Archive of Our Own ^beta

Steve scrubbed at his hands longer than necessary.

Charcoal dust clung stubbornly to the creases of his fingers, dark smudges blooming and fading under the water as he rubbed his palms together. Art class always left him like this,  marked, half-clean, smelling faintly of soap and graphite. He shut off the tap and turned to reach for a paper towel. The dispenser to his right was empty, so he turned the other way, going for the left dispenser.

Someone was standing right in front of it.

The guy was leaning against the wall beside the door, one shoulder pressed into the tiles, phone angled loosely in his hand like he’d forgotten what he’d opened it for. Dark hair fell into his eyes in a way that looked accidental but probably wasn’t. He didn’t seem to notice Steve at all, thumbs idle, weight settled like he had nowhere else to be.

“Hey,” Steve said, calm but firm. “You’re kind of blocking the towel dispenser.”

The guy glanced up, eyes sharp despite the lazy posture. For a second, he just looked at Steve and then stepped aside without a word.

As Steve reached for the towels, he caught sight of it: a small red star inked beneath the guy’s left ear, half-hidden by hair. It didn’t look professionally done.

“Thanks,” Steve said, out of habit.

The guy hummed something that might’ve been acknowledgment and went back to his phone.

That was it. No smile. No joke. No follow-up.

Steve dried his hands and left, he was gonna ask Tony (who somehow knew almost everyone at this school already) about him.

He found Tony not much later, sprawled across a couch in the common area like he’d been born there. Steve didn’t comment on how both of them were supposed to be in class in a couple minutes and instead sat down next to his friend.

“If I give you a description of someone, you can tell me their name, right?” Steve asked like it was the most normal thing.

“Why, you make a new friend?” Tony asked, eyes glittering with interest that Steve didn’t trust.

Steve rolled his eyes and didn’t go in on the question. “Tall. Dark hair. Looks like he could either punch someone or fall asleep standing up.”

Tony shrugged, “Bunch of dudes here that look like that.”

“He’s got a red star tattoo beneath his ear?”

“Oh, that’s Barnes,” Tony said like Steve knew what he was talking about. “James, I think. Everyone calls him Bucky.”

Steve waited.

“His parents have money,” Tony said, eyes on the opposite wall. “Like, actual money. The kind that makes people assume things. Anyway, they sent him to that youth home near here. Official reason is ‘structure.’ Unofficial reason is… apparently he was too much to handle.”

Steve frowned. “That doesn’t mean anything.”

“Exactly,” Tony said. “It’s the kind of phrase adults use when they don’t want to explain themselves.”

Steve leaned back, crossing his arms. “Too loud? Too angry?”

“Too inconvenient,” Tony said quietly. Then, after a moment: “Too sad, maybe.”

Steve looked at him with questioning eyes.

Tony cleared his throat. “His best friend died last year. Train tracks. People don’t usually survive that kind of thing, not the person who jumps, and not the ones left behind.”

Steve stared at the floor.

“They were close,” Tony continued. “Like, inseparable close. After it happened, Barnes stopped showing up places. Started getting into trouble. Teachers say he doesn’t care. Other kids say he’s intense. You know how it goes.”

Steve nodded once. He did know.

“Anyway,” Tony said, forcing a lighter tone that didn’t quite stick, “that’s the Barnes lore as far as I’ve heard. Take it with a grain of salt.”

Steve flexed his fingers. There was still a faint gray stain at the edge of his thumb.

“Did he say anything?” Tony asked.

“No.”

Tony smiled faintly. “Tracks.”

They sat there for a while longer, not talking. Tony eventually picked his phone back up. Steve didn’t move.

“People decide things about you fast,” Steve said, almost to himself.

Tony didn’t look up. “Yeah. They do.”

***

Steve was sitting at the kitchen table with his sketchbook open, not drawing.

The page was blank as ever, pencil balanced uselessly between his fingers. He’d been like that for a while, staring past the paper, listening to the refrigerator hum, trying to think his way around something instead of through it.

Tony was digging through the cabinets with the kind of determination that suggested he wasn’t actually hungry, just restless.

“They gave us a new assignment in art today,” Steve said eventually.

Tony paused. “That sounds ominous.”

“It’s a theme thing,” Steve went on. “Mortality. Endings. How people imagine them.”

Tony closed a cabinet. “Of course it is.”

“They want concepts,” Steve said. “Not realism. Symbolism. How people think about death, not how it actually happens.”

Tony leaned against the counter now, arms crossed. “And you’re overthinking it.”

Steve didn’t deny that.

“I keep circling the same question,” he said. “Why people fixate on certain ways to go. Like… why some ideas stick, and others don’t.”

Tony tilted his head. “You mean methods.”

Steve glanced at him. “Yeah.”

Tony exhaled slowly. “Okay. That’s not where I thought tonight was going.”

“I’m not planning anything,” Steve said flatly.

“I know,” Tony replied just as quickly. “I’m just orienting myself.”

They were quiet again. Outside, a siren passed somewhere too far away to matter.

“I think people want control,” Tony said after a moment. “They want something that sounds final and clean.”

Steve nodded. “Or something they’ve heard about. Stories travel faster than reality.”

“Exactly,” Tony said. “People repeat what they think they understand. Some ideas get mythologized.”

Steve tapped his pencil against the table. “And some are just… louder. More dramatic.”

Tony grimaced. “Yeah. Movies did us no favors there. I wish they’d show the aftermath more.”

Steve looked at Tony, brows furrowing when he mentioned how they had to pick Barnes’ friend off the tracks in pieces. The thought made him sick. They were silent after that for a while.

“I don’t think it’s about pain tolerance,” Steve said quietly after a minute. “Or courage. I think it’s about what feels imaginable in the moment.”

Steve finally looked down at the page and drew a single line.

“I don’t want to sensationalize it,” he said. “I just want to understand why people talk about it the way they do.”

Tony pushed off the counter and grabbed an apple, rolling it between his palms. “Then maybe your piece isn’t about the methods at all. Maybe it’s about the conversation around them.”

Steve considered that.

“People reduce it to lists,” Tony continued. “Like naming things makes them manageable. Less personal.”

Steve’s pencil moved again, sketching shapes now, not images.

“Yeah,” he said. “That sounds right.”

Tony took a bite of the apple. “See? You were stuck for nothing.”

Steve didn’t answer, but his hand didn’t stop moving this time.

***

They met on ‘The Lawn’ because Tony insisted on it.

“It’s a buffer,” Tony said, weaving through the crowd near the train station with the confidence of someone who’d already decided this was happening. “You don’t go straight from school-brain to club-brain. You lhave to get into it, have a couple drinks beforehand.”

Steve made a noncommittal sound and followed.

He’d agreed mostly because arguing took more energy than walking, and because Tony had been relentless all afternoon. The park opened up in front of them, a wide stretch of uneven grass dotted with people sitting in loose circles, bottles passed between hands, music leaking tinny and distorted from someone’s speaker.

Steve slowed automatically, eyes scanning. Old habit. He took in exits, distances, the way groups clustered and overlapped without really connecting.

“This is the part where you relax,” Tony said, glancing back at him. “You’re doing the thing with your shoulders.”

“I always do the thing with my shoulders.”

“Exactly.”

Tony was already being pulled sideways, greeted loudly by people who apparently knew him well enough to grab his arm without asking. Steve hung back, hands in his jacket pockets, letting the scene wash over him without stepping fully into it.

Social gatherings always felt like this to him, not unpleasant, exactly, but dense. Too many conversations happening at once, none of them meant to be finished.

He was just starting to settle into observation mode when Tony reappeared, a bottle pressed into Steve’s hand before he could refuse.

“Hold this,” Tony said. “You don’t have to drink it.”

Steve looked down at the label, then back up. “You know that’s never how this works.”

Tony grinned. “I have faith in your self-control.”

Steve took a small sip anyway. Not because he wanted to, because it gave him something to do with his hands. The taste was sharp and citrusy and immediately unwelcome. He swallowed and resisted the urge to make a face.

People drifted closer. Someone laughed too loudly. Someone else leaned in like proximity counted as intimacy.

Steve shifted his weight, uncomfortable in a way he couldn’t quite name.

That was when he noticed Barnes.

He wasn’t in the center of anything. That stood out. He was close to a group, close enough to be included, but angled away, shoulder turned slightly, gaze drifting past the conversation rather than into it. He held a drink and kept sipping at it. His laughter came a beat late, like he was following cues rather than responding.

There was something about it that looked like pretending.

Steve’s attention snagged despite himself.

Their eyes met by accident.

Not a spark. Not anything special. Just awareness of each other,  brief and uncomfortably clear.

Barnes’ expression didn’t change much. If anything, it went a little flatter, like a door closing halfway instead of all the way. He lifted his bottle in a vague, almost questioning gesture.

Steve hesitated, then mirrored it. Acknowledgment, nothing more.

Barnes looked away first.

“Don’t stare,” Tony murmured, suddenly at Steve’s side again.

“I wasn’t.”

“You were doing the thing with your face.”

Steve took another sip, mostly to avoid responding.

Tony followed his line of sight. “Oh. That’s Barnes.”

“I know,” Steve said.

Tony leaned in slightly, voice dropping. “You remember what I told you. Youth home. Rich parents. Too much to handle.”

Steve’s jaw tightened. “That still doesn’t mean anything.”

“I know,” Tony said. “Just… context.”

Steve watched Barnes laugh again, sharp and quick this time, then fall silent just as fast. Someone said something in his ear and Barnes flinched, barely, but enough that Steve caught it.

“People here are loud,” Steve said.

Tony snorted. “That’s one word for it.”

Steve looked back down at his bottle, realized it was emptier than he’d intended. The warmth in his chest wasn’t pleasant,  it made the world blur at the edges, softened in a way that felt dishonest.

He didn’t like it.

Still, it was easier than being fully present.

The music shifted. Someone stood up, knocking knees and spilling a drink, laughter erupting around the mess. Steve stepped back instinctively, bumping lightly into someone behind him.

“Sorry,” he said automatically.

“It’s fine.”

Barnes again.

Up close, he looked more tired than Steve had expected. Not in a dramatic way, just worn at the edges, like someone who hadn’t slept enough in a long time. The red star was clearer from this angle, the skin around it unmarked.

Barnes nodded once, polite, and started to step away.

“Hey,” Steve said, surprising himself.

Barnes paused.

“I’m Steve.”

Another hesitation. Then, “Bucky.”

They stood there for a second, the noise swelling around them, conversation pressing in without touching either of them.

“Tony,” Steve added, gesturing vaguely. “He’s the reason I’m here.”

Bucky’s mouth twitched. “Yeah. I figured.”

Steve almost smiled.

“Anyway,” Steve said, unsure why he was still talking. “If you want to… not be in the middle of all that, there’s space over there.”

He gestured toward the edge of the park, where the grass dipped slightly and the sound thinned out.

Bucky considered him for a moment. Long enough that Steve wondered if he’d overstepped.

Then Bucky shrugged. “Sure.”

They moved without ceremony, not exactly together but not apart either. Tony watched them go, eyebrows raised, but didn’t interfere.

The noise softened at the edges of the park. The city hummed instead of shouted and they sat on the ground.

Bucky took a sip from his bottle and grimaced. “I hate this stuff.”

“Same.”

They shared a brief, quiet look, not agreement, exactly, but recognition.

Steve leaned back on his hands, staring up at the darkening sky. “You don’t have to stay,” he said. “I’m not… good company.”

Bucky huffed a short laugh. “You’re fine.”

***

Steve came back to himself on a couch that smelled like old smoke and spilled beer.

For a second, it felt like blinking after a long nap, the kind where time collapses instead of passing. His head throbbed dully, sound muffled and distant, and someone was tugging insistently at his sleeve.

“Steve. Hey. You good? Come on.”

Tony’s voice.

Steve tried to sit up and immediately regretted it. The room lurched sideways, lights smearing into each other. He pressed his feet into the floor to anchor himself.

“How did I-…” He stopped. The rest of the question refused to line up and for a moment he thought he was gonna throw up.

“Doesn’t matter,” Tony said briskly. “We’re leaving.”

Steve let himself be pulled upright. The club was smaller than he remembered, dark, low ceiling, air thick with sweat and something sweetly chemical. Too many bodies packed too close together. The realization made his stomach clench.

Cold air hit him the second they stepped outside, sharp enough to cut through the haze. Steve bent forward, hands on his knees, breathing until the nausea backed off to a tolerable distance.

“Okay,” he muttered. “Okay.”

Tony hovered without hovering, close enough to catch him if he tipped but not making a show of it.

Behind them, someone stumbled out the door.

It was a girl, young, unsteady, mascara smudged beneath her eyes. She leaned heavily into Tony’s shoulder like gravity had suddenly tripled.

“I gotta pee,” she announced to no one in particular.

Tony sighed. “Of course you do.”

“There’s a gas station,” Steve said, squinting at a lit sign down the street. It felt important to be useful, to prove he wasn’t dead weight.

They got maybe halfway there before the cashier took one look at the girl and shook her head.

“Nope. Bathroom’s not for that,” she said flatly. “She’s just gonna throw up everywhere.”

Tony swore under his breath and steered them away before the argument could turn into a scene. The girl didn’t wait long. She slumped near the edge of the pavement, muttering something that might’ve been an apology or might’ve been a song lyric.

Steve stared at the ground, the moment landing slowly, awkward and embarrassing in a way that cut through the fog.

“I’m sorry,” Tony called back toward the gas station, already pulling Steve along. “Rough night.”

They didn’t stop walking until the street thinned out and the noise fell away.

Steve’s head was clearer now, pulse settling. He took stock the way he always did when things went wrong: location, people, damage.

“Where did she come from?” he asked finally.

Tony glanced back. “Evan brought her. I think her name’s Mara. Or Mia. Something with an M.” He grimaced. “They bailed early. Left her behind.”

Steve looked over his shoulder. The girl waved weakly.

“Great,” he said.

“We’re not leaving her,” Tony said immediately.

“I know,” Steve replied. He rubbed a hand over his face. “I just want to go home.”

Tony hesitated, then did the thing he always did when he needed to persuade without pushing. “A friend of mine has a couch. And weed. And water.”

Steve closed his eyes for a second.

“Fine,” he said. “But I’m not babysitting.”

Tony smiled like he’d won something. “You won’t have to.”

They herded Mara along gently, her steps uneven but cooperative enough. She leaned into Steve once, briefly, like she’d mistaken him for a railing.

“Sorry,” she slurred.

“It’s okay,” Steve said, automatically. He meant it.

Later, much later, after they’d dropped her off somewhere safe and the night had finally loosened its grip, Steve sat on the edge of the bed at the place of Tony’s friend who he still didn’t know the name of, shoes still on, head in his hands.

He didn’t remember most of the club.

That bothered him more than he wanted to admit.

Tony lingered in the doorway. “You good?”

Steve nodded once. “Yeah.”

***

Steve woke up on the same couch from the night before, the air thick with stale smoke and the ghost of last night’s noise.

For a few seconds, he didn’t move. He catalogued sensations instead, the dull ache behind his eyes, the uncomfortable angle of his neck, the unfamiliar weight against his side.

Someone was breathing next to him.

Steve turned his head slowly and he was so sure he must be dreaming.

Because Bucky was asleep beside him, curled slightly inward like he’d folded himself there out of habit rather than comfort. His hair fell into his face, softer like this, the sharp edges from last night dulled by exhaustion. Steve didn’t remember lying down. He didn’t remember choosing this couch. He didn’t remember choosing this.

Memory came back in pieces, disconnected and frustratingly incomplete.

The field behind the house.

Cold air on his face.

Someone laughing too hard.

Bucky leaning close so Steve could hear him over the music.

That last part lingered longer than the rest.

Steve remembered standing outside, away from the worst of the noise, bottle cold in his hand and a joint he was sharing. He remembered Bucky swaying slightly, not drunk exactly,  just untethered. Steve had reached out without thinking, fingers closing around Bucky’s wrist to steady him.

“You’re gonna fall,” Steve had said.

Bucky had looked at him then, really looked. Too long. Too clearly.

“Yeah,” he’d answered, quietly. “Probably.”

Steve remembered the way Bucky hadn’t pulled away. The way his thumb had brushed the inside of Steve’s wrist instead. Not an accident. Not nothing.

They hadn’t kissed.

But Bucky had leaned in, forehead resting briefly against Steve’s shoulder, breath warm through Steve’s jacket. Steve had frozen, not because he wanted to move away, but because he didn’t know what the right thing to do was.

It had felt like standing on the edge of something without seeing how far down it went.

A door creaked somewhere in the house.

Steve carefully shifted, easing Bucky’s weight off him without waking him. His head felt clearer now, the fog lifting just enough to leave behind unease instead of confusion.

The living room was a mess. People sprawled wherever there’d been space, some asleep, some pretending to be. Steve stepped carefully, shoes still on, avoiding bodies and empty bottles.

In the hallway, Tony emerged from the bathroom looking like he’d lost a fight with the mirror.

“Morning,” Tony croaked.

Steve winced. “Is it?”

“Technically,” Tony said. He eyed Steve, then glanced toward the couch. “You okay?”

“I think so.”

Tony studied him for a moment, sharper than his condition suggested. “You remember last night?”

“Enough to be annoyed about what I don’t remember,” Steve said.

Tony hummed. “That tracks.”

They stepped outside together. Morning was pale and cool, the kind of quiet that felt earned. Steve breathed it in, grounding himself.

“You and Barnes,” Tony said eventually. Not teasing. Just stating a fact.

Steve stiffened. “What about us?”

Tony shrugged. “You disappeared outside. You came back… less alone.”

Steve looked down at his hands. There was a faint smudge of something dark on his thumb, charcoal, maybe. Or dirt.

“Nothing happened,” Steve said.

Tony tilted his head. “You sure?”

“I didn’t say nothing almost happened.” Steve shrugged.

Tony smiled faintly. “Ah.”

They started walking toward the station together, shoes crunching softly on gravel. The distance felt longer than it had the night before. Steve’s thoughts kept circling back, unhelpful and insistent.

He didn’t like not knowing what something meant.

Halfway there, Tony nudged him lightly with his shoulder. “You gonna talk to him?”

Steve hesitated. “Yeah.”

“Good,” Tony said. “Because you’ve had that look since we left.”

“What look?”

“The one where you feel like you stepped into something without signing the paperwork.”

Steve exhaled. “I don’t want complications.”

Tony snorted. “Buddy, you slept on a couch together. That ship sailed.”

Steve didn’t answer.

***

Steve didn’t like the skate park.

Too loud, too public, too many people pretending not to look at each other while doing exactly that. Tony had said Bucky came here often, so Steve was here too, hands shoved into his jacket pockets, posture stiff with purpose.

Bucky was easy to spot.

He leaned against the railing near the stairs, one foot hooked around the rung, phone loose in his hand like he wasn’t really using it. He looked like he was waiting without admitting it to himself.

Steve walked over before he could second-guess it.

Bucky looked up when he noticed him, surprise flickering briefly across his face before settling into something guarded. Not unfriendly. Just careful.

“Hey,” Bucky said.

“Hey,” Steve replied. He stopped a step too far away, then corrected it. “Do you have a minute?”

Bucky nodded, pocketed his phone. “Yeah.”

Steve exhaled slowly. He’d rehearsed this on the walk over, short and no unnecessary buildup.

“So,” he began, then paused. “About yesterday.”

Bucky’s shoulders tightened almost imperceptibly. “Okay.”

“I don’t remember all of it,” Steve said. “But I remember enough.”

Bucky waited.

“We fell asleep on the couch,” Steve continued. “Together.”

Bucky blinked. Once. Then he huffed a short breath that might’ve been a laugh if it hadn’t sounded so tired. “Yeah.”

“You don’t seem surprised,” Steve said.

“I woke up first,” Bucky replied. “Figured you’d put it together eventually.”

Steve frowned. “Why didn’t you wake me?”

Bucky shrugged. “You looked like you needed it.”

That shouldn’t have mattered. It did anyway.

Steve shifted his weight, irritation curling in his chest, not at Bucky, exactly, but at the ease with which he’d been read. “That’s not really your call.”

“No,” Bucky said quietly. “It’s not.”

They stood there, the sounds of boards rolling and wheels scraping concrete filling the silence between them.

“I just want to be clear,” Steve said at last. “Nothing… else happened, right?”

Bucky looked at him, really looked this time. “No.”

Steve searched his face for hesitation and didn’t find any.

“We didn’t do anything,” Bucky added. “You fell asleep. I didn’t feel like moving.”

“Okay,” Steve said. He meant it.

Bucky hesitated, then spoke again. “If that bothered you, I’m sorry.”

Steve shook his head. “It’s not that it bothered me.”

“Then what is it?”

Steve opened his mouth, closed it again. He hadn’t expected that question to land so close to the truth.

“I don’t like not knowing how I got somewhere,” he said finally. “Or what it means.”

Bucky nodded slowly. “Yeah. Me neither.”

They shared a look, honest in a way that made Steve’s chest feel uncomfortably tight.

From behind them came the familiar sound of someone rolling to a stop far too close.

“Well,” Tony said cheerfully, hopping off his board. “This looks intense.”

Steve groaned. “Tony.”

“What?” Tony held up his hands. “I’m not judging. Just observing.”

Bucky smirked faintly and pushed off the railing. “I should get going.”

“Yeah,” Steve said, then paused. “Hey. Thanks. For… last night.”

Bucky met his eyes. “Anytime.”

That was somehow worse than if he’d made a joke.

Steve watched him go, wheels rattling against the pavement, until Tony cleared his throat pointedly.

“So,” Tony said. “Couch buddies.”

“Don’t,” Steve muttered.

Tony grinned. “I’m just saying, you look like someone who realized something and doesn’t like what it implies.”

Steve turned away from the skate park, shoulders tense. “I didn’t realize anything.”

Tony followed, amused. “Sure you did.”

***

Steve hadn’t left the apartment in days.

Their summer break had started, and with it came the familiar rhythm: sitting on his bed, sketchbook balanced on his knees, pencil smudges on his fingers. He drew a lot. Wrote when the lines stopped making sense. Let music hum low in the background until it blurred into something soft and indistinct.

When his head felt too full, he let himself get high. Not to escape, exactly, more to narrow the world down to something manageable. Just his thoughts, his hands, the paper. He’d always liked being alone. Lately, being around people felt heavier than it used to.

Tony, on the other hand, seemed to thrive on noise.

People, pills, playlists, Tony bounced between them like he was afraid of standing still too long. The bright days always came first, followed by the inevitable crashes: jaw clenched, eyes tired, still talking anyway. And as if that wasn’t enough, he narrated every detail of his nights out.

Every time Bucky’s name came up, Steve’s attention snapped sharp and immediate.

They hadn’t run into each other again since the skate park. Still, Bucky lingered. In the apartment. In Steve’s head. Like a thought he couldn’t put down once he’d picked it up. Even his own walls didn’t keep him out, and Steve hated that, not because it hurt, but because it didn’t make sense.

He chewed on the end of his pencil and stared at the page on his bed, at the half-formed notes and sketches he’d left there earlier. Steve had never planned his art. Never sat down with a clear idea of what it was supposed to become. Things just came out of him when they needed to. Half the time, he only understood what he’d made after the fact.

He let himself fall back against the pillows, eyes closed, thoughts loosening.

“Taaa-daaa!”

Tony burst into the room without warning, hands cupped around his mouth like a trumpet. “Delivery.”

“Shut up,” Steve muttered, voice rough with tiredness, pulling the blanket over his head.

“I cross the city for you,” Tony complained theatrically, “risk my reputation, and this is the thanks I get?”

Steve answered by throwing a pillow.

Tony caught it, immediately flopped down on the bed with exaggerated force, knocking the air out of Steve and then proceeding to smack him with the pillow in retaliation.

“Who wins?” Tony demanded triumphantly, pressing it into Steve’s face.

“Mmf-… you…” Steve managed.

Tony rolled off the bed and hit the floor with a thud. Steve used the moment to shove him away with his foot.

“Still fewer brain cells lost than you,” Steve shot back.

Tony grinned, unbothered. “Worth it. Better a bump on the head than turning into a hermit stoner.”

Steve didn’t answer. He didn’t need to.

The days had started blurring together, late mornings, bare minimum effort, art until his hands ached, music until he fell asleep again. He felt oddly balanced, more present than he had in a while. Tony disagreed, of course, which was why the small, owl-shaped pill now sat in Steve’s open palm.

“You said you’d try,” Tony said, suddenly serious. “My rules. My time.”

Steve looked at the pill, then up at him. “I know.”

Tony relaxed at that, satisfied. “Good.”

He hovered nearby, restless, watching too closely. Steve sighed, took a glass of water, and swallowed.

Tony’s grin spread slow and victorious. “And now,” he announced, “we wait.”

They’d settled into Tony’s room, the lights dimmed, his PlayStation humming softly. Tony played on, half-focused, while Steve lay curled near the corner of the room with a blanket wrapped tight around his shoulders. For a while, everything was fine, background noise, familiar sounds, the illusion of control.

Then his pulse picked up.

It hit all at once. His heart started racing, heat blooming under his skin, then cold snapping in right after. He pulled the blanket closer and shifted until his back pressed against the wall. Every sound grew sharp, invasive. The clicking of buttons. The low music. Tony breathing.

“Hey,” Tony said, glancing over. “You good?”

When Steve lifted his head, Tony burst out laughing. “Oh wow. Buddy. You’ve got full dinner-plate eyes. Go look in the mirror, you look like you’re about to unlock a new superpower.”

Steve heard him, registered the words, but they landed somewhere far away. Moving felt impossible, like his body might shatter if he tried. The room pressed in. Too much.

With trembling fingers, he grabbed his phone, shoved his headphones over his head, and let the noise dissolve into something internal. Time lost its shape. Tony kept talking for a bit, then mercifully stopped, letting Steve disappear into himself.

Eventually, the pressure shifted.

The thoughts came fast and clean, stacking on top of each other with startling clarity. Steve took off his headphones.

“Tony,” he said suddenly, voice steady despite everything. “The idea of family. The kind you’re just… born into. It’s strange to me.”

Tony paused the game. “Wow. Okay. We’re doing this now.”

Steve barely noticed. “People act like it’s automatic. Like you’re supposed to fit into this shape, grow up, build a life, pass it on, repeat. But no one really talks about what that does to you. Or what happens if you don’t fit.”

Tony leaned back against the bed. “You forgot the goal to plant a tree,” he said dryly.

Steve huffed, almost a laugh. “Yeah. That too.”

He swallowed, jaw tightening. “I just think… most people don’t realize how much power they have over someone when they’re responsible for them. How permanent it is. You don’t get to half-do it.”

Tony watched him more carefully now.

“When you’re a kid,” Steve went on, words tumbling faster, “the adults around you are the whole world. They’re the map. And later everyone’s surprised when people come out… messed up. Or distant. Or scared of getting close.”

His jaw ached, fension, not panic this time.

“And then we’re all just adults walking around pretending we know what we’re doing.”

For a moment, Tony didn’t joke.

“Steve,” he said finally, quieter, “you’re not wrong. But you’re also thinking way past the point of usefulness.”

Steve frowned. “What does that mean?”

“It means,” Tony said, shrugging, “you’re trying to solve the entire human condition from the floor of my bedroom.”

That earned a weak smile.

Steve stared at the ceiling. The room felt different now, less hostile, more neutral. The fear had drained out, leaving something softer behind. A strange sense of closeness to everything. To people. Even the ones he kept at a distance.

“Sometimes I think,” he said slowly, “that I only ever really learned how to rely on one person and that’s myself.”

Tony didn’t press. Didn’t need to.

“Yeah,” he said instead.

They sat like that for a while, listening to the muffled sounds of the apartment, to life continuing outside the room. Steve felt oddly clear, no edges, no panic, just awareness.

Finally, Tony broke the silence with a small grin.

“You know,” he said, “for someone who claims to hate people, you think about them a lot.”

Steve closed his eyes. “I never said I hated them.”

Tony chuckled. “Fair.”

***

Steve woke slowly, eyes glued shut, blinking them open with care.

His jaw ached like hell, he must’ve clenched his teeth all night. It felt like he hadn’t slept at all, like he’d just rolled around in the dark for hours. The clock told him it was already past noon.

The apartment was quiet. Tony was probably already out and about. Steve shuffled into the kitchen and made himself a bowl of cereal, standing there half-awake when the doorbell rang.

He froze.

He hated the sound, the way it yanked him out of his head and demanded interaction. For a second he considered ignoring it. Then it rang again.

Through the peephole he saw Bucky. He looked smaller than Steve remembered, hair falling into his face as he awkwardly tucked a strand behind his ear.

Steve opened the door.

Bucky smiled, a little tentative, and held up a small notebook between them.

“You left this at the other place,” he said. “I’ve been keeping it safe.”

Steve stared at it. He’d searched his room for days.

“I didn’t look inside,” Bucky added quickly.

Steve took it, fingers brushing the cover. “You could’ve just given it back at the skatepark.”

“I didn’t know you’d show up… also, I don’t live far.”

That explained it.

Steve hesitated, then surprised himself. “Uh… do you want to come in?”

He immediately wondered when he’d started inviting people into his space without thinking about it.

Bucky nodded. “Yeah.”

He slipped off his boots in the hallway, all black layers and worn fabric, and Steve noticed absently how much of his wardrobe seemed to orbit the same few colors.

Steve handed him a glass of water (is that what you do when you invite someone in?) and led him into his room. Bucky looked around, curious but not judgmental. A couple band posters. A cluttered desk with a laptop. A guitar in the corner. The bed barely more than two mattresses stacked on top of each other. Bookshelves crammed full.

The walls were covered in half-written thoughts, lyrics, crossed-out lines. The floor in clothes and loose pages.

“I didn’t clean,” Steve said automatically.

Bucky waved it off. “Looks lived in.”

He paused, eyeing the guitar. “You play?”

“Sometimes.”

There was a beat of quiet, weird enough that Steve felt the urge to fill it.

“What’ve you been up to? Over the break, I mean.”

“Nothing special,” Bucky said lightly. “You busy?”

“Technically always. Practically… not really.”

Bucky tilted his head. “Want to do something?”

The answer came out before Steve could stop it. “Sure.”

Bucky smiled like he’d already expected that. He stood and motioned toward the door.

Steve followed, pulling on his shoes without fully understanding why he was saying yes, only that Bucky moved through space like he belonged there, like Steve had known him longer than he actually had.

In the hallway, Bucky asked, “Where’s Tony tonight?”

“Either out or at some party,” Steve said.

Bucky nodded, thoughtful, then stepped outside. When Steve hesitated in the doorway, Bucky turned back.

“Come on,” he said. “You’re slow.”

“Where are we going?”

Bucky just raised an eyebrow.

Once Steve followed, Bucky led him towards the train station, Steve half-surprised that Bucky, who was a bit shorter and should’ve had shorter legs, had no trouble keeping up.

“You’re the first person who hasn’t complained about my pace,” Bucky said suddenly, like he’d plucked the thought straight out of Steve’s head.

“Gets you where you’re going faster,” Steve replied.

Bucky nodded. “Exactly.”

For a moment, silence settled between them until Bucky broke it again.

“You know how in movies or books people our age always sneak into public pools at night or do something reckless and cinematic?” he said. “And then you see that and feel like you’re doing life wrong because nothing ever happens?”

He laughed, but it didn’t soften the seriousness of it.

“Would be a boring movie,” Steve said dryly. “Two hours of you sitting on a couch staring at the ceiling with a cup of tea.”

Bucky snorted. “I don’t even bother making tea. I just refill an old bottle with tap water and call it a day. The idea that everyone’s out here in cozy socks with a laptop is blogger propaganda.”

Steve smiled despite himself. “I do actually make tea sometimes.”

“Of course you do,” Bucky said, rolling his eyes. “You know how people stage those ‘accidental’ perfect moments? Same with stories. Everyone wants to look interesting. Nobody wants to be boring.”

They crossed the street together.

“Nobody does anything just to do it,” Bucky went on. “It’s all for later. So you can say it meant something.”

Steve thought about that longer than he expected.

At the platform, he checked the schedule while Bucky balanced on the edge of the curb, arms out like a kid. Steve realized he hadn’t done anything spontaneous in a long time, especially not without Tony nudging him into it. Strangely, it didn’t feel wrong.

“I could lie down on the tracks right now,” Bucky said casually.

Steve’s head snapped up. “What?” He immediately thought of Bucky’s friend and what Tony had said

Bucky looked at him, eyebrow raised, like he was testing something.

“Then people would remember me like this,” he said softly. “Not older. Not different. Just… this version.”

The words sat weird.

Steve forced a crooked smile. “You’re being dramatic.”

“I’m serious.”

Steve sighed and glanced at the board. “Next train’s not for three hours. We’re walking.”

As they left the station, he finally answered Bucky properly.

“People who know you for a long time stop seeing the outside first,” he said. “They get used to it. And honestly? I think you get to a point where it matters less.”

Bucky kicked a pebble along the sidewalk. “Growing up scares the hell out of me.”

“Everyone’s pretending,” Steve said. “No one actually knows what they’re doing.”

He lit up, then grimaced faintly, annoyed with himself for accepting the pill the night before, the buzz still clinging to him.

“I hate the idea that life just… happens,” Bucky continued. “School, work, a job you don’t hate too much, forty hours a week, barely any time left, then suddenly it’s over.”

Steve exhaled smoke. “Yeah. That part sucks.”

“You’re the most pessimistic person I know,” Steve added.

Bucky shrugged. “I’m realistic.”

Steve looked at him sideways. “I get it. I really do. But I don’t think growing up is as fixed as people pretend. It’s just another story we’re told.”

Steve kept talking, because stopping now felt worse.

“‘Growing up’ is something people made up,” he said. “And now they mostly use it as a nicer word for giving up. You don’t have to do that just because everyone expects it. You can just… decide it means something else.”

Bucky made a face. “Like what?”

Steve shrugged. “For me? It just means your body changes. That’s it. Mentally… why would that ever be finished?”

Bucky scuffed his shoe against the pavement. “Feels like everyone’s already decided I’m late to something.”

“That’s pressure,” Steve said. “School, family, everyone yelling about the future until you forget that it’s still… open. You don’t have to lock yourself into some soul-killing job just because it’s the default. Especially now. There are options. More than people pretend.”

Bucky squinted at him. “You sound like a motivational poster.”

“I hate those,” Steve said quickly. “I just… I used to be scared someone would wake up one day and tell me I was an adult now and I’d missed the point.”

Bucky snorted. “Congrats. I think I’m having a midlife crisis.”

“You’re seventeen.”

“Details.”

They walked on for a moment. Bucky pulled out a cigarette, lit it, exhaled sideways.

“Maybe I won’t even make it to forty,” he said lightly.

Steve’s jaw tightened. He hated the smell, the smoke, the casual way Bucky said things like that.

“Statistically unlikely,” he said, flat. “You worry too much for someone who claims not to care.”

“When I was little, I thought adults had it figured out,” Bucky said. “Like the world came with instructions and they’d already read them.”

Steve nodded. “Yeah.”

“I’m starting to think they just pretend really hard.”

Bucky hopped ahead, suddenly bright again. “I’ve decided I’m never taking responsibility for anything.”

Steve smiled, but it didn’t quite reach his eyes.

They turned a corner, and Steve recognized the street immediately. The building loomed ahead, big, ugly, tired. Cars crawled past. People lingered where they always did, pretending not to be seen.

Bucky didn’t seem fazed. He danced a few steps ahead and stopped at a heavy metal door, locking it behind them once they were inside.

“Can’t have random people wandering in,” he said. “Rules.”

The inside smelled faintly of disinfectant and something fried too long ago. The walls were scuffed, paint peeling in places where posters had been ripped down and never replaced.

“Reception’s over there,” Bucky said, pointing. “Technically I’m supposed to sign visitors in. Technically.”

Steve raised an eyebrow.

Bucky grinned and kept walking.

“The cafeteria’s in the back. You can eat there if you trade in meal vouchers, but don’t. I once found ants in my bread, and I’m pretty sure the cook dropped my food on the floor and just… committed to it.”

Steve stopped at the stairs. Bucky grabbed his sleeve.

“Elevator,” he said. “Fourth floor.”

The elevator arrived with a groan that didn’t inspire confidence. Inside, it was barely big enough for two people to stand without touching.

Bucky pointed to a red lever on the wall. “Apparently this stops it. In case of emergencies. People use it when they wanna make out or something.”

Steve, without thinking, flicked it.

The elevator lurched and stopped.

Bucky’s eyes went wide. “Steve-…”

“Just testing,” Steve said quickly, flipping it back. The elevator shuddered into motion again.

“I’ve never actually tried that,” Bucky muttered. “Thought I’d panic.”

“Would’ve been a shame,” Steve said. “You’d regret not knowing.”

Bucky went quiet.

“I don’t regret things,” he said finally.

Steve looked at him. “Not even the ones you didn’t do?”

Bucky didn’t answer.

The elevator jerked to a stop again and the silence snapped with it. Bucky pushed the door open, it complained loudly, metal scraping metal.

“Common room,” he said, nodding toward the first open door they passed.

Inside, a TV flickered too bright in a too-dark room. A couple of girls were sprawled on couches, half-watching some nature documentary.

“…and that’s why orcas hunt together,” one of them was saying. “They’re smart and they eat meat, that’s what makes them monsters.”

“Just like us,” Bucky called in, waving. “Sleep well.”

A few half-hearted groans followed them down the hall.

“That’s the kitchen back there,” Bucky went on, pointing without slowing. “Bathroom’s down the left, and-“ he stopped in front of a door “-this one’s mine.”

From somewhere behind another door came a muffled sound that Steve really didn’t want to identify too closely.

“Some people here bring hookups back from clubs,” Bucky said with a shrug. “Some don’t. I stopped trying to figure out who’s doing what.”

He unlocked his door and pushed it open.

The room was small, functional in the most depressing way. Furniture that looked like it had survived several decades and given up sometime in the early 2000s. The bed was narrow, pushed against the wall. Shelves crowded with mismatched things: old paperbacks, cheap figurines, a couple of stuffed animals that had seen better days, a cactus that somehow was still alive.

A bowl full of little plastic chips sat on the desk. Steve guessed food vouchers.

In the corner stood a bulky old monitor attached to a tower that hummed faintly, like it was offended to still be needed.

“Nice setup,” Steve said lightly. “What is that, ancient Windows?”

Bucky elbowed him in the ribs. “XP. No internet.”

Steve blinked. “No internet? How are you still a functioning human being?”

“I get phone data,” Bucky said. “And there’s a computer room upstairs. Four computers that actually connect. You have to sign up, one hour a day max. Streaming anything is basically a myth.”

Steve frowned, taking it in.

On the desk sat a half-empty box of oats and a jar of applesauce. The balcony door led to nothing but a narrow concrete slab. The bed was covered in a pile of plush toys and above it, taped to the wall, were pencil drawings. Figures, creatures, abstract shapes. A few looked uncomfortably like self-portraits, distorted just enough to feel intentional.

“If ‘outside’ felt more like outside,” Bucky said suddenly, breaking the quiet, “I’d rather be there.”

Steve nodded. He understood exactly what Bucky meant.

The room wasn’t awful because it was messy. It was awful because it was temporary in a way that had lasted too long, like a place meant to hold you, not belong to you.

Steve leaned back against the doorframe. “Still,” he said softly, “you’ve made this place yours… somehow”

Bucky looked around, then shrugged. “Guess I had to put myself somewhere.”

Steve didn’t say it, but he thought it:

You shouldn’t have had to.

Bucky sat on his bed, motioned for Steve to sit beside him and flopped back against the pillows. The bed was surprisingly comfortable, the light dim and warm, like it was trying too hard to be kind.

“Do you believe in reincarnation?” Bucky asked suddenly.

Steve tilted his head, studying him. For a moment he wondered if Bucky asked these things because he thought it made him sound interesting, or because he genuinely couldn’t stop thinking about them. He decided it didn’t really matter.

“There’s this theory,” Steve said slowly, “that a person lives a bunch of lives before they’re… done. That each time you take something with you… good, bad, neutral. Depends on how you lived. Every life you’re meant to learn something different.”

Bucky turned onto his side, propped on one elbow. “So which one do you think I’m on?”

Steve hummed. “Eighth,” he said finally, a smile tugging at his mouth. “You don’t feel brand-new, but you’re not… tired enough yet.”

Bucky snorted. “I think you’re way further.”

Steve winced. “Rude.”

Then Bucky’s expression shifted, turning more serious. “I hate that idea,” he said. “Being reborn. New body, new people. Like none of this really matters. I’d rather it be one shot. One body. One chance.”

Steve nodded. “Makes it count.”

“Exactly.” Bucky stared at the ceiling. “If I’ve already lived a dozen lives with different people who mattered to me, this one feels less special.”

“In some bigger picture, maybe the body doesn’t matter,” Steve said quietly.

“But right now it does,” Bucky insisted. “I only get this one.”

He hesitated, then asked, almost casually, “Have you ever seen a dead body?”

Steve shook his head.

“I have,” Bucky said. “They don’t look like people anymore. Pale. Wrong. Like something important already left.”

Steve swallowed.

“Were you raised religious?” he asked gently.

Bucky clasped his hands dramatically and muttered a half-mocking prayer, eyes closed. When he looked back at Steve, he was grinning.

“Catholic. Technically. I don’t really buy it. Went to a church-run school for a while. Services were mandatory. We used to hide in the bathrooms until the teachers caught on.”

It didn’t sound like he was confessing anything. More like he was listing trivia about himself.

“I don’t think the soul is just one solid thing,” Steve said after a moment. “I picture it more like… energy. Like tiny pieces that break apart when you die and flow into something else. You wouldn’t come back the same. But parts of you would keep going.”

Bucky smiled faintly. He liked that Steve thought about things like this. He liked that Steve tried.

“What if God is just… that?” Steve continued. “A source. Like a core. Everything comes from it and goes back to it.”

He closed his eyes for a second. In his head it wasn’t religious. It was light. Motion. Something pulling and pushing all at once.

“I’ve been to some really dark places already,” Bucky said lightly, like it was nothing.

Steve opened his eyes. He didn’t know how to answer that. His thoughts tangled, their knees touching without either of them moving away.

Bucky shifted closer, just enough that Steve felt the warmth of him properly now. It didn’t feel like crossing a line. It felt… okay.

***

Ever since Bucky had shown up at Steve’s door a few days ago, just to return his notebook (allegedly), they’d kept finding excuses to see each other again. Long walks that went nowhere. Conversations that stretched too late. It felt like neither of them had anywhere else they wanted to be.

Two loners who, against their better judgment, had decided being alone together was somehow easier.

Steve didn’t believe in coincidence. Maybe he wanted to. Either way, he’d quietly made it his mission to prove to Bucky that life didn’t have to be as flat and pointless as he liked to pretend it was. That you always had a choice, even if it didn’t feel like one.

The abandoned freight yard loomed dark and rusted in front of them. Steve stepped closer to one of the old train cars, heart beating a little too fast as he shook the spray can and lifted it.

Before he could press down, Bucky’s hand landed on his shoulder.

“You don’t have to prove anything to me,” Bucky said.

Steve huffed, nerves disguised as confidence. “I’m just gonna sign it with your name.”

He started spraying, the metal hissing beneath the paint.

“All you need is love,” Bucky read aloud, then snorted. “You’re kidding, right?”

Steve stepped back, lowering the can and squinting at his own work. “What, making fun of a John Lennon quote now? Want me to add a little footnote explaining what an uncultured idiot you are.”

“That line didn’t even save the world in the sixties,” Bucky muttered.

“Doesn’t mean it’s wrong,” Steve shot back, shrugging.

Bucky opened his mouth to reply, then froze.

“The cops.” he whispered suddenly.

A beam of light cut across the darkness.

“HEY! WHAT ARE YOU DOING THERE?”

Steve reacted without thinking. He grabbed Bucky’s hand and bolted.

They ran across the tracks, gravel slipping under their shoes, breath tearing out of their chests. Shouts echoed behind them. Steve vaulted up between two cars, hauling himself onto the coupling and pulling Bucky after him.

He moved instinctively, placing himself in front of Bucky, arms braced on either side of him against the cold metal. Their bodies pressed together, Steve’s heartbeat loud in his ears, not sure if it was his own or Bucky’s he could feel.

The flashlight swept past them, then moved on.

Only when the light disappeared did Steve realize he was holding his breath.

“Well,” he murmured, voice low, “that was definitely more exciting than running a blog.”

Bucky lifted his head, eyes bright even in the dark. “You do this a lot?”

“I like leaving marks,” Steve said. “Reminders that I was there.”

He told himself he didn’t care how close Bucky was. Told himself it was just the adrenaline. But the lie didn’t hold.

Steve leaned in before he could talk himself out of it.

The kiss was brief and soft. Familiar and strange at the same time. Like something that had been waiting for the right moment to exist.

When they pulled apart, Bucky’s cheeks were flushed, his smile small but not fake like often.

***

Tony was leaning against Steve’s doorframe, wearing nothing but boxers and a hoodie that definitely wasn’t his. He spooned cereal into his mouth with zero urgency, staring at Steve the way he always did when he thought he’d figured something out first.

“You know Barnes has a crush, right?”

Steve paused mid-strum, fingers stilling on the guitar strings. “A what.”

Tony grinned around a mouthful of cornflakes. “A crush. On a person. A real, human someone.”

Steve forced himself to shrug, even though the reveal hit harder than it should have. “Okay? Good for him.”

Tony snorted. “You didn’t know.”

“I didn’t ask,” Steve said lightly, plucking at the strings again like nothing had happened. “Not really my business.”

Tony tilted his head, studying him. “Funny. You usually notice things like that.”

Steve didn’t look up. “Doesn’t mean anything.”

“So,” Tony said, still hovering in Steve’s doorway, “you’re really not bothered?”

Steve glanced up from the mattress where he sat cross-legged, guitar resting against his knee. “By what?”

“By the fact that Barnes is apparently busy with his mystery crush,” Tony pressed. “They’ve been inseparable lately. And when everyone goes out, he goes with them.”

Steve shrugged. “Doesn’t concern me.”

Tony raised an eyebrow. “You sure? You’ve been hanging out all week like an old married couple.”

“That just happened,” Steve said, deliberately casual. “Doesn’t mean anything.”

Which wasn’t entirely true, but it was close enough to be believable.

The truth was, Steve liked Bucky. More than he wanted to admit, even to himself. But liking someone didn’t mean you were entitled to anything. And he’d learned that lesson the hard way once already, opened himself up, trusted too much, and walked away with nothing but disappointment and the bitter aftertaste of being fooled.

He didn’t want that again. Didn’t want half-truths and uncertainty sitting so close to his ribs.

Besides, Bucky hadn’t said anything. Hadn’t mentioned anyone. And Steve wasn’t about to read meaning into silence.

Tony watched him for a long moment. “You’re weirdly calm about this.”

Steve gave a thin smile. “I’m just realistic.”

Tony clicked his tongue. “You always are.”

Steve strummed the guitar once, sharp and clean, letting the sound settle the thoughts he didn’t want to follow. Whatever Bucky felt for someone else, whoever that someone was, it wasn’t Steve’s place to question it.

And if a small, traitorous part of him wondered who had managed to catch Bucky’s attention…

Well. He kept that part quiet.

***

Steve had been in the bathroom for almost an hour when Tony knocked again, harder this time.

His stomach twisted in on itself as he finally stood, hands braced on the sink. He’d leaned too far into it earlier, too much weed, not enough food, and when he stepped into the hallway, the world tipped sideways. The lights swam, the edges of everything going dark for a second.

He slid down to the floor, back against the wall, closed his eyes and focused on breathing. Slow. Even. He waited until the blood stopped roaring in his ears, until his body remembered how to exist properly.

Bucky had never mentioned a crush.

Tony had, of course. Casually. Like it didn’t matter.

Steve wondered why that detail had lodged itself so firmly in his chest.

He hadn’t wanted to ask. Didn’t want to know. If Bucky liked someone, fine. Better, even. That meant there was no risk of things getting complicated. No danger of expectations forming where Steve didn’t want them.

He didn’t want anything serious.

Didn’t want to owe anyone time, effort, explanations.

Didn’t want to be someone people expected things from.

Eventually, he pushed himself up and stared at the ceiling, letting the dizziness pass completely. Tony would be pacing in the kitchen by now, probably narrating his own thoughts to the refrigerator.

Steve dragged himself back into his room and pulled on the first things he found: a flannel shirt, ripped jeans. He barely looked at himself in the mirror. He already knew what he’d see, someone who blended into corners, who preferred watching to participating.

Someone people didn’t look at twice.

That was fine.

“Are you done?” Tony called from the kitchen. “Or did you fall into the bathtub and die?”

Steve rolled his eyes and stepped out. “Relax.”

Tony leaned halfway into the fridge, voice muffled. “You ready?”

“Hm?” Steve said absently, scanning the counter before reaching for a granola bar, shoving it in his mouth in two bites.

Tony shut the fridge and looked at him. “We’re leaving.”

Steve bent down, grabbed his shoes. “Yeah, yeah.”

Tony frowned suddenly. “By the way, did you eat my chocolate?”

Steve paused. “No.”

Tony squinted. “I know I had some.”

Steve smirked despite himself. “Maybe it achieved enlightenment and left.”

Tony groaned. “Unbelievable. You’re buying new chocolate tomorrow.”

Steve slipped on his shoes, the familiar quiet settling back into place. Whatever Bucky was doing tonight, whoever he was thinking about, it wasn’t Steve’s problem.

***

The club was loud in that low, constant way, reggae bleeding into dancehall, bass vibrating through the floor and into Steve’s ribs. There was a small terrace outside with sun loungers that made the place stupidly popular in summer, but inside it was all shadows and bodies and spilled drinks.

Steve took a slow sip of his beer and only then realized his eyes were already searching for Bucky.

He spotted him a little off to the side, sitting alone on the steps that led outside with a bottle in his hand, not really watching the crowd. For a second, Steve felt oddly relieved.

Then he noticed the guy crouched in front of him.

The guy was talking fast, gesturing too much, leaning into Bucky’s space like he owned it. Steve didn’t like the way Bucky’s shoulders were pulled tight, or how his mouth was set like he was bracing himself.

That’s his crush, Steve thought grimly. Or maybe just someone who thought he was.

He moved closer without really deciding to, catching a few words over the music.

“-told you it’d be better if you didn’t come,” the guy snapped. “Can you stop pulling that face? You’re so damn weird, man.”

Steve stepped in before he could think better of it.

“Just because you don’t understand him doesn’t mean he’s weird,” he said, voice steady despite the sudden heat in his chest.

The guy looked up, annoyed. “And you are…?”

Bucky straightened, brushing a strand of hair out of his face, his expression dark. “Steve. That’s-…” he hesitated, then sighed. “That’s Alex. Alex, Steve.”

Alex’s eyes narrowed slightly as he took a step closer. “Ah. Heard about you.”

Steve didn’t move. “Great.”

Alex lifted his hands placatingly. “Look, man, I’m with Bucky. No reason for this to get awkward. We should all be cool, yeah?”

Steve met his gaze flatly. “I don’t care about being cool with you.”

Alex’s jaw tightened.

“Steve, just go,” Bucky said sharply. Steve had never heard that tone from him before, hard, distant. “Seriously. Don’t make this a thing.”

“I’m not,” Steve shot back. “He is.”

“Don’t get involved,” Bucky said. “I didn’t ask you to.”

That did it.

Steve scoffed, turned on his heel, and shoved through the crowd toward the bathrooms, anger buzzing under his skin like electricity. What the hell had he been thinking? Coming here, stepping in, acting like he had any right-

The bathroom was cramped and smelled like cheap soap and smoke. Steve braced his hands on the sink, breathing once, hard. Stickers and half-faded tags covered the walls. He stared at them without seeing any of it.

He was angry at himself. For caring. For noticing. For letting Tony drag him out tonight at all.

The door creaked open behind him. He didn’t turn. He didn’t need to.

“Are you jealous now?” Bucky asked, voice light in a way that cut worse than shouting.

Steve turned slowly. “Does he know we kissed?”

Bucky blinked. Then he smiled, small, sharp. “You are jealous.”

“That’s not-” Steve stopped himself, laughed humorlessly. “God, you really think you’re a lot more interesting than you actually are.”

Bucky stiffened.

“You play these games,” Steve continued, words spilling out faster now, meaner than he meant them to be. “You like having people orbit you. Because if someone ever really looked close, they’d see there’s nothing there but-”

He stopped. Too late.

Bucky’s expression finally cracked. Not dramatic, just tired. Wounded.

“Wow,” he said quietly. Then he turned and walked out, forcing a crooked smile as the door shut behind him.

The room felt suffocating.

Steve stood there, frozen, then dragged a hand through his hair and swore under his breath. That hadn’t been fair at all. It hadn’t even been true. It had just been easier to hurt first than to admit he’d felt small.

He kicked one of the stall doors once, hard, then paced the length of the bathroom.

He had to go after him.

Steve saw him before he crossed the street.

Bucky was sitting on the steps by the metal door across the street, shoulders hunched forward, elbows on his knees like he’d been there a while. From a distance it almost looked like he was waiting. Or hoping someone might come out after him and pretend it was an accident.

Steve slowed without meaning to.

He sat down beside him, not touching him or even looking at him directly. Just close enough to be there. For a moment he only watched Bucky out of the corner of his eye, how he worried his lower lip when he was thinking, how his fingers slid through his dark hair and tugged at it absentmindedly, how his nose scrunched when something bothered him.

Steve had known him for a while now. And still, it felt like seeing him properly for the first time.

Bucky looked… fragile. Not in a way that asked for protection, just stripped of whatever armor he usually wore. The sharpness, the confidence, it was gone. What was left was thin and tired and very, very human.

Steve swallowed.

“I’m sorry,” he said quietly.

His voice came out rougher than he meant it to. He cleared his throat. Only then did he realize how long they’d been sitting in silence already.

Bucky turned his head a little. Not fully. His mouth curved into a small smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes.

“It’s fine,” he said. “You weren’t wrong.”

Steve frowned. “I was.”

Bucky shook his head, staring at the pavement. “I wasn’t really wanted there tonight anyway. The whole thing was kind of doomed from the start.”

Steve couldn’t hold his gaze. Shame crept in, slow and heavy. He’d gone for the throat because it was easier than admitting he cared.

“Oh god,” Bucky muttered, tipping his head back. “I wish I was high right now.” He huffed out a breath that almost sounded like a laugh. “I spend so much time trying to look like I’ve got everything under control. Like no one gets a say over me. And somehow I still end up-”

He stopped himself, jaw tightening.

After a second, he went on, quieter. “I think I hate people for being interested in me. Or maybe I just hate that it’s never… deep. It’s always surface-level. A façade.”

Steve listened. Really listened.

Bucky wrapped his arms around his legs, pulling them closer. “Apparently I’m only likable from a distance,” he said. “No one actually knows who I am. I don’t even know, most days.”

A tear slipped free before he could stop it, darkening the asphalt between his shoes. He wiped at his face roughly, embarrassed.

Steve felt something in his chest twist.

“You’re wrong,” he said softly.

Bucky let out a short, hollow laugh. “Because you see me?”

Steve winced, not at the question, but at how much it echoed his own words earlier.

“No,” he said. “Because thinking nothing good is ever going to happen to you just because it hasn’t yet-… that’s… it’s bullshit.”

Bucky looked at him then. Really looked.

“And you know that?” he asked, skeptical.

“I don’t,” Steve admitted. “But assuming the worst is just another way of protecting yourself. It doesn’t mean it’s true.”

For a moment, Bucky said nothing. His eyes searched Steve’s face like he was trying to read something there, intention, maybe. Or sincerity.

Finally, his shoulders sagged.

“Thank you for coming out,” he said quietly.

Steve nodded, throat tight. He didn’t trust himself to say anything else.

Bucky leaned his head back against the wall, staring up at the dark sky. After a moment, Steve did the same.

***

At first, Steve had thought Bucky’s behavior was just another carefully practiced role, another way of keeping control, of always standing just a little apart from everything. But since the argument in the club bathroom, he knew better. He knew now that none of it had been like he thought.

There was something restless about Bucky, something that couldn’t stand being alone for too long, even when he wasn’t with Steve. Alex, whoever he really was to Bucky, kept him at a distance, burned hot and fast, demanded loyalty without offering much in return.

Steve wanted to understand him.

He wanted to figure out what was hidden behind that façade.

“What do you actually want to do later? When you’re grown up, I mean.” Bucky asked quietly.

They were lying side by side on Steve’s bed, close enough that their shoulders touched. Bucky absently played with the bracelets around Steve’s wrist, tracing the worn leather with his thumb. Their closeness had become natural over the past days, so natural it almost scared Steve.

“What I’ve always done,” Steve said. “Art.”

Bucky tilted his head. “You’re not afraid that won’t work out?”

Steve shook his head. “Why wouldn’t it?”

“I mean… financially,” Bucky said, carefully. His fingers slid through one of Steve’s hair strands, slow and distracted. The fairy lights above the bed reflected in his eyes.

Steve stared at the ceiling. “I don’t want to waste my life chasing money. In my world, that’s just not worth it. And I don’t think this system is going to last forever anyway.”

Bucky smiled faintly, though it looked strained.

He reached into his pocket, pulled out two painkillers, and swallowed them dry without hesitation. He always carried them, treated them like candy, Steve remembered him explaining once that it was easier that way.

“So,” Steve said after a moment, turning his head toward him. “What about you? What do you want to do?”

Bucky swallowed again and looked away. “I don’t know.”

“Then why are you in the graphic design course?”

“I like drawing.”

Steve nodded slowly. “Yeah. But I don’t think graphic design is the right place for you.” He hesitated, then added, “I did an internship at an advertising agency once.”

Bucky’s eyebrows lifted. “And?”

“Terrible,” Steve said without hesitation. “They sell people things they don’t need. If you go along with it, you’re just another cog keeping thoughtless consumption alive. I had to rebuild the same designs over and over again, following instructions, and after a month my boss told me I had no talent and wouldn’t amount to anything.”

Bucky’s jaw tightened. He worried his lip with his teeth, visibly angry on Steve’s behalf.

“I never went back,” Steve continued. “I just… trust my gut now. If you do what actually fulfills you, things tend to open up. New paths, new chances.”

Bucky picked at the black polish on his nails, restless as always, unable to sit still.

“What do you actually want most?” Steve asked gently.

“Nothing,” Bucky said. “That’s the problem.”

Steve frowned, stealing a glance at him. He searched for something to say, something that wouldn’t sound hollow or forced.

Bucky sighed and pushed himself upright. He picked at a scab on his scraped knee and said, almost casually, “I should go.”

Steve knew exactly where.

He didn’t want to be cruel, didn’t want to comment, so he stayed quiet. But Bucky didn’t let it go.

“You’re mine,” Bucky quoted what Alex said. “But I need my freedom.”

Steve scoffed under his breath.

Bucky rushed to correct himself. “He told me from the start he didn’t want obligations. No responsibility for anyone else.”

“You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed,” Steve said quietly, almost without thinking. He frowned, then added, “It’s from The Little Prince. You read it to me the other night.”

Bucky blinked, clearly caught off guard that Steve had remembered. For a split second something softer crossed his face, but then it hardened.

“Relax,” he snapped. “I don’t actually care.”

“Yeah,” Steve said, a bitter laugh slipping out. “I can tell.”

“Thanks,” Bucky shot back. His eyes flashed, sharp and angry.

“He’s playing you,” Steve said, the disappointment in his voice unmistakable. “And you know it.”

“That’s none of your business,” Bucky said stubbornly, chewing on his lip. The wrinkles around his eyes stood out more than usual, flushed with frustration. The insecurity was written all over him.

Steve scoffed. “Oh, right. Sorry. I forgot… you’re this incredibly deep, misunderstood person who just happens to be with someone who doesn’t give a shit about you, but it’s fine because you believe in some big, cinematic idea of love.”

Bucky rolled his eyes.

“You think in patterns,” Steve continued, words tumbling out faster now. “You don’t step back, you don’t think things through. Everything feels terrible because of your mindset, not because the world is conspiring against you. If you’d just stop clinging to everything that drags you down and quit living like you’re in some indie film, things might actually-”

Bucky laughed, sharp and hollow. “Wow. Enlighten me some more, Steve. Since you’re apparently on your final life already. Take my soul with you when you move on, yeah? I really don’t feel like waiting through a couple more.”

“Just-… go,” Steve snapped.

Bucky stared at him for a heartbeat longer than necessary, then turned and left, the door slamming behind him.

Steve sat there, breathing hard, shocked by how much time he’d wasted on someone who refused to listen.

“What the hell was that?” Tony asked, poking his head into the room. His expression said exactly what he was thinking: Why did Bucky just storm out like that?

“He drives me insane,” Steve muttered, shoving his hand through his hair. He turned too sharply, clipped the nightstand with his knee. It tipped over with a crash, knocking a lamp to the floor.

Tony winced. “Yikes.”

Steve sank onto the edge of the bed, anger already curdling into something worse.

Tony lingered in the doorway, quieter now. “You know… telling someone they’re the problem when they’re already drowning usually doesn’t help.”

Steve exhaled slowly.

“I’m not saying you’re wrong,” Tony added. “But he doesn’t need a diagnosis. He needs someone to actually see him. And yeah… trusting someone? That’s terrifying. Especially if you’re used to being alone.”

Steve didn’t respond.

Tony sighed. “Just… think about it.”

When Tony finally left, Steve was alone with his thoughts. That was the dangerous part.

He replayed the argument again and again, each sentence hitting harder on repeat. He hadn’t wanted to humiliate Bucky. He’d just wanted to protect himself… and overshot, again. Instinctive self-defense, sharp and careless.

Eventually, he leaned back, staring at the ceiling.

He hated that Tony was probably right.

He hated that Bucky might have heard the truth, but not the part that mattered most.

That Steve had been scared.

And that maybe, for once, he’d wanted someone to stay.

***

Two days later, Bucky stood in Steve’s hallway, his hood pulled low, shadowing most of his face.

“What happened?” Steve asked carefully. “What did you do?”

He wasn’t even sure why he’d come over anymore. He’d called yesterday. And the night before that. When Bucky hadn’t picked up, Steve had gone past his place, stood across the street longer than he wanted to admit. He was sure he’d seen movement behind the lighted window.

“Slept,” Bucky said.

Steve frowned. “Two days?”

Bucky’s eyes flicked up. He knew. He knew Steve had been there.

“Yeah,” he rasped, exhaustion sitting heavy in his voice. “Can I come in?”

Steve stepped aside without thinking. As Bucky passed him, he brushed his fingers lightly over Steve’s stomach, kicked off his shoes like he belonged there.

“When nobody checks on you, you just disappear. I had to check on you,” Bucky said lightly. Too lightly.

“And when nobody checks on you, you pass out for forty-eight hours?” Steve shot back, trying  (and failing) to hide the concern.

“It wasn’t dramatic,” Bucky muttered, tugging his sleeves over his hands.

Steve crossed the room, closed the music program on his laptop, then turned back to him.

“I’m sorry,” they both said at the same time.

Bucky smiled faintly and decided to change the topic.

“I mean… yon’t get me wrong, I’m not complaining,” he said. “But why are you always home?”

Steve shrugged. “I like being alone. I do my thing. Parties and stupid people just distract me.”

Bucky tilted his head. “So… Tony’s a stupid person now?”

Steve snorted. “Tony’s the smartest, most selfless person I know. He sees through people and uses it to help. Even if it doesn’t always look like it. He just… likes noise. I don’t.”

Bucky picked at the chipped polish on his nails. “I don’t get why you’re here, though. Even if you don’t want to be.”

Steve hesitated.

“You can sound kind of… above it all sometimes,” Bucky said quietly. “You know that?”

The words hit him more than he’d admit.

Bucky looked up at him, pale and rigid, like something fragile pretending not to be. “Imagine you didn’t need this body. This skin. Imagine you could just exist mechanically. Or digitally.”

“A detached consciousness?” Steve murmured.

Bucky didn’t answer. He didn’t have to. Steve could tell, too glassy eyes, too slow movements. The oversized hoodie swallowed him whole, bruises blooming faintly along his legs, peeling out from his scuffed up pants. He was on some pills.

“Is there anything that actually throws you off?” Bucky asked suddenly, as if he hadn’t heard a word. “Anything that makes you sad?”

“Nothing,” Steve said automatically, forcing a smile. “I’m a cyborg.”

Bucky didn’t smile back.

Steve stepped closer. “Bucky. What’s going on?”

Bucky’s lips trembled. He bit down hard, but it didn’t stop the tear that slipped free. Steve reached for his hand without asking.

“I’m just so confused,” Bucky said, words spilling out like he’d been holding them back forever. “It feels like my head’s going to split open. Nothing fits together. The more I try to understand myself, the worse it gets. Like… like I woke up from the Matrix, or I’m stuck in the Truman Show or something.”

Steve watched Bucky for a long moment and realized, belatedly, that maybe the problem hadn’t been what Bucky was doing now, but how long he’d been doing everything alone.

“No,” Steve said finally, when Bucky muttered something about sounding ridiculous. “You don’t. You really don’t.”

Bucky frowned slightly, like he didn’t believe him.

“I always had Tony,” Steve went on. He scratched at his chin, a small smile tugging at his mouth despite himself. “I think that helped more than I realized. We talked. A lot. About everything. We questioned things together. We were skeptical together. And, yeah, honest. Brutally honest, sometimes.”

He exhaled. “I always knew I had someone. A real friend. So even when the world looked like exactly what it is… I could still see what it could be.”

Bucky swallowed. “I’m so blind.”

Steve tilted his head. “Sometimes you’re a walking cliché.”

Bucky huffed, irritated. “And you’re not?”

“I also hate empty gestures,” Steve added calmly.

Bucky’s eyes snapped up. “Then why do you even bother with me?”

“Because I like you.”

Bucky didn’t answer. He tried very hard not to look at Steve, failed, and then just… stayed there, caught. There was something unguarded in his eyes now, dark, tired, honest in a way that felt dangerous. Steve saw it, and Bucky knew he saw it.

It unsettled him. Something inside him shifted, started moving too fast.

They stared at each other longer than was comfortable, neither willing to back down, neither knowing what to say that wouldn’t make things worse. Steve had never lost a staring contest in his life, but he’d also never wanted to look away less.

Bucky’s eyes were deep. Sad. Steve had the strange, irrational thought that he could fall into them. That there was something there he could hold onto, if Bucky would let him.

Time slipped. Steve didn’t push. When it became clear Bucky had nothing left to say, Steve reached for an ashtray instead, lit a joint, and took a slow drag.

“Next big war’s gonna be about resources,” he said lightly. “Then everyone loses their minds.”

Bucky looked relieved at the change. “Cool. Let’s buy a city and wreck the system from the inside.”

Steve snorted and held the joint out to him. Bucky took it, inhaled, then said suddenly, “I’ve been thinking about my dad again.”

Whenever Bucky came down from something heavier than weed, his family surfaced.

“And?” Steve asked.

“Parents ruin you.”

“Probably not on purpose.”

“Doesn’t matter,” Bucky said flatly. “It’s too late. What’s he gonna teach me now?”

Steve thought about Tony. About their parents. About everything that had been missing and everything that had still mattered anyway.

“He doesn’t have to teach you anything to have shaped you,” Steve said. “People take up space in your life even when they fail at it.”

Bucky stared at the ceiling. “He had the chance. I wanted him to use it. He didn’t. I’m empty where he’s concerned.”

Steve reached for Bucky’s hand. Let his fingers slide between his, rest there.

“Does that make me cold?” Bucky asked quietly.

“No.”

“Ungrateful?”

“No,” Steve said again, firmer. “But… maybe someday you’ll see it differently.”

Bucky turned his head then, really looked at him. “You think so?”

“Maybe,” Steve said. “Maybe not. Both are allowed.”

Bucky squinted, then laughed weakly. “God, I must look wrecked.”

Steve smiled. “Yeah.”

“Wow. Thanks.”

“Nice, though.”

***

The train station platform was overgrown, swallowed by grass and weeds, like a place the world had quietly decided to forget. Steve walked along it slowly, feeling like he’d stepped into the set of an abandoned movie, something post-apocalyptic, something where nature had won. The sun was warm, a light breeze moved the tall grass back and forth, and there were more birds out here than he ever heard in the city.

Bucky was staying with his mother for a few days. Farther out than Steve had expected. He’d sat on a regional train for over an hour, voluntarily, just to see him. Not that it meant anything.

And then there Bucky was.

Dark hair tied into two uneven knots, jean shorts, a shirt so oversized it nearly swallowed him. He looked smaller than Steve remembered. Too small. His head seemed almost too large for his body, his limbs thin, fragile in a way that made Steve’s chest tighten every time he noticed it.

He looked sick. Or maybe Steve was just imagining it.

Steve was still trying to figure out how to say anything about that without hurting him when Bucky reached up, brushed his index finger lightly over Steve’s lower lip, and frowned.

“What happened to you?”

Steve huffed, embarrassed. “Lost a fight with my nightstand.”

Bucky made a skeptical face. Steve scratched the back of his head. “It’s cursed. I swear.”

That earned him a tiny smile.

They started walking, fields stretching endlessly around them. Bucky told him about working a night shift in some massive warehouse, loading crates until his arms felt like they might fall off. Too many energy drinks. Getting sick. Not wanting to cancel because they needed someone, because he needed the money.

Steve hated how casually Bucky said it.

“You couldn’t have done something less… destructive?” he asked.

Bucky shrugged. “I almost made twice as much as I would’ve at the café.”

He laced his fingers through Steve’s and tugged him off the path, into a field where the grass was already pressed down from others passing through.

“What’s Tony up to these days?” Bucky asked.

Steve snorted softly. “Last time I checked? Not sleeping.”

Bucky glanced at him. “Still?”

“Yeah. He used to get these stress episodes back when we first moved in together. Too much pressure. Sometimes he’d wake up convinced something was wrong, like the room wasn’t real, or something was trying to break in. Once he tried to leave the apartment at three in the morning.”

Bucky winced. “That bad?”

“I found him in the hallway, shaking,” Steve said. “Didn’t even remember it the next day.”

They walked in silence for a moment.

At the edge of the field, near a small line of trees, an old, rusted bathtub lay tipped on its side. Bucky stopped there and sat down, patting the metal for Steve to join him.

“This is my place,” he said quietly. “Don’t tell anyone.”

Steve sat beside him.

Bucky turned toward him, studying his face. “You know what I like about you?”

“Terrifying question,” Steve said.

“You don’t look at me like I’m just someone,” Bucky said. “Like I’m interchangeable.”

“Most people don’t see past the surface,” Steve replied.

Bucky nodded, then asked, almost absently, “Why aren’t you with anyone?”

Steve hesitated.

“Should I be?” he asked.

Bucky shrugged. “Just curious.”

“I had a girlfriend,” Steve said finally. “A while ago. Short. Intense. Bad combination.”

Bucky raised an eyebrow.

“I was controlling,” Steve admitted. “Not in the obvious way. Just… rigid. Needed everything to make sense. Needed reassurance. It turned ugly fast.”

“So you swore off relationships?”

“I swore off investing energy into things that make me smaller,” Steve said. “People like to pretend relationships fix something. Most of the time they just give you new things to fail at.”

Bucky smiled faintly. “That’s bleak.”

“Honest,” Steve corrected.

Bucky leaned back, staring at the sky. “Tony once said you act like someone who figured out how people work and then decided it wasn’t worth playing along.”

Steve huffed. “Sounds like him.”

They sat there for a while, the wind moving through the grass, the world quiet and wide around them.

Bucky turned his head again. “I’m glad you came.”

Steve didn’t answer right away.

“Yeah,” he said finally. “Me too.”

Bucky didn’t answer right away. He seemed to be lining the words up in his head first, like he was afraid they might fall apart if he moved too fast.

“I just… feel okay with you,” he said finally. “With you and Tony. Everywhere else it’s like I’m constantly bracing myself. Like something’s about to tip me over or tear me open.”

Steve didn’t know what to say to that. He rarely did.

He watched Bucky instead, the way his shoulders sloped forward, the way his clothes swallowed him, the fine dark strands of hair slipping loose from their knots. There was something brittle about him, something unfinished, like he was erasing himself a little more every day. Steve had the recurring, sickening thought that one day Bucky might simply disappear. Not dramatically. Just… thin out into nothing.

Sometimes Bucky’s expressions slipped, just for a second, like the mask cracked. He’d stare too long into the distance, then catch himself and paste a smile back on, careful and practiced.

Steve found himself wishing that there were no substances in the world at all. No pills, no alcohol, no nicotine, no weed, no anything.

But even as the thought formed, he knew it was a lie. Take all of that away and Bucky would still be standing at the edge. He just wouldn’t be numb anymore.

And that terrified Steve more.

What the hell was he supposed to do?

“Have you ever had a near-death experience?” Bucky asked suddenly.

Steve shook his head. “Not really.”

Bucky tilted his head. “Not at all?”

Steve hesitated. Then nodded slightly. “I almost suffocated when I was a kid. I was seven.”

Bucky’s attention sharpened instantly.

“I had a bad cold. Couldn’t sleep. I woke up thinking the noise in my head was snoring, which is stupid because I don’t snore. Something felt wrong, so I sat up and tried to call my mom, and nothing came out. No air. Nothing.”

Steve swallowed, surprised at how clearly it came back.

“I panicked. Climbed down from my bed. I remember thinking I needed help but not knowing how people got help at night. I was sure that was it.”

Bucky was watching him like he might break if Steve stopped talking.

“My mom heard me somehow. Turned on the light. I just stood there and croaked out ‘doctor’ like that was a complete sentence.”

He exhaled slowly. “I was convinced I was going to die.”

“What did you think?” Bucky asked quietly. “In that moment.”

Steve stared at the grass. “I thought… ‘Wow. That’s it.’ I thought I’d at least get to grow up first.”

A pause. “I remember imagining an older version of myself I’d never get to be.”

Bucky blinked. “That’s… a lot for a kid.”

“Yeah. My mom freaked out. Tried to carry me. I couldn’t breathe right, felt like I could pull air in but not let it go. I was running around like an animal until she held me down and forced me to stay still.”

His jaw tightened. “I saw myself in the mirror for a second. I looked like I’d already met death and didn’t like what I saw.”

They drove to the hospital after that. Steam treatments. Needles. White beds. Steve remembered all of it. What scared him most wasn’t the pain, it was being alone.

“What was it?” Bucky asked.

“Airway issue. Rare for my age. A few nights in the hospital, breathing treatments.”

He shrugged. “That was it.”

Bucky reached for his hand without asking, tracing slow lines along Steve’s arm like he was grounding himself.

“If you could go anywhere,” Bucky asked after a while, “where would you go?”

“Somewhere green. Quiet,” Steve said. “An island, maybe. Middle of nowhere.”

Bucky smiled faintly. “Japan. Tokyo, especially. The clothes, the chaos, the color. I think I’d disappear into it in a good way.”

Steve glanced at him. “You could do that.”

“Maybe,” Bucky said. “If I were braver.”

They talked about practical things then, work, studying, possibilities. Steve joked about Bucky opening a tattoo studio one day. He told him he’d be first in line.

Bucky laughed, shy and disbelieving.

The sun dipped lower. Steve looked up just in time to catch Bucky watching him.

The kiss happened without ceremony. Light. Careful. Bucky barely touched his split lip, afraid to hurt him.

Steve didn’t pull away.

“Sorry,” Bucky murmured, smiling like he hadn’t meant to but didn’t regret it either.

Steve watched him for a long moment, something weird blooming in his chest.

***

Bucky kept circling the same thoughts, over and over, no matter how often he tried to get closer to the center of them. Every time something sharp came into focus, he veered off again, distracted himself with small, manageable things. The surface. The details. Anything but the core.

Fear was what stopped him from looking straight at it.

He’d been high earlier, still was, probably. Someone had handed him something on ‘The Lawn’, some syrupy cough stuff that burned going down and made his head feel pleasantly far away. He’d said it made him feel softer, quieter. What it actually did was make his skin crawl. He’d been scratching all evening, especially at his scalp and legs, like he couldn’t quite get out of his own body.

“You know what people say about you,” Bucky said suddenly, turning his head toward Steve. “Out there. On ‘The Lawn’.”

Steve glanced over. “What do they say?”

“That you think you’re better than them,” Bucky said. “Because you don’t come with us. Because you don’t talk much.”

Steve didn’t look particularly bothered. “I get called arrogant a lot,” he said. “I’m used to it.”

Bucky huffed. “You can be intimidating.”

“That’s not intentional.”

“Doesn’t mean it doesn’t happen,” Bucky shot back. “Sometimes you leave people feeling stupid.”

Steve frowned slightly. “I don’t look down on people,” he said after a moment. “I just… need something to meet me halfway. Curiosity. Awareness. I don’t do well with conversations that don’t go anywhere.”

Bucky snorted. “You can’t expect everyone to know what you know. You’re not done learning either, you know.”

Steve tilted his head. “That’s fair.”

There was a pause. Then he added, more quietly, “Honestly? I think everyone’s kind of an idiot in some way. Me included.”

Bucky smiled faintly at that.

“I think what actually pisses you off,” he said, “isn’t that you’re smarter. It’s that you feel alone in it. Like no one else is really… keeping up.”

Steve didn’t answer right away.

“Are you still high?” he asked instead.

Bucky ignored the question.

“Tony’s like that too,” Steve said eventually. “He just learned how to soften it. How to think about how things land, not just what’s technically true.”

Bucky smirked. “Yeah. He’s gentler with other people. You’re gentler with ideas.”

Steve rolled his eyes. “Analyze yourself with the same enthusiasm you analyze me.”

Bucky laughed at that.

The room fell quiet after.

Steve got up, pulled the curtains shut, plugged in the string lights along the wall. The soft glow filled the space without demanding anything from it. Bucky lay back on the bed, eyes closed, legs covered in thin red lines from where he’d scratched too hard.

Steve sat beside him with his sketchbook, jotted something down, then just… stayed. They’d spent hours like this before. Separate heads. Separate spirals. Same room.

“I don’t get it,” Bucky said eventually, voice muffled. “This. Existing.”

He sat up and pulled his sleeves over his hands, a reflexive movement. Steve had noticed it a while ago. He just hadn’t said anything, pretending (maybe for both their sakes) that Bucky could hide it from him if he really wanted to.

“Why are we even here?” Bucky asked, leaning forward, elbows on his knees, face buried in his hands. “What’s the point of any of it?”

Steve exhaled slowly. He was exhausted. Bucky was overstimulated, wired in that itchy, uncomfortable way, and part of Steve wanted to shut the whole conversation down and go to sleep.

But another part of him knew better. When Bucky asked things like this, it wasn’t theoretical. It was survival.

“I don’t think there is a built-in point,” Steve said. “I think we have to make one.”

Bucky shook his head. “I can’t. I don’t fit into this. I don’t understand how things are supposed to work. It feels like everyone else got instructions and mine are… defective.”

Steve looked at him properly then. His sweater, bare legs covered in angry red marks where Bucky scratched too much, fingers still worrying at his sleeves like he was trying to disappear into them.

“I don’t think anyone actually understands the system,” Steve said quietly. “They just pretend they do.”

“It looks like they’re functioning,” Bucky muttered. “Like I’m the only one glitching.”

“You’re not,” Steve said. “A lot of people feel like that. Like us.”

He paused. “Some people learn the rules and play along. Some play without realizing it’s even a game. And some get stuck in the middle, knowing something’s wrong but not knowing how to fix it.”

Bucky swallowed. “Or they’re in the game and don’t understand the rules at all.”

Steve nodded. “Yeah.”

They sat with that for a moment.

“If you strip it down,” Steve continued, carefully, “all we really have is where we came from and what we choose to do next. History explains how we got here. The future’s… unfinished. The worst thing we can do is just accept everything as fixed and stop questioning it. That’s when it really gets unbearable.”

Bucky frowned. “If I don’t orient myself by what I was taught, then what do I use?”

Steve thought about it. About teachers, expectations, rules that had never quite fit him either.

“What you were taught is a starting point,” he said. “Not the whole map. Every generation has to adjust things. Otherwise it starts feeling like you’re living in the wrong time.”

A pause. “I don’t know. That might be normal.”

Bucky stared at the floor. “I feel like my head’s not even here half the time.”

“Then change something,” Steve said gently.

Bucky scoffed. “You say that like it’s as easy as fixing a stomachache with a heating pad.”

“I know it’s not,” Steve said. “But we still have some control. Not over everything. Just… small things. Slowly.”

“How am I supposed to change anything,” Bucky murmured into a pillow, shifting restlessly, “when I don’t even know how I’m supposed to get through the day?”

Steve hesitated, then said it anyway.

“You’re not alone. I’m here. Tony’s here.”

He watched Bucky carefully. “We’ve got you.”

Bucky looked at him, uncertain, like he wasn’t sure whether to believe that or be afraid of it.

“If you don’t have food,” Steve added, quieter now, more practical. “Come over. If you can’t pay rent someday, you sleep here. If you need help, you call me. That’s not… optional.”

They fell silent.

Steve’s words hung between them, and hearing them out loud made something twist uncomfortably in his chest. He’d come here wanting peace, wanting to be left alone, and instead he’d bent himself around someone else’s gravity again. Why did he trust his instincts with everyone except himself?

“I feel like I need to peel my skin off,” Bucky whispered suddenly. “Everything touching me itches. I can’t stand it.”

He dragged his fingers through his hair, nails scraping at his scalp.

From the outside, it might’ve looked like a bad attempt at flirting. Steve knew better. He always did.

***

Being alone in an apartment that was usually shared felt different than being lonely.

When you lived with other people, family, friends, their presence lingered even when they were gone. In the mug left on the counter. In a jacket draped over a chair. In the quiet certainty that someone would come back eventually.

Being alone in a place where you were actually alone pressed in on Steve’s chest in a way he hadn’t expected.

He tried to imagine what it must feel like for people who were always on their own. There was a difference between solitude and isolation, and he suspected the line between them was thinner than most liked to admit.

He hadn’t seen Bucky in three days.

They hadn’t talked, either. Steve told himself it wasn’t his place to chase him down. It wasn’t even really his place to want to. He wasn’t entitled to Bucky’s time, or his attention, or his choices.

Bucky was probably with Alex.

That pissed him off more than he’d like to admit, ever.

He had no right to be upset about that. None. Whatever Bucky felt for Alex, whatever he did with him, wasn’t Steve’s business. He would’ve felt ridiculous trying to claim otherwise, like he was secretly keeping score or trying to control something that had never been his to begin with.

And yet.

The jealousy sat there anyway. Ugly, quiet, impossible to ignore. It made him withdraw instead of react, made him default to silence because anything else felt unfair.

Relationships had never been easy for him. He’d known that for a long time. They required a level of emotional labor he didn’t always know how to perform without losing himself in the process. He was good at being useful, good at being steady, good at being there, but the rest of it was work, and he was already tired.

Still, what bothered him most wasn’t Alex.

It was how blind Bucky sometimes was to his own downward spirals. How easily he disappeared into his head, into patterns of thought that kept tightening until there was no room left to breathe. Even if Bucky hadn’t mattered to him, if he were just someone passing through Steve’s life, he would’ve hated watching it happen.

He pushed himself up from his chair, leaned the guitar against the wall, and stood at the window.

If you help others, you help yourself, Tony liked to say. Not because it guaranteed anything in return, but because being there for someone else grounded you in the present. Because it reminded you that you still existed outside your own head.

Steve had never taken the saying to mean that kindness was transactional. More that it tethered you to something real.

He shifted the curtain aside and looked down at the street. People moved quickly, purposefully, each wrapped up in their own momentum. Everyone trying to carve out a place for themselves, a pocket of safety in a system that didn’t make it easy.

He’d always had certain advantages. He knew that. He’d never been beaten down in the same ways others had, never had to build armor just to survive daily life. Teachers had told him he was wasting potential, that he was lazy, that he just needed better organization, better habits, better discipline.

No one had ever stopped to ask whether the system itself was broken.

Steve didn’t believe people were meant to be standardized. He didn’t believe learning was supposed to feel like punishment. Curiosity came naturally when you weren’t constantly being measured against someone else. He’d learned that on his own, through music, through art, through the things that grabbed him and refused to let go.

Knowledge didn’t need to be hoarded. It didn’t need to be carried around like proof of worth. That was what the internet was for, shared memory, collective understanding, people building on each other’s ideas instead of guarding them.

If everyone saw the potential in that, he thought, things would be different.

Then again, maybe he was just one more person staring out a window, convinced he’d figured it all out while the world kept moving anyway.

He let the curtain fall back into place and sat down on his bed.

The education system was outdated. He was sure of that. It treated people like machines on an assembly line, same pace, same output, same expectations. No room for different rhythms, different minds. Creativity got flattened. Independence got discouraged.

And people like Bucky got lost in the process.

School is awful, but you just have to get through it, his own parents had said once, years ago.

They’d meant well. They always did.

Still, he wondered how many dreams quietly died under that logic.

Steve lay back and stared at the ceiling.

He didn’t have answers. Not really.

But he knew one thing: the worst mistake a person could make was believing they had no power at all.

And wherever Bucky was right now, whoever he was with, Steve hoped he’d remember that too.

Even if Steve wasn’t the one beside him.

***

The wind tore past them as they rolled downhill. Bucky was sat on the back of Steve’s bike, squinting against the cold air while the sun dipped behind the treeline and flared gold through the branches.

Steve had brought Bucky up here because it was one of the few places that wasn’t packed with people. A small garden tucked high above the city, quiet enough that you could see the whole valley stretch out below you. From up here, problems shrank. The city looked manageable. Almost gentle. But they didn’t stay long.

Bucky had been clean for two days now. Completely sober. Ever since Steve had found him out there in the woods, pale and shaking and scared in a way that still hadn’t let go of Steve’s chest, he’d made a point of keeping him busy. Moving. Distracted. Present.

“So,” Bucky said, grinning suddenly, wind pulling at his hair. “Today was good.”

Steve smiled despite himself. “Yeah. It was.”

“If it always felt like this,” Bucky went on, “I think I could actually handle things.”

Steve leaned forward on the handlebars and raised his voice to carry over the rushing air.

“It can feel like this. When you’re not numbing yourself into the ground.”

Bucky reached back and jabbed a finger into Steve’s side without warning. “Says you.”

Steve laughed, startled. “Hey.”

“Kinda rich coming from the guy who smells like weed half the time.”

Steve’s smile faded, just a little.

“I don’t use it the way you think,” he said. “And I’m not addicted.”

Bucky snorted. “That’s what everyone says.”

Steve didn’t answer right away.

He’d stopped smoking a few days ago. Physically, it hadn’t been hard. But he’d noticed the itch, the reflex to reach for something familiar when his thoughts got too loud. He’d never liked admitting that.

“I know you don’t want to hear this,” Bucky added, more gently now, “but sometimes it feels like you need it. And that’s… not great.”

Steve’s jaw tightened. The words were more true than he wanted them to be. He hated criticism when it brushed up against something true.

“I’m not pretending it’s perfect,” he said. “I just-”

He exhaled. “It slows things down for me. Makes me notice what’s actually happening instead of spiraling.”

They coasted onto flatter ground, pedaling more slowly now.

“So why do it at all?” Bucky asked after a moment. “Why smoke?”

Steve thought about it. He always did, he just rarely said the answer out loud.

“When I’m a little high,” he said finally, “I’m here. I notice textures, sounds. Music actually lands in my body instead of just my head.”

A pause. “Playing guitar like that feels… grounding. Like therapy.”

“That still sounds like avoidance,” Bucky said.

“It is,” Steve admitted. “A little. Like putting a filter over things so they don’t hurt as much.”

Bucky frowned. “That’s kind of the problem.”

“Yeah,” Steve said quietly. “I know.”

They rode in silence for a bit.

“I wish I could play something,” Bucky said suddenly. “Guitar. Piano. Anything.”

“You know you can still learn an instrument,” Steve said as they rolled toward his place. “People do that at any age.”

Bucky glanced at him, surprised. “You really think so?”

“Yeah. Or write. Or draw. You already do that,” Steve added. “You’re good at it.”

Bucky’s eyes widened just a little, color creeping into his cheeks the way it always did when someone noticed him properly. Steve had learned that look by heart. It wasn’t praise Bucky reacted to, it was recognition. Like Steve had spotted something alive under all the noise.

“Words always feel… too fixed,” Bucky said after a moment. “Music and art lets people put their own meaning into it. Nobody tells you what it has to be.”

He shrugged. “That’s why I draw instead of writing.”

Steve nodded. That made sense.

They were only a few blocks from Steve and Tony’s apartment now. Steve didn’t even ask whether Bucky wanted to come in, it had stopped being a question a while ago.

“You know what’s kinda cool?” Bucky said, staring at his phone as they walked their bikes inside. “I used to have to buy magazines just to keep up with artists I liked. Now I can just… follow them. See what they’re actually doing.”

“Everything’s more unfiltered,” Steve said, unlocking the door.

Then, quieter: “Sometimes too much.”

He hesitated, then added, half joking, “I’m trying not to binge dumb YouTube videos until I can’t get out of bed anymore.”

Bucky snorted. “Good luck with that.”

Steve hauled the bike up the stairs while Bucky bounced ahead of him, poking at his arm. “Oh my god. Do you have ice cream?”

“It’s probably freezer-burned.”

“Still ice cream,” Bucky declared solemnly.

Steve was just feeling that small, careful pride, two days sober, a good day behind them, when the apartment door opened fully and the smell hit him.

Chocolate. Warm. Sweet.

“Please tell me you didn’t,” Steve muttered.

Tony’s voice floated out of the kitchen, far too cheerful. “Where have you two been? Food’s ready.”

Steve stepped inside and shot Tony a look. Tony lifted his hands immediately.

“Relax. Regular brownies. Mostly.”

“Tony.”

“What? I didn’t even put much in.”

Bucky, meanwhile, had already grabbed two and was chewing happily. “These are great.”

Steve sighed. He’d stayed clean. Bucky had stayed clean. And now Tony, who absolutely knew better, had introduced temptation like it was a party trick.

Tony met Steve’s glare with a sheepish shrug. “I just thought… you know. Normal night.”

Steve let it go. Fighting about it wouldn’t help.

They retreated into the living room. Tony flopped onto the couch, remote in hand, scrolling through documentaries like it was a ritual. Steve pretended not to know exactly where the couch, TV, and gaming console money had come from years ago. That chapter was over. Mostly.

The documentary droned on in the background.

A while later, the edges of things started to soften. Not sharp like smoking, slower, heavier. Bucky sank into the cushions, eyes half-lidded, breathing steady.

“Okay,” Tony said suddenly, staring at the screen. “You know what I was just thinking about?”

Bucky blinked. “If this guy actually killed himself?”

Tony shook his head. “Nah. Probably murdered. But that’s not it.”

He paused. “Why we have to pay just to exist somewhere.”

Steve glanced over. “You mean rent?”

“Land in general,” Tony said, warming to the topic. “People just… decide they own it. Sell it. Shape it. Ruin it. Like the planet signed a contract or something.”

Steve smiled faintly. Tony only ever talked like this when he was high.

“I like when you get like this,” Steve said. “You don’t do it often.”

Tony smirked. “That’s because you’re usually telling me to shut up.”

“Only sometimes.”

Bucky listened quietly, eyes unfocused but attentive. Steve watched him out of the corner of his eye, wondering, not for the first time, who Bucky would’ve been if the world had made more room for him. If people like Alex hadn’t felt like lifelines just because they were kind.

The documentary ended. Nobody moved.

***

Steve knew Bucky had been with Alex again.

Alex liked Bucky. Not in the way Bucky probably hoped he liked him. Steve was pretty sure Alex liked the version of Bucky that came apart easily, the one that could be pulled along with substances and late nights and reckless decisions. Steve doubted Alex really understood what he was messing with. Or maybe he did, and just didn’t care.

Steve did care.

He sat down at his desk, flipped his laptop open, and typed without really thinking about what he was searching for. He skimmed articles, studies, half-baked psychology blogs, anything that might explain why Bucky gravitated toward people like Jan. Why he kept drifting into situations that made things worse instead of better.

One sentence made him stop.

“People who develop addictive patterns often experienced emotional instability or loss early in life. They learned that the world is not a safe place, that reliance on others is unreliable, and that vulnerability is something to be guarded.”

Steve leaned back slowly. It made sense.

It wasn’t that Bucky didn’t want connection. It was that connection had never been stable enough to trust.

To feel okay, people needed something steady from the outside. But when that never came, when you grew up feeling overlooked or misunderstood, you learned to replace it with something immediate. Something that worked now.

Tony leaned against the doorframe, peering at the screen over Steve’s shoulder.

“Ever hear that thing about babies?” Tony said. “If you don’t pick them up when they cry, they learn early that nobody’s coming.”

Steve frowned. “Who the hell doesn’t pick up a crying baby?”

Tony shrugged. “Some people think it builds independence. Toughens them up. It doesn’t. It just teaches them they’re alone.”

Steve swallowed. “That’s messed up.”

“Yeah,” Tony said quietly. “And kids don’t forget it. They just grow up carrying it differently.”

Steve hesitated. “Do you think… Bucky…?”

Tony didn’t answer right away. He rubbed a hand over the back of his neck.

“I don’t know,” he said finally. “Could be. I know he doesn’t have a great relationship with his parents. And he clings to people who make things louder instead of safer.”

Steve nodded.

Tony exhaled. “Look. I don’t care if people experiment. Whatever. But Bucky’s not experimenting, he’s spiraling. And if he keeps letting people like Alex drag him into that crap, it’s gonna end badly.”

Steve stared at the floor. He already knew that. That was the problem.

“Yeah,” he said quietly.

Tony grimaced. “I know I’m not subtle about it. Sorry.”

Steve shook his head. “Someone has to say it out loud. At least with you, I know you mean it.”

Tony gave a crooked smile. “One of my many charms.”

Steve didn’t smile back, but he felt better knowing Tony was worried too.

If Bucky was falling, at least he wasn’t falling unseen.

***

They were sitting on the same train they’d take again the next morning, the one that would bring them back to school for the first time after summer break.

Outside the window, the city thinned out into fields and clusters of trees that looked too calm to belong this close to everything else. It was the kind of view that made it easy to forget where you actually were.

Steve stirred his smoothie with the straw, more to have something to do with his hands than because it needed it.

“I think,” he said slowly, “the most important thing is figuring out who you are. Like, really figuring it out. Not the version you perform. And once you know that… even just a little… you can start figuring out what actually makes you feel okay.”

Bucky watched the landscape slide past, his reflection faint in the glass. “When you say it like that,” he said, “it sounds easy. Almost… nice.”

“It can be,” Steve said. “Sometimes.”

“And what then?” Bucky asked. “When you’re sort of… okay?”

Steve shrugged. “I think then you want to help other people get there too. Or you just let yourself enjoy it for once. Both are allowed.”

Bucky huffed a quiet laugh. “You sound ridiculous.”

“Yeah,” Steve admitted. “I kind of feel ridiculous saying it.”

He hesitated, then added, softer, “I don’t usually talk like this with anyone. It’s weird how… natural it feels with you. Like I’ve been hiding behind some version of myself for so long that I forgot it was a version.”

They were nearly alone in the compartment now. The train had already passed the final stop twice and turned back again, looping between end stations without either of them bothering to get off.

“I’m really bad at admitting when I mess up,” Steve said. “Even to myself. He glanced at Bucky. “You’re not.”

Bucky smiled faintly. “I don’t know. Most of the time I’m just confused.”

Their eyes met.

“But you are too,” Bucky added.

Steve lifted an eyebrow. He usually hid it well, even from himself, but Bucky wasn’t wrong.

“I don’t trust people easily,” Steve said after a moment. “I like being in control. Keeping my own little world contained. Probably because being alone used to feel safer.”

“Why?” Bucky asked.

Steve thought about it. “Habit, maybe. Being in my head all the time. It made me confident in some ways. And terrified in others.”

“At least you’ve still got a big mouth,” Bucky said, trying to lighten it.

Bucky laughed quietly. “You should’ve seen me when I was younger. I used to argue with everyone. Sixth grade, I picked fights like it was a hobby. I said whatever I thought and didn’t care who it upset.”

“What changed?”

“I started looking at myself from the outside,” Bucky said. “And I didn’t like what I saw.”

The thought of school starting again the next day felt unreal, distant enough that Steve shoved it aside. He had no idea how they’d exist in the same building again. No idea how Bucky would handle it. Or how everything else, the drugs, the people tugging at him from different directions, would fit into that reality at all.

The train kept moving.

***

Tony stuck his head through Steve’s half-open door, grinning like an asshole.

Steve was still in bed, phone in hand, hair a mess, brain barely online.

“Hey,” Tony said far too cheerfully. “Saw Alex yesterday.”

Steve blinked. Once. Twice.

Tony, already committed to chaos, was cutting at his own fringe with a pair of kitchen scissors, letting the hair fall wherever it landed. “Pretty sure he and Bucky aren’t… whatever they were anymore. At least that’s what people are saying.”

Steve scrubbed a hand over his face, trying to locate a reaction somewhere inside himself.

Had Bucky told him?

Did Bucky even want him to know?

Would it change anything if he did?

“Okay,” Steve said finally.

Tony paused, eyebrows lifting. “That’s it?”

Steve shrugged. “What do you want me to say?”

Tony snorted, closed the scissors with a sharp click and wandered off toward the kitchen. “Nothing. Just saying. Also, we leave at ten to eight.”

“Perfect,” Steve called after him, pulling the blanket over his head.

***

Steve spent the entire morning restless.

Bucky hadn’t been on the train. Hadn’t answered his messages. And now that Steve was back in the building, everything felt… wrong. Too bright. Too loud. Like the last weeks had happened somewhere else entirely.

When the bell rang for break, Steve grabbed his bag out of habit, he’d already stopped pretending he took notes, and that’s when he saw Bucky.

Standing outside a classroom. Hands shoved into his sleeves. Looking weird somehow. More alert. Like someone who hadn’t slept enough but also hadn’t slowed down at all.

Their eyes met.

For a second they just stared at each other, like strangers trying to remember something important they’d forgotten.

Then Bucky moved.

Straight toward him. No hesitation. Fingers closed around Steve’s wrist and pulled him down the hall before Steve could get a word out.

“Buck-”

Bathroom.

A stall, barely wide enough for two people to breathe.

The door shut behind them, the lock clicking into place, and suddenly Steve was pressed back against the thin wall, Bucky’s hands on his chest, his breathing too fast, his pupils blown wide.

Steve knew immediately.

He wasn’t sober.

That should’ve been enough to stop it. And it almost was.

“We shouldn’t,” Steve said, even as his hands came up to hold Bucky’s wrists, grounding him there. “This isn’t-“

“I think we should,” Bucky said, voice low and certain, skin warm, eyes bright in a way that scared Steve a little.

Steve’s stomach twisted.

Did it matter who was standing here with him right now?

Would it matter tomorrow?

He tightened his grip, forcing Bucky to look at him properly. Really look.

“I don’t want this if you don’t want me,” Steve said quietly.

Bucky swallowed. Then leaned in, forehead pressing to Steve’s. “I do.”

The kiss was messy and real and a little desperate. Not like movies. Not like porn. Not like any of the neat explanations people liked to give for things like this.

Just two people who’d been holding too much inside for too long.

***

Bucky vanished again after break.

Steve barely registered the rest of the school day. The halls, the noise, the way people moved around him like he was standing still and everyone else was rushing past. By the time he got home, it felt like he’d been underwater for hours.

Panic sat heavy in his chest.

The kind that made you want to pack a bag and disappear.

New city. New name. No explanations.

Except… Tony.

Tony would notice.

This place wasn’t right for him anyway, Steve thought. It never had been. Talking to Bucky, really talking, had helped in ways he hadn’t expected. It had helped Steve, too. And now that line was gone. Crossed. Smeared into something undefined and dangerous.

Friends had been simple.

This wasn’t.

He lay on his bed staring at the ceiling, replaying the moment in the bathroom over and over, searching for something solid in it. Something that meant this instead of that.

Nothing stayed still.

***

Tony rolled lazily back and forth on his board, clearly bored, while Steve circled him with his bike, not really paying attention to either activity.

Same routine as always.

Tony insisted they come out.

Tony immediately lost interest.

“I swear,” Tony said, dragging a foot to stop himself, “I only come here for the aesthetic.”

Steve snorted but didn’t answer.

He saw Alex before Alex saw him.

And immediately wished he hadn’t.

Alex walked straight toward him, confidence sharp and deliberate. Stopped right in front of Steve and stepped close enough to block the front wheel of the bike with his foot.

“Well,” Alex said, voice low. “Look who it is.”

Tony clocked the tension instantly and, for once, had the good sense to shut up. He shifted back a little, hands in his pockets.

“What do you want?” Steve asked, steady despite the way his pulse jumped.

Alex smiled without humor. “I can imagine what he’s been telling you about me. Funny thing is… he tells me stuff too.”

Steve’s jaw tightened. “About what?”

Alex leaned in just slightly. “Like how today went. Bathroom and all. Was he good?”

Something cold slid down Steve’s spine. If he didn’t know better, he would’ve beaten the hell out of Alex just for that last question.

Alex straightened, clearly enjoying the silence. “What’s wrong? Last time you looked a lot more… confident.”

“I don’t have time for your bullshit,” Steve said finally.

Alex laughed softly. “You think this is about you?” His eyes flicked past Steve for half a second, toward the school, toward something that wasn’t there anymore. “He still comes back to me. Always does. He says he doesn’t know why, but I do.”

Steve’s hands curled into fists at his sides.

“This thing you think is happening?” Alex continued, stepping closer again. “It’s not serious. It never is. I’ve known that from the start. I just let it play out.”

He paused, letting it sink in.

“As long as you’re one of his distractions,” Alex said quietly, “you’re one of mine.”

Steve shoved the bike toward him hard enough that Alex had to step away.

“Get out of my way.”

Alex stared at him for a moment, then smirked and gave him a shove to the shoulder as he passed. “Do yourself a favor and stay out of it.”

He spat on the ground near Steve’s tire and walked off, rejoining a couple of people waiting a short distance away.

Tony didn’t move.

Didn’t joke.

Didn’t smile.

He watched Steve carefully instead.

“…Okay,” Tony said slowly. “I feel like I missed a very important episode.”

Steve swallowed, chest tight, eyes fixed on the spot where Alex had disappeared.

“Yeah,” he said. “Me too.”

***

Steve almost didn’t stop.

He should’ve kept riding. Should’ve gone home, showered, let the day dissolve into something less sharp. Instead, he cut the brakes too hard and the bike skidded slightly before he jumped off, pulse hammering in his ears.

Bucky was already there.

Leaning against the fence like he’d been waiting. Steve registered the way his knees were locked, the way his shoulders were tight. That familiar instinct to catalog Bucky’s tells kicked in before he could stop it.

Something was wrong.

Steve dropped the bike and walked the last few steps straight toward him. No detours. No soft opening.

Bucky saw his face and straightened immediately.

“What’s going on?” he asked, cautious. Too cautious.

“I was honest with you,” Steve said, the words breaking out of him before he’d planned them. “So why are you doing this?”

Bucky blinked. “Doing what?”

Steve laughed once, sharp and humorless. “Don’t.”

That wiped something off Bucky’s face. Not guilt, something closer to irritation, like Steve was complicating things by naming them.

“Are you talking about Alex?” Bucky asked.

The fact that he said the name without hesitation was answer enough.

Steve’s jaw clenched. “Do you talk to him about us?”

Bucky didn’t answer right away. His gaze dropped to the ground, shoe scuffing against concrete. The silence stretched, thick and ugly.

Steve felt his chest tighten.

“…Bucky,” he said quietly. “Why?”

Still nothing.

“Does he get a kick out of it?” Steve pushed, heat creeping into his voice now. “Knowing things he shouldn’t? Knowing me through you?”

Bucky’s head snapped up, eyes wide. “That’s not what this is.”

“Then what is it?”

Bucky exhaled sharply, running a hand through his hair. “You’re making this bigger than it is.”

There it was.

Steve stared at him. “You couldn’t even look at me just now.”

“That doesn’t mean anything.”

“It does to me.”

Bucky’s shoulders tensed, hands curling into fists inside the sleeves of his hoodie. “I already cut things off with him.”

Steve let out a bitter breath. “Yeah? For how long this time?”

The words landed harder than Steve expected. He saw it immediately, the way Bucky flinched, the way his mouth tightened.

“Don’t do that,” Bucky said, voice strained. “You’re not being fair.”

“Fair?” Steve echoed. “I find out from him that I’m apparently your new… thing, and I’m the one not being fair?”

Bucky looked away again.

Steve felt something in him crack.

“So when were you planning on telling me?” he asked. “That I’m part of this narrative now?”

“I just wanted him to leave me alone,” Bucky said quickly. “That’s all. I didn’t think-”

“You didn’t think about me,” Steve cut in.

The words fell into the space between them and stayed there.

Bucky swallowed. “I said I was sorry.”

Steve shook his head. “No. That’s not-…” He stopped, dragged a hand down his face, forcing himself to breathe. “Did you ever stop to think what I want?”

Bucky finally met his eyes. There was something hard there now. Defensive.

“You knew what I was like,” he said. “You knew this wouldn’t be simple.”

Steve’s chest burned.

He thought of the friend Bucky had mentioned once, late at night, voice flat, like it didn’t belong to him. The way he’d said the name and then gone quiet. The way Steve knew it was that friend.

The friend who’d taken the quiet way out.

Someone Bucky had loved and never learned how to grieve without locking the door behind it.

Steve stepped closer. “I’m not your escape hatch,” he said, low. “I’m not here to be used until it gets uncomfortable.”

Bucky’s jaw clenched. “You got what you wanted.”

His eyes filled with tears.

“And now it’s too much,” Bucky continued, voice trembling despite himself. “Just like always.”

Steve stared at him, disbelief cutting through the hurt. “You think I planned this?”

Bucky didn’t answer.

“I don’t even know if I can do this again,” Steve went on, anger finally spilling over. “If this is what being with you looks like. Wondering who else gets pieces of me without my consent.”

“Being with me?” Bucky asked softly.

Steve didn’t respond.

He just shook his head, grabbed his bike, and turned away.

“Steve,” Bucky said, his voice cracking now. “Wait.”

Steve paused, but only for a second.

Then he pushed off and rode away, the wind burning his eyes, his chest aching with the weight of something he’d wanted to protect and now didn’t know how to touch without bleeding.

***

Steve hadn’t slept.

He’d tried, lights off, phone face-down, room quiet except for the radiator ticking, but his body refused to follow. The weed was supposed to knock him out, instead it just softened the edges of the anger until all that was left was a tight, restless awareness. He counted breaths. Lost track. Lit another joint he didn’t even really want.

By the time he heard the key in the door, the anger was gone.

What was left felt worse.

Voices murmured in the hallway, Tony’s, amused and distant, and then footsteps that Steve could’ve recognized blindfolded. The door creaked open. A familiar shape slipped inside and closed it again with care that came a second too late.

Steve rolled onto his side before he could stop himself.

Bucky hesitated, then crossed the room and climbed into bed like he’d always belonged there. Cold air followed him under the blanket, along with the faint bite of alcohol and something sweeter underneath.

Steve wrapped an arm around him on instinct and buried his face against Bucky’s hair.

“I hate when you drink,” he muttered. “You smell like a stranger.”

Bucky huffed a weak laugh. “Been a long night.”

Steve didn’t answer. He just held on a little tighter, like if he didn’t, Bucky might evaporate.

They lay there for a while, the silence stretching but not breaking. Steve stared up at the ceiling, watching shadows move with every passing car.

“I don’t know what this is,” Bucky said eventually. His voice was quiet. Careful. “Between us.”

Steve closed his eyes.

He replayed the afternoon without meaning to, the words he’d thrown too hard, the way Bucky’s face had gone unreadable, the memory of someone else, years ago, who had smiled and said it’s fine right before disappearing forever. He swallowed.

“You make me react,” he said finally. “I don’t like that I do.”

Bucky turned his head, trying to see Steve’s face in the dark. “Is that supposed to be a bad thing?”

“I don’t know,” Steve admitted. “It scares me.”

Bucky rolled onto his back again, staring up with him now. “So… was that what you meant earlier? When you said you didn’t think you’d ever do this again?”

Steve didn’t hesitate this time. “If it doesn’t work with you,” he said, quietly, “I don’t think it works with anyone.”

Bucky went very still.

“Why?” he asked.

Steve turned toward him, their faces close enough that he could feel Bucky’s breath. “Because you’re… you,” he said, like it was obvious. Like there was nothing else to explain.

Bucky’s throat bobbed as he swallowed. In the dark, Steve could hear the change in his breathing.

They didn’t kiss right away.

When they did, it was slow, almost tentative, not desperate, not performative. Just two people checking whether the other was really there. Bucky’s hand found Steve’s wrist, not pulling, not pushing. Just holding on.

Later, when the room had gone quiet again and the night pressed in from all sides, Bucky rested his forehead against Steve’s shoulder.

“You know me,” he murmured.

Steve tightened his arm around him.

“Yeah,” he said. “I do.”

***

Tony didn’t knock.

Steve heard him in the hallway first,p acing, stopping, pacing again, and then the doorframe filled with familiar motion as Tony leaned in, arms crossed, eyes sharp.

“So,” Tony said. “You gonna tell me where Barnes is, or should I assume he’s becoming a recurring guest star?”

Steve didn’t look up from where he was sitting on the edge of the bed. “He’ll come by later.”

Tony raised an eyebrow. “Later later, or ‘I don’t want to talk about it’ later?”

Steve huffed. “You ever notice how you always think you’re funny at exactly the wrong moments?”

“Deflection noted,” Tony said cheerfully, stepping fully into the room. He inhaled once, wrinkled his nose. “Wow. You smell like bad decisions and midlife crisis.”

“It’s weed,” Steve muttered.

“Ah. The gateway drug to emotional vulnerability.”

Steve finally looked up at him. “You’re impossible.”

Tony planted his hands on his hips. “And yet, here I am. So. Let’s talk about your apparent lifelong fear of commitment.”

Steve groaned and scrubbed a hand over his face. “I do not have-“

“-a fear of commitment?” Tony finished. “Correct. You have a fear of choosing wrong. Which is different, but you don’t get points for semantics.”

Steve went quiet.

Tony softened just a fraction. “Look,” he said, more seriously now. “Everyone’s out here pretending there’s some permanent, optimized version of love they’re supposed to lock into. But most people are just… compatible for a while. Until the masks slip. Until they don’t.”

Steve nodded slowly. “I know.”

“What I’m hearing,” Tony continued, “is that you didn’t freak out because things changed. You freaked out because you thought they had changed.”

Steve exhaled. “Nothing actually did.”

“Exactly.” Tony snapped his fingers. “You two didn’t suddenly become a Hallmark movie. No status updates. No expectations you didn’t already have. Same rules. Same pace.”

Steve leaned back on his hands, staring at the ceiling. “I worked myself up over nothing.”

Tony grinned. “Welcome to being human. Population: all of us.”

After a beat, he added, more gently, “So. Are you…?”

Steve hesitated. Just for a second.

“I don’t know,” he said honestly. “I think so. Maybe. Yeah.”

Tony smiled, not teasing this time. “Good.”

Steve glanced at him. “That’s it? No lecture?”

“Oh, I already gave the lecture,” Tony said, turning toward the door. “You survived it. I’m proud.”

He paused in the doorway. “For what it’s worth,” he added, “if you were actually scared of closeness, you wouldn’t look this calm right now.”

Steve watched him leave, the door clicking shut behind him.

The room felt quieter after that.

Later, much later, Bucky showed up.

They didn’t talk right away. Just sat together on the bed, shoulders touching, the night humming softly around them.

“There’s something I should tell you,” Bucky said finally.

Steve turned toward him. “Yeah?”

Bucky swallowed. “I didn’t mean for this to become… important. At first.”

Steve smiled faintly. “That’s usually how it goes.”

Bucky let out a breath, almost a laugh. “I thought you were just… something easy. Something good.”

“And now?” Steve asked.

Bucky met his eyes. “Now I know I can’t lie to you.”

“Good,” Steve said. “I don’t want you to.”

***

They hadn’t been to class in days.

At first it had felt like skipping. A small rebellion. Then it turned into something different, time stretching, hours bleeding into each other until school became abstract. Steve couldn’t remember the last bell he’d heard.

They stayed in his room instead.

Tony sprawled across the floor most days, surrounded by scraps of paper and half-finished ideas. Bucky claimed the windowsill, knees drawn up, watching the street like he was keeping lookout for something he couldn’t name. Steve floated between them, thinking, reading, pacing. Sometimes Bucky wrote for hours in a battered notebook. Sometimes he just stared at the wall, cigarette unlit between his fingers.

Steve didn’t see the point of sitting in a classroom anymore. The diploma felt arbitrary, a piece of paper that didn’t promise anything real. Tony agreed loudly. Bucky didn’t argue, but he didn’t agree either. He just stayed.

“I think I want to try it,” Steve said one afternoon, breaking a silence that had gone on too long.

Tony didn’t look up from the papers in his lap. “Try what?”

“You know what,” Steve replied. “Just once.”

Bucky’s gaze snapped to him. “You’ve been looking at stuff again.”

Steve nodded. “I like knowing what I’m getting into.”

Bucky snorted. “Of course you do. God forbid you ever jump blindly into anything.”

“I’m serious,” Steve said. “I don’t want to spend my life wondering if I missed something important.”

Bucky tilted his head. “And you think this is… important?”

“I don’t know,” Steve admitted. “But I think I’ll keep asking myself if I don’t.”

The door opened after a knock, before anyone could answer.

Tony was there, grinning like he’d been waiting for this exact cue. “Look what I got.”

He fanned a stack of papers dramatically.

“Gentlemen,” Tony announced, “Behold.”

Steve took the pages automatically, scanning them with a growing frown. “Are these…?”

“Convincing,” Tony said proudly. “That’s what they are.”

Bucky leaned forward, eyes narrowing. “Are those fake diplomas?”

“Allegedly,” Tony said. “If anyone asks, they’re very inspired replicas.”

Steve stared. “Tony.”

“Relax,” Tony replied. “Nothing flashy. Mediocre grades. Totally believable. I even left a typo in one.”

Bucky let out a short, disbelieving laugh. “You’re insane.”

“And yet,” Tony said, lowering his voice conspiratorially, “no one’s going to miss you two disappearing from school early.”

Steve looked down at the papers again. The seal. The signature. The careful imperfection.

“This is illegal,” he said.

“Extremely,” Tony agreed. “But effective.”

For a moment, no one spoke.

Then Steve folded the papers and handed them back. “I’m not saying yes.”

Tony shrugged. “Didn’t ask for a commitment.”

Bucky watched Steve closely. “You okay?”

Steve hesitated. “I don’t know. But I’m not panicking so…”

That seemed to satisfy something in Bucky, even if it didn’t relax him.

Later, after Tony had left and the light outside had dimmed, Bucky stayed.

They lay on the bed fully clothed, shoulders brushing. The room smelled faintly of smoke and old paper.

“I don’t think you’re chasing the experience,” Bucky said quietly.

Steve turned his head. “What do you think I’m chasing?”

“I think you’re trying to feel like you chose something,” Bucky replied. “Instead of just… ending up somewhere.”

Steve considered that. “Is that bad?”

“No,” Bucky said. “Just dangerous if you forget why you started.”

Steve swallowed. “Will you tell me if I do?”

Bucky didn’t answer right away. Then: “Yeah. I will.”

***

It was well past midnight, but Steve’s room glowed softly, constellations drifting across the ceiling.

Tony had rigged up a cheap star projector earlier, said something about “mood lighting” and “existential honesty”, and now the walls were alive with slow-moving light. It made the room feel untethered, like gravity had loosened its grip.

They lay scattered across the floor and bed. Steve on his back, hands folded on his stomach. Bucky half-curled near the foot of the bed, shoulder pressed against the frame. Tony rolled around lazily on the rug, staring upward like he might fall into the fake sky.

“Have you ever been,” Tony began, voice oddly careful, “actually cruel to someone? Like… on purpose.”

The question lingered.

Steve opened his mouth, then closed it again.

Before he could answer, Tony continued, faster now, as if afraid of the silence. “I mean not sarcastic-cruel. Not accidentally. I mean really knowing you’re hurting someone and doing it anyway.”

Bucky answered first. “No.”

Tony glanced at him. “Never?”

Bucky hesitated. His jaw tightened. “Okay. Maybe not never.”

Steve turned his head slightly. “What happened?”

Bucky exhaled through his nose. “Online. Years ago. I used to mess with people in forums. Pretend to be someone else. Make them trust me. Sometimes they even liked me. Or at least liked who they thought I was.”

Tony went quiet.

“I lied,” Bucky said simply. “About everything. It felt… safe. Like none of it counted.”

Steve swallowed. “Did it?”

Bucky didn’t answer.

After a moment, Steve spoke. “I used to get other kids in trouble for things I wanted to do.”

Tony barked out a surprised laugh. “You?”

Steve nodded, staring at the ceiling. “Nothing big. Just… small rules. Stuff I knew would get punished. I’d talk them into it, stand back, act innocent. I hated getting caught.”

“That’s messed up,” Tony said, but there was no judgment in it.

“It was efficient,” Steve replied. “And a little funny...”

Tony rolled onto his side, propping his head up. “Okay, so we’re all low-level villains. Noted.”

Silence settled again, comfortable but heavy.

After a while, Tony asked more quietly, “Have you ever been cruel because you were angry?”

Bucky shifted. “Yeah.”

Steve felt his chest tighten. He didn’t interrupt.

“There was this guy,” Bucky said. “He liked me. I didn’t like him back. He told me anyway.” He paused. “I took it personally. Like he’d crossed a line just by feeling something.”

“What did you do?” Tony asked.

“I said things I can’t take back,” Bucky replied. “About him. About what he was worth. About how he didn’t get to use words like love.”

Tony winced. “Damn.”

“I was furious,” Bucky said. “And I didn’t even really know why.”

Steve turned his head toward him. “Do you still feel bad?”

Bucky nodded once. “Every time I think about it.”

The stars drifted slowly across the ceiling, uncaring.

“How do you live with that?” Tony asked.

Steve stared upward. “I don’t think you get over it. I think you just… stop feeding it.”

No one spoke for a while.

Eventually, Tony broke the quiet. “We should do something with our lives.”

Steve huffed. “That’s vague.”

“I mean it,” Tony insisted. “Something real. Something that isn’t just… this.”

“I just want to be happy,” Bucky said softly. “And have fun.”

“Same,” Steve murmured. “Without wrecking anyone else in the process.”

Tony groaned. “You two are exhausting. Do you know how hard that is?”

“Yes,” Steve said. “That’s the point.”

Tony rolled onto his back again. “We can’t just wait for life to happen.”

“We also can’t force it,” Bucky said.

Steve exhaled. “There has to be something in between.”

Tony was quiet for a moment, then grinned faintly. “Okay, hear me out.”

Both of them groaned.

“Imagine this,” Tony said. “You wake up inside the heart of a living blue whale.”

Steve grimaced instantly. “Absolutely not.”

Bucky snorted despite himself.

“You’re inside,” Tony continued, warming to it. “The thing is alive. You’re alive. Someone surgically put you there. In scuba gear.”

“Why?” Steve demanded.

“Unknown reasons,” Tony said. “Challenge? Bet? Science?”

Bucky frowned. “How do you get out?”

“Exactly,” Tony said triumphantly. “That’s the game.”

Steve shuddered. “How big is a whale heart?”

“Big enough to stand in,” Tony replied smugly. “Saw a model once.”

Bucky closed his eyes briefly, imagining it, the pulse, the heat, the blood rushing past. “That’s horrifying.”

“But you could swim through the arteries,” Tony added. “Hypothetically.”

Steve made a face. “I hate everything about this.”

Tony smiled at the ceiling. “See? We’re thinking again.”

***

Steve woke slowly.

Not the sharp kind of waking, more like surfacing, the world easing back into place piece by piece. The first thing he noticed was light. Pale, washed-out morning light slipping through the blinds, dust drifting in it like it had nowhere better to be.

Then he blinked.

Bucky blinked too.

They were facing each other, close enough that Steve could see the faint crease between Bucky’s brows, the way his lashes stuck together a little, sleep-heavy. It felt oddly intimate, realizing they’d woken at the same moment.

“Hey,” Bucky murmured.

“Hey,” Steve answered, just as quietly.

For a second, that was all. No weight. No echoes from the night before pressing down on them. Just two people, awake again, still themselves.

The room was warm, uncomfortably so, and the city was already alive outside. Steve guessed it had to be around six. The sheets were tangled beyond saving, wrapped around them like they’d fought sleep and lost badly.

They lay there, limbs overlapping, staring at the ceiling while the last fragments of the night drifted past. Neither of them felt dramatic about it. Mostly they felt wrung out. Empty in that strange way that came after something intense had passed through you and left you hollowed but breathing.

The night had knocked them sideways. Steve knew it would take time to sort through everything it had shaken loose. What surprised him was that, alongside the exhaustion, there was still something else, a quiet awe. A deeper respect for the thing they’d messed with. And, if he was honest, a flicker of fascination that hadn’t gone anywhere.

“Happy birthday to you,” Steve mumbled suddenly, voice rough with sleep. “Happy birthday to youuu…”

Bucky snorted, then laughed softly. “You’re late.”

“Technically,” Steve said, “I’m extremely early.”

Bucky smiled, turning his face into the pillow. “My mom used to sing to wake me up. When I was little. Now she just texts me the exact minute I was born.”

Steve glanced at him. Bucky didn’t talk about good memories much. He filed that away.

“My mom,” Bucky went on, “got me writing, I think. She read to me constantly. Bought me books before I even knew what to do with them. Let me mess around on her old typewriter like I wasn’t absolutely destroying it.” He paused. “Teachers used to write comments about my vocabulary. Like it was a personality trait.”

Steve smiled faintly.

Bucky nudged him with his knee. “What about you?”

Steve stared up at the ceiling again. “My dad’s the reason I love music. He listened to everything. Loudly. Filmed stuff, took photos, filled the house with noise.” His voice softened. “After he died, I kept his things around. Cameras, tapes. Like if I surrounded myself with them, he’d still be close.”

Bucky turned to look at him properly now. “You never really talk about him.”

Steve shrugged. “Didn’t feel necessary. But… yeah. He mattered.”

They let that sit.

The sunlight crept higher, catching in Bucky’s eyes. Steve noticed the way his expression changed, the brief hardening, like a memory had snagged on something sharp.

“Have you ever been hurt by someone?” Bucky asked quietly. “I mean… physically.”

Steve shook his head. “Not really. Got slapped once. Deserved it.”

Bucky huffed. “Figures.”

After a beat, Bucky asked, “Have you ever hurt someone?”

Steve’s mind jumped immediately to Tony, to the thin scar under his chin, the one he pretended not to care about.

“Yeah,” Steve said. “Once. It wasn’t on purpose. We were kids. He ran into something I was holding. Still think about it.”

Bucky watched him carefully. “How do you make that stuff stop hurting?”

Steve thought about it. “You don’t. Not completely. You just… let time pass. And at some point, you decide whether you’re going to carry it like a weapon or like a lesson.”

Bucky considered that. Then nodded.

He tucked his head under Steve’s arm, warm and solid there. Steve adjusted instinctively, pulling the blanket higher around them.

“Today’s my day,” Bucky murmured. “Tony said I get to decide what we do on my birthday.”

Steve smiled. “What’s the verdict?”

“Nothing,” Bucky said promptly. “Absolutely nothing.”

Steve laughed softly. “Bold choice.”

“The crash after last night is brutal,” Bucky went on. “I just want… quiet. Maybe I’ll grab my stuff from the dorm later. Deal with real life tomorrow.”

Steve didn’t argue. He understood that need, the pause before the storm.

After a while, Steve shifted, sitting up slightly. “No more drugs just to numb things,” he said. “Not like that.”

Bucky looked up at him, serious now. “Promise?”

Steve held his gaze. “Promise.”

Bucky nodded, decisive, even through the haze of exhaustion. “Okay.”

Outside, the city kept moving. Inside, for a little while longer, they stayed exactly where they were.

***

The apartment door was half open, like it often was, and Bucky took the steps two at a time, impatience written into every movement.

Bucky didn’t knock. He never did.

He shoved the door open with his shoulder and pressed the little savings book straight into Steve’s chest who had heard him coming up the stairs.

“I’m done,” Bucky said, a little breathless. “I don’t want to sit on this forever.”

Steve looked down at it, then back up at him. “You’re serious.”

Bucky nodded. There was a tightness to his mouth that had nothing to do with fear. “It’s just money. And money can turn into distance. Into not being here anymore.”

“And where would you go?” Steve asked quietly.

Bucky shrugged, but his eyes were bright. “Somewhere. I’ll figure it out.”

Steve turned the booklet over once, feeling the weight of it. Of the choice.

“If you want,” he said slowly, “you don’t have to do it alone.”

Bucky blinked. “You mean-”

“I mean,” Steve interrupted gently, “if you want company.”

For a second, Bucky didn’t answer. Then he exhaled, something easing in his shoulders.

“I didn’t think you’d say that,” he admitted.

From behind them came a crunch.

Tony leaned in the doorway, chewing on an apple like he’d just wandered into the scene by accident. “If this turns into Tokyo,” he said casually, “I’m in.”

Bucky snorted despite himself. “Of course you are.”

Tony grinned around another bite. “You’d miss me.”

Steve watched them, the way it already felt decided without anyone officially deciding, and something inside him finally settled.

Maybe none of them needed saving. Maybe they just needed to move.

Steve handed the savings book back to Bucky.

The future didn’t feel fixed anymore.

It felt open.