit, another five miles, but packs it in and heads home anyway. The sun’s not visible yet, but the sky has that peculiar brightness so it’s not far off.
By the time he reaches his apartment, the sunlight’s streaming bright through the windows, illuminating the entire place with light. He heads straight for the fridge and the bottle of orange juice, drains half of it in three gulps because Sam’s a bad influence, and then goes to shower and start his day.
Two hours later, there’s a knock on his door that is less a knock than a pounding, and when Steve goes to answer it, he finds Bucky: steel-jawed, hair slick, eyes blazing. Vibrating with… something.
“Buck—” begins Steve, staring.
Bucky doesn’t say a word; he pushes right past Steve, across the apartment, where Bucky sends his left fist flying, a single punch straight into the wall.
*
The problem with punching a wall with a metal hand is that the metal hand has a tendency to break the wall. In this case, go through not only the first layer of drywall, but also the drywall on the other side, straight through to Steve’s bedroom.
“Could’ve been worse,” says Steve when it takes five minutes to extract Bucky from the wall. “Lucky you didn’t hit a support beam.”
Bucky stares at him. “Lucky,” he says flatly.
“Take the luck where you find it, Buck,” says Steve, but he brings back two beers for each of them, and maybe drinking before noon is frowned upon, but Bucky’s pretty sure at least one of his handlers had vodka before he even got out of bed every morning, so he’s not going to argue.
Anyway, it’s not like either of them can get drunk. It feels somehow right to try.
Should’ve kissed her.
“Why do you even have beer?” wonders Bucky, halfway through the second bottle. He hadn’t said anything during the first; just drained it like it’d actually do a damn thing to get him drunk. He’s not drunk; he’s barely tipsy, even if his head’s swimming a bit. His eyes are hot and red and his left shoulder hurts, like he’s been using his arm as a jackhammer.
“Dunno,” says Steve. He’s crashed out next to Bucky, matching him drink for drink even though he won’t feel it, either. It feels right, somehow; every time Bucky looks over at Steve, he expects some too-short punk sitting next to him at some dive in Brooklyn, consoling Bucky over a cheap beer because the latest dame turned him down.
Maybe he did. Maybe it’s a memory coming up in a flash, or maybe it’s just wishful thinking to simpler times.
He’d have kissed her, in simpler times.
“Pepper probably bought it,” Steve adds.
Bucky looks at the label. “Huh. Guess her taste in beer is better than her taste in men.”
“Thanks, Buck,” says Steve, all sincere-like, because he’s an asshole like that. “Means a lot.”
Bucky snorts and takes another swig to drain the bottle, and Steve grabs it and walks the empties back to the kitchen.
“Sorry about your wall,” Bucky calls after him.
“You can help me fix it,” Steve calls back.
Bucky flexes his left fingers; they don’t seem nearly as damaged as the wall, apart from a couple scuff marks he’ll have to buff out later. He makes a fist and stares at it.
A fist-bump.
He’d given her a fist-bump.
Christ, he’s an idiot.
There’s music in the background, something Bucky doesn’t recognize. But Steve listens to all sorts these days; most of it isn’t too bad. Better than the noise Stark listens to, better than the country Barton favors. Wilson introduced Steve to Motown, which Steve loves and Bucky can appreciate, but it’s not his first choice generally speaking.
This sounds like something Bucky might actually like, if he wasn’t prepared to hate it for the rest of time, just for the association of being introduced to it now.
I’ve been for a walk
On a winter’s day…
Yeah, he could live without ever hearing this song again, definitely.
Steve throws a bottle of water at Bucky, who catches it against his chest, and lays back down on the couch, propping his feet up on the coffee table. Steve’s jaw works like he’s trying to figure out what to say, like the words in his head are still in a jumble as he figures out what order to say them in.
“Spit it out, champ,” says Bucky finally.
“So I was thinking about Arnie,” says Steve.
Bucky opens his mouth, about to call Steve out on his bullshit—seriously, Arnie? The guy was not thinking about Arnie.
But what he says instead is, “What about him?”
“I think we should take him out.”
“What, put him on the Cyclone?”
Steve punches Bucky in the right arm and only pulls the punch a little. Bucky punches him back, with equal force.
“Lunch. Maybe a movie.”
“He’ll fall asleep.”
“So he falls asleep. There’s a festival in Queens, some Hitchcock retrospective.”
“Which flicks?”
“39 Steps, Suspicion, Jamaica Inn. Couple others.”
Bucky snorts, fairly sure couple others includes a few with trains. “Yeah, all right. Wouldn’t mind seeing some of them again. Lady Vanishes. Strangers on a Train.”
“Asshole,” says Steve. “When’d you see Strangers on a Train, that was what, ‘52? You were frozen in ’52.”
“So were you.”
“Answer the question.”
“You were in Vienna and Stark’s an asshole.”
Steve swears.
“Eh, it’s all right,” says Bucky. “Only ever fell off the one.”
“Christ, Buck.”
“Which flick were you thinking?”
“At the moment, Dial M for Murder,” snaps Steve, annoyed. “Specifically, yours.”
If I didn’t tell her, warbles the duo singing, and the other two have the audacity to repeat it.
I could leave today…
Bucky reconsiders murder and how it pertains to digital playlists.
Steve’s phone, somewhere on the other side of the room, dings with an incoming message. Steve frowns at it.
“You gonna get that?”
“If it was important, Jarvis would say,” says Steve. “And I’m sitting here with your sad ass.”
“Apologies, Captain Rogers,” says Jarvis. “The message is from Dr. Banner. He is looking for Sergeant Barnes but does not want to intrude.”
Bucky groans and rubs his face, but Steve sits up, all worry and concern. “What’s wrong? Did the pollen—?”
“Nothing’s wrong,” snaps Bucky. “He wanted to see me after it was over, and I didn’t bother.”
“Buck.”
“Don’t Buck me. I’ll go back. Just…” Bucky picks at the couch’s fabric for a moment. “Couldn’t stay in there any longer. Not when…”
Steve frowns, waiting. Like he knows if he waits long enough, Bucky will say something incriminating.
Fucking Widow, teaching the team the patience Bucky taught her.
Bucky heaves a sigh. “I know what you’re doing, asshole.”
“Then you know I can wait you out.”
“I should have kissed her,” blurts out Bucky.
Steve blinks at him. “Okay. Kinda thought you would have but…”
“After. I should have kissed her after.”
“After what?” asks Steve delicately.
“After the pollen ran out, punk.” Bucky gets up to start pacing. “Christ, Steve, it was just… and she was… and we… dammit. I should have kissed her, and now I missed my chance.”
“You sure about that?” asks Steve.
“Yes, I’m sure,” snaps Bucky. “You think I’ve gone this long and can’t tell when a dame wants a kiss or not?”
Steve opens his mouth, and then closes it again, as if he’s thought better of whatever he was going to say.
“We agreed,” Bucky reminds him. “Friends.”
“Uh-huh.”
“What happened last night, that was a one-time thing. Extenuating circumstances.”
“Right.”
“And neither of us want to jeopardize the others’ position on the team if things went south.”
“Sensible.”
“Stop agreeing with me, jackass. I know you don’t mean it.”
“So why not kiss her?” asks Steve.
“She needs space, after last night,” says Bucky.
“She needs space.” Steve sounds skeptical.
“We just spent the entire last 24 hours together, including the mission,” says Bucky, irritable. “So yeah. Figured she needed a little space.”
“Figured. How do you know? You didn’t ask her.”
“Oh, and you asked Stark?” Bucky retorts, and Steve’s face goes tight.
“We’re not talking about me.”
Buck groans and bangs his head against the wall. Not hard enough to dent, just hard enough that he can feel it. “Should have kissed her.”
“Well, why the hell didn’t you?” asks Steve, exasperated. “You did everything else.”
“Yeah, under the influence of sex pollen,” says Bucky tersely. “How do I know anything she did with me last night was real?”
He pauses. “How the hell do I know anything I did last night was real?”
The room is quiet for a moment. Just to fill the silence, Bucky bangs his head against the wall again.
“Should’ve kissed her,” mumbles Bucky. “Just to see.”
“Buck,” says Steve, his voice gentle now. “I have to ask. Are you still going to be able to work with her? Because if you can’t…”
I couldn’t have waited another moment.
There’s no one else I trust to go back to normal afterwards.
I can’t lose you, Bucky.
For once, the should’vekissedher is quiet. As if it’s acknowledging that maybe, this time, he shouldn’t have.
Bucky jerks his head up. “You’re not sending her away because of my fuck-up, Rogers.”
“I don’t want to, but—”
“But nothing,” says Bucky harshly. “I’ll go back to Wakanda, if she can’t stand the sight of me after last night.”
It takes a moment before Steve says, “What about you?”
Bucky closes his eyes, and remembers.
Her fingers in his hair, the way she smiled into his kiss.
Laughter and giggles and whispers in his skin. A soft huff of breath as he slid into her, the flutter of her eyelids, the fervent hunger as she arched under him.
But also this:
Halfway through the night, lying on his back on the bed, lit only by the lamp on the far side of the room. She sat next to him, fingers trailing up his skin from his dick to his chest, as if tracing every bone. Over the ridge of his Vibranium arm, without the slightest bit of hesitation, her gaze focused and steady, even as she transferred from flesh to metal.
Sensation was strange, through the arm—but she didn’t change the way her fingers dragged along the ridges, just as careful and gentle as they’d been on the rest of him. She traced metal fingers the same as she traced the flesh versions; and later, when she took his hands in hers, interlocking their fingers together, she unhesitatingly took the metal hand, just as she did his other.
Should’ve kissed her.
“Talk to her, Buck,” says Steve.
Bucky shakes his head. “We agreed. Back to normal. Friends only.”
“Fuck that,” says Steve, a little bit heated.
“Tried that, pal, didn’t really help,” says Bucky, knowing the joke is weak.
“Did it make it worse?”
Bucky doesn’t answer, and while he’s trying to decide what to say, Jarvis interrupts again.
“Sergeant Barnes, Dr. Banner wishes you to know that Miss has left the Med Unit and is on her way to debrief. However, he will be available for most of the morning, whenever you are able to stop in.”
It’s as much a pointed reminder as it is a welcome break. Bucky takes a breath and stands.
“Buck,” says Steve, before Bucky reaches the door. “You should’ve kissed her.”
“Ain’t that what I’ve been saying?” says Bucky bitterly.
“Yeah. So. What are you gonna do about it?”
Bucky pauses at the door. He doesn’t look back at Steve. “Nothing. I’m going to do… nothing.”
“Bucky—”
“This is how she wants it,” says Bucky, and his voice is a little stronger now, a little louder. “Pollen’s out of our systems, everything back to normal like it never happened at all.”
“And that’s okay with you?”
“Doesn’t matter either way,” Bucky retorts. “This is how she wants it. And I’m gonna make damn sure it’s what she gets.”
“And what do you want, Buck?” says Steve. He sounds almost… desperate, in a way, like he can’t believe what Bucky’s saying.
Should’ve kissed her.
“I want what she does,” says Bucky, and goes to find the things he’ll need to fix the hole in the wall.
(Should’ve kissed her.)
(Shut up.)