Nine Hours Pre-Cody.
Is there anything more exciting than the first few weeks of a secret love affair? Operating under the guise of attentive professionalism (were vet/client relationships off the table? Elsa would have to check that…) for small things to help the newcomer? Things like… "checking the hay quality" as an excuse for a literal roll in said hay.
Not that anyone took any notice, but it was fun. Never had either Bucky or Elsa been asked why the vet's visit far outweighed those of bigger and more populated farms. Never had anyone passed comment about her leaving there in the morning (with increasing frequency), only to return there in the evening and her jeep never to move in between. That came down to one of two things: The privacy of the farm itself from its neighbours, or simply: no one cared.
More to the point (in Bucky's old fashioned, ingrained chivalry), the whole experience was not defined by him just sleeping with his vet; though there was plenty of that, it dictated many of their nights and their mornings. When Elsa stayed, of course. They had, for the most part, a sweet, affectionate, respectful, practical cohabitation. When she was not there, be it at work or spending the occasional night at the apartment for laundry, her absence nipped and stung him. And when she was there… all had been righted in the world; that of the ex-Winter Soldier, at least.
But Bucky did not dare to call it love yet.
"Bucky, I know you don't want to hear this, love, but I really have to go…"
That morning, like so many others (but with a monster storm brewing on the horizon), saw Elsa half-heartedly fighting to go to work; not too hard, mind you. Despite her body sandwiching his to the not-quite-single mattress, Bucky's only arm clamped to her waist kept her to him but, if she really wanted him to let her go, she knew precisely where to poke. Instead, her arms met behind his neck and her cheek warmed his collarbone.
"No…" The whined protest would have been expected from a two-year-old, not a one-hundred-year-old ex-assassin. He redeemed himself, however, with the lasting pecks to the top of her chocolate crown, then nuzzling the exact spot as if to iron them in enough to stay with her for the rest of the day, until he could replenish them himself later. "No, c'mon. Stay..."
"So you can have your wicked way with me? Again?"
"What, so it's not wicked when you do it? And you mounted me."
"You're foul, James." He wasn't the only thing foul. Between the heat and the mixed scents of an incredible night, the front door and several windows would need to be opened. "And I've never seen a man's eyes roll in his head like I did yours last night." The most effort the little vet went to in getting up simply included burrowing further into her partner's natural musk; prompting him to tighten his hold and plant another kiss. "I'm going to be late for my first appointment, then the next one, then the next one, then I'll be late getting back here. Do you want me driving in the storm? And everywhere is going to be closed early so dinner-"
"Tell 'em you broke down. Or… where's my baling knife, I'll slash one of your tyres and it won't even be a lie." She lived for that mischievous hum; awake enough to know better but still tired enough to be endearing. Both were yet to open their eyes.
"I have a spare in the boot, under the blood cooler."
"If you've got a spare in the trunk, I'll slash that too."
"Tell me, do you have much experience in slashing tyres?"
"Well… uhh… explosives were more the Winter Soldier's bag but, yeah, pre-shipping out… There was a gang that used to pick on Steve when I wasn't around. One day, they pulled up beside him when he was walkin' to my place, dumped a Coke over his new white shirt, then jumped back in the car and took off." Only then, irked enough by the memory, did James Buchanan Barnes open his eyes and shift her grounding ever so slightly, prompting her to do the same: the beginning of the dreaded getting up.
"He got to my place, my mom went crazy, whipped the shirt off him to clean it, gave him one of mine and we went lookin' for 'em. Spotted the car parked outside an automat and slashed the tyres with a piece'a glass I found in the street."
Bucky assumed the pause was his partner trying to come to terms with his delinquencies when he did not have Hydra as an excuse. But… That was Brooklyn, a somewhat unforgiving environment in the 30's and 40's; particularly after the Crash of '29. He and Steve had always managed to find themselves in trouble and while most of it was in self-defence, that time happened to be revenge. However, it seemed his little vet had heard enough of his and Steve's pre-shipping out antics to be surprised by it. Instead…
"What the Hell is an automat?" After a pause of his own, bordering on (playfully) indignant, Bucky wondered if she'd heard him right. Why wasn't she berating him for damage to property?
"That's what you took from what I just told you? "What's an automat?""
"I just don't know what an automat is. I've never heard of one." Christ, baby, I gotta take you to Brooklyn… Little did he know the last automat closed the same year he massacred the Starks.
"It's like uhh… it's like a diner but… there's all these glass compartments in the walls with the food in 'em and you just… grab what you want. Sandwiches, desserts, breakfasts, you name it. The one on Willoughby Street had the best-"
"Apple pie?"
"Shut up." If the last thing that Bucky heard was the giggle that followed, he knew, for certain, he would die a happy man. Those Goddamn apple pie jokes…
"I mean… I understand the practicalities of it but… I can't decide if it sounds appealing or not."
"Simpler times." The White Wolf reasoned with something akin to a shrug and incline of his shaggy head. "Fewer food safety standards."
"Mmm… Seems so long ago but… you're here." Despite how incredibly well things were going and how famously they got in (in bed and out of it), Bucky still had those sneering doubts encroaching upon him when they were least welcome; like just then, when she was naked, beautiful and sprawled on top of him. Don't worry, she'll find something wrong with you. The age difference? Mismatched times and experiences? You'll run out of things to talk about eventually and when you do, she'll drop you like her fiancé dropped her. The sex won't save you either. It might be keeping her here for now, but she'll get bored. Be prepared, for your own sake.
Shut. Up.
But… just to be safe…
"Does that bother you?"
To hear it from her would prove invaluable and so, the forlorn White Wolf (a name he had been given and accepted as a remarkable honour) dipped his head even lower to line his nose to her cheek. Without prompting, or even an inkling into how crucial her answer would be, the little vet took the intimacy beyond what he gave her: turning her head to placidly find his lips with hers.
"Would I be here if it bothered me?" No, you wouldn't be. And thank God you are…
"Just makin' sure."
"You're not the first older man, you know. Alastair was six years older than me, and I thought that was pushing it a bit but… this new fellow I've been seeing, he has sixty-eight years on top of that. He's so wonderfully strange, you see, he calls things by different names..."
"Oh, that's why he's strange…?"
"Mmm… It's terribly sweet. Like the rest of him."
"Yeah, well, all joking aside, if I ever come across him, I will punch him in the face."
Unfazed and undoubting, Elsa found the strength and will to pry herself free (minus the poke) and begin the arduous process of getting ready for work. Fresh underwear fished from her bag and unofficial uniform salvaged from the floor, she went about the morning routine of getting breakfast started; even a slice of toast and a cup of tea would do.
"If you insist upon doing that, will you just give me some notice? Ten seconds would do it."
"Why? So you can stop me?"
"No, love. So I can record it."
It came Bucky's turn to laugh; watching, besotted, as she went about filling the kettle to boil it. Small things, like this prime example, tended to remind him of his (previously) unimaginable good fortune in having her; despite the snide utterances of his own mind.
"You had me worried there for a sec, Els."
Kettle heating, Elsa took to opening the windows to dispel the aroma upon herself while Bucky infatuatedly watched every bounce of her hips as she did so.
"You're rather fond of that nickname now, aren't you?" She pressed coyly, returning to the kitchen with a flirtatious glance over her shoulder to start preparing toast. "You're the only one who's called me it since my mother died." Bucky, oversensitive and borderline paranoid Bucky, immediately panicked; fearing a line crossed and of offending one of the best things (so far) to happen to him.
"I can stop… It's no pr-"
Toast slowly growing golden under the glowing bars of the grill, it did not require much supervision just yet, so Elsa re-crossed the restricted living space with purpose; cutting off her lover's bumbling by plopping back down on the bed. Well… What really cut him off was the doting press of her lips to his. What took his breath away (like it always did) was the similarly enamoured hold of bright blue on his, pulled back just enough for their gazes to meet briefly before she scarpered to rescue the toast.
"Sweetheart, you can call me every name under the sun, but as long as it's wrapped up in that rugged accent of yours, I'll come running."