He never knew when she'd show up.
The first time he'd been at the Smithsonian. Baseball cap on, head down, collar up - lurking through the Captain America exhibit, reading the biography of himself, trying to remember... then she had come out of the crowd and stood beside him. Every muscle in his body had tensed with just the presence of another human being so close. He hadn't even realized who it was.
"Bucky Barnes," she had said, a smile in her voice. "That has to be the worst nickname ever."
Those words had sparked a memory of something - a previous conversation, maybe? - and put him at ease. Surprising, given that he had tried to kill her only a few days before. He looked at her, could see the edge of a bandage peeking out from the collar of the black t-shirt she wore under a leather jacket. "I'm sorry," he had said.
"Wanna get some coffee?"
Several hours of conversation and a quickie in the bathroom later, they had parted ways. He had continued to visit the Smithsonian for a week or so after, but hadn't seen her again. He'd kicked himself for not getting her phone number or address. Then again, he didn't have either of those things himself, and knowing Natalia, her information was classified.
He was holed up in an abandoned apartment building - one of those factory buildings being converted into luxury apartments. Funding must have fallen through because the place was devoid of anyone but other squatters like himself. He used the fire escape to get in and out of the top-floor apartment he'd chosen for himself. Aside from plastic sheeting covered the wall studs, the place was indeed luxurious with hardwood floors, high ceilings, and granite countertops. The chrome plumbing fixtures were nice, even though there was no running water. Still, it was better than sleeping on the streets.
A job with a construction crew earned him money under the table, and he didn't have to show them any ID or answer any questions about what he'd been doing for the last seventy years. Now he was just "Jimmy," and half the crew didn't speak English, so he could keep his head down and avoid conversation entirely. He was pretty sure most of the guys thought he was a convict. Not far off.
It had been two weeks since he'd seen her, and he'd given up. Maybe she'd been after some piece of information he'd given her, and she had no more need of him. Just as well. His life was complicated enough without adding Natasha Romanov into the mix.
So, there he was, installing some drywall with the help of a nail gun, when she came through the door of the office they were renovating. He almost shot a nail through his foot.
"Think you could get off for lunch a little early?" she asked, twirling a lock of her bright red hair around her finger.
He couldn't get out of there fast enough. "You're going to blow my cover," he muttered.
"Cover? You mean the baseball cap?" She smirked. "It's like you and Cap went to the same spy school."
"How... how is he?" he asked. Last time they hadn't talked about Steve at all.
"He was in the hospital," she told him. He had known that much. He'd sneaked in to make sure his best friend had lived. Steve had been breathing when he'd left him there on the bank of the river, but it had worried him that Steve wasn't completely invincible, despite the serum. "He's out now. Looking for you."
Part of him wished Steve would find him, be the one to show up while he was at work. Part of him wished Steve would never find him.
They stopped at a food truck. He ordered a Cuban sandwich and she ordered a frita, and they sat on a bench and ate in relative silence. When they were done, she looked at him and he looked at her, and then she had kissed him, her breath spicy and hot. With no private place, he knew what happened last time wouldn't happen again, but that made it all the sweeter. He could kiss her and enjoy that without thinking about going further. "Get a room," said some old bag passing by, and they pulled away from each other laughing. Natalia ran her fingers through his hair. He closed his eyes and enjoyed the sun on his face and the way her fingertips made his scalp tingle.
"Why can't it be like this..." he started to say.
Natalia pressed her lips into his neck, then stood and held out her hand. "Time for work," she said.
They held hands as they walked back to the construction site. At the door he gripped her hand and faced her. "When will I see you again?" he asked.
She looked down. Her thumb rubbed against the worn material of his black leather glove. "When are you going to take this off?"
He looked at her. She knew he couldn't take that glove off unless he wanted to completely blow his cover. With a breathy laugh she stood on tiptoe and kissed him, earning the whistles of a few of his coworkers. Then she left.
For days he found himself looking around as the lunch hour neared, his head snapping up every time someone walked through the door. "Waitin' on your girl?" one of the crew said once, and Bucky glared at him. The man shrugged but asked no more questions.
Natalia wouldn't do the same thing twice, he told himself. That was the reason.
It was five days later that she bumped into him - literally - as he walked home from work. He'd had his head down as usual, using peripheral vision to catch the movements of anyone trying to follow him. Then bam, his right shoulder collided with someone. He turned to glower, saw the red hair. "Hey, soldier," she said. Neatly turning, she fell into place beside him as he walked.
"Hey, yourself," he said.
The autumn day was sunny and bright. She twined her fingers through his as they walked, making his arm swing like they were any happy couple out for a walk on a nice day. He couldn't keep his lips from curving into a smile.
They walked right past the abandoned apartment building.
It wasn't so much that he was keeping it a secret. He wanted more than anything to take her up there and lay her down on his air mattress. Or better, take her to a hotel - he had money for that now. He wanted her to take him to her apartment, so he could learn something about her. What did she do all day?
"You look like you're brooding," she commented.
"I am," he said.
She dropped his hand and danced in front of him, walking backwards. "Let's go to a movie. One of those romantic comedies where you know exactly who's going to end up with who. Totally predictable."
"I haven't been to a movie since 1944," he said.
"A lot has changed," she said. "Movies are in color now."
They bought tickets - he paid for hers - and with their arms full of popcorn and soda, they sat in the back of the nearly-empty theater. Bucky barely watched the events onscreen. He was mesmerized by the way the light flickered across her face. When the actors onscreen climbed into bed (his eyes widened when he realized they were actually showing what they were showing), Natalia climbed onto his lap. In the dark she kissed him and he jumped a little when her hands slid into his pants. He wanted to protest that they were in public, but his mouth was full of her and so were his hands. He forced himself to wait until the movie became loud enough to mask when he came.
After the movie Natalia said she had to use the bathroom. Bucky watched her go in, then left the theater.
All night he tossed and turned. This little game they were playing didn't have rules, but he worried he had broken them. He worried he would never see her again.
The flashbacks started soon after.
It got so he couldn't sleep at night. Every time he closed his eyes he heard machine gun fire and shells exploding, inhaled the thick smoke and dust, felt the rumble of tanks. He started frequenting the bar down the street. It was open until 4 a.m. He could sit and sip a beer and watch whatever happened to be playing on the television mounted in the corner.
He thought it was a dream when he saw her on the TV. Rubbed his eyes, squinted. It was her. Speaking with the Senate. Her cover was completely blown. She was exposed for whoever would want to go after her: the remains of SHIELD, Hydra, her old comrades from Russia. Never mind any of her targets over the years.
Unsurprisingly, he didn't see her for a long time. He had other concerns. The flashbacks were getting worse. He couldn't focus at work, and the foreman told him not to come in anymore. The weather was getting colder, and without electricity, he couldn't keep squatting in the apartment.
He took to watching his old friend, Steve Rogers.
Steve wasn't hard to find. He wasn't trying to hide. Bucky watched as Steve went grocery shopping, as he visited the Smithsonian, as he went to support group meetings with Sam Wilson. Sometimes he felt like he could just walk over and slap Steve on the back and sit down with him, start chatting like 70 years hadn't passed.
Instead he remained in the shadows.
It was a bitter mid-November afternoon when Bucky was watching Steve from across a busy street. Steve was on an apparent date with a pretty blonde. The two laughed over steaming mugs of coffee. Bucky rubbed his cold hands together.
"Aw, how cute."
He smiled before turning his head. She was back. Her cheeks were rosy from the chill air and she wore a giant black scarf around her neck.
"I helped fix them up, you know," Natalia said, sitting on the cold stone steps beside him.
"Natalia Romanova, matchmaker." His voice croaked - he hadn't spoken aloud in a long time.
"No one calls me that here. No one but you."
He shrugged. "Old habits die hard."
"You tired of sleeping in that cold apartment yet?"
He knew from the shit-eating look on her face that she had known this whole time where he was living. He hadn't fooled her. "It's fine," he said, even though the cold had started to give him other flashbacks.
"Come on. Let's see if I can warm you up." She stood, held out her hand, pulled him to his feet even though he didn't need her help to get up.
"Lead the way," he said.
Of course she led him back to his place. Even took him up the fire escape. Inside, candles covered the floors and windowsills, creating a warm glow. How had she managed this one? His air mattress was gone, replaced by a king-sized bed covered in silk sheets and a thick down comforter. If he ignored the plastic sheeting, he could imagine they lived in a mansion.
She pushed him down on the bed. He allowed her to unlace his boots and throw them aside. Unzip his jacket and toss it to the floor. Underneath he had on a thick fisherman's sweater, and under that, a long-sleeve thermal top. She peeled away each layer. Her eyes flicked to his metal arm for the barest of moments, but it was enough. He pulled off the glove and pressed his palm to her face.
Her clothes came off, and the rest of his, and they made it nice and warm under the duvet. For once his arm didn't feel cold when it touched him. She ran the back of her fingers along his stubbly jawline, while he traced the smooth skin along her collar bone.
"You don't have to hide," she murmured.
He didn't answer.
"We all know what you did wasn't your fault. SHIELD, what's left of it, anyway, could use your skills. They could reverse Hydra's programming."
He considered a life like that. Back at Steve's side, fighting for what was right, with Steve as his moral compass. At Natalia's side, too. But he was tired.
"I just want to disappear for a while," he said into her hair.
They slept, curled against each other. Once he drifted awake, pleased to still feel her warmth in his arms. Then a bad dream hit, one of the worst he'd had. Back with Hydra, back with Pierce, feeling the bone-chilling cold of cryo taking over his body.
This time, when he woke up screaming, he found himself alone. Some of the candles had burned out. He ran his hand over the sheets where she had lain and they were cold.
The winter became a tedious schedule of soup kitchens and homeless shelters and more construction work. He began visiting the library, using the computers to hack his way into Shield's databases, looking for a clue. He wanted to find her first, this time. He still watched Steve and on occasion shadowed Sam too, as well as Sharon, the blonde Steve was now dating.
Then he saw her.
By chance he'd caught a glimpse of Clint Barton heading home, and for a few days he trailed the man he knew to be Hawkeye. Clint had an interesting life. Walking his dog, sleeping, drinking coffee. It was the kind of normal life Bucky had always wanted. While Steve was often stopped on the streets by those who recognized him, Clint had no such trouble.
He trailed Barton to a pub. He watched Clint have a few drinks with friends, win a tidy sum playing darts, all while Bucky sat in a dark corner and nursed a Guinness. His legs itched to stand and challenge Clint himself - a whole scenario played out in his head where he bashfully lost and then he and Clint swapped war stories, until Clint finally realized who Bucky was and then called Cap and Steve came in and - then she walked through the door.
"You can beat these rubes, but what about me?" she challenged, and Clint had handed over the darts. Of course Natalia's aim was deadly, and she and Barton tied over and over again until finally Clint relented and bought her a drink. Vodka, naturally.
He watched her all evening, until Clint yawned. Natasha waved him off, then headed straight for Bucky's table.
"Looks like I got the jump on you this time," he said.
She grinned. "That's what you think."
"Want another drink?"
"Nah."
"I'd invite you back to my place, but I don't really have one."
She came close to him, and when he sat back she slid onto his lap and wrapped her arms around his neck. "We could go to my place," she said.
"You have a place?"
She laughed low in her throat. "Yes."
"Let's go, then."
He led her to her apartment. It was mostly a hunch, based on tax records and false names, and the leak of information since that Senate hearing. And so the game started again. He kept tabs on her whereabouts and she seemed to know his. He would order her a coffee before she arrived at the coffee shop, so that the barista called out her name as she walked through the door. She would have lunch delivered to whatever site he worked on, with a note that might have a drawing of a heart and the letter N. He began to spend time in her apartment when she was off on one of her many missions; her cat didn't like that arrangement at first, but soon it warmed up to him and he would watch television with the beast curled up and purring on his lap.
It was almost like they were dating.
Except they never went out with other people. No double dates with Steve and Sharon. No dinner parties. Any outing was spontaneous. It wasn't until he followed her to a party one night that this fact hit home. All of the Avengers were there, most with dates, some without. He watched her flirting with Clint in that friendly way they had. His chest ached. But he couldn't go in there. Even though Steve had been looking for him, Bucky knew that all the others would treat him like a villain, an enemy.
That night he stood on Steve's doorstep for a long time. He left before Steve came home.
Despite the bitter February cold, he wandered the streets rather than return to Natasha's apartment. He settled for a back alley with a nice spot next to a heating vent as his bed.
In the morning he climbed up the fire escape and sat outside her window. When she woke up, she pulled the window open and told him he was an idiot.
"I'm tired of this game," he said. "Will you come with me to Steve's?"
She kissed him and pulled him inside. "Just one thing first," she whispered in his ear.
Of course.