It wasn't until about eight-thirty in the morning before Bucky wandered out of the bedroom, still in his sleep pants and t-shirt and without having bothered taming his hair or anything, shuffling to the kitchen. Steve was seated at their dining table, which sat just off the kitchen, watching him over a cup of coffee.
Nothing was said before Bucky poured his own cup and had joined Steve at the table, eyes half-lidded and not making any move to actually drink the cup in front of him.
"Didn't sleep well?" Steve asked.
Bucky made a noncommittal noise that sounded vaguely like a zombie.
"Nightmares?"
Bucky made that noise again, still not really answering. It was way too early to think. It was actually about an hour later than he was usually up, but it sure as hell felt earlier than that.
"Wanna talk about it?"
He opened his eyes enough to actually look at Steve this time, though it took him another long second to formulate an answer. "No." He yawned. "Wasn't one of those nightmares. Just the old-fashioned kind."
Steve smiled faintly. "Monsters under the bed? I still get those. I think that's just normal."
"Oh, good, something in my head is still normal."
Steve gave a heartfelt sigh, clearly weary of this discussion. It was far from the first time they'd had it. "Bucky, stop being so hard on yourself. I mean it."
"You always do," Bucky said, not offering any promise to change. "When I start feeling saner, I'll stop."
"The more you do it, the harder it'll be to feel sane," Steve said, not calling surrender without a bit more of a protest. Obnoxious bastard.
Bucky gave him a grumpy look. "Steve, stop. I'm tired of this conversation. You don't live in my head, you don't have to deal with these things except as the occasional friendly fire. Stop pushing me." He looked down at his coffee, debating actually taking a drink. "Besides, it makes it easier to deal with if I make a joke about it. I'm sorry for my deadpan delivery. Didn't mean to upset you."
"It's fine." Steve set down his cup. "I didn't realize it was a joke. You're pretty self-deprecating."
"Most of the time, I'm not serious," Bucky said, which was as close as he'd get to admitting that it wasn't always a joke. There were plenty of times he felt that genuinely frustrated with himself as to say and think something that would ultimately set him two steps back from the one step forward he'd taken.
Steve seemed to let it go at that. "You might want to wake up faster," he said. "In case you forgot, Tony and Pepper are showing up today around noon to visit."
Bucky looked at him blankly, then swore. "I forgot that was today. Fine, I'll finish my coffee then try to look like I can go out in public without a leash."
Steve laughed. "You'll try?"
"Until I have coffee, I can't promise anything," Bucky said, finally picking up his cup.
Steve had brewed some rather weak coffee that morning, so it took a second cup before Bucky felt human enough to clean himself up for public appearances.
"That took you awhile," Steve said, waiting for him at the table and playing with Bucky's tablet. "When'd you turn into a woman?"
Bucky gave him a murderous look. "I hope someone sets your hair on fire."
"If I keep talking, it'll probably be you starting that fire," Steve said, setting down the tablet.
"You're damn right. Jesus. Who put extra asshole in your cereal this morning?"
Steve stood up and walked towards the door, grinning like the jerkface he was. "I used the wrong container. I thought it was sugar."
"We need to start labeling them, then," Bucky said, grabbing his cap and pulling it on. "And we really gotta figure out a better way to make it hard to recognize me. I'm tired of wearing this dumb thing every time we go out."
"What, you don't like hat hair?" Steve said, still clearly full of piss and vinegar, if the laugh in his tone was any indication.
Bucky gave him another glare, though not quite as murderous as the last one. "Until you have long hair, you can't understand hat hair."
Steve dropped the smile, staring at him like he'd just said something really damn stupid. "Bucky, anyone with hair can get hat hair. Unless your brilliant powers of observation missed it, I have hair."
"It looks dumber with long hair," Bucky grumped at him, following Steve out the door and waiting while Steve locked up.
"If you say so," Steve said, locking up behind them. "Okay, time to put on the silent routine. Tony and Pepper are renting their own car, so we can just take the bike to meet them."
Bucky gave him an annoyed look, but went quiet. He usually was fine with not talking, it meant he didn't have to try to rely on rusty old talents in dealing with the public at large. But it also gave Steve way too many opportunities to say something snarky at him without having to worry about Bucky being an asshole right back. Steve didn't tend to take advantage of the situation like that, but sometimes the punk couldn't help himself. Bucky usually just gave him a glare to induce death until Steve laughed and then shut up.
With the crap Steve had already given him that morning, and with Tony adding his own brand of special into the mix, Bucky had a feeling he'd be doing a lot of internal swearing and wanting to slap someone.
At least Pepper would probably be on his side.
They were meeting their friends at the Smithsonian; for some dumb reason, Tony wanted to finally get to see the Captain America exhibit. Both Steve and Bucky had tried to convince him it wasn't all that great, and it was weird for them to go to it, but Tony ran right over them with the threat that he'd just buy the museum and take it home with him to see it. So in the name of keeping Tony from actually making good on that, they agreed.
It was the middle of the week in a September, so the museum was not quite as crowded as it was on weekends or in the summer, when families would start playing tourist while the kids weren't in school. There was a decent sized group of kids that looked like they were either in jr. high, or maybe freshmen in high school. But they were mostly contained by their teacher and adult escorts, so they weren't underfoot. Bucky didn't pay them much mind.
"There they are," Steve said, standing up on his tip toes and waving. Bucky turned his attention from trying to not trip over small people to spot Tony and Pepper. Tony waved back, acknowledging Steve and Bucky's presence, and the two pairs navigated through the thin crowd to meet up somewhere in the middle.
"Hi, you two," Pepper greeted cheerfully once they'd finally gotten to the middle.
"You're a bit late," Tony said, clearly giving them shit about it. Bucky bit back a sigh.
"Sorry," Steve said. "Traffic between our place and here was a bit thick. Everyone wanted to go get lunch. I don't understand why they can't pack a bag lunch for themselves instead of clogging up the roads and wasting their time grabbing a burger from a cheap joint."
Tony gave him a frustrated look. "You are still not modern enough. Come on, I want to finally see this exhibit and laugh at how outdated you guys were back then."
Steve scowled. "Is that why you wanted to come here? Tony, you didn't have to drag us here for that, you just had to open Wiki."
Tony flashed him a shit-eating grin. "There's nothing like seeing a relic in person. Besides." He held his hands out in a shrug. "I want to see what things were like back then. I grew up on stories about you, it'd be nice to get more than anecdotal lessons. The old man didn't know everything, and I don't know what questions to ask you old fogeys to get the rest of the story. This is a good place to start."
Steve shook his head. "I still think this is dumb."
"Hey, look at it this way, you have a fan that's not going to bug you for an autograph," Tony said. "Now, are you going to show me the best parts of this place, or am I going to be trusted to wander around on my own?"
Pepper laughed. "Don't trust him to his own devices," she said.
"I know better than that," Steve said, heading for the exhibit.
Bucky pulled up the rear, not really excited to be there. The place dredged up a lot of memories that he didn't always like having in his face. Times were better back then in a lot of ways, but talk of the war inevitably led to the fall, something that still gave him nightmares and probably always would. He preferred remembering things before he enlisted, and nothing in that exhibit really talked about that part of Steve's life.
They wandered around, Steve answering Tony's occasional question, but Tony was uncharacteristically quiet for the most part, reading and studying the displays. Bucky had seen it all before, and knew everything it said first-hand, so he didn't pay much attention, mostly watching the crowds and focusing on keeping his head down to avoid being recognized. Coming here, where his face was plastered around, was never safe, so Bucky always felt a bit more paranoid on the very rare occasion one or the other of them had dragged them to visit the old days.
"Born 1917?" Tony said, loud enough to draw Bucky's attention. "He's old."
Knowing that Steve had been born in 1918, it was pretty obvious which display they'd finally found. He looked over to see his three friends at that damn memorial to him. He watched their reflections; Tony and Pepper were genuinely reading, but Steve was studying the picture like he might undo everything and wander back in time if he just stared hard enough.
Bucky had tried more than once to keep him from doing that, had to every time they were there, but Steve rarely listened. It made Bucky uncomfortable. He knew it was just guilt on Steve's part, but sometimes Bucky couldn't help but worry that somehow, he wasn't as good as he'd been back then, like he somehow wasn't good enough anymore. He rationally knew that wasn't likely, not with the way Steve was, but the idea still haunted him from time to time.
It was one of a million issues that Bucky had developed since his memories had come back, and while he'd been getting better about talking to Steve about them when they came up after that mess in Kiev, there were still some things he just couldn't bring up yet. This was one of them, and part of him wondered if it'd be one that stayed firmly behind mental lock and key for the rest of their lives.
Knowing his luck, however, Steve would probably catch him at just the wrong moment and wrestle it out of him.
"Excuse me?"
A low female voice tore his attention away from getting lost in his own head again, and Bucky looked around a moment before noticing the shy-looking teenage girl in front of him. She was wearing a gray shirt with a round emblem on it that Bucky realized was a depiction of Steve's shield on one half, Bucky's metal arm on the other.
The girl was holding a black sharpie. "You're the Winter Soldier, right?"
Bucky wasn't a hundred percent sure if he should confirm that or not, or even how to, but with a look of confusion on his face, he reluctantly nodded.
The girl held up the sharpie. "Will you sign my shirt? I'm a big fan. Is Captain America with you? I'd like his autograph too, if he's here and you think he'd be willing to."
Steve being willing to was no question; while he wasn't always comfortable with his star status, he was nice enough to oblige fans that approached him. Bucky, on the other hand, had never been asked to give an autograph, or even really noticed, and when he was, most people felt too unnerved by his silence to interact with him.
So Bucky wasn't quite sure how to react to this.
But the girl had asked nicely enough, and she looked like it'd taken all her courage to approach him, and while Bucky had become more of an asshole than he used to be, he wasn't that much of an asshole that he could upset a kid like that. So feeling very awkward, he took the sharpie. The girl half-turned, pulling aside her hair to expose the back of her shoulder for him. It took him a second to figure out how to sign 'Winter Soldier' rather than his real name and still have it look like a familiar signature. He finally scribbled out something that looked vaguely like the right name, then capped the marker and handed it back.
The girl smiled, looking like he'd just made her century for her. "Thank you! Is the captain here?"
Bucky inclined his head towards where Steve was finally wandering away from Bucky's display. The girl turned to approach Steve, and after a bit of hesitation, Bucky followed. Steve noticed Bucky first, and before Steve could say or do anything, Bucky motioned to the incoming fan.
"Captain America?" the girl asked, sounding a bit more confident than she had when she'd approached Bucky.
Steve gave her a personable smile. "I deny everything that guy might've told you about me."
The girl shook her head. "Oh, he didn't say anything. But he was really nice when I asked him to sign my shirt. Is it okay if I ask you to, too?"
Steve looked at Bucky in shock, and Bucky refused to give him a reaction. Not that he needed to, Steve knew how to read Bucky's lack of expressions. Recovering quickly, Steve looked at the young fan. "You have a lot of courage," he said, taking her offered sharpie. "Most peole aren't brave enough to approach him."
While Steve signed her shirt, the girl smiled. "I'm a big fan. I couldn't get your autograph and not his. You both protect people when you go out. I know most people don't really think of it that way, since you're the hero and nobody really knows anything about him, but I don't think that's fair."
"You're a rare one, then," Steve said, capping the marker and handing it back to her. "You look a little young to be here alone, so you'd better go find your parents or class or whoever you're here with."
The girl tucked her marker into her jeans pocket. "I'm here with my class. My teacher's probably going to give me detention, but it's worth it. Thank you!" Then she hurried off and disappeared into the crowd.
Steve took a step closer to Bucky, staring at him as if he'd sprouted a third eye in his forehead. "You actually gave her your autograph?" Bucky shrugged a bit awkwardly. Steve shook his head. "You surprise me sometimes."
"Welcome to stardom, Mister Stoic," Tony said. He had one of his usual asshole smirks. Even Pepper looked like she was trying to hide a smile. "Feels good, doesn't it?"
Bucky gave him a look like he'd just had a glass of sour milk.
Steve laughed. "I think he's been trying to avoid that."
"Well, just wait. It'll happen whether you like it or not once the right reporter takes the right picture," Tony warned.
Not a day Bucky was looking forward to. He didn't actually mind being famous. He got used to that in the forties. But trying to keep a lid on how he'd survived was going to be a royal pain in the ass. No matter how little fault was on his head, getting authorities and the public at large to let him be if it was found out that he was Hydra's favorite attack dog was going to be difficult.
"We'll deal with that when it happens," Steve said. "Come on, there's more to this museum than just this exhibit."
The rest of the museum- at least what they saw of it -was far more entertaining. Bucky hadn't seen it all, there was simply too much there, and while they stopped at some exhibits that Bucky had already been to, they found a few he hadn't, and the farther they got from the Captain America displays, the better he felt. That place just had too many memories and Bucky spent enough time in the past, he didn't need to be there while enjoying a day out with his tiny handful of friends.
Tony called an end to what would've been an otherwise endless day of playing tourist in the museum by deciding he had to have a cheeseburger or he might waste away into nothing. Steve had warned him that they didn't really know of any high quality places for that, since neither of them really ate any kind of burger, but Pepper laughed and said that Tony's idea of a cheeseburger was Burger King.
Steve had outright laughed at Tony for that. Tony was less than amused.
Since Steve and Bucky almost never ate fast food except when they had no choice, which was basically never, Steve suggested a local cafe that had good food, far better than the average American restaurant. It wasn't expensive enough to be considered 'high end', and it was more of a hole in the wall restaurant, but the place had been founded by a woman in Steve and Bucky's time. Her granddaughter, who now owned and operated the place, used the same recipes as her grandmother, so the food was more familiar to them than most modern restaurants. Most modern places had too much grease.
Tony protested that the grease was the good part, but he was quickly overruled.
The restaurant, called "Mama's," hid itself in a quiet business zone not terribly far from the big tourist traps that D.C. had to offer. It didn't attract as much attention as well-known places, but its location kept them in business.
The hostess at the podium by the door smiled in greeting. "Hello, Captain Rogers, Winter Soldier. Glad to see you back. We're quiet right now," she said, motioning to the abundance of open tables, "so pick your poison. I'll let Mama know you're here."
Steve grabbed menus, something the hostess had forgotten, probably since Steve and Bucky both had a usual order they rarely strayed from, so they were usually unneeded. He held them out to Tony and Pepper.
Tony took his, staring at Steve. "You're known around here."
Steve shrugged, leading them to a back table that was a usual spot for them. "We come in whenever we manage to botch cooking dinner."
"And how often is that?"
"About once a week."
Tony gave an exaggerated sigh, holding Pepper's seat for her. "For two life-long bachelors, you should really know how to cook for yourselves by now."
"We cook fine," Steve protested. "We just have a thing where we try a new recipe every week and that's the one we usually burn. Modern day stoves and ovens are a lot more efficient than what we had. And cooking methods are different, too. Remember, we moved out on our own in the middle of the Depression, quality food wasn't exactly something that was easy to find. Even though Bucky was better off than me, he still rarely had the good stuff. So we boiled everything. It hid the flavor of the bad food. Turned it into inedible mush, but at least it didn't taste awful."
Tony looked at Pepper. "I'm getting a first-hand history lesson from someone who's not covered in wrinkles."
Pepper laughed, and if Tony's yelp was any indication, she had probably also kicked his ankle under the table. "Be nice, Tony."
"I'm perfectly nice," Tony protested, then looked back at Steve, seated across from him. "So what about after the Depression? Surely food was better then."
"I still couldn't afford it," Steve said. "I couldn't get a very good job with my health problems. Bucky would sneak money into my wallet sometimes, so once in awhile I ate better than usual, but as a rule, getting out of the Depression didn't do much but give me a small raise. And it wasn't long before we both enlisted, anyway. You don't cook in the military."
"I'm surprised you even left the house in one piece with all the problems you had," Tony said.
Steve took that one gracefully, if the fact that he didn't give Tony a sour look or a kick to the shins was any indication. "I didn't have a choice, Tony. And even when Social Security came along, I didn't feel right taking it and sitting around when I could still do something. Besides, that program was so new back then, working got me more money. If I weren't working, I would've been existing on one meal a week."
Then Steve glanced at Bucky. Bucky gave him a curious look, wondering what he was about to get dragged into. "Besides, when I get bored, I get into trouble, and I didn't have my own self-appointed guardian angel all the time to get me out of it."
Bucky scowled, reaching over and punching Steve on the arm. Punk.
"And now that you can handle trouble, he's glued his feet to yours to replace your shadow," Tony said. "You two do everything backwards."
"It's called valuing what you have, Tony," Steve said. "Besides, we're mutually insane."
"And yet you two still manage to be straight. I don't understand how." He looked at Pepper. "We're not that bad, are we?"
Pepper pursed her lips, clearly trying to keep from laughing in Tony's face. "Tony? Shut up."
"Thank you, Pepper," Steve said. He gave Tony a dirty look. "Keep talking and I'm letting him stab you with his fork." He nodded his head in Bucky's direction.
Bucky gave Tony his best flat look that promised bodily harm when Tony was least expecting it in response.
Tony drew back, studying Bucky like he was trying to decide if Bucky might actually flip his shit and stick a fork in him, or if it was a bluff. They all knew it was a bluff; Bucky didn't hurt friends if he could help it, and very few strangers were worth the effort of doing more than walking away from. The only ones that really had to be afraid of Bucky were people who tried to hurt Steve.
After a moment, Tony pointed at him. "That's not funny."
Bucky flashed him a perfectly evil smile, sitting back in his chair. Tony gave him one more wary look, before looking at Pepper. "What do I do to deserve this?"
"Do you want the full list?"
Before Tony could do more than open his mouth in protest, a young woman in her mid-twenties approached them. "Steve! Winter! Isn't it a bit early in the day for you to show up?" she demanded with a wide smile on her face. Her ginger hair was pulled up in a bun, loose curls framing her face.
"Hi, Mama," Steve said. "We had guests in town, so we thought we'd introduce them to your fabulous cooking."
Mama blushed, and Bucky couldn't help but allow himself a small smile. He always thought she looked pretty when she blushed. If he weren't busy hiding his identity, he'd be almost tempted to ask her out for a cup of coffee. But even if his identity wasn't an issue, he'd be hesitant to actually do that. He and Steve had a healthy number of enemies lurking about, and if there was anything he'd learned from watching other superheroes in the news, it was that their civilian girlfriends were easy targets for the bad guys. Even Pepper hadn't escaped that.
He liked Mama too much to put her through that. Especially when he still wasn't interested in anything long term to offer her to make the danger worth it.
"Is your name really 'Mama'?" Tony asked.
Mama smiled. "My real name's a secret, Mister Stark. Mama is what my grandmother was called, and when she gave me the business, it became my name. Now, before you start trying to schmooze my secret out of me and Miss Potts there has to hurt you for it, why don't you look over the menu and tell me what I can fix for you personally."
Tony glanced at the menu that he hadn't even picked up off the table. "Please tell me you make good old American cheeseburgers?"
Mama smiled brightly. "Sure do, honey. Best in town." She took his menu, then looked at Pepper. "Do you need another minute?"
"Um." Pepper looked down at the menu helplessly. Their conversation hadn't given her a chance to see what the place even offered. "Do you have soups?"
"We have chicken noodle, chili, broccoli and chedder, minestrone, and today's special is chicken tortilla."
Pepper handed Mama her menu. "I'll take the special, that sounds good."
Mama turned to Steve and Bucky. "And let me guess, you two aren't going to give me any excitement by ordering anything different?"
Steve gave her a smile and a shrug. "You know us, Mama. We'd like our usuals, please."
"Hmph. You men, creatures of habit." She may have been trying to sound cranky at them, but she had a million watt smile on her face that she seemed to reserve just for them. They were definitely her favorite customers. She didn't serve anyone else personally, that's what she had waitstaff hired for, but she handled Steve and Bucky herself. Bucky wondered why sometimes. The obvious answer would be their fame, but he half-heartedly wondered if there weren't another reason.
Probably just another girl flirting with Steve. He'd have to convince Steve later to ask her out.
Once Mama had walked away, Tony focused his attention on Bucky, which only earned him a bored look in return. "So, magpie, how do you order food in a restaurant when you have a permanent lock and key on your vocal cords?"
"He writes it down," Steve said. Tony really should've expected that by now. They'd just spent all afternoon with Bucky remaining completely silent and Steve answering for him whenever Tony tried to pry a word or two out of Bucky. He'd talk later once they weren't in public. And he was half tempted to let loose a string of profanity to make his former commanding officer proud once they were, just to annoy the shit out of Tony and make Steve roll his eyes and then introduce his face to his palm. But he had more class than to do that around Pepper.
Although if someone blew up the apartment while they were there, all bets were off.
Tony propped his chin on his elbow, staring at Bucky. Bucky returned his look with a quirked eyebrow. Tony didn't say anything at first, tilting his head a bit. "You really are good at this silent thing, aren't you? Doesn't that get frustrating?"
Bucky shrugged one shoulder with a conceding look.
"Please tell me you'll at least start talking a little bit once the press finds you? Because if you continue your silent treatment, they're going to start speculating about why."
"Let them speculate," Steve said. "They already speculate all sorts of weird things."
"Which you could dismiss if you just offered an interview," Tony pointed out.
"If the presence of RPF on the internet is any indication, I'm going out on a limb to say you're wrong."
Bucky closed his eyes wearily, hanging his head. It may have amused him to no end when Steve discovered that stuff, but it was still irritating to know it was out there. Being someone's wet dream was one thing, even though it was a little creepy, but when that wet dream had to involve some strange gay sex fetish with his best friend, it was just outright weird.
People very frequently confused the everloving shit out of him.
"Well, okay, not everyone will listen, but-"
"We'll handle it when people find out who he is, Tony," Steve interrupted him. "In the meantime, they can wonder."
Pepper put a hand on Tony's shoulder. "Tony, we can try to talk them into listening to your usual graceful media handling once we're not at a public restaurant," she said.
Tony glanced around. "Okay, fair enough. But you two will listen to my suggestions."
Steve gave him an aggravated look. "I can't wait, Mister I Am Iron Man."
"I thought you were still under ice when that came out."
This time, Steve did kick Tony under the table. "I can watch old news reports on the internet, Tony. It's not that hard."
Tony scooted his chair back. "Will you people stop abusing my legs?"
"Not as long as you keep talking," Pepper said sweetly. "And besides, Winter over there hasn't touched your legs."
"He's out of reach," Tony said, as if Bucky would do it if he were in reach. Bucky had better ways of getting back at someone for being a smartass.
"That wouldn't stop him," Steve said.
Mama approached them, four plates balanced on her arms. "Okay, guys, here's your food. Chicken tortilla for the lovely lady, an old-fashioned cheeseburger for Mister Stark, and these two cretins get their usuals. The chili's a little hot this time, Steve, be careful. Winter, here's your salad. If you four need anything, have someone come fetch me."
Tony studied his burger. "Where's the grease?"
Mama gave him a bright smile. "I don't fry my burgers. Makes less of a mess. Most people find they prefer my way once they give it a try."
Tony didn't look convinced, and Bucky saw Mama's smile falter a bit. She was a bit sensitive about her cooking sometimes, especially when she was trying to impress someone with it. Before Tony could open his mouth to say something stupid that might hurt Mama's feelings, Bucky grabbed his knife and stabbed it through the burger.
Tony jumped, staring at the knife, then at Bucky. "What the hell was that for?!"
While Bucky gave Tony a dark look, Steve grabbed Bucky's fork and shoved it into his hand. "Here, eat your salad. Your way of telling people they're being assholes needs some work." Bucky took the fork and jabbed at a piece of lettuce, but didn't stop giving Tony that look.
"Oh, Winter, honey," Mama said, giving him a sad smile. "You don't have to threaten your friends just to save my feelings. If he doesn't like it, that's fine. My way's not for everyone."
"Is that what that was about?" Tony demanded. "Boy, we gotta find you a voice. Calling me an asshole is a lot easier when you can talk and scares me less than having a knife stabbed through my food." He looked up at Mama. "I didn't mean to imply your cooking wasn't fine. I am not one to turn down trying a cheeseburger cooked differently. I was just trying to figure how you managed to cook one with such little grease. I doubt you have a tiny George Foreman back there."
Mama's smile brightened again. "I bake 'em. They cook all the way through without turning into grease pits or cooking unevenly."
Tony looked like he was thinking about that for a moment. "That's brilliant. Now, with all eyes on me, allow me to try this masterpiece and decide if I'll become too spoiled by it to ever eat at McDonald's again." He removed the knife, giving it a dirty look before setting it down as far away from Bucky as possible.
"Honey, if you can still go back to McDonald's after eating my food, I may as well close up my business," Mama said while Tony took a bite big enough that Bucky wondered just how much he had to unhinge his jaw to do it.
Mama waited with a nervous look on her face as Tony chewed, which was as exciting as watching a cow do it, but eventually, Tony managed to get that gigantic bite he took down his throat. He looked up at Mama. "This is amazing. I don't think I've ever had a better cheeseburger." He turned to Pepper. "We're moving here so I don't have to fly across the country every time I want one."
Before Pepper could do more than laugh in Tony's face, Steve spoke up. "Tony, I think we'd both have to kill you if we had you as a neighbor. You'd come bug us too often."
"You two need bugging," Tony said. "And I'd be on hand to fix Mister Silent's arm if he tries to catch another RPG."
Mama gave Bucky a disapproving look. "And what am I supposed to do if you get your fool self killed doing things like that? I'll lose my favorite customer."
Bucky felt himslf blush and decided to focus on his salad instead of the conversation. Normally, he'd flirt back, but it was a little hard to do that when you couldn't speak up. Damnit.
"Aw, look, you made him blush," Tony said, clearly trying to not laugh his ass off. Bucky gave him a look of pure hatred. Tony held up his hands. "Okay, hands off the fork. I don't need stabbed in the eye by it."
"Don't you mess up my table with blood, Winter," Mama scolded. "I'd better leave before I have to be witness to a murder. You guys enjoy your meal, have one of the waitresses come get me if you need anything."
Bucky watched her go with interest, not for the first time, and while Steve had never said anything about it, Tony apparently felt the need to. "I'd say you need to ask her out, but that would be the most awkward lack of conversation in the world."
No longer having the energy to give Tony much hatred for the day, reserving it for when he was really stupid, he gave Tony a tired look that waited patiently for Tony to retract his statement.
"I've tried to convince him to stop hiding," Steve said, stirring his chili idly, which was clearly still too hot to safely eat. "But while I'm used to being a celebrity, I've never been one with anything to hide, so I'm coming up with nothing helpful to spin as a reason he's still alive without giving anything we don't want in the public knowledge away."
"I have an idea or two," Tony said. "We'll discuss them later. Maybe get Mister Lonely Hearts back into the dating scene. Probably do wonders for his temper."
Steve looked over at Bucky, not saying anything to that. Bucky paused mid-bite, staring at him, wondering what that look was for, until he realized that Steve was giving serious consideration to Tony's statement. He gave his friend a thoroughly offended look. Steve should know better than that. Girls were nice, but had never been the be-all, end-all to his sense of fun and relaxation. Not dating hardly had anything to do with his occasionally short temper. That was all Hydra.
Steve shrugged. "You used to be a lot more social," he said. "Maybe interacting with more than just the three of us would do you some good."
Bucky looked away, staring down at his food while he poked at a strawberry with his fork, biting on the inside of his mouth to keep from saying something. He hated it when Steve did this, pointing out all the ways he was different from back then, as if he were somehow not as good as he was before Hydra had screwed with his head. Just because Steve had managed to survive decades mostly unchanged didn't mean Bucky had. He knew Steve wasn't doing it purposely, but it did nothing to help Bucky's insecurities.
He really wanted to tell all of them to fuck off and leave, but that felt really childish, so he settled for ignoring them completely. It wasn't like he could speak up to defend himself anyway.
Thankfully, Steve took the hint and directed conversation away from Bucky, although Bucky caught Pepper giving him a curious look from time to time. He ignored it, not really able to ask her why, able to only guess and of course, with how the afternoon had already gone, his guesses were probably miles into the misanthrope-tinted territory than what was truth. Pepper hardly had a mean bone in her body, she was probably just concerned for him.
He didn't know how to address her concern though, with or without words, so he just put it aside and focused on his salad.
The rest of the day went by a little easier. The others left him mostly alone, allowing him to shove everything back into the dark corners of his mind where he didn't have to deal with them. It probably wasn't the healthiest way to go about things, but it got him through, at least for now.
Tony had never actually been to the city, so he and Pepper dragged Steve and Bucky along all over the city like a couple of tourists from a nowhere place that never saw anything exciting. He'd accuse them of being from Nebraska if he didn't know better.
It was just past seven when Pepper told Tony that if he dragged her to one more statue or memorial or display, her feet were going to have very stern words with him. "You can play more tomorrow," she said.
"But it's too early to go back to the hotel and plant ourselves in front of the TV," Tony protested.
Steve raised his eyebrows at Tony. "You came to visit us, it is possible to visit friends at their home rather than wandering around like a bunch of out-of-towners who are only missing the mandatory camera from the nineteen eighties."
Bucky choked back a laugh.
"Give me credit, Spangles," Tony said. "My camera would be a custom-built digital camera that takes better pictures than those used in magazine photoshoots. It'd do the Photoshopping for me."
Pepper sighed theatrically. "See what I put up with? He's lucky he has me, anyone else would've smothered him in his sleep."
Steve motioned to Bucky, the first time since lunch that anyone had brought him into the conversation. "I'm sure he'll offer to fling him off the Washington Monument for you." Bucky chose to not comment, but Tony gave him a look like he wouldn't trust Bucky not to do it. Bucky didn't know if he felt amused or insulted by that, but after attacking Tony's food at lunch, he figured he probably deserved it.
Pepper smiled. "I'm sure he would, and he's a perfect gentleman for it. But despite his flaws, I like Tony enough to let him live."
Tony gave Pepper a dirty look. "Thank you, Miss Potts, that's very comforting. You're sleeping in the other bed tonight."
She gave him a dazzling grin. "You aren't the one that gets to kick people out of the bed."
"As wonderful a display of flirting as this is, I'd rather not be witness to it," Steve said. "Come on, we'll lead you back to the apartment. It's small, but if you want to pry a word out of him-" once again, Steve motioned to Bucky, "-we can't be out in public."
Bucky didn't say it, which probably surprised no one, but he was just as fine not participating in conversation anyway.
"It would be nice to see if he still has a voice," Tony said. "I half expect him to cough out grave dust when he opens his mouth."
Luckily for Tony, Pepper spoke up before Bucky could decide how to respond appropriately. "Not everyone has to talk as much as you," she said. "You're far too in love with the sound of your own voice. Sometimes silence is bliss."
"Why do you think I drag him out into public?" Steve said, and once again, Bucky wasn't sure how to react there. "He never stops saying things to traumatize me at home."
Oh. That again. Seriously, did that man never get over anything? It'd been a week since the Hot Pockets article and Bucky hadn't found anything quite that horrible to share since. He'd given Steve a happy week off from trauma. Just for that, he was going to go scouring the internet after Tony and Pepper left for their hotel. Steve would regret challenging him like that.
"Traumatize?" Tony glanced at Bucky. "What, do you teach him all the new fun slang these days that you didn't have in your day?"
"Ask him about the Hot Pockets when we get to the apartment," Steve said grumpily. Bucky really struggled to keep that deadpan look on his face instead of laughing at Steve's expense.
"What about the twinkie?" Tony said, and Pepper laughed. Steve and Bucky could only exchange a look of deep confusion before Tony sighed. "That's something else I have to introduce you two to. Anyway, yes, Hot Pockets, I prepare myself to ask about them."
Pepper reminded them of sore feet that might be forced to step on other feet if they didn't get back to a place where said feet could be rested, and after Steve gave Tony the address to plug into his GPS, the two pairs split up to meet up at Steve and Bucky's apartment.
Steve and Bucky got there first, thankfully, since otherwise, poor Pepper might've been left standing at the door, waiting for them. They waited downstairs by the front door for a couple minutes, only nodding in greeting to a neighbor as she left, before Tony and Pepper showed up. Pepper looked tired, not in a sleepy sort of way, but she definitely looked ready to put her feet up and relax for awhile.
"You look like you need to be carried up the stairs," Steve said, unlocking the secured front door.
Pepper smiled. "I can make it awhile longer. I'll just make Tony rub my feet when we get to our hotel."
"Volunteered yet again," Tony said.
"Admit it," she said as Steve and Bucky led them up the stairs, Bucky following Steve as always. "You like the chance to pamper me."
"Why'd you wear heels when you knew you'd be walking so much?" Steve asked, sparing a glance backwards.
"Habit," Pepper said. "I'm usually either barefoot or in heels. I forgot I had regular shoes with me when we went to meet you guys." Bucky looked back at them as they stopped on the landing by the apartment door. Pepper gave Tony a sour look. "Naturally, he wouldn't let me forget it the whole way here."
Tony tried to look innocent. "I merely suggested that you should've remembered. Your memory is supposed to be better than that."
"You two sound like us," Steve grumbled, opening the door and standing back to let their guests in. "That's kind of disturbing."
"It's what happens when you get two smartasses together for any amount of time," Tony said, stepping into the apartment with Pepper. Steve followed, with Bucky right behind him, who closed the door and locked it once everyone was out of the way. Tony looked around. "Nice place. Little small."
"We don't need much room," Steve said, hanging up his keys on the key hook. Bucky took off his hat, glad to have it off. Steve studied him a moment. "Okay, you're right, long hat hair looks funnier than it does on those of us with short hair."
Bucky glared at him. "Thank you for noticing." He started running his fingers through his hair, trying to fix the mess as best he could without a mirror and a brush and maybe a shower.
Tony put on a face of mock-surprise. "He speaks!"
Bucky turned that glare on Tony, but said nothing to dignify that brilliant display of Royal Asshole.
Tony frowned. "Or, he did speak. Come on, what's it take to get a 'screw you' out of you?"
"Kiss off, Tony," Bucky said, still trying in vain to tame his hair. He really wanted a shower; the bad thing about hats in the warm months was that they tended to lock in heat and cause a lot of sweating. Which was not only really uncomfortable and gross, but it lent to the horrible mess known as Hat Hair.
But they had company, and even he thought it'd be kinda rude to wander off and take a shower while they were supposed to be visiting, unless he was covered in blood or had fallen into a mud hole or something.
"Close enough," Tony said.
Steve moved their coffe table closer to the couch. "Pepper, come put your feet up before you're tempted to use them to hurt Tony."
"Steve, you are an angel," she said, settling down on the couch. She slipped her feet out of her heels and kicked them up on the table with a grateful sigh.
Tony flopped down next to her. "Just remember which angel it is that's going to be giving those feet a massage later," he said.
She patted his shoulder. "Don't worry, Tony. I would get bored with a good boy next door. Not enough of a smartass."
Steve tried to act embarassed by her description, pulling a chair over from the dining table to sit on. Bucky stood next to him, on Steve's left side by long-since unncessary habit. "You haven't been around Steve enough," Bucky told her. He looked at Steve, who was giving him an offended look. "Deny it, and I will pull out Story Time."
Steve slouched in his chair a bit, looking grumpy.
"Ooh, story time," Tony said, sitting forward. "Do tell."
"Bucky, show him the Hot Pockets," Steve quickly said in an obvious attempt to deflect the current topic.
Bucky let him get away with it for the moment, walking over to the table and grabbing his tablet. He did a quick search to pull the article back up, then handed the tablet over to Tony. Pepper leaned over to read over Tony's shoulder while Bucky took his original spot by Steve.
Tony's eyebrows raised. "Four minutes? You don't nuke a Hot Pocket for four minutes."
Bucky smothered a laugh, mostly at Steve's expense as his friend stared with his jaw slack at Tony. "That's the part you notice? I'd ask what's wrong with you, but Pepper might take all night listing everything."
While Pepper laughed, Tony handed the tablet back to Bucky. "I've been on the internet longer than you have, Cap," he pointed out. "I'm not as easily traumatized."
"Okay, that explains you," Steve said, and Bucky saw Steve point to him out of the corner of his eye, "but that doesn't explain him."
Bucky was already looking for something to see if anything could break Tony's cynicism, so he barely acknowledged Steve. "You don't see my reactions when I first find these-" He cut himself off, blinking a few times at an article. "Well, that was fast."
Steve sighed. "What did you find this time, Bucky?"
"Guy ended up in the emergency room because his bladder ruptured."
"Well, that's horrible, but where's the trauma?" Tony asked. "And how does that happen? If you hold it too long, you tend to wet the bed."
Bucky lifted his head to look at Steve, even though it'd been Tony to ask that question. "His-" He cut himself off and glanced at Pepper a bit sheepishly. He forgot she was there, and he'd been raised that there were just some things you didn't say in mixed company.
She waved it off. "I'm sure I've heard worse from Tony," she said. "I'm sure I've said worse, too. Welcome to the twenty-first century, where we women get away with things. So what was wrong with his dick?"
Well, she was certainly blunt. "It was too swollen to piss or to get a catheter in."
Tony started to say something that'd probably be obscene, so he quickly cut Tony off. "He put it in a hornet's nest."
The other three went completely dead silent for about five seconds before Tony shuddered, Pepper barely held in a laugh that didn't sound at all sympathetic, and Steve made a whiny noise that said he was putting too much thought into this.
Bucky looked at Steve. "See? You had a week off. This is what you get for acting like I do this every day."
"Friendly fire!" Tony griped.
Steve pointed sternly at Bucky. "I am taking the internet away from you. I don't care if you don't do it every day, you do it often enough."
"Does it make it better that this traumatizes me, too? I'm only sharing because I refuse to suffer alone, and you like me too much to do that to me."
"You know, I don't remember you being quite this bad back when we were younger," Steve said with an exasperated look on his face.
There it was again, that indirect accusation of not being as good. He did horrible things now that he didn't back then. He wasn't as good.
It was stupid, and also stupid, and was stupid mentioned? But it crawled under Bucky's skin. He'd had a whole day of that, he was pretty much at the end of his patience for it. He shoved his tablet into Steve's hands. "Here, get lost in Wikipedia or something."
Steve nearly dropped the tablet, and just as Bucky turned to walk away, he saw Steve clutching it tightly and staring at him in shock. He started to say something, but Bucky's trajectory towards the hallway which led to the bathroom shut him up, as Bucky figured it would. Asking where Bucky was going would, at that point, border on insanity.
Not that he was actually going to the bathroom or anything, he just needed to step away to get ahold of his temper before something bad happened. He didn't like fighting with Steve, never did, but he hated it even more since getting his memories back, because there were still the memories of the aggression towards a stranger, and while he was no longer brainwashed, there was still Hydra programming hiding inside his brain. And Steve had, at one time, been a target. Bucky didn't really trust himself to get into a heated fight with Steve when his temper was on a knife's edge already.
"Well, that escalated quickly," Tony said as Bucky finished rounding the corner.
Bucky paused, staying just out of sight, turning slightly to eavesdrop better.
Steve sighed. "I have no idea what just happened," he said. "He does this sometimes, something just sets him off and I don't know what to do. He didn't used to be like this." There it was again, that implication. Bucky took a deep breath to keep from doing or saying something he'd regret.
"I thought he was talking to you more," Pepper said.
"He was," Steve said. "Is. But there's still a lot he doesn't say. Once upon a time, I would've known even without asking, but-" he trailed off a moment, and Bucky braced himself for whatever Steve might say next. "I guess sometimes it seems like I don't know him at all anymore."
Ouch. Bucky swallowed tightly, then turned on his heel and headed to the bathroom, not wanting to hear more. He resisted the childish urge to kick the door, and made himself simply flush the toilet and then run the water in the sink long enough to sound like he'd washed his hands before heading back out.
He paused just around the corner, shoving everything back into that private little corner of his mind where he didn't have to deal with the really stupid shit that his brain decided to be upset by, and pulled out his old charismatic tricks to help him get through the evening without exploding into ugly bits all over the walls.
"Feel better?" Tony asked as Bucky came back into the living room.
Bucky gave him a tired look. "I'm not dignifying that, Tony."
"You're back to your usual charming self, so I'm taking that as a yes," Tony said.
"Pepper, hit him for me," Bucky said, sitting down on the floor next to Steve's chair and crossing his legs underneath him. He didn't know why he did that when he wasn't barefoot, the treads of his boots tended to dig into the back of his legs. One would think he'd learn, but he never did.
"I have to be careful about abusing him," Pepper said. "He has a soft head, I might cause brain damage."
"I can buy that."
Tony made a face. "What is this, pick on Tony day? First my food gets stabbed, then I get accused of making fun of the most wonderful lady in my life, and now I'm being verbally assaulted."
Pepper gave him a cute little smile, patting his arm. "We do it because we love you."
"You all have a funny way of showing love."
"Your idea of love is inflicting schwarma on us," Steve said.
Bucky raised an eyebrow, glancing between Steve and Tony. "I missed a reference."
"Something that Cap does often," Tony said, apparently dodging the schwarma accusation. Bucky decided he'd have to ask Steve later about it. "You should've seen how excited he was to get a reference that Thor missed."
Steve sighed. "Do you have any idea how frustrating it can be to miss every joke people around you make?"
"What joke was this?" Bucky asked. He'd let the schwarma thing go for the moment, but he really had to hear what had Steve jumping on a joke.
"Wizard of Oz reference," Tony said. "Loki had brainwashed one of SHIELD's best agents, and Nick said something about wanting to know how Loki had turned him into one of his personal flying monkeys."
"Wizard of Oz is still in the public mind?" Bucky asked. "Nice to see that not everything I knew is gone. Please tell me Judy Garland aged well."
Tony looked pained. "Uh, no, not really. Drugs and alcohol kinda hit her hard."
Bucky felt massively disappointed. "Well, there went my first celebrity sweetheart ever."
"You had good taste," Pepper said. "I always thought she was very pretty. I wanted to look like her when I was a little girl."
"She was kinda young, wasn't she?" Tony asked.
Bucky stared at him incredulously. "She was only five years younger than me," he pointed out. "And at least that was an acceptable age range. Steve here had a thing for Katherine Hepburn, and she was eleven years older than him."
Tony looked over at Steve. "You have a thing for older ladies? Good luck with that."
Steve gave Tony a dirty look. "Tony, I'm going to stuff some old socks in your mouth if you don't knock off the age jokes."
Bucky laughed. "He's always had a thing for older women," he said. "I think Peggy was older than him too." He looked at Steve for confirmation. "Wasn't she?"
"By five years," Steve said. "Which meant absolutely nothing. Why are we critiquing each other's taste in women?"
"Because that's what guys do?" Tony said, half a statement and half a question.
Steve pointedly looked in Pepper's direction. "Not all of us here are guys."
Pepper fluttered her eyelashes at him. "You haven't asked me about my taste in women. I prefer brunettes."
Bucky had a slight jolt of culture shock at her blatant statement of bisexuality; there'd always been jokes between guys in the military, but guys in the military were generally not considered to have ideal social standards, at least not around each other. But he'd never heard a woman make a statement like that, and never would've in his time. A lot of that probably went back to the whole 'mixed company' thing.
But whether it was a joke or not, it didn't particularly bother him. Besides, it was Pepper. She was a whole level of special snowflake by herself. Anyone who'd be in a relationship with Tony would have to be.
Tony looked at Pepper. "No wonder you always picked on me for my taste in women. I've always had a thing for blondes."
"Lucky for me," she said. She put a finger on Tony's lips, shushing him. "And before you even put it into your fantasies, no, I will never tell you of any of my escapades before you and I got together. You can just continue to wonder."
Tony made a whining noise. "That's not nice."
"I have to keep up with you somehow."
"Okay, before I drift off into happy mental images land, I think it's time to change the subject," Tony said. He studied Bucky first, then Steve. "I believe I offered some advice on public relations?"
Oh, this should be good.
"I once again point out your wonderfully successful press release about being Iron Man," Steve said.
"And the one where he announced Stark Industries was no longer going to manufacture weapons, which was basically the biggest money-making part of our company," Pepper said.
"Which was a good move, both business-wise and morally, since Obadiah was selling those weapons under the table to terrorist groups," Tony protested.
Pepper looked at him. "Yes, but when you want to change the direction of your company, you typically start putting the plans into place and make a smooth transition before you run to the press. I'm not saying it wasn't understandable why you did it that way, but that sort of method isn't going to help Bucky with his problem."
"Who said I was going to recommend that tactic?" Tony said. "That's the kind of strategy you use when you're fresh out of the mind games. He's had time to get his head on straighter than it probably was a year ago, he shouldn't face that problem. So counting that against me is just not fair, which once again leads me to the question. Why is this pick on Tony day?"
"Because you make every day a pick on everyone else day," Steve said. "But honestly, we'll take the help. I can work a crowd, but I never handled the PR of my tours when I sold bonds, and leading a military operation doesn't require a lot of interaction with the press."
Tony pointed to Steve before looking at Pepper. "See? He's not holding two non-stellar moments against me."
"Tony? Focus on the subject at hand," she said.
"Which I was trying to do. Glad we are now on the same page." He looked over at Bucky. "Okay, what do we have to work with? We've done enough digging to make a statistical guess that there are no records of Hydra's work on you besides that file you keep here. Mind if I borrow that tonight, by the way? You'll get it back, but I'd like to look at it and see if I can guess at any long term effects of those chemicals that they couldn't predict because you spent most of that time in the freezer. Last thing we need is your brain shorting out, or all your special super soldier powers failing at the worst time possible."
Steve glanced at Bucky, and Bucky shrugged in response. It wasn't going to be much that Tony didn't already have an idea of, and if Tony could help him, then by all means. Steve nodded, then turned back to Tony. "Remind me before you leave, I'll grab it for you."
"Excellent. So, those records are safe from the public. Which means we have to find an explanation for why you survived. We could just flat out say you don't remember, which is certainly possible. You fell off a mountain, after all, which would make it perfectly reasonable that you have amnesia of the event and everything after it. However, that's not going to deter the press much. They get presistent. So, if I remember what Cap said before, you were captured by Hydra in 1943. How public was that known?"
"Front page news," Steve said. "It was my first real mission as Captain America, and the number of soldiers that we rescued was pretty large. None of us ever spoke of what happened to Bucky while he was there, though. The other men didn't know, and I only had an idea, and Bucky doesn't remember exactly what happened during that time."
Tony made a thoughtful face. "Okay, so we could easily say 'we blame Hydra' without giving anything away. Given Hydra's long history of being hated by the American people, they'll buy that and have all sorts of righteous anger over them hurting one of the country's heroes. So that's covered. Are there any possible news reports that might've spotted you during any one of your Hydra missions?"
"I haven't found any on the internet, but that doesn't necessarily mean anything," Bucky said. "I only generally check the mainstream news. There might be something in the conspiracy theory community, but most people don't take them seriously."
"I highly doubt there's anything to find," Steve said. "Natasha was the first one to tell me about him, and she said most of the intelligence community didn't even believe he existed. If they weren't convinced, I doubt there's anything out there that would convince a civilian."
Bucky frowned, then looked up at Steve. "How did she know to even find out about it in the community?"
"Because you shot her," Steve said.
"When was this?"
"About six years ago, she was on a mission in Iran and you shot your target right through her."
Bucky had absolutely no clue about this incident, but that didn't mean much. He didn't tend to remember anyone involved other than the target themselves. It was only those last two missions that he remembered more than that, on the causeway and then on the helicarrier. And if he were truly honest with himself, the 'mission' on the helicarrier wasn't as much of an order from Hydra as it was an attempt to exorcise the uncomfortable feelings that Steve had dredged up. "I'll take your word for it," he said. "I guess if I ever see her, I'll say sorry. Probably won't mean much, though."
"It's polite," Steve said.
"You and your manners," Bucky said with a roll of his eyes.
"Like you don't have any."
"He stabbed my food," Tony said. "I'll believe that he lacks them."
Steve gave Bucky a pointed look of consternation. "He saves his rudeness for his friends. Haven't figured out how that works."
"Because you're a punk and you deserve it," Bucky said.
"Jerk."
"You know, it is amazing watching you two interact," Tony said. "You have this perfect balance of being complete assholes to each other without actually hating each other. It's the weirdest foreplay I've ever seen. Can I be the best man when you get married? I'll even pay for the bachelor party."
Bucky inclined his head towards Steve. "As long as you're his. I don't think I like you enough to let you be mine."
"Who is it that repairs your arm?" Tony demanded.
Before Bucky could retort to that, Pepper perked up. "Ooh, can I be your maid of honor? I'll wear an old-fashioned dress and everything."
Bucky laughed, mostly because he could see Steve holding his head in his hands in his peripheral vision. "Do your hair in curls and we'll call it good."
"An excuse to wear my hair in curls, I see nothing wrong with this," Pepper said. "Can we make this a thing?"
Steve shook his head, clearly only half-heartedly playing along, which was normal when this line of jokes came up. Dum-Dum used to make them from time to time, and while neither Steve nor Bucky threatened to kill him over it, Steve always felt a bit uncomfortable about it in front of anyone other than just him and Bucky. They'd been making those jokes at each other for years; well, mostly Bucky making them at Steve, but Steve could hold his own when he wanted to. But adding other people to the mix always seemed to make things awkward for Steve.
Hell, even Bucky hadn't been entirely happy about it, but Tony and Pepper were easier to joke with than some of the guys in the Commandos had been, in no small part because it was more socially acceptable in the society Pepper and Tony had grown up in than the one that he and Steve had.
"I'd probably have to kill him in the planning process, Pepper," Steve said.
Bucky snorted. "Yeah, we were never good at coordinating anything that didn't involve making the bad guys dead or captured." He gave Steve an annoyed look. "Mostly because you never wanted to help me pull pranks on my siblings. If you'd just helped me out, Peter never would've gotten away with tattling and gotten us hit with Mom's switch."
"I never figured out why she'd hit me, too," Steve said. "I never did anything."
"You didn't rat me out before I'd already put crickets into Peter's shoes. Guilty by association."
Tony raised an eyebrow. "You put crickets into your brother's shoes?"
"And gum in my sister's hair."
"I am so glad I was an only child," Tony said. "With siblings like you, I wouldn't need enemies."
Steve started outright laughing. "Bucky was never as bad as his sister. She may have gotten gum in her hair from time to time, but she had no problem getting us back. Never mess with a Barnes woman."
Bucky decided to direct the topic back to their press issues; wandering back down memory lane about his family just led to the thought that his brothers and sister were probably long since dead of old age, and Bucky didn't particularly feel like letting his brain follow that. "So how exactly are we going to explain why I can suddenly jump off a bridge and not even break my legs without getting into too much detail about what Hydra did?"
"Ah, the super soldier problem," Tony said. "Unless you ever feel like giving a direct interview, we can probably just let them infer that you were experimented on, which is a pretty obvious answer to how you survived that fall in the first place. Of course, then we might have to account for where you were these last few decades and how you haven't aged." He looked annoyed. "This leads us back to revealing too much. You must've gotten that arm from someone, and Hydra's our number one suspect, unless you want to try to blame the Soviets, since you have the communist star on your arm."
Bucky glanced over at his shoulder. "I don't think that'd be a good idea," he said. "Black Widow's taken a lot of heat from the public for her service to the KGB. I don't think the American people are going to tolerate another one of their people being a former Soviet assassin. That might be pushing it."
"So we need to lay blame on Hydra," Tony said. "What we have so far is 'Hydra did some unknown experiment, which let you survive the fall, and then apparently got ahold of you and replaced your arm, and likely did more experiments.' But why? And what'd they do with you for the last seventy years?"
Steve sighed. "That's the problem we've run into. We're probably going to just go with he doesn't remember, but there's no way we can plausibly deny that it probably wasn't anything good."
Something occured to Bucky, and he didn't like it one bit. "Black Widow said most of the intelligence community didn't believe I existed. Keyword, 'most'. Which means some did. I don't think any of them have spoken up yet since I've resurfaced as Steve's business partner, but there are still government agents out there who know I was an assassin for some unknown entity. Assassins are not generally greeted as heroes."
"Hm." Tony made a face as he considered that. "Natasha wasn't arrested or held terribly accountable for her work for either the KGB or SHIELD, and she was a willing participant in that. Given your history as Captain America's best friend, you're not terribly likely to be held accountable for something you obviously weren't able to consent to doing, given your obvious head problems."
"So the insanity plea," Bucky said, making a face of disgust. "Just what I always wanted to use."
"I'd quibble the legal definitions of that, but I suppose by laymen's terms, that's close enough." Tony looked over at Pepper. "I'm forgeting something."
Pepper tilted her head, quiet for a moment, before looking at Bucky. "I think I'd decline to call a press conference about your survival. Especially if you're going to play the amnesia card. If you claim that, it'll seem more reasonable to be avoiding the press while you get your head back on right. Just stop hiding under your hat and let the press figure it out on their own. Steve's a well-known celebrity, and now you are too, even if nobody knows your real name. You'll probably encounter plenty of overenthusiastic reporters and paparazzi who will take the right picture and put two and two together. Just let it happen."
"Oh, and start talking in public," Tony said. "Because it's kinda creepy. And you won't have to stab people's food to make a point."
Bucky saw Steve scratching his cheek to hide the amused smile that Bucky could clearly tell was there. Asshole. "You're never going to forgive me for that, are you?"
"Have you been sorry about it yet?" Tony asked.
"You were upsetting Mama."
"Then no, I won't."
Tony and Pepper stayed another hour or so, topics drifting off into general chatter. Tony occasionally made a point of being surprised that Bucky was joining in as if he hadn't spent the entire day acting like his vocal cords were damaged. Bucky eventually threatened to find something even worse about male genitalia maiming on the internet to share if he didn't knock it off. It mostly worked.
It was actually Tony who called an end to the night's visit, which surprised Bucky since he'd heard of Tony going for way too long without sleep unless Pepper pestered him, but with how quickly Pepper agreed it was time to go to the hotel to sleep, Bucky figured she was about to say something herself anyway.
Steve and Bucky got up to walk their guests to the door, and Steve paused on his way there and altered his trajectory. "Almost forgot," he said. "Lemme get that file for you, Tony."
Tony stopped near the door with Pepper. "Good catch. I must be off my game, I almost forgot, too. But you'll ignore that and remember that I am perfect in every way."
While Steve made some sarcastic remark to Tony in reply, Bucky was distracted by Pepper stepping over to him and hugging him. "Thanks for the visit," she said. Then, in a lowered voice, added "talk to Steve. He's worried about you."
Bucky pretended she hadn't said that. "Go get some sleep," he said. "And remember to wear proper shoes tomorrow."
She groaned. "Don't worry, I won't forget. My feet won't let me."
Tony turned to Pepper. "Ready? I seem to recall owing you a foot rub."
"Speaking of sore feet," Pepper said, giving Bucky a smile before heading to the door with Tony. "We'll meet you guys here about ten tomorrow. Be prepared for Tony to find trouble for us to get into."
"I didn't find us trouble today," Tony said. "Why are we assuming I will tomorrow?"
"Because the four of us are spending an extended amount of time together," she said. "If you don't find trouble, trouble will find us."
"Just as long as that trouble doesn't find us here," Steve said. "Good night, you two."
Tony and Pepper said good night, then left, leaving Steve to lock the door behind them. He stifled a yawn. "Okay, I don't know how it got so late, but I'm thinking it's time to sleep," he said.
"I'm not tired yet," Bucky said, even though he was a little. But he didn't feel like sleeping, not when his brain was trying to do flip flops that would just keep him up. He mentally sent an angry 'thanks a lot' in Pepper's direction for dragging the day's annoyances that he'd purposely forgotten back to the forefront of his mind. If he went to bed, he'd just lay there, unable to sleep until his brain finally shut off in exhaustion.
Steve glanced at the clock on the wall. "It's past eleven," he said, although his tone indicated there was a question hiding in there somewhere.
"I also slept in this morning," Bucky said, hoping this wouldn't turn into an argument. He wanted a bit of time away from Steve to get his thoughts back in order so he wouldn't blow up at him.
"True," Steve said, conceding the point. "Don't stay up too late, you don't want to end up sleeping in tomorrow."
Bucky rolled his eyes. "Yes, Mom. Who's the older one here?"
"You act like I was the only one that ever needed looking after," Steve said. "I mean it,come to bed at a reasonable time, or I'll come find you and tie you to your bed."
"Promise?"
Steve lightly cuffed Bucky upside the head. "Jerk."
"Punk."
"Good night, Bucky," Steve said, shaking his head, then headed back for the bedroom.
Bucky waited patiently for the door to close, watched the clock until about five minutes had passed, just to give Steve a chance to settle into bed and maybe fall asleep, then headed to the window and crawled out through it to the fire escape just outside. He climbed up to the roof, where he usually went when he needed to think and try to sort his head out without Steve's help. He'd been going there less often than he used to, but it was still a quiet retreat for him, and one he needed at that moment.
There was a small divet in the concrete that he'd created in the early days, hitting the ground with his mechanical fist in a snit of frustration, and Bucky used it as a marker for where to sit, digging the heel of his boot into it once he was settled. Small, broken pieces of concrete shifted under his foot.
Of course, the problem with sitting up there to sort through his thoughts only really worked if he'd had coherent thoughts. Mostly, it was just a jumble of frustrating feelings of insecurity that were things he should've been over in school after getting turned down by a girl for the first time. This wasn't shit adults were supposed to do.
But he couldn't really help it. Steve thought he'd changed so much that he didn't even know who Bucky was anymore. And that hurt. It hurt deep.
He kept trying to tell himself that he misunderstood, Steve hadn't meant it the way his completely warped little brain was taking it to mean. And rationally, he knew that. He knew Steve well enough to know that. He needed to just kill the little rat bastard living in his head that drowned out logic.
But even knowing Steve hadn't meant anything like that, it still pissed Bucky off, the constant underhanded attempts at fixing Bucky like he was broken. Sure, he had issues left over from too many years of chemicals and mindwipes and the removal and repression of any kind of emotion, but goddamnit, he wasn't broken like some sort of toy that needed to be glued back together. And even if he were, the glue would always be obvious, so what the hell was Steve trying to accomplish? It'd be a patchwork job at best.
Damnit.
Bucky kicked loose a decent sized chunk of concrete from the divet, grabbed it, and threw it hard enough that if it were to hit something, it'd leave a nice hole in whatever it hit.
Which was almost Steve. Steve dodged to the side, barely holding onto the rail of the fire escape as the rock went zooming by him. "Hey!" Steve stared where the rock had gone, then looked back at Bucky, climbing the rest of the way onto the roof. "I thought you were staying up because you had slept in, not because something was bothering you."
Bucky didn't bother to answer, looking back down at the indentation in the roof, not giving Steve any attention.
Steve walked over and sat down beside him, watching him expectantly. Bucky maintained his silence, until Steve was finally forced to speak. "Talk to me?" he said. "You used to tell me when something was bothering you."
Used to. There it was again, that goddamn indirect accusation. Bucky kicked up another chunk of cement and flung it with his left arm, the servos whining as the tension was released, sending the rock careening off the edge of the roof, leaving an impressive dent, and finally embedding itself in the side of the building across the street.
Steve jumped, staring in the direction the rock went, then looked over at Bucky. "Okay, you're angry at me."
It was a brilliant observation, but Bucky declined pointing it out. He was doing his best to avoid getting into a verbal fight with Steve, although with as persistant as Steve could be when Bucky was upset about something, he had a feeling that his 'best attempts' would ultimately fail.
"I can't fix something if I don't know what's broken," Steve said. At Bucky's continued silence, Steve sighed. "Come on, Buck. You promised you'd talk to me more."
"I promised I'd try," Bucky said with a bit more bite in his tone than he'd intended.
"Then try."
Bucky clenched his jaw a moment before finally looking over at Steve. "Forget it, Steve. It's not worth worrying about. Go back to bed."
"If it's got you angry at me, then it's worth worrying about," Steve said. "You never shut me out before-"
"Before what?" Bucky interrupted. "Before I died? Back when I was a better person, when you actually knew who I was? I swear to Christ, Steve, if you make one more remark like that, I'm throwing you off the roof to see if you bounce when you hit the street." He didn't really mean that threat, but Bucky was one of those unfortunate people who spat out hurtful things they didn't mean when angry and backed into a corner.
Fortunately for their friendship, Steve knew that and didn't take anything Bucky said personally when he got like that.
Steve frowned, a look of confusion more than anything else. "When did I say you were a better person back then?"
Bucky went back to watching the concrete pieces of the divet moving under his boot heel. "You haven't," he admitted. "Not directly, anyway." He refrained from elaborating, realizing once again that he was being a stupid teenager all over again and maybe stupid wasn't even a strong enough word.
At that moment, he was probably angrier at himself than at Steve.
Steve was quiet, leaving Bucky to stew in his own juices and wishing Steve would just go to bed and let Bucky deal with things on his own, but that was something Steve just wasn't capable of, and Bucky knew it.
Steve hadn't changed one bit. Bucky was the only one that really noticably had. Even without Steve pointing that out, however innocently, Bucky knew that, and that was half the damn reason he'd stayed missing so long after rescuing Steve from the river. He hadn't wanted to face what had changed about him, or how that'd ultimately affect their relationship. He'd only come home because the loneliness had been crippling and he'd given in out of desperation.
"You heard what I said to Pepper and Tony," Steve finally said, not really asking as much as acknowledging it.
Bucky felt the anger at least momentarily subside, an irrational fear taking over. He looked at Steve. "I haven't changed that much, have I?" He silently begged Steve to say no, because if even Steve said yes, then maybe he really was more screwed up than he thought. He didn't want to think that Hydra had taken that much of himself away from him that it'd actually prevent him from repairing a broken friendship with Steve.
If Hydra really had screwed up the only thing he had that was keeping him even halfway sane, he wasn't sure he could be held responsible for whatever he did to them in retaliation.
"No, not really," Steve said without hesitation, which went a long way towards shutting up his stupid, stupid thoughts at least long enough to hear Steve out. "There are ways you have, though."
So much for that reassurance.
"And I'm fine with the changes," Steve continued. "I understand them. I just don't always know how to help you when something sets you off. I know you're upset about something that I don't understand, and I can't do a thing to help you, because you don't talk to me about these things. Like you said this morning, I don't live in your head. I'm not a mind reader." He reached forward and grabbed the piece of the roof that Bucky was jabbing at with his foot, pulling it away from Bucky's temptation. "You're as bad as I used to be over my physical handicaps. You oughta remember how it feels to be helpless to do anything for your best friend."
That was something Bucky hadn't really considered, in no small part because a physical handicap that could easily result in death wasn't exactly the same as a head bombarded by too many chemicals and too much programming. So Bucky hadn't drawn that connection. "Fair enough."
"How long has this been bothering you?" Steve asked. "This wasn't just today, was it?"
Bucky reluctantly shook his head. "No. I mostly ignore it. It's a stupid little thing. I know you don't mean it." He wished he had that rock that Steve took. "Jesus, I'm acting like a stupid fourteen year old girl. I am at the point of asking you to drag me behind the shed and putting me out of my misery before I regress any further."
Steve gave Bucky a stern look. "You say that every time I pry something out of that closed mouth of yours, and I'm going to keep telling you that no, you're not, and no, I won't. You're human and you've been through more than most. I have yet to think you were being stupid about anything you've talked to me about."
"You'd be the only one."
Steve lightly kicked Bucky's shin, so lightly that Bucky almost didn't notice it. "Come on, don't be so hard on yourself. I know you probably don't care much for yourself right now, but I care about you. You're my brother in every way that matters, always have been. I love you, you stupid jerk, and I'm going to be there for you, even if I have to glue myself to your side to do it." He stood up. "Now that I've thoroughly made you uncomfortable with enough sap to give you cavities, why don't we go back inside and go to bed? You'll feel better with some sleep."
Love. That was a word that had never actually come up between them, never had to, but it made him feel better to hear it right then. "You know, for someone that says he doesn't know how to help me, you're damn good at doing it," Bucky said, getting to his feet.
Steve smiled. "I guess I know you better than I was giving myself credit for."
Bucky felt the last of the day's tensions fall away at that. "Come on, you dumb punk, you said something about sleep, and if I let you continue talking, I'll end up too uncomfortable to sleep in the same room as you."
Steve frowned. "What, the brother disclaimer wasn't enough to keep you from making a stupid joke?"
"I will never stop making that joke, Steve."
That earned a heartfelt sigh from Steve, who followed Bucky down the fire escape. "Fine. Just don't let Tony pick out the music for the wedding."
Bucky looked up at him from the spot outside their window. "Shut your mouth," he said sharply. "I've heard his brand of audio pollution, and if I never hear it again, I'll die happy."
"Good, we're in agreement, then."
"We usually are." Bucky sat down on the open window ledge, pausing before hopping down into the living room. He looked at Steve. "Thanks."
Steve smiled. "I'm with you to the end of the line."
"Punk."
"Jerk."
It was eleven-thirty when Bucky and Steve finally crawled into their respective beds. And this time, Bucky didn't even get the old-fashioned nightmares.