HOME

Sam understood something about Steve. And that was that he was searching for a home, but he didn't know what home felt like anymore. Sam knew that home was supposed to feel like people, it was never really a place but those that inhabited a certain time beside you. Bucky might have been a home once, Sam was sure that Peggy had been, that Steve's mother had been. Sam got that, because he had been looking for the same thing. It felt like home had been shot out of the sky with Riley. His parents could no longer be home, though when he came back from the war he wished that they could be. That would be easier, a home already known. But time changed what home was, it always had, and so it left Sam searching.

That was why, one night on the road in the middle of nowhere with the stars above like promises waiting to be made, Sam was surprised to find home. Steve was curled up in the passenger's seat, finally asleep, and in their little rental car he had slumped so his head was on Sam's shoulder. Steve had a few days stubble, but he looked peaceful, a little smile left from Sam teasing him about his music taste before he drifted off.

Sam's surprise then washed into understanding, relief. Because, even if neither of them would mention it for weeks to come, he knew Steve had found home too. It was silly, maybe, but in other ways it just made sense. They fit together, they let the other know he didn't have to stand on his own.

There was an excited part of Sam, one that had been searching for so long that wanted to pull the car over and shout to the desert night wind, "I'm home!" But he didn't, just held the knowledge close and kept driving as his shoulder was warmed by Steve; as his whole life was changed by him.

So, when the time came, after Ultron, after finding Bucky, Sam should have guessed this was what Steve would ask him next. "Will you join me?" Blinking his large lashes, hand outstretched like Steve could just lead Sam, right then, to wherever he planned to go.

"You want me to be an Avenger?" Sam asked, and for some reason saying it out loud didn't sound as nuts as he thought it would.

"Yes," Steve said, a little hopeful smile playing around his lips.

Sam grinned at him then, taking his hand only to turn it out of a hand shake, twining their fingers together. "It's not Brooklyn, but I suppose it will do."

Steve pulled Sam's hand closer with his own and kissed each knuckle and Sam had never seen him look happier, more relaxed. As though, after all this time, home was finally a secured place he could knew how to get to. And Sam understood that too, because it felt like Steve was always pulling him towards him and that Steve felt the same tug; one of safety and warmth even in the dangerous lives they lead. "You won't regret it," Steve promised.

"No, I bet I won't," Sam could only reply with a happy grin but couldn't help adding: "At least not all of the time."

Steve just rolled his eyes at Sam before tugging him close.