Archive of Our Own

“It’s so stupid,” she says, long after Stevie and Stark and the rest of them have left. Her breath is still shaky but the tears have slowed, though there’s a wet patch on Bucky’s shirt that doesn’t bear examination. “I think I’m hungry.”

 “Nah, not stupid,” he says, trying to sound as if he’s not thinking about kissing her.

“Yeah, it is,” she says, finally glancing up at him. “Because if I go back upstairs and it still smells like bacon, I’m definitely going to throw up again.”

Which decides the next step, anyway. “Lucky for you, we’re not going back upstairs,” Bucky tells her. “Go brush your teeth, I’ve got to change, and meet me in mine, okay?”

She cocks her head a bit. “What are you planning…?”

“You’ll see. Go on, get.”

She wrinkles her nose. “You spent too much time with those horses.”

Bucky laughs.

*

About half an hour later…

It takes longer than Bucky anticipated to wash the mission off his skin; he swears he can still smell horse even after shampooing his hair twice, so he does it a third time for good measure and that seems to do the trick.

The hot water feels good, anyway, and he stands in the spray, letting his wash over him, thinking of the stars splattered across the sky, the way she’d turned briefly green before racing to the toilet to throw up, the warmth of her pressed against his chest, while the rest of the team swirled in chaos around them.

They know, now. Steve’s shocked then disappointed face, followed by the tension in his neck, the stiff way he moves and talks when he’s trying not to lash out in anger.

Tell her, Buck. Tomorrow night, soon as we’re back.

Yeah, well. That plan got somewhat turned upside-down, didn’t it.

Bucky knows she’s in his apartment the moment he steps out of the shower.

It’s got nothing to do with enhanced hearing or smell or whatever; he just knows she’s there because when he’d gone into the bathroom, his apartment had been quiet, and when he turns off the water, there’s music playing.

She came. Even after the chaos of the Med Unit, the team descending in a furious, never-ending catastrophe. She’s in his apartment, waiting for him.

He grins as he rubs his wet hair with the towel, dripping on the bathmat, his tags swinging from his neck. They tap against his chest lightly, like a metronome.

—sit under the apple tree with anyone else but me—

For a moment he thinks she’s put the record on the player, but if that was the case, it wouldn’t be playing from the hidden speakers he knows are installed all over the apartment, which means it’s Jarvis acting as DJ, and not herself. He’d read into the lyrics, but he’s pretty sure she just asked Jarvis to play something he’d like while she waited, especially when the next song is Cole Porter and not the Andrews Sisters.

At words poetic, I’m so pathetic

That I always have found it best

Instead of getting ‘em off my chest

To let ‘em rest, unexpressed…

“Funny, Jarvis,” Bucky mutters wryly as he pulls the Henley over his head. It’s muffled enough that either Jarvis doesn’t hear it clearly enough to respond, or else he knows there’s no response actually necessary.

Her back is to him when he finally opens his bedroom door to the main room. Pepper had called it “open-concept” when he’d first moved in. It’s a modern way to describe what he thinks of as a studio apartment, honestly; kitchenette along one wall, big living area that can be used for everything else. Having an attached bedroom and bath makes him feel like he’s living in Versailles.

It doesn’t look like it, though; Pepper helped him see to that. Hardwood floors are covered with dark rugs; squishy chairs have all four legs attached. Floor lamps are the only lighting instead of the overhead fluorescents that hum and make his eyes hurt.

There’s dark curtains on the windows, filtering the light that comes in too bright at the end of the day. There’s posters and paintings on the walls that don’t feature bookshelves; movies he remembers seeing back in the day, a couple paintings Steve did of their old neighborhood. A photograph of a claw-foot bathtub, which had confused him at first until he remembered the actual tub in their old apartment’s kitchen, and then he’d laughed so hard he put it in a gold frame and stuck it on the wall in his fancy-pants kitchenette.

His record player, with boxes and boxes of old records nearby, because it drives Stark up the wall to have anything that old in the building. Stevie notwithstanding.

It’s not exactly a piece of Brooklyn, circa 1938. But it’s as close as he’s likely to get in his lifetime again, and he tries to keep the modern world out.

She fits, though. She shouldn’t; she wears jeans and sneakers and a lacy top; her hair’s pulled back in a ponytail and there’s piercings in her ears.

She stands at the floor-to-ceiling bookshelves that stretch along the far wall, her fingers trailing lightly over the spines as if she’s browsing for something to read, slowly moving as if she’s actually taking in the titles one by one.

He likes the way she looks, going over the books he’s accumulated in the last few years. He likes the way he feels, looking at her like she should be there. Like the place is actually home, instead of just where he lays his head at night.

He wants to kiss her. But he always wants to kiss her, and he thinks he’s getting used to the feeling. If he kisses her in this room, they probably won’t end up going to eat, and she’s got to be starving by now.

“You can borrow one, if you want,” he offers. She doesn’t jump or startle, either, which makes him wonder how long she was gonna let him stand there, watching.

“Have you read all of them?”

“Most of them. At one time or another.”

She turns then, smiling a bit sheepishly. “Jarvis said it was okay to come in. I didn’t mean to—”

“It’s okay,” he assures her. “Ready to go?”

She hesitates. “Uh… is this a date?”

Yes.

Maybe.

Do you want it to be?

“Because the whole team knows now,” she says, hurrying through the words without looking at him. “And they’re definitely going to realize we’re not up there, and I know what you said before, about being around, and I asked you to be around, but we agreed, friends only, and I don’t want you to think I’m reneging on that—”

“It’s not a date,” says Bucky, his heart sinking, because he doesn’t want to hear her say anything else in that worried, nervous tone. “Just don’t want you to smell anything that’s gonna make you vomit again.”

Her smile’s a bit shaky. “Okay. Okay.” She takes a deep breath. “Not sure what that leaves, though. The only thing that doesn’t make me throw up these days is a bakery.”

“Soup?” he suggests.

“Maybe?”

“Pho,” says Bucky firmly.

Her eyes light up. “Your super secret pho place?”

“I don’t have a super secret pho place.”

“Yes, you do, you’re always grumbling about how none of the pho anywhere else is as good.”

Bucky snorts. “Fine. I have a super secret pho place. It’s in 1965 Saigon. Are you ready to go or not?”

“Ready,” she says immediately. “But not if it involves time travel.”

“I sure as hell hope not,” he agrees.

The pho restaurant is packed – it usually is – but the moment he walks in he’s greeted enthusiastically (<Summer Man!> shouts Dong in Vietnamese, and the name is repeated by everyone in the kitchen) and shown immediately to a table that he’s pretty sure is reserved for family only, but it’s where they sit him when he shows up. The whole restaurant talks or shouts at him in Vietnamese, while she looks amused and bemused.

<What took you so long, Summer Man!> Dong yells at him. <She’s been in the Tower for over a year, and you’re only bringing her to my shop now? Fah! Doesn’t she like pho?>

<It’s the first chance I’ve had,> Bucky protests.

<First chance, first chance. One year, Summer Man! Work faster! I’ll go out of business at this rate!>

Dong goes back to the kitchen, still shouting.

“He seemed really mad,” she says.

“Mostly because I haven’t brought you here before,” Bucky admits.

“What did they call you, when we came in?”

“Ah.” But Bucky is saved from answering when Dong puts two large bowls of soup in front of each of them, and one of his children leaves the towering tray of vegetables, greenery, and other things they can add. “Summer Man. Because they remembered me as the Winter Soldier, and I told them I’m not him anymore.”

Her smile is bright. “Summer Man.”

“Don’t make fun,” he warns her, pointing with his spoon.

She doesn’t answer; she’s too busy eating. He won’t fault her for that, not when her eyes widen with surprise, and then she eats like she’s been starving. Malnourished, he thinks, and he forces himself to stay on his chair and not run back into the kitchen to grab every bit of food he can find to shove down her throat.

Dong would let him. He’d yell about it, but he’d let him.

The soup is delicious. It doesn’t hold a candle to the soup he remembers, but it’s close enough.  She eats through most of her bowl, and he finishes his own and then what’s left of hers.

“I don’t know what it tasted like in Saigon in 1965,” she tells him as he slurps down the last of it. “But that? That was amazing.”

“It’s all right.”

She scoffs. “All right. Well, I can think it’s delicious for the both of us.”

“Whatever you like, doll.”

She wrinkles her nose at him, and he grins, because she can’t stand being called doll, which is why he saves it for special occasions.

This isn’t a special occasion, even if it feels like one.

She rests in her chair with a happy sigh anyway. “I can’t remember the last time I ate something without feeling sick. Maybe all those Jewish grandmothers are right, I should’ve been eating chicken noodle soup this whole time.”

Bucky’s spoon pauses about three inches above the bowl. The idea that she hasn’t been eating anything… “What.”

“Crackers,” she says, as if it’s a dirty word. “I am so. Tired. Of crackers.”

“Is all you’ve been eating crackers?” Please let her be exaggerating.

But she nods. “Almost. Sometimes with peanut butter. Or cheese.”

Bucky frowns at her, and resists the urge to put some extra chicken or spinach leaves into her bowl when she isn’t looking. “You need to eat better.”

“Oh, not you too,” she groans. “I am not eating for two, if anything I’m eating for… one and a quarter. And the quarter isn’t letting me eat anything interesting anyway. Helen was already on me about the multivitamins—”

“Which you’re taking, right?”

She scowls at him, and then steals the last spring roll. “Worrywarts do not deserve spring rolls.”

But she eats it, so he lets it drop, and by the time she’s done, they’re back to debating the next plot to Rickroll Dr. Doom.

There’s more shouting in Vietnamese when it’s time to pay, but Dong does let him hand over some money eventually, which is one of the reasons Bucky goes there frequently enough to have his own table. It almost outweighs that Dong is yelling mostly to get everyone’s attention to the Winter Soldier eating in his restaurant, but then, more business means he’s likely to stay open, and it might not be the same pho as in 1965 Saigon, but it’s the closest Bucky’s found so far.

Besides, Dong never lets anyone bother him while he’s there; the attention is only ever allowed when Bucky’s about to leave anyway. The one time someone tried to cause trouble while Bucky was working his way through a banh mi, Dong was the one to throw the guy out on his ear, and his camera right after. Bucky hadn’t even stopped chewing, all he had to do was sit back and enjoy the show. The guy’s picture is up on the wall by the entry, on Dong’s No Admittance list.

That’s the kind of thing that can go to a guy’s head. Some New Jersey mob boss shit; he walked home that day with Tony Soprano in his head. Woke up this morning…

It's full dark by the time they step back out on the street, and she’s smiling, eyes brighter than he thinks he’s seen in weeks. There’s no tension in her shoulders; her steps are easy and light.

He wants to kiss her.

They’re halfway down the block when she suddenly stops and looks up.

He follows her gaze: it’s the Tower, looming up above them. The Tower is… he’s not sure he’d call it handsome, or even a particularly good piece of architecture. He knows Steve hates it, thinks of it as an eyesore, says the only good thing about living in it is that he doesn’t have to actually see it all the time.

But Bucky’s got to admit, it’s the most futuristic building he’s ever seen. He’d like it for sure, if he’d seen it drawn out when he was a kid. Imagine living it in, on the moon or something.

The A is bright blue; it’s impossible to tell which lights are on with the shading on the windows, but Bucky would be surprised if Steve’s not awake somewhere, either waiting for Jarvis to let him know they’re home, or maybe in the gym, punching out his frustration with them both.

He’s not looking forward to that conversation. All that talk the other night about taking a chance, hoping for more with her… and him knowing all the time she’s pregnant? Oh, yeah, Steve’s gonna have a beef with him for sure.

But Bucky looks over at her again, and she’s still looking up, a slight smile on her face, eyes shining with the reflected light that surrounds them.

She’s so pretty, in this light. She looks better than she did before, too – there’s pink in her cheeks, her eyes are bright, she looks healthy and happy and hopeful.

“It’s gonna be okay,” she says, like she believes it. Maybe she realizes she’s reached for his right hand, clasping it in hers, but he doesn’t think so. Not really, because she does it so automatically, like they’ve always held hands like this.

(They haven’t. He’d know it.)

Hers is a little cool in his, like it always is. It fits perfectly.

“Everything’s gonna be okay,” she continues. “None of them died the first time and I’m not going to, either.”

He opens his mouth to protest… but the words die on his lips.

Maybe hope is the one thing she has that they didn’t.

He can’t take that away from her.

“Barton will have your back,” says Bucky. “Nat, too. Wilson. Hell, darlin’, they’re all gonna have your back. And be on mine for getting you in this mess.”

She glances at him, still smiling. “Pretty sure there were two of us, Bucky.”

“Yeah, but—”

“No yeah buts,” she says firmly. “Stop being archaic.”

He gives her a look. “Archaic.”

But she’s already looking back up at the Tower, still smiling widely. “Steve’s gonna be impossible. And Tony won’t be mad at you forever.”

“Wanna bet?”

“He doesn’t actually hate you, you know.”

“Pull the other one.”

“No, he doesn’t.” She turns to him. “He hates that he feels like he has to hate you. If he really hated you, he’d ignore you. You wouldn’t matter at all to him.”

Bucky shrugs. “It’s a theory.”

She squeezes his hand – and then seems to realize she’s been holding it all this time, because she lets go to gently punch his arm. “You think I don’t know Tony? Maybe not as well as Steve or Pepper or Bruce, but—”

“Okay, okay. You’re right, maybe.”

“Thank you,” she says primly, and starts walking again. Which at least means she’s not staring up at the Tower, brooding. There’s a bounce to her step again, too, as if she’s taken whatever worries she’s been holding and shoved them aside for now. “Anyway, he can’t kill you, I told him he couldn’t.”

“You told him?”

“Mm-hmm.”

“When was this?”

“The morning after pollen night. I don’t think he would have anyway, Steve would have cried.”

“Oh, well,” huffs Bucky. “If Steve would cry. Guess there’s no one else who would.”

“Fishing!” she sings, giggling and stepping a little faster, so he picks up speed to catch up.

He’d still like to kiss her.

But this… this is good too. Full of soup, happy for the first time in… hell, weeks. It feels like they’re back on the same page as they were before the pollen. And that’s a good thing, that’s something to put with the other good memories, the ones he’d shared with Steve.

The stars, the soup, the music, the girl.

Maybe this will be enough.

*

“Steve. I can explain.”

“Really? Is it more thorough than Nat’s explanation last night? Because I’m pretty sure the method hasn’t changed in the last century.”

“Is that how it is?”

“Yeah, Buck, pretty sure this is how it is.”

“Okay. Okay, pal. Go on, get it all out.”

“No.”

“No?”

“No. Because you know what really ticks me off? It’s not that you fucked up and got her pregnant. It’s not even that you lied to me about using protection, or that you’ve been lying to me about the real reason she’s been on provisional. It’s that I want to be so fucking happy for you and you aren’t letting me.”

“Happy. You want to be happy.”

“Bucky, your whole life you’ve wanted this. The girl, the kid, the white picket fence—”

“You see a fence anywhere nearby, pal? No? Because there isn’t one. I don’t have the girl, I don’t have the kid, I sure as hell don’t have a stable job to support either of ‘em—”

“Buck.”

“We’re not together, Stevie. I didn’t kiss the girl. All right? I didn’t kiss her. I don’t get her. She’s not mine, even if the kid is.”

“…Okay, Buck.”

“Okay?”

“Yeah. Okay. You don’t have the girl, and you don’t want me to be happy for you. Fine. I’ll play it your way. What do you want me to do? Ground her?”

“Yes. No. She’d hate that.”

“Okay. Keep her in the Quinjet during missions?”

“Like she wouldn’t break out in ten seconds flat.”

“I’m guessing you want her on your six.”

“Damn straight.”

“Fine. I was already planning to be real picky about what ops she goes on. Hill had a hell of a lot of opinions about it.”

“I’m sure she did.”

“You okay going in the field with Tony again? Because if I don’t have her, I’m gonna need him.”

“…Yeah. I kinda figured.”

“Buck. You know Sam’s not wrong. Those guys out there—they shoot to kill.”

“Believe me, pal, I remember. I was one of those guys out there not too long ago.”

“We’ll do everything we can to keep her safe, Buck. I promise.”

“…Don’t make promises you can’t keep, Stevie. But thanks for trying.”

O