"Can I ask," the timer was ticking gently in the background while we sat across from one another, and Bucky was still studying me like he was as fascinated by me as I was with him. Weird. "What do you talk about in therapy?"

Another pull from his beer and he shook his head, less as if he was answering me, and more as if he was settling something with himself. "Making amends." Holding the bottle in his left hand, he started worrying at the label with the fingernail on his right index finger. "I have a list."

"You don't have to tell me," I didn't want to make shit more awkward between us, since it seemed to come in waves. "I was curious, and I can stamp it down."

"No," his smile, while small was genuine. "I don't mind telling you." Taking a deep breath that made no sound, still so silent, he told me about the notebook and the list of names. "There are rules." I waited, tilting my head to show him I was listening. "Rule number one: don't do anything illegal." I nodded, obviously. "Rule number two: don't hurt anyone." I bit my lip, wondering how difficult he might find that one. "And rule number three: I have to introduce myself." I stared at him when he finished, waiting to see if he had anything else to add. When he took a drink instead, I nodded again.

Squinting, while I worked through his final "rule", I considered where the idea for the amends was coming from. "Like with the Twelve Steps?" He shrugged with a half hearted go, and I went with it. "I mean, you have to admit you made a mistake, and that you're trying to make things right, and here you are."

Bucky considered my bastardized explanation and nodded. "Basically, sure." He leaned forward and I wondered how he managed to NOT make the chair make the tiny squeak it made when I moved in it? "You're taking the fact that I have a list of people that I knew as the Winter Soldier or people who I hurt as the Winter Soldier, pretty calmly, Brooke."

"I was Snapped into non-existence by a giant purple alien that looked like a cross between a California Raisin and Grimace, while he was wearing a hideous gold glove with a bunch of stones that supposedly held all the universe's secrets." I shrugged. "After that, you don't really seem all that scary, Buck."

He shook his head, but his smile came back, which I was hoping for. "You watched the footage?" I nodded. "I try hard to NOT see any of it."

"I can understand that," I could, honestly. "You were right in the middle of it." I would never understand how vast the long arm and eye of the global media really was, but I had seen footage of the actual fight in Wakanda. "Your hair was longer," my eyes moved to the shorter strands and I bit my lip. "And wasn't there a raccoon?"

"Rocket," he nodded and his teeth gleamed. "He swore he'd get my arm."

"It is a pretty badass arm," I admitted, then rubbed my chest. "Even if it did give me a very badass bruise."

He winced and started to apologize, but I shook my head. "I guess you did run into me." He agreed. The timer rang and I chuckled as his eyes flashed to the tiny bird. "Does that mean -"

"It means I can go shred the chicken and cut up the biscuit dough for the dumplings," I started to get up, but he was on his feet first and holding out a hand to help me. Giving him my hand, he eased me to my feet and I thanked him. "You can keep me company or watch TV?"

"I'll keep you company, if you tell me where your bathroom is first." He bartered, and I pointed to the cracked door.

I had popped open the biscuits by the time he joined me and was pulling them out onto the cutting board. Bucky leaned against the counter to watch.

"You know you could just sit down at the table," I offered, as I picked up the knife to start cutting them into chunks. "This won't take long."

"I haven't watched anyone make dinner in a really long time," was the answer I got back, so I kept up my prep until all the biscuits were cut up.

Opening up the pot, which held the shredded chicken bubbling in a thickened yellow gravy, I started dropping the cut up pieces one by one. Bucky was watching as intently as if I were detonating a bomb and he would be up next.

"If my mom were here," I smiled, thinking about how often she'd made this while one of my friends was over and my dad's friends were watching television in the living room. "She'd put you to work."

"Doing what?" He asked, standing up and ready for orders.

Taking a breath, I considered what else we might want with dinner. "Well, I think there are some frozen carrots in the freezer." Bucky opened the door and after a couple seconds I heard the door shut. "If you open them up, we can toss them in with the rest and they'll give us a root vegetable, and Mom won't bitch me out from beyond."

He chuckled, coming up behind me, which I wasn't expecting and then he was carefully adding the bag's contents to the pot as I finished with my pieces of dough. He wasn't too close, at least he wasn't pressed up against me, but I could feel the warmth pouring off of his body and I could smell the same scent that I'd smelled when I kissed his cheek. Leather, metal, hops - Bucky.

"Now we cover it up, and let it cook until the dough isn't dough and the carrots aren't rocks." I went for the lid, but he beat me to it. Almost. Our hands, metal and flesh were on the handle, and I thought he was going to turn awkward on me again, but he surprised me. Instead of flinching or pulling away, he helped me put the lid on. "There, now we just have to check on it every so -" I was stalling again, and breathless.

"Brooke," Bucky was quiet too, but why would he be loud? We were so close. "Turn around?"

I nodded, yeah. Turning around would be a good idea. A watched pot never - Damn it, Brooke, stop that. I turned and there he was. James Buchanan Barnes. Bucky. And I could still feel the heat pouring off of him, like the familiarity of Romeo's. I watched as his Adam's apple bobbed, telling me that he swallowed, but it was silent, like most of his movements were. I waited, hoping that he would make the first move, because he had the height advantage, and I was stuck against the stove. Lucky for me, he took the initiative.

Bucky's head lowered and I met him partway, my toes getting a workout as I pushed up, and I finally got to feel just how full that lower lip of his really was, and he must have slipped a mint into his mouth while he was taking his bathroom break, because instead of hops, I tasted peppermint on his tongue when he opened his mouth. His right hand was in my hair and his left was on my lower back and mine? Clutching at whatever part of him I could grab, because honestly, I couldn't make up my mind.

Breathing is a necessary evil, and damn if I didn't hate that it was, because it meant we had to pull apart even slightly. His forehead against mine, our eyes opening and meeting, and he still wasn't as breathless as me.

"I haven't done that," his thumb was tracing my lower lip. "Since the 1940s." My eyes went wide and he chuckled. "Did you think that I got a Winter Soldier version of Fleet Week?" I shook my head, but didn't pull away from him.

"Was the last time with Steve?" I asked, raising my eyebrow and he rolled his eyes. "You keep comparing us, mister." My fingers were tracing his face, God he was beautiful. "I want to know who I'm up against here."

"NOT Steve," he assured me, pulling back so he could stand straighter and see me better in the light. "I told you, Brooke, you're a hell of a lot cuter than him."

"And I lack certain appendages that he had." I shrugged as he rolled his eyes. "Pretty sure that's going to be something you'll appreciate sooner rather than later, Buck."

Biting his lip, a lip that I promised myself that I would be tasting again very soon, he let his gaze take a very casual stroll down the length of me. "Sooner, Brooke." His eyes met mine again, and it sounded like a promise. "Much sooner."