Take My Hand (My Whole Life, Too)

by EachPeachPearPlum

"Hydra made me obedient, Tasha. They didn't make me stupid, and stupid's what I'd hafta be to think Steve's interested in this." Barnes gestures to himself with his metal hand, something that's supposed to indicate the scars and the prosthetic, the mess inside his head and the fact that even though he loves Steve more than anything on earth just the idea of kissing him is awful.

Notes: So this is my first venture into the MCU (in terms of writing, anyway), and I'm all kinds of nervous about it. Be gentle with me, please...

It's not been unBrit-picked, because I don't know anyone stateside who is active in this fandom. If there's anything glaringly not right, please let me know so that I can fix it, and if anyone is interested in beta-reading and Americanising any of the other fics I currently have in the works, I would really, really appreciate it.

Title paraphrased from Can't Help Falling in Love, of which there have been a great many versions but I think I probably like Elvis's best (not a statement you'll hear from me about any other song, I don't think).

Warnings for the usual Winter Soldier type content, including but possibly not limited to:

1) present day anxiety, paranoia, partial amnesia and PTSD, and

2) references to past murder, torture, lack of autonomy, brainwashing, and a very vague suggestion of non-con...

Despite this, I'd say it's only a mild-to-mediumly angsty fic, and (spoiler alert) they all live happily ever after (anxiety, paranoia, partial amnesia and PTSD aside).

Take My Hand (My Whole Life, Too)

A less aware man might miss the looks Barnes gets as he trails Natasha around the store, but even before Hydra he'd had a better than average sense of what was going on around him. All those years keeping an eye out for Steve, dragging him out of alleys and figuring out which enemy soldier was likely to shoot first, all those years afterwards of having a mark and a mission and knowing failure would result in the kind of punishment that still has him waking up screaming, and – well, whatever, Barnes is used to assessing threats with just a glance, knows when people are paying more attention to him than they should be, and right now there's more than a few people looking at him like they think they should call the cops.

"You could always walk next to me," Natasha says, not necessarily louder than she would normally talk but definitely with less subtlety; clearly, Barnes is not the only one to have noticed the concerned looks they're getting.

"Can't," he mutters, though he doesn't have the words to explain why, certainly not in a way that he thinks she might be happy with. It's team (in this world Steve has pulled him back into, where team means kin instead of keepers) and fear and responsible and discomfort and protect and – it's a lot of things, and the only bit he could get close to explaining is that she is small and breakable and it is his job to keep small and breakable from becoming small and broken. Not because she can't protect herself (anyone who can hold their own against the Winter Soldier does not need to be protected by him), but because under everything Hydra and the Red Room put in or took out, his first ever mission imperative remains.

Small and breakable must not break.

Natasha won't like it any better than Steve did.

"Okay," she says, looking back over her shoulder at him. She's smiling, and her tone is light, but since Barnes has witnessed her threaten Hydra agents with the exact same demeanour, that doesn't mean all that much. Maybe she's got no idea that Barnes is thinking how the meat of his body ought to be enough to stop a bullet when they're shot from behind, maybe she knows and (somewhat improbably) doesn't care, or maybe she's just plotting her revenge – whichever it is, Barnes won't know for sure until it's too late. "Guess you'll just have to put up with people worrying that you're about to murder me, then."

"Funny," Barnes answers, though he does make himself walk a pace closer and half a pace sideways. Not next to her, but close enough to make it clear they're not strangers, and Natasha is diagonally between him and the shelves so he should still make a pretty decent human shield if there's an attack.

"I thought so," she agrees, reaching for what he assumes is a specific brand of bread in amongst all the other practically identical brands of bread. It's one of the things that confuses and frustrates him most about the present, the ridiculous range of choice there is to absolutely everything these days. Not just eggs, but chicken or duck or quail, large or medium or small, free-range or battery. Not just bread, but brown or white or best-of-both, sandwich or toaster, sliced or unsliced, wholemeal or granary or none of the above. Milk from cows or goats or fifty kinds of plant, and it's shit like this that makes Barnes grateful for the cupboards at the tower that seem to magically fill themselves.

Hell, the only reason he's here now is that he needs to be out on missions watching Steve's back, and the team won't let him out in the field until he's proven he can be in the presence of regular people without losing his shit. Given how fucked up grocery stores seem to be nowadays, it's as good a place as any for a trial run, even if all he's doing is trailing after Natasha while they buy things Barnes isn't sure they actually need.

By the time they reach the checkout, Barnes is about as close to at ease as he gets these days, at least when Steve isn't around. He's not actually taken his left hand out of his pocket, and he can't quite keep himself from checking the knife strapped to his right wrist (one of several, plus the guns and the garrotte and the interesting seeming electric thing he lifted from Stark's workshop a few days ago, but it's not like Natasha is ever unarmed either), but apart from his internal outrage at the prices nowadays, the outing is comfortably unremarkable.

Or so Barnes thinks, until they walk out of the store and turn towards home, at which point he finds himself frozen in the middle of the sidewalk.

"Stop staring," Natasha hisses, planting an unexpected and improbably sharp elbow between Barnes' ribs. It's the sort of contact the original Bucky used to be used to, the sort of thing people rarely dare do to him now without clearly telegraphing their intentions beforehand, and it's startling enough that Barnes does as she says, yanking his eyes from the kissing couple sat on a bench across the street.

It's not the most graphic kiss he's ever seen, either now or way back when. All hands are clearly visible – a cupped cheek, a gentle hand on a shoulder, the other two linked and resting on the bench between them – and there's no suggestion of tongues, but… It's intimate, still, made no less so by the fact that it's chaste.

It's a kiss that speaks of familiarity, of comfort and safety, home, and it's only Natasha's hand on his arm that keeps Barnes from barrelling across the street.

"Shouldn't we stop them?" he asks, quietly, as though asking at all is somehow going to draw more attention than the kissing does.

Natasha gives him her well-practiced spy blankness. It's not entirely necessary, since Barnes still isn't doing too well at recognising facial expressions other than I'm going to make you regret doing that and you have no idea how happy I am that you're not dead, but it's sort of nice that she thinks he's close enough to human that she needs to make the effort.

"Why?" she demands, sharp enough that Barnes hesitates, confused, because Steve's massive amount of respect for her means he'd sort of assumed that she'd be an ally in this kind of thing. God knows, Steve's never met a bigot he wouldn't happily punch in the face, and maybe seven decades as an ice cube changes a man but it doesn't change him that much.

"Because it's… not safe," he says, though it comes out as more of a question than anything else.

"And that's the only reason," Natasha says, still blank, and Barnes is pretty sure he's said something wrong somewhere along the line, even if he doesn't know what or why.

It's the not knowing that does it, has him dusting off the cocky grin he's practiced in the mirror, eyes darting from his reflection to an old photo of Bucky and Steve until he managed to get pretty damn close to it, because if Natasha's going to be judging him behind her extra inscrutable expression it might as well be for the truth.

"Darlin'," he drawls, and maybe he's been practicing that too. "If you're suggestin' I got a problem with a person kissin' anyone they wanna be kissin', you ain't half as smart as you think you are."

Finally, the non-expression vanishes, revealing something close to a smile. "In that case, you have nothing to worry about," she answers, then adds, "Darlin'," wrinkling her nose as she mimics his accent, never mind that he's also copying the man he thinks he used to be. "I won't tell you things are perfect now, but people are unlikely to get dragged off into an alley and beaten to a pulp these days."

"Which is swell," Barnes says, though he has his doubts. Maybe not in broad daylight, maybe not on a busy street in Manhattan, but in his experience fear and hatred can be buried but they don't really go away, nor do the awful things people do because of them. "But that don't mean anyone'll step up when the police come."

"Police?" Natasha looks at him, a little wrinkle between her eyebrows. It fades pretty quickly, and Barnes adds another expression to the very small collection he can identify with ease: everyone I know is an idiot. "Falcon," she says, speaking into her earpiece for the first time since they left the Tower. "Get your ass down here, would you? I've already gone through this with one defrosted relic, and it is absolutely not my turn this time."

She pauses a moment, clearly listening to whatever Sam is saying, then laughs. "Deal," she says. "You explain, I'll buy us coffee. James, wait right here. Sam'll be down in a couple of minutes."

"You can't-" Barnes starts – Hill was pretty damn clear when she said he had to be accompanied at all times when outside of the building, and Barnes doesn't actually trust himself a whole lot more than she trusts him – but Natasha is already in the process of vanishing.

X

Sam, hero that he is, shows up before Barnes manages to count past a hundred, stepping out of the alleyway a few doors down from where Barnes is pressing his back against the wall and trying very hard to become invisible.

It's working about as well as can be expected, so Sam spots him as soon as he glances left, closing the small distance between them and leaning against the wall next to him.

"Hey, man," he says, utterly relaxed, and the fact that Barnes knows he's keeping his breathing very obvious and deliberately steady in order to help him calm down doesn't change the fact that it's working. "You doing okay?"

"Haven't snapped and killed anyone yet," Barnes answers, though the joke is undercut by a whisper of genuine relief.

"Wasn't actually what I was asking, but okay," says Sam, pressing his shoulder to Barnes'. It's the second occurrence of physical contact without warning today, and Barnes doesn't take it quite as well this time; he tries not to flinch, mostly fails, and Sam shifts away from him again. Not far enough to offend, or to be obvious to anyone else, and he keeps on talking like absolutely nothing happened. "So, Nat said I was explaining something?"

Barnes looks back at the couple, who have yet to move from the bench over the street from him. They're not kissing now, but they're still holding hands, clearly together in a way that isn't just literal, and Barnes is still the only one paying any real attention to them. Maybe a few people have glanced at them, and there was one man who full on leered, but he'd moved on when one of the women looked right back at him, refusing to be cowed by the unwanted attention.

"They're together," he says, voice so quiet he almost doesn't expect Sam to hear him.

"Yeah?" Sam answers at a somewhat more regular volume. "Good for them."

It shouldn't be a surprising response, when Barnes has had enough time to absorb the lack of reaction to two women kissing in a public place, but — It is a surprise, and it's only when he turns back to Sam and sees how calm he still is that Barnes thinks he might have figured it out.

The words take a moment to get from his brain to his mouth, but Sam seems willing to wait, the way he has every time Barnes has struggled to share his thoughts. He's patient, and he's never judged Barnes for anything he's told him; if Barnes says this and he's wrong, Sam's probably the only person other than Steve who won't treat him differently because of it.

"That's- It's okay now?"

"Same-sex relationships?" Sam asks, though he doesn't wait for Barnes to nod before he answers. "There's still countries where it's illegal, and there are always gonna be jerks, but for the most part, things have got better."

"Oh," Barnes manages, and for all that there's a thousand different things running through his brain, only one actually comes out. "Steve never said."

Sam snorts. "That figures," he mutters, probably not intending for him to hear it, but then Barnes hasn't really been precise about how much Zola's experiments enhanced his senses.

Even so, he's never been able to let it slide when people talk shit about Steve.

"What is that supposed to mean?" he demands, giving Sam what he's previously heard Tony Stark describe as his murder face. He tries not to use it on the team too often, given that they've chosen to welcome him into their home rather than take him somewhere remote and empty a clip into his skull, but if Sam's saying what Barnes thinks he's saying then he goddamn deserves it. "That idiot has been getting into fights for people society hates since your grandparents were in diapers, so don't you goddamn dare suggest he cares who a person loves."

Sam took a step back as soon as Barnes brought the face out, but he's not actually gone any further than that. Both arms are up, hands open and held at chest height, his whole posture meant to convey that he's not a threat, like Barnes didn't know that already.

"That wasn't what I meant," he says quietly, going for the eye contact Barnes works so hard to avoid most of the time. "Steve would never judge someone for something so far beyond their control. I know that."

"What did you mean, then?" Barnes presses, because even if he's willing to give Sam the benefit of the doubt (and he is, he thinks, at least for a little while) he wants to know why he isn't surprised that Steve's skipped telling him a few key facts about life in the 21st century.

Sam gives him this look, still uncomfortably set on eye contact, but it's… softer, maybe. Doesn't make it any easier for Barnes to deal with, mostly because it means Sam's planning on being kind, and he does know that should be a good thing. He knows that he deserves kindness, is very slowly starting to work his way to actually believing it, but right now he'd prefer it if Sam was honest instead.

"Please," Barnes says. "Just tell me the truth, Sam."

"I always do, James," Sam says, reaching out a hand towards him like he thinks it'll encourage Barnes to believe him. "I promise."

Barnes shakes his head. "You don't lie to me. It's not the same thing."

Sam takes his time answering, his hand hovering in the air between them before he slowly draws it back again. "I'm sorry," he says eventually. "I didn't realise you felt that way. I'll try to do better, okay?"

He waits for Barnes to nod (which he does, even if he's surprised enough by Sam's easy acceptance of this point that he can't actually think of anything to say aloud) before continuing.

"Okay," he says. "So – and before I start, I want to be clear that this is my interpretation, and Steve himself might disagree completely, but…

"Steve is – I don't want to say concerned, because I don't really think that's it, but he's…" Sam pauses, maybe thinking, maybe listening to Natasha's voice in his ear, though if it's the latter, it's too quiet for Barnes to hear. Either way, he wants to tell Sam to stop prevaricating and just fucking explain why he thinks Steve's keeping hush about things Barnes isn't going to be anything other than happy to learn about.

That would be rude, though, and Barnes is trying very hard to be human these days, right down to following tedious social conventions the way he thinks Bucky's mother probably would have wanted him to.

"Okay," Sam continues eventually, "So. Steve is conscious of the differences between how you are with him now and how you used to be. That's not to say he minds," he hurries to add, before Barnes can even fully register the sensation of dread that follows his words. "There is absolutely no power on earth that could make Steve anything other than thrilled at having you back in his life, but… The way he tells it, you spent half your time telling him just how dumb he was being and the other half ignoring him whenever he told you the same thing. Even though he's not expecting that back, he can't not notice it."

Another pause, and then Sam nods to himself like he's just reached a decision about something.

"Steve is very aware that you've never said no to him since we brought you here, James," he says softly, and this time when he reaches out he doesn't take it back again, hand resting on the sleeve covering Barnes' metal arm. It's not heavy enough to trigger the pressure sensors there, but Barnes understands that it's a gesture of comfort, probably intended to soften the sharp sting of confusion Barnes feels at his words.

"Why would I?" Barnes asks, his voice too quiet, too small and uncertain. "Steve's never asked me to do anything I'm not okay with doing."

Oh, Sam mouths, his mouth quirking upwards like he wants to smile. "It's real good if that's true," he says, though the flattening of his unfinished smile doesn't really agree with that, nor does his next sentence. "But you've spent so long without a choice that we have to think about it. We can't not, James, and so Steve is doing everything he can to make sure you aren't doing anything just because you think it's what he wants."

"Idiot," Barnes mutters, the word there before he can think about it. It's so much the old Bucky – the pre-Soldier, pre-Hydra, pre-war Bucky, the version of himself he's overheard Steve talking about to other people but can only remember fragments of – that Barnes is surprised into a smile, pleased with himself and then even more pleased when Sam smiles back at him for real this time. "I'm not about to snap to attention just because Steve tells me to…"

He trails off, confused, because what Sam's telling him might explain why Steve sometimes falls silent in the middle of asking him a question but it doesn't actually explain why Steve has missed a few key things from his Intro to 21st Century Life.

Or it does, if Barnes thinks about it, follows the logical progression of the conversation. Steve hasn't told him that two guys or two girls is okay these days, and Sam thinks it's because Steve thinks Barnes is doing anything he thinks Steve wants him to. Honestly, Barnes doesn't know which is more ridiculous, the number of times he's used the word think in that sentence or the possibility that he could ever be delusional enough to believe Steve likes him like that.

Barnes can't help it. He laughs.

Maybe a little too much.

Sam's hand tightens on his arm, enough that Barnes can actually 'feel' it now. "You gonna share the joke, man?" he asks, though Barnes is pretty sure it's only the fact that there's a strict once-per-conversation rule about asking him if he's okay that keeps that from being Sam's question.

"S'funny, is all," Barnes says. "You're saying Steve's worried that if he told me people don't get locked up for being queer these days, I'll just assume that means he's interested and jump him without bothering to check first."

"No," says Natasha, finally joining the conversation; Barnes knows she's been observing them from the shadowy gloom of the alleyway for a good few minutes, but the way Sam jumps and clutches at his chest with the hand that had been on Barnes' arm a moment ago suggests the other man isn't anywhere near as aware of his surroundings as he should be. "What Sam is doing an uncharacteristically poor job of saying is that Steve is worried you'll realise he's in love with you and enter into a relationship you don't want in order to please him. Coffee?"

"Natasha." Sam's voice is low, soft, something that had Barnes cringing and cowering for more than a month after the Avengers brought him in. It's not directed at him, and Barnes knows none of them would hurt him or each other, but while the hot and loud kind of anger used to result in a beating, the quieter sort – it was worse, is all, and even now that he's doing better Barnes sometimes finds himself going someplace else when he hears it.

He holds it together now, focusing his attention on the hot cup Natasha hands him, the siren he can hear heading south down the street three blocks west of their location, the scent of garbage drifting from the alley.

"You were taking too long," Natasha says, her flippant, unconcerned tone just as grounding as the deliberate wiggle of his toes in his not yet worn in boots and counting the number of green things he can see without turning his head. "I decided to speed things up a little."

"It's called tact, Natasha," Sam answers. "It's what we use when we want to have complicated conversations without making anyone panic."

"I'm not panicking," Barnes says, because on a scale of one to catatonic this barely even registers. "Mostly I'm just confused."

"Right!" says Natasha, throwing out her left hand, palm up. "Most of the time, tact is just unnecessarily confusing."

"Actually, I was following Sam just fine. You're the one who's not making sense, doll."

Natasha arches one perfect eyebrow at the name, even as she shakes her head. "Nope," she says. "I'm making perfect sense. You're just not listening."

"Hydra made me obedient, Tasha. They didn't make me stupid, and stupid's what I'd hafta be to think Steve's interested in this." Barnes gestures to himself with his metal hand, something that's supposed to indicate the scars and the prosthetic, the fucked up mess inside his head and the fact that even though he loves Steve more than anything on this earth he can't imagine being comfortable with anything more involved than a very, very occasional kiss.

Except Natasha and Sam are trading the kind of looks that speak volumes, if you're the kind of person who understands shit like that. As it is, Barnes is stuck wondering what he's still not getting, because it's obviously something pretty damn significant, and maybe Sam said he'll try to do better at actually telling him the truth but Barnes is not going to hold his breath.

Trust issues, his therapist says, proving just how much she deserves her fancy degree in stating the extremely fucking obvious.

The looks continue, growing more exaggerated the longer their silent conversation goes on, until eventually Sam decides shaking his head and scowling isn't making his point plainly enough.

"No," he says. "Natasha, no."

"But they're both being such idiots," she answers.

"Yeah, they are," Sam agrees, quickly enough to offend even Barnes' decidedly undelicate sensibilities. "But that's their problem, not ours. Sometimes, you gotta let people be idiots."

"Hey," Barnes says. "Could you maybe quit calling us names?"

"Yep," Natasha grins so brightly even Barnes can tell she's entirely insincere. "Just as soon as you quit deserving them."

"I'm not the one spouting stupid shit, sweetheart. Because unless you're telling me Steve's picked up a fetish for amputees in the last couple of years, there ain't no way he's interested. Wasn't then, isn't now, won't ever be."

"How can you be so sure?"

"Because I'd remember it," he snarls, and there are holes in his head, so, so many holes. Bucky's mother's face and his grandparents' names, his favourite colour and whether he'd eat all his vegetables the way Steve still does even though he's not starving anymore, the first girl he ever kissed, or the second, or the last. Blank space after blank space, nothing but gaping wounds where there's supposed to be memories, and it's been long enough that Barnes is pretty sure he's never getting them back, but of this one thing he is absolutely and irrevocably certain. "Because if there'd been even the tiniest sign that he was interested, Bucky would have jumped on it and never let go! Because they'd have been together, and there's no way in hell I wouldn't remember that!"

He knows he's slipped up before the sentence is finished, without needing to see Sam's frown or Natasha's raised eyebrows. He knows that he shouldn't, knows how much it concerns people when he does, but he still can't help thinking of Bucky Barnes as the person who used to own the body he lives in now. Of the brief flashes of memory as something the real Bucky left behind when he moved out, things he's insane enough to try claim as his own, and even though he knows the man he is now is as much Bucky Barnes as he is the Winter Soldier, it's a hell of a lot easier to claim the latter's deeds than it is the former's.

"James," Sam says, cautious but firm, and Barnes shakes his head, not needing to hear it.

"Him, me, whatever. Point is, I would know."

Except his voice cracks, not how it would before, when they'd make him scream until his vocal chords gave out, and not how it was after, when he'd gotten so used to being silent that he could barely manage a sentence. It's just normal, an everyday weakness, and Barnes suddenly isn't all that sure.

Because that kind of happiness is exactly what they'd have worked hardest to take away from Bucky, the pathways they'd have destroyed first, and they'd have gone to the greatest lengths possible to make sure Barnes never, ever got it back.

"I would," he says desperately, a lump in his throat and his eyes itching, burning. "Please, tell me I'd remember that."

It's Natasha who steps forwards, arms outstretched. Natasha who presses a tiny, delicate hand to the back of his neck, pulling him forwards until his forehead rests on her shoulder, his face hidden in the soft cotton of her shirt. Her other hand sits between his shoulder blades, an unmoving, solid presence, holding him close but not so tight that he can't escape if he needs to.

She doesn't move, not for a long time, doesn't shush him or rock him or pat his back, none of the things he's witnessed on television or in person or can just about scrape together from his haphazard collection of memories. Gestures like that aren't Natasha; offering comfort is not something any of her personas have trained her to do, and the sincerity of her attempt is worth more than than a thousand practiced, empty efforts.

"You remember that you loved him," she says, when Barnes has to step back and complete a full threat assessment, the hug having begun to feel less comfortable than it does restraining. "You remember that you were friends, and some of the things you did together. You remember that you've been with women, even if you might not remember anything specific. Any men?"

Despite the fact that just asking that question would have been stupidly dangerous back in Bucky's lifetime, Natasha's tone is purely matter of fact. She doesn't sound curious, not even in the impersonal but deeply enthusiastic way Stark was the first and only time Barnes let him look at the arm, and, okay, he gets that it's just Stark's manner, that he'd be the same with anyone else on Earth, but the focus he gave the task, the way he threw out incomprehensible phrases for JARVIS to make a note of and as good as forgot the technology he was examining came attached to a person – it was all too close to one of the early doctors, a man who treated inflicting pain like a scientific test, complete with an assistant to whom he dictated notes on method and duration and the one-to-ten scale he made Bucky use to rank the experience. If it means not having flashbacks to that time, Barnes can live with his arm being a little louder and less responsive than it used to be.

But Natasha isn't like that, isn't asking because she's eager to know, to strip him metaphorically naked and examine all his weak points, and that makes it much easier to ignore Sam's quiet, "You don't have to answer that, James," and actually think about it.

"I don't-" he starts, because his head is a mess of bruises and rough hands, pain that broke him enough to beg and then even further, so far he stopped fighting altogether. A mission, maybe sometime in the sixties or seventies, seducing a mark for information, that ended with the mark dead, the information lost and the Winter Soldier three time zones away before they managed to retrieve him.

He thinks got a new handler after that, one who only gave him missions that were supposed to end up with a body on the floor.

Barnes' head is such a mess, memories that twist and tangle until he can't always tell what was the Soldier and what was the original Bucky, which faces belong to his past or his victims. Sometimes he's using his metal arm to stabilise his rifle, only he's shooting at Hydra soldiers instead of a mark; others he's setting the charges to blow up a hospital with tiny Steve at his side, wheezing out a laugh like it's the best joke ever. He's on the bridge shooting at Steve before promising that he doesn't have to be alone; he's standing next to a pretty brunette and he doesn't know if he took her dancing or slit her throat and tucked her up in bed for her husband to come home to; he's pushing Dernier off a building and he's caving in Howard's skull; he's in the chair and it's Doctor Banner at the controls and Morita grinning at his screams.

He's on his knees in a cell, earning himself a boot to the stomach for refusing to unclench his jaw; he's on his knees in an alley near the docks, a hand twisted gently in his hair, dizzy with how much he wants it and how scared he is that Steve might find out, might not want to live with him anymore, because it's one thing to think queers shouldn't be beaten to death in the streets and another entirely to learn that the man you share a home with is one of them.

"James," Sam prompts, pulling Barnes out of his head. It's been a while since he's got lost like that, but then it's even longer since he's had a memory come back that vividly, and a good one at that. Sure, a filthy alleyway wasn't the most romantic of locales and the whole encounter came with a strong undercurrent of fear at getting caught, but the hand in his hair was resting rather than pulling, the only words spoken were enthusiastic praise rather than a stream of threats and insults, and Bucky? Bucky wanted it.

"I'm here," he says, and it takes him a moment to realise that he's smiling. Not the fake, slightly terrifying smile he's practiced in the mirror (however hard he tries, it always looks more like he's ready to sink his teeth into someone's throat and not let go until they quit kicking), but an actual, real smile, just because. "And yeah," he adds. "Yeah, I'm pretty sure."

Natasha smiles back at him. "Okay," she says, and she sounds… proud, maybe. "You remember how much you loved Steve, you remember that you spent almost all your time together, and you remember elements of your past relationships with other people. It does seem to follow that if you'd ever been with him, you'd have at least a few memories of it."

"It does," Sam agrees. "Plus, I asked Steve back when we were looking for you and he said no."

Natasha turns, giving Sam all of her attention (or as close as she ever gets to giving anyone or anything her undivided attention, given that she's almost as paranoid as Barnes is). "You told me not to do that," she says flatly. "You said it would be rude."

"And it would have been, the way you'd do it," Sam answers, seeming just as unconcerned as he always does, turning back to Barnes at the end of his sentence. "I know there's a lot you've not got back, James, but I'm about as sure as I can be that that's not part of it. Okay?"

Barnes nods. "Thanks," he manages, and then, because it doesn't sound quite as grateful as he means it to, adds, "That helps."

"Good," Sam says, while Natasha just smirks.

X

Natasha allows Barnes a good ten seconds to feel relieved that however fucked up his brain is, it could clearly still be a hell of a lot worse, then decides it's time they were getting back home.

Sam ducks back into the alley again before taking off, while Natasha merely arches an eyebrow at Barnes when he very deliberately places himself on the street side of the sidewalk – to hell with manners and chivalry; it's not like Natasha's about to walk in front of a car and Barnes has nothing but pity for the poor, stupid bastard who tries to mug her, but a rooftop sniper is going to struggle to get a good shot at her and if Barnes chooses to take on the role of meat-shield, it's really no one's business but his own.

It's not a long walk back to Avengers Tower, and since Natasha isn't really any more inclined towards conversation for the sake of conversation than he is, they don't really talk along the way. Honestly, it's as close to comfortable as Barnes can imagine being outside the safety of the tower, and they make it back without any significant incidents occurring.

Sam rejoins them at the entrance to the building, apparently choosing not to make the supremely logical decision to fly straight up to Stark's penthouse landing pad and walk down a couple of flights to the floor he, Barnes and Steve share. Instead, the three of them ride the elevator up three thousand floors (or that's how it feels, anyway), Sam and Natasha leaning against one side and trying to look unthreatening whilst Barnes stands stiffly opposite them and pretends having other people in an enclosed space with him doesn't have him on the verge of panicking.

They're maybe halfway up when Natasha and Sam both tense, turning to look at each other and seeming to communicate without actually saying anything. Natasha finishes the non-conversation with a half-shrug, then says, "Thanks, Steve. We'll be there in a minute."

There's a pause while Steve replies, and then Natasha says, "JARVIS, we're going all the way up, please."

"Certainly, Agent Romanoff," the computer replies. "Will Sergeant Barnes be accompanying you?"

Sam and Natasha exchange glances again, both of them breaking into small, careful smiles, still as far from Barnes as the elevator allows. "We've got a mission, James," Sam explains, though Barnes had pretty much worked that out already. "As far as we're concerned, you're cleared to accompany us. It's entirely your choice."

"Oh," says Barnes; lack of brutal murder aside, he wouldn't particularly have described the outing as a success.

"It went well," Sam continues, and Barnes knows it's just that he's good at reading people, observing verbal and non-verbal cues and figuring out what they mean, but it feels a little too close to mind reading for comfort. "You handled being around a lot of strangers without any adverse reactions, and you held it together through a very difficult conversation. You've shown in training that you can keep things non-lethal, and Stark's put some time into building you tranq guns that work and feel like the real thing if you'd prefer not to go hand to hand. If you want in, you're in."

It should be an easy decision, given that Barnes has been fighting to get to a place where he can have Steve's back the way he used to. He fucking hates watching Steve head off on missions, knowing that the odds of him coming home safe are higher when Barnes isn't locked up in the tower like a fairytale princess, and now that the metaphorical door is unlocked Barnes should be leaping on the opportunity to be out there.

Except Bucky never wanted to be a soldier. That was always Steve, leaping into back alley brawls without a second thought, trying his luck at the recruitment office over and over, jumping out of planes and on top of grenades. Steve has always been the one standing up for other people, fighting for what's right, and Bucky? Bucky only ever wanted to fight for Steve, and if Steve was gonna get himself beaten up or shot at Bucky was never not going to be there with him.

The Winter Soldier never wanted anything, didn't even understand the concept. The Soldier fought and killed because there was no choice at all, because the creature they'd turned Bucky into didn't know any other way.

Barnes, the person who is slowly building himself from the tattered shreds Bucky and the Soldier left behind, is still getting used to having options, and it's so much harder to make a decision when he's not prepared for it.

"Come to the briefing," Natasha says, taking a careful step closer to him. "Hear what the mission is, then decide if you want to come with us. Yes?"

Barnes nods gratefully – for all it's an obvious and completely logical suggestion it's both exactly what he needed and not something that had occurred to him – then addresses the ceiling. "No need to drop me off anywhere, JARVIS," he says, earning a smile from Sam as the elevator starts back up again.

This being Stark's super swanky tower, it's only a matter of seconds before the doors are opening with a ping on the top floor. Barnes is the first one out; even if he knows Stark's security is tight enough that there's not going to be anyone other than the rest of the team, his extreme paranoia about protecting his people comes out on top of his extreme paranoia about having people behind him.

Of course, Sam and Natasha are just as willing to let that stand as Steve is, flanking Barnes as he walks into the briefing room.

"You're here. Good," Steve says, not looking up from the table in the centre of the room, sparing enough attention from whatever plan he's coming up with to register the elevator arriving but apparently not enough to count the number of people leaving it. "Looks like another Hydra base, though our intelligence suggests it's primarily a storage site. Tony just happens to have a satellite in the area, so we've got real-time surveillance; there doesn't seem to be anyone home, so it's just going to be the three of us. Widow, you and I will take an entrance each, and I need you on aerial support, Falcon."

"Which base?" Barnes asks.

Steve's head comes up, that same dumb grin he always wore around Bucky blazing across his face. "Hey, Buck," he says, his serious, man on a mission demeanour replaced instantly with Barnes' best friend. Which is great and all, but Barnes has been entirely focused since hearing the H word. "Are you coming with us?"

"Depends," Barnes answers. "Which base?"

He approaches the table, not waiting for Steve's answer, and looks down at the holographic displays there: a map, blueprints, the satellite feed Steve was talking about.

"It won't be empty," he says, and he doesn't know how he knows it, only that he does. A flick of his fingers brings the blueprints up into the air, a three dimensional display hovering above the tabletop. "Minimum five armed guards on each floor on the blueprint, twice that on the first subterranean level. F- three floors underground, mostly just armed techs after the first one. Sentries posted here, here, and-" Barnes pauses, pushing through the blankness that tries to descend in order to pick out three separate locations on the satellite feed. Each place he touches takes on a red glow, while the blueprint rises to allow for three empty floors to appear below it.

"Further monitoring on all major access routes," he continues, tracing his fingers down all of the roads in question and leaving another set of markers at the most likely places. "Surveillance cameras and agents posing as civilians. Don't waste time on a stealth approach, they'll know you're there."

They're all looking at him, Barnes knows that without having to look up. He can practically feel their concern wrapping around him like a blanket, thick and suffocating, too heavy for him to shake off, but if he acknowledges it… He can't acknowledge it.

"Above ground should be easy to clear," he says instead, moving from the surveillance photos to the floating blueprints. "Warehousing. Sublevels for research. Weapons testing. Chemicals. Biological experiments."

There's silence, as oppressive as their concern for him, and then Natasha says, "Anything else we need to know?"

Her tone is detached, businesslike; judging by Steve's slightly sharper than usual inhalation, he doesn't approve, but Barnes mostly finds her distance calming, enough that he manages to turn away from the table. He can't look at Steve, or at Sam, but Natasha does a an impeccable job of pretending not to care about him as anything other than a source of information, which makes her safe.

"Four levels underground," he amends in shaky Urdu, the first language he can think of that he knows Steve doesn't speak at all, and within a week he'll have the basics down now that Barnes has used it in front of him. "Hidden door to the lowest one. Should be empty."

Natasha looks back at him, her face that blank mask she does so well, but Barnes thinks she understands him. She usually does, has since they first brought him in; even when Steve spent his time looking for evidence of his best friend inside the Soldier and Sam would have settled for a finding proof of a person, Natasha knew what to say to get them all on the same page.

Still, if Barnes can't go in there and protect Steve himself (and he can't; in that building, one of a number of places where Hydra kept their Asset contained, Barnes will be nothing short of a liability), he has to be entirely sure Natasha knows what Barnes needs from her. "Don't let him go down there."

When Natasha answers, it's in English, which is no doubt just as deliberate as Barnes' choice of language even if he's not currently in the right place to work out her reasoning. "Understood," she says. "We've got each other's backs, James."

Barnes nods – Natasha might be the best liar he's ever met, but her team are the only family she's ever had and he knows she won't lie about her intention to protect them – and forces his gaze from her to Steve.

"Don't do anything stupid," he says brusquely, because it's a damn sight better than the don't go don't go oh please God please don't go when I can't follow you that's the only other thing in his head.

"How could I?" Steve asks, a tentative smile on his face, like he can't work out if he should be joking or not when Barnes is skirting the edges of an episode, if it'll help pull him back or push him right over the edge. "I'm leaving all the stupid here with you."

It's… Barnes doesn't know what it is. It's Steve today, larger than life and as healthy as Bucky always wanted him to be, and it's Steve then, tiny and frail and so fucking determined that it scared the shit out of Bucky. It's both of them, making the same dumb joke to get a smile when things are awful, and Barnes can't help but step forwards, pulling Steve into a rough approximation of a hug.

Steve's arms come up immediately, freezing level with Barnes' elbows, not holding him in return but not pushing him away either. It's how their hugs normally go: Steve never makes the first move, never does much more than rest his hand on Barnes' arms on the rare occasion Barnes finds himself with enough guts to reach out, the whole thing tends to feel so awkward and uncomfortable that Barnes usually walks away afterwards feeling just as in need of comfort as he did before. Their hugs are quick and largely one-sided, Barnes stepping away when he remembers that Steve isn't going to hold him back, and it's only now that he's thinking about why Steve's so hesitant.

He mostly figured Steve wasn't a fan of hugs, or maybe just not hugs where one of the arms involved was a cold, hard, metal murder weapon, but maybe it isn't. Maybe, if Sam and Natasha are right, it's because he wants it more than he thinks Barnes does.

If, maybe, they're both so worried about holding on too tight that they're forgetting it's okay to hold on at all.

Ridiculous.

This time Barnes doesn't pull back, keeps his arms around Steve longer than he normally would, and eventually Steve's arms move the rest of the way. His hands rest lightly on Barnes' back, not holding tightly but there, present in the pounding of his heart against Barnes' chest, the tiny hitch in his breathing that would be imperceptible to anyone with unenhanced hearing, the scent of his soap and his skin and the coffee he drank this morning and the pasta he had for lunch.

He's Steve, all of him, there in his arms, and Barnes doesn't ever want to let go.

Metaphorically speaking, at least; Barnes can only really maintain that level of contact for a few moments before his skin starts itching, his breath gets kind of uneven, and his head starts to go to some not so good places. He steps back, Steve's arms sliding away like they were never there, and gives him a determined look.

"I mean it, dumbass," Barnes says. "You come back in one piece, okay?"

"I'll do my best, Buck," Steve answers, smiling like Barnes has done something remarkable, something extraordinary, something more than a hug and a bit of casual name-calling.

Still, as foolish as that smile is, Barnes can't help but return it.

"We've got his back, man," Sam says, which is actually a lot more reassuring than Steve's promise. "We'll bring him back to you."

Natasha, meanwhile, doesn't overtly acknowledge Barnes' anxiety. "JARVIS," she says mildly. "Tell Tony we need him to suit up and meet us in the hangar ASAP."

"Oh, please," answers Stark, his voice coming from the same invisible speakers JARVIS talks through. "Bruce and I have been listening in since Barnes nixed your whole it'll be a cakewalk thing. We're in."

Barnes feels a surge of relief at that, because the Hulk is fucking unkillable, Stark's suit is really damn difficult to crack open without his fancy spinning can opener, and maybe Barnes doesn't trust them as much as he does Sam and Natasha but he's seen enough footage of the Avengers in action to know that none of them will let the others come to harm if they can help it.

He nods, knowing that thanks to Stark's cameras the two outside the room will see it just as clearly as the three of them inside it (yeah, fine, maybe Barnes has convinced JARVIS to allowing him access to the cameras in the shared areas of the tower, so he's well aware how good they are), then turns around, stalking back into the elevator.

"Okay," he hears Steve say as the doors slide closed. "New plan."

X

JARVIS, proving himself every bit as intelligent as Stark's bragging suggests, doesn't ask where Barnes wants to go. The elevator ascends smoothly, all the way up to the roof, and the doors don't make that stupid pinging noise when they open up onto the top deck of the tower.

Barnes steps outside, sidles seven steps to his right and then sinks backwards into the shallow recess he knows is there. It's a little too narrow to be entirely comfortable, but the fact that he's enclosed on three sides helps. The only directions anyone can come at him from are in front, in which case he'll see them in time to draw a weapon (assuming he hasn't heard them long before they come into view), or above, in which case they'll walk into one of a number of traps he's set up (non-lethal, though that's more because Barnes wants the opportunity to interrogate any interlopers than because Steve said they had to be). Likewise, the only way for Barnes to get at anyone is via the elevator, and he managed a few months ago to talk JARVIS into refusing to open the doors unless he can correctly recite a sixteen digit access code, so the only way he's attacking someone is deliberately and whilst in full control of his faculties.

It's a good place, secure. Barnes likes it up here.

Barnes watches until the jet takes off, Stark flying loops around it, throwing a sloppy salute towards the tower. Barnes doesn't acknowledge him (most of the time, ignoring Stark entirely is by far the safest approach), and then he doesn't manage to acknowledge much of anything for a while.

He doesn't go away, even though it's quieter, easier. He can't, because Steve is flying straight into one of the buildings where they kept the Winter Soldier, where they froze and defrosted him, where they gave him briefings and reminded him what would happen if he failed, where they burnt the memories out of his head, hurt him until he begged to die and then hurt him some more, kept going with all of it until he forgot his name and his life and the fact that he was a human being, and-

It's easier, is all. When remembering what happened to him starts to get bigger than can fit in his head, sometimes he just… shuts down, is probably how this century would put it. He can't forget, now that things are coming back to him, and it's not all shit he's capable of dealing with. Sam talks about triggers and disassociation and whatever the fuck else, gives him ways – healthier ways, he says – to handle it, but, the way Barnes sees it, if he doesn't want to live in his ugly shithole of a brain, it's no one's business but his own.

Except Steve is flying straight into Barnes' personal hell, and if Barnes can't be there to protect him then he's damn well going to be here, in his brain and his body, waiting for JARVIS to give him progress updates.

It's not quite an hour between Barnes leaving the briefing room and the first notification from JARVIS, a quiet statement that the Avengers are on target to reach the base in a matter of minutes.

Barnes taps a thank you into the wall beside him, too tense to manage actual words. It seems the sentiment is conveyed clearly enough, though, because JARVIS replies, "You're welcome, Sergeant Barnes. Would you like me to connect you to their communications system?"

He's offered every other time Steve, Natasha and Sam have been on a mission together, and Barnes has refused every time; listening to the sounds of a battle he wasn't able to see, gunshots and shouts and confusing orders with no context, hearing his friends get injured and not knowing how bad the damage was… It would be worse than just getting occasional information from JARVIS, worse than getting nothing at all.

Today is no different; Barnes shakes his head wordlessly, because on top of all his usual reasons for refusing there's the fact that if Natasha fails to keep Steve from finding where they kept the Soldier, Barnes really doesn't want to hear his reaction.

"Very well," JARVIS replies.

He falls silent, though it feels to Barnes more like a pause than the end of the conversation. He's not sure how he knows, because talking to JARVIS lacks all the usual elements of human interaction, but then Barnes is too out of practice to really interpret anything but the most obvious cues. Whatever it is, he's not surprised when JARVIS continues half a minute later.

"I wonder, Sergeant Barnes, if you might perhaps be amenable to some company," he says.

Even though he was expecting JARVIS to say something, it takes Barnes a few seconds to parse this, and then a good few more to decide if he'd rather agonise alone about whether his friends are okay or do so with an audience. It's the latter that wins, because Barton (not included on the mission due to a sprained ankle and three broken ribs, sustained in mysterious circumstances he refuses to explain to anyone) is undoubtedly just as concerned as Barnes is, because he might not have experienced exactly what Barnes has but he knows what it is to be controlled by someone else, and because once you've witnessed a man singing hideous pop songs at three in the morning while wearing only very purple underwear, it's pretty damn difficult to feel embarrassed around him.

Barnes lifts his right shoulder and dips his chin, half shrug and half nod, the best approximation of a non-verbal I won't object to company but I'm not asking for it.

JARVIS doesn't reply, but since Barnes' answer is neither a firm refusal nor an absolute acceptance, he's not overly concerned about whether or not JARVIS understood him. A few moments later, though, he hears the soft hum of the elevator ascending, barely audible even to Barnes' enhanced ears.

It arrives quicker than Barnes is expecting, and he's bracing himself for Barton's particular brand of restlessness when he hears the confident click of stiletto heels stepping out onto the roof.

They fall silent as Ms Potts (it has to be, since Natasha is absent and there aren't any other women JARVIS would allow into the residential areas without an escort) pauses, and then start up again, slower than before.

"Are you sure he's up here, JARVIS?" she asks, out of Barnes' line of sight, not that that prevents him from identifying her location to within a couple of inches (the other side of the wall, his ten o'clock and seven feet away).

He considers stepping forwards, but his sudden appearance has a tendency to startle people and Pepper Potts is not someone he wants to surprise. She has a reputation for being formidable that extends back long before she was exposed to Extremis, and whilst she poses no threat to him with the serum in its dormant state, there's also the fact that Steve and Natasha both have a great deal of respect for her. Barnes trusts their judgement (Natasha's more than Steve's, when it comes to anything other than assessing a danger to Barnes' life), and he doesn't want to upset either of them by upsetting Ms Potts.

"Sergeant Barnes is around the corner to your right, Ms Potts," JARVIS answers, pausing a moment before he continues. "I would request that you proceed with caution, if prolonged contact with Sir has not impaired your ability to do so."

At that, Barnes' breath catches on its way out, breaking the steady in-two-three hold out-two-three rhythm he's supposed to practice when his head goes to dark places. JARVIS is usually incredibly tactful (particularly given the identity of his programmer), so if he's warning Ms Potts now rather than before she reached the roof, it's because he wants Barnes to hear him as well, which means Barnes probably looks too much like a serial killer for comfort.

He rolls his shoulders, making a deliberate effort to relax them, and unclenches his right fist from around the knife he wasn't consciously aware he'd been holding, sliding it back into the holster he's not really supposed to be wearing.

"It's fine, JARVIS," he manages quietly. His mouth is dry, voice close to grating, and Barnes clears his throat, tries to work up a little more volume before continuing. "I'm coming out, Ms Potts."

His left hand is raised, fingers spread in a way that is supposed to indicate harmlessness, and he has to put effort into keeping his footsteps from being utterly silent as he emerges from his alcove.

Ms Potts is waiting for him, almost precisely where he estimated her to be. Her stance seems to be relaxed, almost entirely lacking the fearful tension he's used to seeing from people who know they're face to face with the Winter Soldier.

"Please, Sergeant Barnes," she says, smiling as she offers him her right hand. "Call me Pepper."

Tentatively, Barnes accepts the handshake. Ms Potts' – Pepper's – grasp is firm but not tight, and although it's brisk the handshake doesn't seem rushed, doesn't suggest she's uncomfortable or afraid of him; her hand is cool but not cold, palm dry, pulse steady.

It's nice, that a civilian in the know isn't scared of him. Kind of stupid, for a woman as smart as she's supposed to be, but nice anyway.

Barnes dredges up a smile, probably too late for it to look at all natural. Pepper just smiles more, though, and as far as Barnes can tell it seems genuine.

"Steve's told us such a lot about you, Bucky. It's good to finally meet you," she says, then carries on before he can fully process his surprise. Not that Steve would talk about him, or that he would have painted a ridiculously idealised picture of him, but that anyone would hold that picture above the seventy years of slaughter. "Sorry, I should have asked first. May I call you Bucky, or would you prefer James?"

Barnes falters, doesn't know. It's not a question he's been asked in so, so many years – Steve calls him Bucky like they've never been apart, JARVIS calls him Sergeant Barnes like it's a title he's even close to deserving, and everyone else calls him James or Barnes or some stupid nickname he doesn't stand a chance of understanding – and it's not a question he can answer because not one of the names they call him actually feels like it fits. It's something so basic any child could answer it, and the fact is that Barnes is too pathetic to manage that much.

But Pepper's just waiting patiently, like his near panic at being asked such a simple question is perfectly normal and not something he should be utterly ashamed of. Her smile doesn't waver for a second, nor does she try to take back the question, and eventually Barnes shrugs, noncommittal, uncaring.

"Either," he manages, so fucking useless he might as well have stayed silent.

"Okay," Pepper answers. "I'll stick with Bucky for now. If you change your mind, just let me know."

She does the waiting thing again, seeming set to carry on with it indefinitely, so Barnes nods.

"Okay," she says a second time. "Bucky, Clint and I are keeping each other company until the team get back. We'd like you to join us, if you're comfortable with doing so."

It's the first time he's got an offer like this, and Barnes doesn't know the answer here any better than he did her last question. He'll tag along when Steve wants him at movie nights or team meals, sometimes spending time outside of that with Sam and Natasha, and Stark jumps at anything he thinks might be an opportunity to demand a look at the arm, but when Steve's on a mission Barnes mostly spends his time alone.

He's never been invited to any kind of gathering without Steve there to run interference, and he doesn't get why that's changing now.

"Why?" he asks, kind of shaky and very much uncertain, but Steve has promised more than once that he can ask questions without fear of consequences and Barnes is working really goddamn hard at believing him.

There's a moment where Pepper just looks at him, little creases forming between her eyebrows, and then she nods, almost smiles at him. "In my experience, when someone I love is doing something dangerous, it's a little easier to manage how worried I am if I'm with people who are equally worried," she says. "I can't guarantee it'll make it any better for you, but I don't want you to be alone unless you want to be."

Barnes takes a few seconds to think this through, trying to figure out if she and Barton genuinely want him there or if they're just being polite. It's not something he worries about normally – Steve, Barnes is fairly sure, is never nice to him for any reason other than he wants to be; no one could fake being kind as constantly and consistently as Sam does without snapping; Natasha picks and chooses when she wants to follow social conventions, and does so in a way that makes it perfectly clear she doesn't consider it necessary when around the team; and Stark seems to treat everyone with the same mix of thoughtless generosity and brutal tactlessness – and Barnes doesn't know how he's supposed to detect if an offer is borne of good manners or genuine kindness.

Fuck, he's going to have to ask.

"This because you want me there or because you're too polite to exclude Captain America's fucked up war buddy?"

"Polite would be not turning you away if you asked to join us," Pepper explains evenly, no sign at all that she finds Barnes' question difficult or uncomfortable to answer. "You live in our home, and you're deeply important to Steve. In light of that fact, I would like to take the opportunity to get to know you better."

So it's not so much an invitation as an assessment, Barnes realises, and the fact that this makes it much easier to deal with is probably the kind of thing that would have Sam's voice going all soft and concerned if he knew about it. But Sam isn't here, and knowing that he's being tested really does make it easier.

Barnes has undergone test after test after test since Steve brought him in. Brain scans and psychological profiling, physical fitness, mental well-being, and then, once they decided he wasn't going to start butchering people if they let him near a weapon (like he hadn't been armed all along), assessments of his combat abilities: fighting armed and unarmed; his ability to hit a target with any number of weapons; his skills at stealth and infiltration. Assessments are simple, just a matter of answering questions and following instructions.

He can deal with that a lot better than with a standard social interaction.

"Understood," he says. "Should I leave any weapons behind?" His psychiatrist requests it of him, and in deference to her delicate sensibilities Barnes leaves any visible weapons in a box just inside the door; he's willing to do the same thing for Pepper, particularly since it still leaves him with concealed knives, guns, a couple of garrotting wires, his second best set of knuckle dusters and vials containing concentrated doses of at least three different poisons.

"That won't be necessary," Pepper answers. "Shall we?"

She offers her arm, the way Barnes thinks his dates probably used to. It's muscle memory that has him accepting, threading his arm through hers and escorting her to the elevator.

She waits patiently while he recites this week's access code, and he releases her almost as soon as the doors close, stepping away and folding himself into the corner as far from her as possible, the same way he did with Sam and Natasha earlier.

Pepper doesn't seem perturbed by this behaviour, nor does she come any closer than where he left her. Instead, she just asks JARVIS to take them down to the Avengers' floor, then looks back at Barnes again.

"You know, you really don't need to worry about us welcoming you purely because it's good manners," she says lightly. "I know you've met Clint Barton before. Do you honestly think he does anything just to be polite?"

X

JARVIS announces that the team have landed shortly before the elevator stops, and it feels like every muscle in Barnes' body turns to ice. He staggers his way out of the elevator after Pepper, following her into the team's living room and sitting at the very edge of the chair he usually occupies when Steve drags him in there.

It's a good chair, solid enough that he can stand up quickly if he needs to, and uncomfortable compared to all the other soft, squishy chairs in the room, which guarantees no one else will sit in it unless there's no choice at all. He's got a clear line of sight on all doors and through to the kitchen, but is far enough from the windows to make it damn difficult for anyone outside to get a bead on him. It's safe, or as close as Barnes ever feels to safe nowadays.

"Look who I found," Pepper says, kicking off her heels and settling on one of the too soft couches with her feet curled up underneath her.

"Barnes," Barton says from his perch atop the back of Natasha's usual armchair. "How's it going?"

Barnes shrugs, doesn't speak; he made the mistake of actually answering that question the first time Sam asked him it, and hasn't done so since then.

"Ms Potts, the team are about to enter the building," says JARVIS. "Sir has instructed me to tell you that they may experience some communication issues. I may be unable to update you on their progress, and Sir does not wish you to be concerned."

"Thank you, JARVIS," Pepper answers. "Please, keep us updated as much as possible."

"Certainly, Ms Potts," JARVIS says, then falls silent.

Barnes sits there, tense and uneasy; if anything could make waiting for Pepper to begin her assessment of him even more uncomfortable, it's knowing that Steve is beyond the range of communication. Anything could happen to him, or to the others, and JARVIS won't know and won't be able to tell Barnes about it and he should be there.

He's supposed to have Steve's back. He should be with him, and to hell with what they did to him in that place, with the memories that came rushing back from just knowing where the mission is. Barnes should have put on his goddamn mask and that uncomfortable goddamn uniform and just fucking dealt with the pain and the nightmares, gritting his teeth and charging on in the way he did back in the war.

"I should be there," a voice says, and for quite a long moment Barnes can't be certain it's not his. "If something happens because I'm not there…"

"You can hardly walk, Clint," Pepper Potts says, not unkindly but very definitely matter of fact. "Exactly how much use do you think you would be if you were there?"

"I can still shoot," Barton argues. "All I'd need is Tony to drop me somewhere high up and I could take out my fair share."

Pepper mmhmms at him. "Say I ignore the fact that you've been forbidden from the range until your ribs are closer to healed. What would happen when someone attacked you in your high place and you couldn't run away and you couldn't fight back?"

"I could so fight back."

"You'd be a liability, Clint," Pepper says softly. "The team would be worrying about you more than they'd be thinking about what was happening around them, and someone else would get hurt."

Barton looks up, away from her, and apparently Pepper takes this as acquiescence because she turns her gaze to Barnes. "And you can stop with whatever you're thinking, too," she says, even softer. "You know you made the right choice in staying behind. I won't ask what your reasons were, but I have no doubt that they exist, and that you would be there if you could be."

She's looking at him, sharp and unwavering, and Barnes can't look away, no matter how much he wants to, how much the eye contact makes his pulse skitter and his skin itch.

She's right, he knows that. Best case scenario, going back into that building would have made Barnes freeze, either sinking under the memories it brought up or disappearing into the nowhere place he goes in order to get away from them. He wouldn't have been able to help, would have been a stationary target, and Steve would have put himself in danger to get Barnes out of it.

Worst case scenario, he'd have reverted, and the team, his friends, would have found themselves up against the Winter Soldier on top of whatever Hydra are throwing at them right now.

There's a chair in that building, between the room with the off-white tiles and the icy water and a hole in the centre of the floor and the room with the glorified icebox that was the closest thing Barnes had to a bed for seven decades. Even if Barnes managed to hold it together well enough to be useful in a fight, he's not sure coming face to face with the chair wouldn't end up with him just sitting down and waiting vacantly for the Hydra agents to strap him down and turn on the power.

However much he might want it to be otherwise, Barnes couldn't have protected Steve in that building.

But Steve is- Steve is his everything.

"I won't survive it if something happens to him," Barnes says, because it's true and because they need to know. If Steve's injured, if – God forbid – he doesn't come back, they need to not be around him when he finds out.

"Fuck that," Barton answers, standing up and limping in Barnes' general direction. "If something happens to Cap, we're gonna need you to help take out the fuckers responsible."

He stops at a more or less safe distance, and maybe his glare isn't a patch on Natasha's but it's clear that's what he's aiming for. His hand is out, like he's waiting for Barnes to shake on it. "Avenge first, disintegrate after. It's in the name."

"I don't believe it'll come to that, Agent Barton," JARVIS interrupts, before Barnes has long enough to come up with an answer (and he wants to agree, to promise that if Steve gets hurt he'll be out for blood with the rest of the team, but he thinks mostly he'll just be out, a danger to himself and everyone around him). "Sir has disabled the device preventing me from connecting with the team. I can confirm that the team have neutralised all Hydra personnel above ground without sustaining any major injuries, and are now preparing to clear the subterranean levels."

"There we are," Pepper says lightly. "As yet, there's no need for aggravated violence, so you can sit yourself back down, Clint, and stop trying to be intimidating."

Barton huffs an exaggerated sigh, then flops into the chair next to Barnes, actually sitting on the seat rather than balancing somewhere ridiculous. "Sorry, Mom," he says, also huffy and exaggerated. "Though, for the record, I wasn't just trying. I was succeeding, right, Barnes?"

Barnes knows what his answer should be, that he should either argue that Barton isn't at all intimidating or play along, make a joke about how he's quaking in his boots. Except both options are complicated, because it's not so much that Clint is intimidating (the man is basically a disaster masquerading as a human being, spending half his time injured and the other half talking the kind of shit that gets him injured in the first place) as it is that Barnes is uncomfortable with having anyone standing within a few metres of him when he's sitting. His space is his space, sometimes he needs more of it than others, and right now he needs a good bit more of it than sometimes.

By the time he feels up to pretending he can handle joking about having someone looming over him like that, Barton and Pepper aren't looking at him anymore. They're talking to each other instead, their conversation flowing easily, and Barnes stays silent, waiting until they've finished and Pepper is ready to begin questioning him.

Except she doesn't seem inclined to question him at all; other than the occasional glance in Barnes' direction whenever JARVIS makes a report on how the mission is going, neither she nor Barton is acting concerned about the fact that he's just sitting there.

He tries to pay attention, in case part of the assessment involves his ability to carry a conversation, but he's had seven decades of being punished for listening to his handlers talking around him. He still finds himself drifting back into that mindset sometimes, particularly when his emotions are running high.

Like, for example, when the best friend Barnes has been in love with for much longer than he can remember is charging around a place where Barnes was tortured armed only with an oversized frisbee.

The best friend who, if Sam and Natasha are right, is just as in love with him in return.

Barnes isn't entirely sure he believes them; now that he's moved on from freaking out about the possibility of having forgotten a relationship with Steve to freaking out about the mission, he's going back to the argument he had against the possibility of Steve loving him.

Because Bucky, the old, pre-Soldier Bucky, was good at people. He could talk to them, charm them, understand them. He knew who they were and what they wanted from him, and he knew just as easily how to get what he wanted from them. Bucky could tell when someone was attracted to him, when to flirt and when to walk away.

He remembers looking at the old Steve – the tiny, breakable, perfect Steve – and wanting to reach out, hold him close and never let go. Remembers the constant struggle between wanting to force the world to see how amazing Steve is and wanting no one to ever see it so he could keep Steve all to himself. Remembers looking up at Steve and trying wrap his hazy, crazy head around what he saw, remembers thinking he must have died on that table and equal parts hating that Steve had gone before him and being glad that the afterlife had seen fit to give Steve the strong, healthy body he'd always deserved.

Barnes remembers despising Peggy Carter because of the way Steve looked at her, remembers coming on way too strong to his best friend's girl so that he could prove she only wanted him for his swanky new outsides and not the solid gold he's always been on the inside. Remembers the way Peggy'd looked right through him, had eyes only for Steve, loved him just as much as Bucky did and Barnes does.

He remembers what Steve-in-love looks like, remembers wishing Steve would look at him like that and knowing he never would.

So, yeah. Barnes stands by it. If he'd ever noticed Steve showing even a flicker of interest in him, Bucky would have jumped on it.

Natasha's wrong. Sam is wrong.

Barnes just needs to stick with ignoring his feelings, ignoring the insane, infinitesimal possibility that Steve might return them.

He has nothing to offer Steve, anyway.

"Sergeant Barnes," says JARVIS, and if it's possible for a computer to sound cautious, that's how he sounds. It's like he's trying not to alarm Barnes, which is in itself alarming because it's the tone people use when they don't know how he'll react to what they're saying.

"Steve," he says. "Is he hurt? What happened?"

"Captain Rogers is unharmed. He and Sergeant Wilson are currently sweeping the second sub-level," JARVIS replies before Barnes has finished the question. "I apologise for alarming you. Agent Romanoff has asked me to connect you to her. Would you like to take the call here or in another room?"

Barnes looks across the room at Barton and Pepper. They're talking quietly again, and neither of them is looking at him, but there's a certain stillness to them both which suggests they're waiting to hear his answer.

He doesn't know what he wants.

If he asks to speak to Natasha somewhere else, they'll want to know why. They won't ask (or Pepper won't, at least, and Natasha says that Barton is an idiot and Barnes never has to answer his questions unless he wants to), but they'll wonder and he'll know they're wondering and he'll feel more uncomfortable than he already does.

But, based on the fact that she and Clint haven't asked him anything, maybe Pepper didn't invite him here to interrogate him, in which case he's here just because she wanted to be kind to him. And she said she wouldn't ask him why he'd stayed behind, which is definitely kind, and Barnes thinks he might want her to understand, even if he can't tell her himself.

Barnes shrugs, then pushes himself to make a decision the way he's supposed to. "Here's fine," he manages.

"Very well," JARVIS answers, and there's a few seconds of silence before Natasha starts to talk.

"I'm in," she says. "I've set explosives, and JARVIS is destroying the computers as we speak. By-"

"Is that Barnes?" Stark's voice cuts in. "Tell him J's deleting everything but the names, which he's already started running. Anyone who's even tangentially connected and still alive will be behind bars or dead by this time next week."

"Tony!" Pepper scolds.

"By which I mean they'll have been shot by SHIELD when they resisted arrest," Stark explains quickly. "Obviously I won't be killing anyone. Though, really, Pep, if you knew what these bastards were doing, you'd be encouraging me. I've seen some shit in my time, but what these bastards did to-"

"Stark!" Natasha barks sharply, and, miracle of miracles, he actually stops talking. "As I was saying, James, by the time we leave, no one will know this place ever existed. And that includes Steve, right, Tony?"

"Oh, believe me, I've got no desire to go through what you said you'd do to me if I said anything," Stark says. "Speaking of our fearless leader, we need to be moving on before he finds his way down here."

"Okay?" Natasha answers, and it takes Pepper glancing in his direction for Barnes to realise they're waiting for him specifically to answer.

He manages a jerky nod, then remembers that half the people he's talking to aren't in the room. "Thank you, Natasha. Stark," he mutters, not because he's ungrateful but because he's trying not to go non-verbal on them.

"No problem," says Natasha. "We'll be back soon."

"Be safe," Pepper tells them, before JARVIS ends the call and the three of them lapse into silence.

Barnes waits for one of them to say something, because surely now they have to be curious enough for it to override good manners.

They know why he's here with them rather than out there with Steve, and even if they don't know the particulars they've heard enough to realise that bad things happened to him there. That has to merit some kind of has comment, even if it's only a well-meaning but entirely unwanted expression of sympathy or the are you okay? that's he's come to know and despise.

But all that happens is that Barton pushes himself to his feet and says, "I'm getting a drink. Anyone else?"

Pepper glances at her watch, then looks up at him with a smile. "I'd love a gin and tonic, if it's not too much trouble."

"And would madame like ice and lemon with that?" Barton grins, putting on what is presumably supposed to be a butler accent (not something Barnes has much experience with, unless he counts JARVIS, not that Barton sounds anything like that).

"You're an angel, Clint," Pepper answers.

"And here I thought I'd been called every name in the book," Barton says. "Barnes, you want something?"

It's not a difficult question, but between trailing Natasha around the grocery store, the absurd, emotional conversation that followed it, and Steve off on his mission now, it's not exactly been an easy day. As much as Barnes wants an answer to come quick and easy, it doesn't.

He's leaving it too long, he knows, but open questions can be hard even on a good day. If he's given a few options he can handle it, mostly, and yes-or-no questions are something close to simple, but Barton is asking him to choose from an almost unlimited number of things (and, given that it's Stark's bar Barton is about to be raiding, it's about as close to unlimited as it gets).

He should have answered by now.

"Tell you what," Barton says, a ridiculously light, breezy tone, incongruous enough with Barnes' anxiety that it cuts right through it. "I'm having a beer, so I'll grab two the same. If you want one, great, and if you don't, I get to have a second without needing to get up again. Yeah?"

The relief that he no longer has to make a decision (or nothing more complicated than whether he wants to drink the bottle he's going to be holding, anyway) wars with the frustration at failing to make up his mind. And he should probably say no, express his autonomy by making a decision of his own or whatever it is his therapist is always banging on about, but he can't. He just can't.

Not like it matters what he drinks, anyway; his serum might be some shitty knockoff of the one Steve got juiced with, but Barnes still hasn't been able to get more than slightly tipsy since the first time Zola had him.

He nods, earning himself a grin from Barton before the other man hobbles his way over to the bar in the corner.

Barnes finds himself watching, overly paranoid, as Barton makes Pepper's drink with all the flair of a professional, then pulls two identical bottles from the fridge. He uses the bottle opener built into the bar to pop the top off one of them, though a glance at Barnes is enough for him to decide not to open the second one, and then, carrying both bottles by the neck in one hand and the glass in the other, makes his slow way back over to where Barnes and Pepper are sat.

It's only as he's accepts the still sealed beer that Barnes realises the polite thing to do would have been to offer to help.

"Thanks," he mutters, though he thinks it's probably a case of too little and too late when it comes to remembering to be human.

"De nada," Barton answers, dropping back into the sofa beside Pepper. He uses his good leg to drag a footstool closer, then puts his feet up. Letting out an exaggerated sigh, he crosses his legs at the ankle, looking so at ease that Barnes feels a flash of jealousy.

God, he misses being able to relax when he knows he's in a safe place.

That stupid, twitchy part of his brain looks over the bottle for signs of tampering, hopefully too subtly for the others to pick up on it; finding none, Barnes uses his metal thumb to flip the cap off and takes a careful sip.

Even knowing the high quality of just about everything in the Tower, Barnes is still surprised by how good it is, and in the next couple of minutes he finds he's managed to drink a good two thirds of the bottle.

He's contemplating finishing it and going up to get another one when JARVIS speaks. "The team have left the building and are boarding the jet. Detonation is planned for immediately after takeoff. Sir wishes me to convey his offer to stream footage of the explosion."

"Yes!" Barton answers with immense enthusiasm. "Definitely yes."

Pepper rolls her eyes, but she's also smiling. "You're such a boy, Clint," she says lightly. "Though I suppose I don't have a problem with it."

Barnes does, and he wants to refuse, but… He's not sure he can, when Barton and Pepper have both already agreed and he's not actually sure why he doesn't want to watch the building blow up. He thinks he should, that this is what Sam means when he talks about catharsis, but, honestly, Barnes is content enough just to know it's gone and he won't ever have to go back there. He doesn't need to see that building again, even if it's just to watch it burn.

But if Pepper and Barton want to watch, it's not his place to prevent that.

"Sergeant Barnes," JARVIS says. "I require a response in the affirmative from everyone present. Do I have your consent to proceed with showing the feed from Sir's camera?"

Barnes shakes his head, then nods, undecided and not at all comfortable. "I…" he starts, and then realises the out he's been given: JARVIS only requires a positive answer if he's in the room. "I can't," he says, swigging down the rest of his beer and standing up. "But go ahead."

Halfway out the door, he remembers again to be polite. "Thank you, Pepper."

There's silence, and then as he steps into the hallway, the faint sound of footsteps on thick piled carpet.

"Bucky," Pepper says, drawing up alongside him, her voice as gentle as the hand she rests on Barnes' arm. "I'm aware that what I'm about to say is none of my business, and you're more than welcome to tell me to buzz off if you want, okay?"

Again, she waits long enough for Barnes to realise her question isn't just rhetorical, and to drag up a shaky, near silent, "Okay."

She squeezes his arm, only very lightly, and offers him a tiny, tight smile before she speaks again. "I know you need to keep Steve safe, but I think you made the right decision in staying behind." A pause, maybe waiting for him to object, tell her to buzz off like she said he could, and then, "You need to be certain you can handle it before going off on a mission with them, because what you said, about not surviving if something happens to Steve?"

Pepper takes a breath, her hand sliding down Barnes' arm to grasp his, feeling awfully fragile against his palm; all he has to do is twitch wrong, squeeze too tightly, and he'll crush those slender fingers, splinter bones and turn muscles into pulp.

He doesn't want to, but he could, and he wants to pull away, warn Pepper that she shouldn't trust him that much. That she shouldn't touch him, shouldn't get this close, shouldn't offer him the comfort he doesn't – shouldn't – need.

"It goes both ways, Bucky," she says, still gentle. "If he loses you again, I don't believe Steve will last a week, and the world definitely won't be lucky enough to have him come back twice."

That's – Barnes doesn't know what it is, other than that the idea terrifies him, damn near stops his heart in his chest. Not the thought of dying, or not for Steve, anyway; it wouldn't be the first time he's died keeping Steve alive, and he's not afraid to do it again. There's a thousand worse ways to go, and maybe Barnes sat this one out because he knows he couldn't have fought worth a damn in that place but it wasn't to keep himself alive.

Barnes isn't afraid to die, not even a little bit, but Steve following him?

There's no fucking way Barnes is letting that happen.

"He wouldn't dare," Barnes as good as growls, and maybe it isn't fair to glare at Pepper like this is her fault, but knowing that doesn't mean he can help it.

Pepper doesn't seem alarmed by his angry face, or is at least very good at hiding it if she is. "Not deliberately," she says, as though that's any goddamn comfort at all. "But on his first mission after the ice, Steve jumped out of a plane without a parachute, and that's just the tip of the reckless iceberg. Until he got you back, Steve didn't seem to think it mattered if he lived or died, as long as the team won. Losing you again is all it would take to tip him back into that mindset, so you have to trust your instincts. Don't go out there unless you're absolutely certain you'll make it back in one piece, understand?"

Despite the fact that she's been nothing but kind to him the whole time, in this moment Pepper is every bit as intimidating as Natasha sometimes chooses to be. And the thing is, he could kill her in more ways than he can count, but since he doesn't want to do her harm, Barnes is intimidated.

"Understood," he answers, a little bit mechanical, a little bit closer to the Soldier than he is to Bucky, but Pepper just nods.

"Okay," she says, taking a step back and releasing his hand. "I'll let you go, then. They'll be back soon, and you know Steve'll head straight to your floor to see you."

Barnes returns her smile, also fairly mechanically. "Yeah," he agrees faintly; it would be a matter of seconds to ask JARVIS to let Steve know he's on the team's shared floor, but Barnes needs to talk to him and it's not the kind of conversation they should be having around other people.

He drifts towards the elevator, having to work very hard to maintain the emotionless expression that used to be the only face he had.

The doors slide closed and Barnes lets the mask drop, hands clutching hard enough at the railing behind him to leave marks in the metal. He should feel at least a little bad about it, but it's about the only thing keeping him upright and he's already throwing all his remorse into feeling shitty over what's going to happen when Steve gets home.

Because he could have ignored it, he could. Everything Sam and Natasha said, that was just words, and maybe they're pretty certain Steve has some very strong feelings for him but Barnes is almost completely sure they're wrong. And, anyway, if he doesn't hear it from Steve, it doesn't count, and since Steve hadn't said it when Barnes was still Bucky, a happy, healthy, whole human being, he's not going to say it to the fucked up mess he is now. He'll never say anything, Barnes will never ask, and they'll carry on as they have been.

Happy, or at least the best possible approximation of it, until one day Barnes snuffs it saving Steve's ass.

But if Pepper's right, if after Barnes kicks the inevitable bucket Steve's going to approach every single fight like it's an opportunity to follow him…

There's no other fucking option. Barnes has to break Steve's heart, and he has to do it tonight.

The elevator pings as it reaches his and Steve's floor, and Barnes stalks down the hall to their kitchen to wait for the stupid lughead to join him.

X

It's an eternity and no time at all before he hears the elevator making its dumbass pinging noise again, followed by the sound of Steve's footsteps. There's two muffled thuds – Barnes has waited by the elevator for Steve to get home often enough to know it's him kicking his boots off – followed by the damn near silent click as he leans the shield against the wall beside them.

"Buck?" Steve calls, the same careful way he always announces his presence. "You around?"

Barnes takes a sharp, shaky breath before answering. "In here."

And then Steve's in the room with him, looking tired but happy, a bruise on his cheekbone already fading from purple to a sickly green. "Hi," he says lightly. "You okay?"

Barnes nods, then shakes his head.

"I don't want to sleep with you," he says, which isn't quite the gentle, Bucky-like heart breakage he was planning on going with.

Steve takes a step back, expression going from the easy smile he wears when Barnes is having a good day to something completely blank, as expressionless as the face Barnes sees in the mirror most of the time. His arms come up, hands open and palms facing outwards, and even knowing that there's no way it's a threat Barnes can't help but mirror Steve's next step backwards.

"I'd never ask you to, Buck," he says. "God, if I've ever given that impression, I…" There's a noise, a sign of emotion Barnes can't decipher, and then Steve carries on. "Never, Bucky, I promise."

He's still backing away, but the blank expression is flawed, cracking, and- he looks like he did on the very rare occasion Barnes told him about his nightmares, a deep-seated and poorly concealed horror that was almost always followed by Steve throwing up in the bathroom as soon as he thought Barnes had fallen back to sleep.

"I know that, dumbass," Barnes says, and the words are his truth but the insult and intonation is entirely instinct leftover from Bucky.

Steve isn't listening, though, too busy freaking out to hear a word Barnes is saying to him. "I have to go," he says, the words hurried, frantic, and he's already most of the way to the door out of there. "Bucky, I- You're safe here. You'll always be safe here, and I- Whatever I've done to make you think that, I am so, so sorry."

"Breathe, Steve," Barnes says, approaching Steve slowly, though he doesn't think it's that or his words that makes Steve stop talking; Steve is just about hyperventilating, breath rapid and rasping, too close to the old, sickly Steve for comfort, and the Bucky instincts have him stepping into Steve's space and placing his organic hand on his back.

Steve flinches, tries to move away, but Barnes holds onto him, has to. "Breathe," he says again, sharper. "Fuck's sake, Stevie, of course I'm fucking safe here. Wouldn't ever have crossed my mind if it hadn't been for… There was this couple, while I was out, and Sam and Natasha said maybe you didn't tell me it was allowed now in case I took it the wrong way."

He accompanies the words with rubbing Steve's back, matching the motion to his own breathing. He doesn't know what else to say, too used to being the one in need of calming down, but it seems to be working; after a minute, Steve's breathing slows, and even if the eyes he turns on Barnes are still too wide, at least he's looking at him.

"Steve," he says, moving the hand from Steve's back to his shoulder, his thumb rubbing absent lines along his collarbone. "You done freaking out yet?"

Steve blinks, swallows both visibly and audibly, then does a weird head-jerk thing that looks like he's trying to simultaneously nod and shake his head. "They shouldn't have said anything," he says, his hand coming up to wrap around Barnes' wrist, grip loose, thumb pressing lightly against his pulse point. "Bucky, I- I wish they hadn't."

Barnes shakes his head. "They should have," he says, before Steve can go back down the rabbit hole of guilt again. "Natasha said you're in love with me, and-"

"I don't expect anything from you," Steve interrupts, quietly desperate. Gently, he moves Barnes' hand from his shoulder before releasing his wrist and stepping away. "I understand if you feel uncomfortable living here now, but I- How I feel is on me, Bucky. It's not something I ever wanted you to have to worry about."

"I'm not worried, Steve," Barnes says. "God, would you just shut up, quit trying to run away and let me talk for five minutes."

Mercifully, Steve actually stops flapping and gives up trying to distance himself from Barnes. He's braced as though for a blow, and never mind that it's been over a month since Barnes lost control enough for that to happen outside of training (he'd had a nightmare, bad enough that Steve had tried to shake him awake and earned himself a shiny fist to the face when Barnes woke up too fucking terrified to know where he was or who was touching him).

It's not an entirely promising start, but then Barnes kind of fucked up any chance of that when he blurted out his lack of interest in being intimate with Steve rather than building up to it like a sane person. But he has to try, even if Steve looks like he's just waiting for Barnes to start hating him, because Steve is-

He's Barnes' goddamn rock, is what he is, like the parable about the builders. And, sure, Barnes has no idea how the hell that's one of the things he's got back when so many more important things are lost, but apparently it is, and it fits. Steve is the solid, stable ground on which Barnes has built his sense of self, and without him, everything Barnes is just crumbles away.

"I'm glad she told me," he says, and for the first time he can remember he's the one trying for eye contact and Steve's the one trying to dodge it. "I didn't mean to be so out of the blue with it, but… I've been thinking since she said it and the end of the conversation came out before the beginning."

He pauses, reaches slowly out to Steve. He's cautious about it, fully expecting him to pull further away again, so the brush of his fingertips against the fabric of Steve's sleeve is a little startling.

"Steve," Barnes – Bucky, he can be Bucky, even if it's only for the length of this conversation – says, holding on. "Stevie, you gotta know that I love you more than anyone and anything on this earth, and if they hadn't said anything I'd've wasted a second lifetime thinking it was just me."

Steve… He makes a noise, sort of strangled and unclear. Bucky doesn't know how he's really supposed to describe it, but it's significant, noteworthy, and Bucky needs to carry on more than he needs to figure it out; there's a chance that noise is Steve getting his hopes up, and if so Bucky needs to weigh them back down again.

"Thing is, I'm no good for you," he tells Steve. "Not just 'cause I was the Soldier, so you don't have to start with the whole wasn't your fault, you're still a person thing." Bucky pauses, takes a breath, and then pushes on, "I can't have a relationship with you, Stevie. I can't be any kind of partner for you, no matter how much I'd like to be. I don't want to have sex with you. With anyone. I can't imagine ever wanting to. I could handle kissing maybe once in a blue moon, but would you honestly want to try kiss someone who's more likely to knife you than reciprocate? And assuming I ever managed to fall asleep with someone next to me, chances are I'd be trying to kill them the first time I had a nightmare. I'm not the guy you have a relationship with, Steve, and I'm never going to be."

Bucky sighs, hating his stupid, fucked up brain and the fact that it means he has to say what he's about to say. "You gotta quit loving me, Stevie. You gotta find someone else."

Finished, Bucky drops his gaze from Steve's, looking down at his feet instead. He forces his fingers to release their grasp on Steve's sleeve, then starts to step away from him.

He gets maybe half a dozen steps away before he hears Steve swallow.

"Bucky," he says, barely more than a whisper. Bucky doesn't stop, and Steve clears his throat before continuing at a volume slightly closer to normal. "Please wait, Buck."

Reluctantly, Bucky stops, but he is done with eye contact for today; even for Steve, he can't manage any more, and so he stands with hunched shoulders and offers the floor his best neutral expression.

"I can date other people, Buck," Steve says. "If that's what you want me to do, that's what I'll do, but I can't stop loving you."

"You can," Bucky answers. "You just gotta find the right person. Someone like Peggy."

"I could've lived my whole life with Peg and I would've been happy. I loved her, and if I'd made it home I would've asked her to marry me, but I'd still've been in love with you until the day I died."

"Steve."

"No, Bucky," Steve says. "I heard you out, and if you're saying you won't ever want a relationship with me I accept that, but I've loved you since- since before I even knew what love is. If I could turn it off like you're asking me to, I would. Ask anything else of me, and if it's in my power to give you it I will, but this isn't something I have any control over."

His feet shuffle against the floor, just outside of Bucky's line of sight, and Bucky finds himself looking up, just far enough to see Steve wringing his hands together.

"I'm sorry, Buck," he says. "I think I should stay with Sam for a few nights. I don't want you to feel uncomfortable."

He shuffles his feet again, takes a step backwards, and the next thing Bucky knows he's alone in their apartment, the door to the emergency stairs snicking closed behind Steve.

Immediately, Bucky wants to beg for him to come back. Wants to demand that he stay and never leave, because Bucky only ever feels uncomfortable when Steve is gone. Wants to run after him, grab hold and not let go, attach himself to Steve's side like the most stubborn of barnacles. Wants to promise that he'll try, that he can be human again, can be what Steve needs, he can, as long as Steve just stays here with him.

But he can't, not really, not in any way Steve would want. Bucky goes away sometimes, leaves his body an empty shell, but he doesn't think he could go far enough to endure any kind of physical relationship if he tried, and he almost certainly couldn't drag himself back into his body again afterwards. It would destroy the few parts of him that aren't yet broken entirely, and it would all be pointless because Steve would sooner die than hurt Bucky.

Steve wouldn't so much as hold his hand unless he knew Bucky wanted him to, would hate himself if there was even the slightest chance Bucky was allowing contact rather than welcoming it, and so he can't go after Steve or call him back.

He'll never be the man Steve deserves, and Bucky needs to leave him be until that sinks in.

(But, God, he wishes Steve was still here.)

"I said I'd accept it if you told me you didn't want a relationship," Steve says, striding back into the room with absolutely none of the hesitance he showed when leaving. "But you didn't."

Bucky stares at him, confused, not entirely sure he's not just imagining his presence; Steve was the one who chose to leave, and it makes no sense for him to come back to reiterate a conversation they've only just had. It was hard enough to say it all the first time, knowing how much it wasn't what Steve wanted to hear, and Bucky doesn't want to hurt him again.

But if Steve's come back, it's clearly not sunk into his thick head properly, so Bucky's just going to have to make sure he understands.

"I can't, Steve," he says, shaking his head. "I can't be with you."

"You said that," Steve replies; Bucky is a little surprised to realise that he's closer than he was a moment ago, that he's managed to get there without Bucky noticing him move. "But, Bucky, do you want to be?"

Even as he knows he should stay quiet, Bucky feels his answer bubbling up in his throat, bursting out of him before he can stop it. "Of course I want to, Steve."

Steve breaks into the hugest, most ridiculous grin Bucky can ever remember seeing, on him or anyone else. "Then I don't see what the problem is."

"How?" Bucky demands, his hands flinging into the air of their own accord. "Did you not hear a word I said?"

But Steve's smile barely dims at all, and although he doesn't physically move any closer, it feels to Bucky like he does. "Every single one," he says softly. "But I think maybe when you're talking about a relationship, you don't mean the same thing I do.

"See, to me, a relationship is having someone I can sit with in an evening and talk about our days. It's having someone I can share my problems with and who can share their problems with me in return. It's knowing that we might not agree on everything, but when it comes to the important stuff we're always going to be on the same side. Coming home from the worst day ever and feeling better just because the person I love is there. Introducing them to my friends and taking them to dinner at my favourite places and buying things I hate because I know they'll love them. Waking up in the morning knowing the first person I see is going to be the person I most want to see. Going into a fight knowing I don't need to watch my six because you're there to watch it for me. Sitting up for hours in front of commercials for things no one sane would ever want to buy because neither of us can sleep. Hurting because you're hurting, and smiling for no other reason than that you're smiling.

"So what if we never have sex. So what if we have separate beds. So what if you need me to ask before I kiss you, and you say no more often than you say yes." Steve pauses a second, his smile softer now, and almost impossibly earnest. "Bucky, those things aren't important. They don't make a relationship, and if you don't want them, I don't want them. I love you, and you've said you love me, and as far as I'm concerned those are the things that matter."

He falls silent, just watching Bucky for a long, long moment, and then, still earnest but not quite as confident, says, "So, I guess I'm asking if you want to go steady."

Bucky can't do anything but stare at him. He's barely tracking what Steve's saying, let alone being able to form an opinion on it.

Fortunately, it seems that Steve is aware of this, because he nods sharply, then continues.

"Okay," he says. "I've said what I wanted to say, so I'll let you think about it. And, Bucky, whatever you say, you will always, always be my best friend. I give you my word that there won't be any negative consequences if you say no, and I'll accept your decision absolutely. Tell me you don't want what I've said, and we'll never talk about it again. Nothing has to change unless you want it to."

He nods again, not quite so sharply, and gives Bucky one last smile before he turns around, making his way to the door to leave yet again.

Bucky shouldn't need time to think about it, or space, or whatever Steve thinks he's giving him by leaving. Steve might think he would be okay with a relationship lacking most forms of physical intimacy. Hell, he might even be right about it, in the short term, but after a couple of months, he'll be thinking differently.

Even the serum can't give a person unlimited patience, and Steve's going to get tired of waiting for something Bucky can't give him. And he knows Steve won't pressure him into anything, won't push after Bucky says no, but he'll wish and he'll want and he'll do everything in his power to hide it but that won't change the fact that there's a part of him that's disappointed.

That, disappointing Steve, is something Bucky's done way too much of in his life, and he's sure as hell not going to do it any more than he has to.

He shouldn't need to think about it at all.

Turns out, he doesn't think about it at all.

"Wait," says his mouth, with absolutely zero permission from his brain. His metal hand is equally disobedient, reaching for Steve's arm again and holding on. "Stevie…"

Because Steve has never once acted like he's waiting for Bucky to get his memories back. He jokes like he used to, teases and pokes fun, and sometimes Bucky manages a laugh and sometimes he doesn't but Steve still smiles at him. He sometimes cooks the same terrible meals he'd have on the table when Bucky got home from work, back when he was too sick to keep a job but still stubbornly determined to earn his keep, and Bucky comes home after his shitty therapy sessions and chokes them down the way he would before.

Steve teaches him the crap about the future he doesn't know (blind leading the blind, if ever I saw it, Sam said once, to Natasha's fervent agreement) and he sits up for fifty-odd hours in a row when Bucky's head is extra fucked up. He makes sure JARVIS buys them junk food because he thinks Bucky might like it even though it's so lacking in nutritional value Steve winces whenever he sees it. He leaves daft little doodles in ridiculous places, and doesn't even stick around to see Bucky smile when he finds them. He opens his arms to offer Bucky a hug, encircling him like a wall no invader could ever get past if Bucky accepts and not even batting an eyelid when he shakes his head and defends his space too vociferously. He tries to leave his enemies alive whenever possible but for Bucky he'll burn down the whole fucking world if he has to.

He brought Bucky back from hell, and he's the reason Bucky's clawed himself back from the brink every single day since.

"Yes," Bucky says, because Steve took a stupid, suicidal chance when he put down the shield and let the Winter Soldier beat his face to a pulp, and now it's Bucky's turn to take a chance on him.

He owes it to both of them to try, at least. Maybe it doesn't work out, maybe Steve realises Bucky isn't close enough to who he was to be worth the effort, Maybe he ends things when he figures out how important all the things Bucky can't give him actually are, maybe they both wind up with their hearts broken and no idea how to live their lives in the aftermath… Maybe, but even so, Bucky's putting down his shield. He's trying.

"Steve," he says, and then again, "Stevie," stronger this time. "Yes, Stevie. But don't go thinking that changes anything. I'm still not going to bed with you."

"Okay," Steve answers, easy as anything. "Tony was talking about ordering Moroccan on the way back. D'you feel up to eating with everyone, or should we get our own and eat here?"

Bucky shrugs, then shakes his head, then says, "There's fine."

"Okay," Steve says again. He holds out his hand, the way he does when Bucky's buried himself in a mound of pillows and blankets on the sofa in their living area (something he's only recently started being comfortable enough to do, and only on their floor, when JARVIS has secured it and Steve's locked in there with him) and Steve is offering to haul him to his feet.

Except he's already standing, doesn't need Steve to get him off his ass and on his way to wherever Steve wants him to go, so why is he…

Oh.

Steve wants to hold his hand.

It's not like they've never held hands before; Bucky has at least a dozen fuzzy memories of clinging to a tiny, sickly Steve's hand like his sweaty palm against Steve's was the only thing holding death at bay. And after that, too: during the war when one or the other of them got themselves landed in the infirmary; the day of a mission gone bad and Steve winding up in the Avengers' on-site medical facility; the nights when it's been Steve's turn to have a nightmare and Bucky's to reach out and pull him from it; the day he quit running long enough for Steve to catch up with him, to reach out and say it's okay, I've got a place where none of them will ever lay a hand on you again; before that, when the Asset dragged its final mission from the river and left him on the bank where his friends would find him and get him help.

Okay. Maybe they've never actually just held hands.

And it's his right hand Steve is offering, so if Bucky accepts, it'll have to be with his left, the arm Hydra forced on him, the hand that's brought so many lives to a premature end. That hand is dripping with blood, drenched in it, and more than once Bucky has found himself scrubbing and scrubbing at it, trying to wash away something only he can see.

But Steve knows that, and he offers all the same.

Bucky accepts.