Disclaimer: I do not own Captain America. I make no profit from this. Captain America created by Joe Simon and Jack Kirby.
Author's Note: FYI, Brooklyn Baby is not a song to listen to whilst reading this fic. Nope, it was definitely not on repeat during the whole writing process, nope. Just enjoy your "60's Hippies Stucky AU" Valentine's Day present, folks.
Steve and Bucky are friends when they're twelve. Bucky lives in the house across the street and his ball ends up in Steve's yard one day. Steve's mom makes him take it back and he sees Bucky standing there with his hands outstretched. Steve gives him the ball.
This happens another five times before Steve asks him if he wants to come over for lunch.
Steve's mom makes them PB&J sandwiches, smiling at Bucky because his father is dead, but the war is over, so it wasn't in vain.
Bucky doesn't feel the same way, but he smiles back.
When they're ten, Bucky moves away. His father is alive, what do you know, living with his new wife in London. (Mrs. Buchanan was never legally Mrs. Buchanan, so it isn't bigamy.)
Steve doesn't like that he's moving. Bucky doesn't like it either.
When he's twenty, Steve meets Bucky again. Bucky looks very different, with his hair longer and greasier than his mother would have allowed.
Steve's still skinny, although he's a little bulkier thanks to a new weight-training program sweeping the country.
They're both in a record store, checking out the new releases, when Steve notices his old friend.
"Bucky?" He says, staring at the man in front of him in disbelief.
"...Steve." Bucky says, but he doesn't sound as surprised as Steve does, doesn't look as anxious as him.
They forget all about buying records and leave the store, going straight to Bucky's apartment.
His place is messy, messier than Steve's ever known a room to be, and he wants to reach out and clean everything, because he feels like Bucky will drown in it all if he doesn't.
"Sorry about the mess, Steve, but...well, my folks ain't around to nag me about it."
"Yeah, I get it."
He doesn't get it, though, not really. Even if Steve was no longer a child, his father's reverence for cleanliness was something that had stayed with him.
Granted, Steve actually liked his father.
As he made careful movements, attempting not to step on the piles of concert posters littering the floor, he noticed a box filled to the brim with postcards, all of them emblazoned with the Union Jack.
Those must be the postcards Bucky sent his mom...
Mrs. Buchanan, who kept the name because she'd had it since she was nineteen, had died a few years earlier. Steve and his mother attended the funeral, but Bucky hadn't been anywhere in sight.
Elsewhere in the room, was a small closet, which was slightly opened. Steve identified something that looked like a uniform dangling from a hanger.
Bucky, who turned around to offer Steve a drink, noticed him staring at the closet.
"Oh, that's my military uniform."
"You were in the military?"
"Yeah. My father made me enlist when we moved back. Said he'd kick me out if I didn't."
"I thouhgt you didn't live with him anymore."
"I don't."
They talked for another hour after that. As he left, Steve tried not to think of the way Bucky's fingers had brushed across his as he handed him a glass of water. He tried to ignore the giddy feeling he had thinking of all the days he would spend with Bucky in the next week, and the next few weeks, and the rest of their lives.
Because Steve missed Bucky. A lot.