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Contrary to popular Bucky’s belief, Steve does not, in fact, think he’s indestructible; he just always thought that the day something finally took him out, he would at least go down with a flourish. Say, a good ol’ bout of pneumonia, nice and phlegmy like God intended. One last epic stand against scarlet fever. Flying out of his seat on the Cyclone and going splat on the Wonder Wheel like a wet sock, hell, tripping down a manhole between Columbia and Vine, anything with a bit of pizazz.
He never imagined it would happen in his own kitchen, on an average Monday morning.
He rolls out of their shoebox-sized bedroom sometime around 6.30, padding drowsily towards the kitchen counter; that’s where the magic of caffeine happens sometimes, when Steve is very, very lucky. Bucky’s already standing there, a tall silhouette in pajama bottoms and a white undershirt, and the steaming cup in his hand tells Steve that yes, oh yes, he is very, very lucky today.
“Hey,” he greets Bucky through a yawn.
“Hey, yourself,” Bucky says, sliding an empty cup towards him with a grin.
“Hrmgm,” Steve concurs beatifically, pouring himself some coffee with his sleep-crusty eyes half closed. The warm aroma wafts up to him, a sweet, sweet promise of undreamed-of wonders like Actually Being Awake, and his spine tingles with anticipation. Yes. This is good. This is a good life, Steve thinks.
His shoulder brushes against Bucky’s bare arm. It’s all but routine by now, easy, predictable; perfected over a lifetime. Attached at the hip, his Ma used to say – and when Bucky’s hip settles against his own this morning, like it’s gravity itself pulling the two of them together, Steve can’t deny himself a private little smile.
A good life. Yeah. Yeah, he’s pretty sure he’s found some of that.
Bucky nudges him softly. “Sugar?”
“Yes, honey?”
There’s a moment there, a split second of sudden and horrible clarity, where Steve’s brain finally clocks in for the day; and when it does, and all the nice little neurons buzz back to life in the cotton mush stuffed in his skull, Steve fucking freezes right on the spot.
Oh no. Wait. No no. That’s not. They don’t do that, that’s not– Oh God.
He looks up, at Bucky and the open jar labelled Sugar in one of Bucky’s hands and the teaspoon held up helpfully in Bucky’s other hand, and the wide-eyed look on Bucky’s face, and a sound much like the trumpets of doom blares urgently in the back of Steve’s head.
“I– I mean, I–”
Fuck, fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck and fuck once more, triple the fucks and six ways to Sunday too.
He’s gonna die. He’s gonna die right here, right here in this godforsaken spot, on this exact rectangle of a floorboard, and nothing on either heaven nor earth can save him.
To his surprise, Bucky’s startled expression quickly melts into a mischievous smirk.
He sticks the teaspoon in the jar and sets the whole thing on the counter, then angles his body towards Steve’s, a twinkle in his eyes like a man who just saw an opportunity and by god he’s going to seize it.
“You coulda said you liked to be called sweet things, Stevie,” Bucky says, teasing his way into Steve’s personal space – so close that his socked feet are bracketing Steve’s, and Steve has to tip his head back just to look him in the eye.
“Fuck you,” Steve grunts, though the sentiment doesn’t quite land as harshly as he’d like – namely because Bucky’s taking his slim waist in those big, strong, capable hands of his, and Steve hasn’t even remotely considered stopping him as a valid option.
“What, you ain’t even gonna buy me dinner first? You cad,” Bucky teases, pink of lips and warm of hands, gorgeous like the first real day of spring after the longest winter.
“Yeah well, you’re a dick,” Steve retorts, heat creeping up from his neck and spreading rapidly over his cheeks. The utter indignity.
“Sugar,” Bucky purrs, and the soft vibration of sound sinks right into the base of Steve’s spine, sweet and shimmering. “Want me to ask if you’re rationed, mmh?”
This is, it’s, it’s mortifying, is what it is.
Steve groans, embarrassment sizzling like hot coals under his skin.
“I swear to God, if you don’t stop talking right now–”
Bucky has the audacity to chuckle – not mockingly, no. Fondly. Which is perhaps even worse. “Yeah, I know, I know.”
He leans in like he can’t help it, eyelids sliding closed as he presses his forehead to Steve’s, rocking them gently together. He cradles Steve’s jaw in one callused palm, thumb tracing the birthmark on Steve’s cheek with something dangerously close to devotion, and oh – oh, would you look at that.
“Call me honey again.”
“I fucking swear, Buck–”
“No, I don’t mean– Just. Please?” And the thing is, the strange, new, wonderful thing is, Steve can smell – no, he can taste the coffee on Bucky’s breath. Can feel it ghost against his skin, right there on the flush of his lips, where kisses should go. His poor heart, willful and arrhythmic as it is, has never pounded as fast as it does right now. “Please, Stevie.”
God, the pang of longing in Bucky’s voice, it twists his insides right up. If this doesn’t kill him, nothing ever will.
So Steve makes a decision. Life or death.
“Kiss me first.”
It’s not too much of a gamble, he’ll admit; not when Bucky opens his eyes to look at him, and he’s like this. His lips parted, his irises blown wide and gleaming, already wracked with need and completely helpless against it. Like Steve’s dangling the hope of something impossible right in front of him, ready to snatch it away as soon as Bucky tries to reach for it, and he’s not sure he should try. He could fall. It would hurt.
So Steve doesn’t make him reach for it.
Steve pushes himself up on his tiptoes, and lets the magic happen.
Bucky kisses him with a tenderness Steve knows no words for. He scoops Steve close, cupping the nape of Steve’s neck in his hand, and licks the sleep-sour taste out of his mouth so sweetly, it turns Steve’s heart inside out.
A hundred, a thousand heartbeats later, Bucky parts from him with a slow, shuddery sigh. He searches Steve’s eyes in the quiet that follows, abashed, as if he’s holding a question on the tip of his tongue that he doesn’t dare ask.
Silly boy. As though Steve could ever deny him his prize.
“Hi,” Bucky murmurs, soft, stroking the intimate spot below Steve’s ear with the pad of his thumb.
Steve’s fists are curled in the front of Bucky’s undershirt, tangled with the thin golden chain around his neck. He can feel Bucky’s heartbeat, the quick-paced drumming of it, du-dum, du-dum, du-dum: here, between their bodies, knocking relentlessly against his fingers. It’s strange, how powerful that makes him feel; how fragile, in this precious naked corner where their skin meets.
“Hi, honey,” he murmurs back, because he promised. Because he’ll call Bucky anything he wants to be called, just to watch the apples of his cheeks flush pink, and that novel spark light up his eyes.
Because it rolls easy off his tongue when he says it, like it belonged there all along.
Because today, Steve has been very, very lucky indeed.