2. "Things you said through your teeth"

Steve has needed Bucky's help all of once before in his scrappy, shit-talking little life. That had been the summer he turned fourteen, and Jack Conden gave him a concussion in the alley behind ol' man McNally's drugstore after his shift. His vision had swum and he couldn't focus on anything and he'd thrown up. Jack broke his nose and knocked out his last baby tooth before Bucky showed up like the angry fist of God.

He's not even sure if Jack ends up limping away from that fight, but he knows that for just a moment, just as Bucky puts bloodied hands on his shoulders, Steve hates him. It is hot and roiling in his stomach, burns his throat more than bile and makes his eyes sting worse than the tears he won't let fall. He hates him more than he hates anyone or anything, more than even his own traitorous weakness.

Steve Rogers doesn't need to be saved. He's fourteen and he already knows from the way people look at him that he'll never grow up to be the kind of man anyone respects. It makes him angry. Bitter. Ready to prove the world wrong. He's too proud to accept the hand up when it's offered.

"Don't," he grits out, and he knows that it makes Bucky ache all over to have to pull his hands back, to have to wait for Steve to pick himself up. "Don't touch me. I don't need your help."


6. "Things you said under the stars and in the grass"

"I miss Brooklyn," Steve says, and he's smiling just a little as he settles back to watch the sky. It's a warm night in June where they've camped down in Austria, and Bucky is thinking about how this is the first time he's been dry in two weeks. He looks over at the blond with a raised brow but doesn't lift his head. "Don't you miss it?"

Steve smiles at him, brighter than the sun or moon or stars. It makes Bucky's heart fucking break. He smiles like they're not in the middle of a war, like they haven't patched up bullet holes in their uniforms for the third time that week. Like Bucky isn't wearing some Nazi-squid boots he pulled off a dead man at the objective because he was tired of having wet feet all the time.

Brooklyn isn't going to be the same when they get back, if they get back, because they're not the same boys they were when they left. He hopes to God that Stevie makes it back.

Bucky just snorts. "Why would I? Everything I miss about home is right here."


13. "Things you said at the kitchen table"

"What if I don't remember?" the soldier asks, unable to meet the man's eyes. "What if I never remember?"

"Bucky, do you. . . do you think my friendship is contingent on something? On anything?" the man sounds scandalized, hurt. His blue eyes are probably wide, brows drawn up and mouth pursed in concern. He has a very expressive face. The soldier is not expressive. He doesn't remember how to make his features move like that, doesn't know if they ever did.

The soldier does not answer. The man reaches across the table and takes his hand. It is the left, the metal, the weapon. The man chooses to take that hand, though they are both resting on the table.

"It's not. You're my friend. You're always gonna be my friend. And if you never remember anything, that's fine. We'll just make new memories. This is it for me, Buck. I'm with you."

". . .'Til the end of the line?"

"Yeah," the man agrees wetly. "Yeah, Buck. Until the end of the line."