Enjoy!
The two look at the door, and Steve narrows his eyes at it. It doesn't sound like Natasha's knock.
"Cap? Are you in there?"
Tony Stark.
"No," Steve says, at first. Then he sighs and opens the door anyway. "Can I help you?" He crosses his arms aggressively and blocks Bucky and the rest of the room from view.
"Can we talk for a second?" Tony asks, his eyes glancing nervously over Steve's shoulder at Bucky.
"Why?"
"I wanted to talk about earlier and – am I interrupting something?" Bucky walks up behind Steve as Tony was talking and evidently surprised him. Not to mention Steve's still not wearing a shirt. Neither of them really picks up on what it looks like to Tony, but Tony doesn't press the issue. Instead, Bucky gives Tony a withering look and says,
"Hi, fuck you, see you later, Stark." He pushes Steve out of the way and closes the door in Tony's face.
"Bucky!" Steve protests, trying to move Bucky away from the door. "What the hell was that?"
Bucky scratches the back of his head and if Steve didn't know better, he'd say he looked slightly ashamed of himself. "Saving you the trouble. I know you don't want to talk to him."
"You can't…Tony, I'll talk to you in a minute, just gimme a second here." Bucky snorts and grabs a white shirt from the closet with the American flag on it, throwing it at Steve's bare torso.
"Put a shirt on, Rogers. Everyone here already knows you're pretty." Steve takes the shirt begrudgingly, mumbling something about just because he's Captain America doesn't mean he has to wear the flag all the time. Then, as Bucky steps away from the door, Steve takes the opportunity to grab the door handle and swing the door open, putting his other hand out to push Bucky playfully out of the way.
"Sorry," Steve says, leaning on the doorframe to block Bucky out. "What were you apologizing?" Tony lifts and eyebrow and leans against the opposite wall. Then he gives a dramatic eye roll with a sigh and says,
"Five minutes. Can you leave Terminator for five minutes to talk to me?" Steve bristles at the nickname and starts to growl,
"Don't call him that…" But Bucky runs over him with words of his own:
"Anything you have to say to Steve you have to say to me." His tone is defensive, and Bucky crosses his arms across his chest as though the matter is finished.
"Why, what are you, Siamese twins?" Tony scoffs, "I don't need to answer to you." Despite his front, Tony's eye twitches nervously and he can't seem to look Bucky in the eye.
"He's fine, Buck," Steve says, "I'll be right back." Bucky scowls and shuts the door behind them.
"He's being weird," Tony says, crinkling his nose. Steve rolls his eyes.
"He's always been weird. What do you want?"
"He can't hear us. We have to walk away."
"Why?"
"Capsicle, you really want to hear what I have to say." Steve follows Tony in silence until they get to the kitchen on Steve's floor, which is several rooms away from Bucky. Tony takes a deep breath and says,
"Look. I'm sorry for being a dick, I just…" Steve snorts and interrupts him. "What?"
"I'm just curious to hear your excuse. It was totally out of line, Tony."
"Don't lecture me, you're not my grandfather."
"I could be."
"Let me finish," Tony says. Steve sees he's serious, so he nods with a small 'sorry..'. "I did some digging on Bucky's file and - "
"You shouldn't have even had access to that!" Steve says, throwing his hands up in the air in exasperation.
"My hands slipped, I'm a genius with a supercomputer, what can I say? Anyway, I found out…well, his file has a list of targets. I'm assuming you read it."
"No," says Steve, furrowing his brow, "I didn't want to know. That was the only thing I didn't touch. Why?"
Tony swallows, pausing for a second as though putting the words together carefully.
"He killed my parents." Tony sighs, running a hand through his hair with agitation, as though trying not to lose it. "He killed them and…I was seventeen, Steve. An orphan. At seventeen. They were high profile SHIELD members, and they were deeply entrenched politically, too. They were the perfect targets. And he personally took them out."
"I thought your parents died in a car accident."
"They did," Tony says shortly, "His car 'accident'."
"Tony, I'm sorry, I didn't…I didn't know." Tony waves it away dismissively. "I knew your dad. He was a good man. Bucky…he didn't really know him all that well, but they got along."
"Yeah, and I know it's not technically his fault."
"It's not," Steve says firmly, "You can't blame him for this."
"It's hard not to, okay?" Tony replies, his voice rising in pitch, "I'm trying. I'm trying really hard not to. But I look at him every day, look at his hands, that damn metal arm and think to myself 'That arm cut the brake lines' or 'That arm steered the truck that killed my parents'. And then I think about what the exhibit says about him, dying for you and all that…sometimes I almost wish he had died."
Steve's expression hardens and he doesn't know what to say. What can he say? He doesn't wish Bucky died on that train, not in a million years, but he also wishes Howard and Maria Stark weren't dead because of him. If Bucky had died, he wouldn't have been in perpetual pain for almost seventy years.
"That's a terrible thing to say. I don't," Steve says finally, "I don't wish he died. He's all I have." Tony frowns at him.
"You have us, dumbass," Tony scoffs. Steve shakes his head.
"That's not what I meant, and you don't understand. He's all I have left of my old life. He reminds me every day of who I am, and without him, I feel like I'm losing it again. Even when I had nothing, I had him. He will always stay by my side and I believe in him. He didn't want them dead, Tony. HYDRA did."
"Remind me again who fought with you in New York against Loki? Was it Bucky? Oh, wait, no, it was me. And Natasha and Clint and Bruce and Thor. Or have you forgotten all of that and all of us? Where was Barnes? The 40s is over, Rogers. It's time for you to start living in the present. Wake up for real this time."
"And here I thought we were trying to be friends again," Steve says with a cynical smile, "I'm sorry for not blaming my best friend for problems he didn't want."
"Well, now he has them," Tony growls, "Watch yourself." He shoves past Steve and almost gets to the door when Steve stops him.
"Are you threatening me?"
"Not threatening, Cap. I don't have to. I'm just warning you to keep both eyes on that sonofabitch. He may be your friend, but he's still armed and dangerous." Steve's jaw tightens at the inappropriate pun. "All I'm saying is to watch your back, because one day you might wake up and we're all you have left anymore." With that, in Tony's usual dramatic flair, he storms out of the room, leaving Cap alone with his thoughts until he decides 'screw Tony and get back to talking to someone who really deserves your attention'.
When he gets back, Bucky's changed into a tight black tank top and grey sweatpants. His hair is still tied back in that ponytail, and he's looking at his metal arm like it's new to him. He's sitting on the edge of the bed, and he stands up happily when Steve walks in.
"That looks like it went well," says Bucky sarcastically. Steve gives him a small smile.
"We're working on it," he replies, "How are you?"
"Better."
"You sound better. More…like yourself."
Bucky smirks, "That's rude."
"It's not!" Steve splutters, "I'm being honest!" He grins at Bucky and continues, "Glad to have you back. I can't believe it." Bucky shrugs and quirks an eyebrow.
"It's pretty cool. I remember everything. It's weird to think I could forget all of that, or at least not see it." Steve's smile falters a bit.
"Everything?" Bucky nods and bites his lip.
"Mhm." Steve's mind flies to Bucky's torture with HYDRA, does he remember that? Or even worse, does he remember killing people? Does he remember killing Howard Stark? Bucky's giving him a weird look now, and he steps forward and pulls Steve into his arms.
"All the bad stuff, with all the good," he says quietly, as though reading Steve's mind. "I'm sorry for not being there for you."
"No, I'm sorry," Steve whines into Bucky's shoulder, "I should have….done something; I should have saved you. It should have been me in your place." Bucky laughs bitterly and pulls away to look at Steve.
"And where would the world be without Captain America, you idiot?"
"Hey, that's my word…" Steve says sheepishly, "You're the idiot, not me."
"And you're still a punk," Bucky says, resting his forehead on Steve's, "I missed you."
"Me too," Steve says, a tear sliding down his cheek, "I hated the world without Bucky Barnes."
"Who's that?" Bucky jokes, a sly grin on his face. Steve gives him a look and Bucky raises an eyebrow. "Too soon?"
"Too soon."
"Yeah, I know. How long was I out, anyway?"
"Just this afternoon," Steve says after a second, looking at Bucky uncertainly, "I'm sure Natasha's coming in a few minutes to drag us out to dinner."
"Mhm," Bucky repeats, "Did she used to work for the KGB? She looks really familiar."
"Well, she did try to kill you," Steve jokes. Bucky tsks and starts towards the door. "Where do you think you're going?"
"I hear Natasha coming," he says simply.
"You…what?!" Steve couldn't hear Natasha walking if he tried. She walks soundlessly on purpose just to scare people when she comes up behind them. Sometimes unintentionally. He opens the door and sure enough, Natasha's standing there, fist raised about to knock.
"Hello boys," she grins, "Nice to see you awake for once, sunshine."
"Thanks," Bucky mutters.
"He remembers," Steve tells her, "No additional cognitive re-calibration necessary."
"Good," Natasha breathes, "That would have been annoying to explain." If Bucky's at all confused by the conversation, he doesn't show it.
