"Maybe I shouldn't be here."

Bucky looks up from watching his new metal hand—courtesy of Wakandan technology and hospitality—recalibrate as he moves it back and forth to find Steve Rogers leaning against the doorway between their rooms.

Steve.

Bucky has… he has slivers of memory—ones that Steve tells him about, ones that come to him in dreams and in nightmares, ones that come to him from a thought, an object, an idea.

He knows enough about Steve to know that he doesn't want Steve to leave.

"Why?" His voice is raspy from disuse. He's not sure when he last said anything, and he can see from the way Steve's eyes jump quickly to his face that Steve is surprised he's said anything now.

Steve seems to study him for a moment. From what memories Bucky does have, he remembers Steve being much easier to read—somewhere in the years Bucky has missed, Steve has learned to keep up his guard. Bucky hasn't learned how to see past it yet, and he's surprised by how much he wants to. It's not common that he feels… like he wants things.

It's not common that he feels.

Whatever's on Bucky's face seems to mean something to Steve, because he strides casually into the room, taking a seat beside Bucky on Bucky's bed, as easily as if they're still best friends.

Maybe they are?

Bucky isn't sure.

It doesn't escape his notice that Steve keeps his hands loose and in front of him, and that all of his steps are too soft to be jolting but not soft enough to be stealthy.

"Don't get me wrong," he says, blue eyes focused on Bucky's metal arm as Bucky picks things up curiously and puts them down, still getting used to his day-old arm. "There's nowhere I'd rather be than here with you." He pauses. He seems to do that a lot. Whether he's considering his next words or giving Bucky time to process what he's said, Bucky isn't sure. "But… there are people looking for me, and there are people looking for you. The two of us together—we're a bigger target."

"You think I'll get you in trouble," Bucky rasps. He clears his throat and glances at Steve—his jawline that Bucky knows is objectively attractive, the furrow of his brow, the steady and intense blue of his eyes when he looks up at Bucky. He used to be shorter than me, Bucky thinks, picturing the little Steve he has in his memories. And skinnier. "This place is safe. You should stay. I'll go."

Bucky looks around the humble residence they've been provided. The blinded windows, the shieldable door that locks from inside, the bed and modest kitchen and a coffee table with a couch all in the same room, barely anywhere to hide.

He moves to stand.

Steve has stayed with him in Wakanda for about a week now, but Bucky was under no illusions that this would be a permanent setup. They're encroaching on Wakanda's kindness, and however much Wakanda says they want to help, the Winter Soldier is an international target and Wakanda is probably the closest thing to a utopia anywhere on earth. Bucky doesn't want to ruin that because someone finds out he's here and suddenly Wakanda's in international trouble, their borders being invaded by UN-sanctioned forces.

He's quite literally ready to go at a moment's notice. He can go now, if that's what Steve wants.

"No." Steve's hand—big, gentle—settles on Bucky's shoulder, wordlessly entreating him not to stand up. Bucky obeys. "That's not what I meant. I said maybe I shouldn't be here."

Bucky shakes his head. "You deserve their protection. This place… it's perfect."

Today is a day for a lot of talking, apparently. That's okay. He enjoys talking to Steve. When he told that to Steve a couple months ago, Steve smiled so widely Bucky had to look away. He didn't want to be looking when it went away.

"You need their protection more than I do," Steve says. "If the government gets their hands on you, who knows what they'll do. At least with me, I'll know it's nothing that bad."

Bucky raises his eyebrows wryly at that. "They'll lock you up." He looks pointedly at Steve's hand, and Steve's cheeks color slightly, his hand dropping from Bucky's shoulder.

Feeling somewhat bereft, even though that's exactly what he'd wanted Steve to do, Bucky stands and makes his way to the kitchen section of the room, rifling through the fridge for something to cook. He finds onions; grabs them and a cutting board and a knife, pulling the skins off the onions in deft movements. He puts water on the stove for rice, because you can't go wrong with rice.

Steve speaks without standing up from Bucky's bed. "And for you, they'll do worse."

Bucky looks up from the onions he's chopping. "Then I'm ready to take that," he says clearly to Steve, before looking back down. He could chop the whole pile in five seconds flat, but he likes the slow, easy movement of this—of cooking, of making something for the two of them to share together. Creation instead of destruction. He wants to savor it. "I don't want to drag you into this."

"You're not dragging me into anything," Steve insists, "I'm making the choice to follow you—" he breaks off, and when he speaks again, there's this hint of bewilderment in his voice that Bucky finds he likes very much. "You're laughing."

Bucky is. It's a strange feeling—he's almost laughed, this weird sort of half-hearted breathy thing—before, since getting out of the ice the last time, but he hasn't really fully laughed for… for what must be a very long time. Years. Decades. Maybe since the last time he was with Steve, way back during World War II. It comes from his chest and his stomach, full of air and sound, and it makes his hands shake a little, so he has to put the knife down.

"I forgot," he says, hands pressed flat against the cutting board to trap the knife into stillness, "how goddamn stubborn you are."

Steve still looks bewildered, his face pleasantly blank for a moment—and then his face lights up like a kid on Christmas day, his shoulders falling as if he's letting go of some tension he's been carrying the whole time they've been together. The sight burns something bright and warm and steady in Bucky's chest. It makes Bucky feel like the fifteen feet between them is fifteen feet too many. Steve's smile could light up the whole continent. The UN's probably coming right now, clued in by the beacon of light shining from the outer edges of Wakanda.

Something comes back, the memory of a feeling, fluttering in Bucky's gut and then in his heart. This smile of Steve's, it wakes something up inside of him, and he gets the feeling that it always has. Something careful and sweet and fierce. Bucky interrogates it and finds it not entirely platonic—perhaps not platonic at all. And when he thinks this, he thinks, oh, it's always been this. Steve. It does not rock his world, this realization; rather, it's as if his world has been revealed to him, and the only thing in his mind is of course.

"I can't imagine what you could be talking about," Steve says, smiling this shit-eating grin, and making his way over to Bucky's side. He presses his shoulder gently against Bucky's.

Bucky feels flesh and bone, heart and soul. He feels so far from metal and mind and mission first that he could almost imagine the Winter Soldier was someone else for one bright, bright moment.

"What can I do?" Steve gestures to the cutting board and the boiling water on the stove. "What is it?"

"I don't know," Bucky confesses, handing Steve the knife and pushing the onions his way. "We'll see."

This, too, is new. He used to have missions, dictated to him in no uncertain terms. Doing something with no clear intent in mind is something he's getting used to again, and he has to admit it's thrilling, addicting. To go into something not sure of what will come out. To be utterly, pleasantly surprised by this thing he achieved by trying and exploring.

Steve tells him that Bucky—old Bucky—used to be like that, too. Always up for experiencing new things, always loving the idea of going out and "playing it by ear."

Smiling at him in a way that makes Bucky's stomach fluttery, Steve takes the knife and obediently begins chopping the greens in the same easy, steady rhythm Bucky was a moment ago.

Bucky thinks they're both trying at the same charade: pretending they're normal people living normal, domestic lives together, instead of two friends in a welcoming but foreign country, wanted by a majority of the world's countries, both frozen for decades in time, on the run and in hiding.

Perhaps Steve is wishing it were Peggy who got frozen instead.

Bucky immediately feels gross and terrible inside for thinking that, for allowing that thought to enter his mind.

Peggy is gone, Peggy is dead. Steve grieved her and had a right to grieve her. She was strong and steady, Steve said. bold and clever and coy and kind, and if Steve loved her for the rest of his long, long life, Bucky wouldn't blame him.

But it's also an ugly thought because it's not a fucking competition. Steve has a big enough heart to love the whole world, and he does love the whole world. He sure loves Bucky a lot more than he deserves.

Even if it isn't the kind of love Bucky craves from Steve, it's enough. It's more than enough.

"Buck." Steve's voice comes gently from behind him. "Hey, Bucky. The fridge is asking for some rescuing."

Bucky's been holding the fridge door open, staring blankly at the contents. That feeling before—of being human, of being removed from the Winter Soldier—disappears as quickly as it came. Bucky's metal hand closes around a plastic bag of ocra, and he dumps the contents into a bowl to wash them. "Sorry," he says. It comes out flat, like the kind of response an artificial intelligence program might give.

Steve presses his hand lightly against Bucky's back, a reminder that he's there, before stepping away. "Don't be sorry."

Steve's keeping his distance again, the thing he does whenever Bucky's acting more like the Winter Soldier than himself. Or maybe himself is the Winter Soldier. Maybe Bucky is the outlier in who… who James Buchanan Barnes really is. Steve doesn't do it to hurt Bucky—in fact, Bucky's positive Steve does it deliberately to avoid upsetting Bucky more—but then Steve doesn't know how much Bucky wants to get closer, and closer, and closer. How the distance between them stings even though it's meant to be for Bucky's sake.

They cook the rest of the meal—curry powder with okra and onions on long-grain rice, desperately needing some sort of citrus sour—in silence, and eat it together across the table from one another, shooting each other glances and each pretending not to catch the other.

"Thank you for cooking," Steve says afterward, all serious voice and steady gaze.

Bucky shrugs one shoulder, even though he can tell that shows of indifference like that discourage Steve, even though Steve tries not to show it. It makes Bucky feel itchy when Steve thanks him. It isn't right. "You helped."

Steve nods once. "Well then, thank you for letting me help."

It's not necessary to thank Bucky. Bucky loves cooking alone, but he loves cooking with Steve even more. It makes him think, sometimes, that maybe they could pull this off, this Bucky-and-Steve act. This the-Winter-Soldier-never-happened act.

"You're welcome," he says anyway. He doesn't think he'd do very well explaining to Steve why Steve shouldn't have to say thank you. And Steve will say thank you regardless.

Steve clears his throat and stands. "Well, I should head in. I might want to begin packing."

Bucky stills. "You won't," he says, trying to sound commanding. It only comes out uncertain. "Don't."

There's a moment between them, when Steve's standing in the doorway again, looking back at him. This breathless moment where Bucky thinks maybe, maybe Steve will give in. Alright, he'll say. If you're so sure.

But Steve shakes his head. "Maybe not tonight," he says, and Bucky knows they'll be discussing this again soon.

"Then—" he falters. "Then stay. Play… play cards with me or something."

Steve's eyebrows jump up, his mouth tugging up in another of his bemused smiles that do things to Bucky's insides, but he drops his hand from the doorway and steps back into Bucky's room, closing the in-between door behind him.

Somehow, Bucky feels as if he's won—not the war, just the battle.

Steve won't stay forever. But he'll stay for cards.

"Got a deck?"

"I think I saw one earlier, when I was unpacking," Bucky says. This is a joke. Bucky had one single backpack, mostly nutrition bars, water, changes of underwear, weapons and ammunition. It sits in the corner at the foot of his bed, untouched.

Steve laughs. Bucky feels a spark of triumph; he has successfully executed a social maneuver.

"No," he says, "I know there's one, help me find it."

Steve looks along the bookshelves, all cluttered with the little things of today the people of Wakanda have been kind enough to come bring him, delighting in the way he inspects them curiously and discovers their uses. Only this village on the edge of the country and the highest clearance of government knows he's here, but apparently, they've taken him in like a stray dog.

Bucky looks in the empty drawers, in the cabinets full of board games and games with little wooden pieces and letters of a language he knows he learned as the Winter Soldier, but can't read without focusing, and finds it among pads of sticky paper, beside a little pack of pens.

This place is so nice.

It's made for living in, not surviving in.

It's not his place to take, or to live in; it just wouldn't be right to accept this place from the Wakandans simply because he likes it more than any place he's been since the ice—but he can't help thinking. The warm weather, the shielded door. Clothes in the wardrobe and in the hamper. Paper, pencils, soft carpets and clean couches, food in the fridge and dishes in the cabinets, clothes in the dresser knickknacks on the bookshelf… Steve just one knock away.

"Buck…"

Bucky blinks. He's standing by the open drawer, his human hand around the deck of cards, rubbing his thumb along the edge of it. He probably has been for a minute or more. "Sorry," he says again.

It's an up and down evening.

They usually are.

"Don't be sorry," Steve says immediately.

Bucky thinks if Steve were put up in front of a firing squad with orders to shoot if he made a sound, and Bucky said sorry, Steve would say don't be sorry before he could even stop himself.

Steve settles himself on the couch, the picture of ease—a show for Bucky's sake—and waits for him with a patient smile, hands open and empty where Bucky can see them.

Bucky wants to take them. He wants to hold them. He wants to watch their fingers wind around each other and then he wants to wind around Steve with parts of himself that are not his fingers. Closer, his heart begs, closer, closer, closer.

He steps closer, his gaze falling away from the gleam of Steve's blond hair in the automatic lights that come on after sunset before he starts staring.

Steve reads it wrong. "Bucky," he says, leaning forward, elbows on his knees, and looking up at Bucky, "Bucky, hey, it's okay. It's not a big deal."

Bucky sits himself on the couch—no blood on the couch; this place is a wonder—and passes Steve the deck across the table. "I could've remembered more of you, but instead I remember how to play poker. My brain is the worst."

This startles a laugh out of Steve, and the victory is no less sweet the second time tonight. Bucky lets himself chuckle too, even though he wasn't joking. He'd give anything to remember more about Steve, to feel less like an imposter standing in the skin of a man Steve once cared about, and to feel more like the man who earned Steve's care and respect.

When Steve shuffles, the crisp sound of the cards cutting through the silence of the night, cuts the deck and shuffles again, Bucky gets the niggling feeling that they've done this before. Steve hands the deck back, and Bucky cuts it, placing the bottom half on top.

Yes, they've done this before. Steve shuffling, Bucky cutting.

It gives him a spark of satisfaction—some of old Bucky is still living in him. Some part of him still belongs to Steve. As he should. As he wants to be.

They play poker into the night, playing first easy and fun, and then playfully competitive, and then a halfhearted, laughing game of missteps and quiet midnight jokes. Some little part of Bucky pretends that if he keeps Steve up late enough, Steve will be too tired and wake up too late to broach the subject of leaving again.

But he's just putting off the inevitable, though. Trying to keep Steve from something he's set his mind to is a losing game, and Bucky knows it.

Steve wakes early in the morning, as he always does. He looks tired—and no wonder, given their late night—but he's got breakfast on the table by the time Bucky's up and dressed. He hardly ever spends time in his own room, except to sleep. From dawn to dusk, he's with Bucky, even when Bucky's company is dry and his words are scarce.

Thankfully, Steve doesn't bring up leaving again, but Bucky can feel it hanging in the air, this thing Steve wants to talk about but won't breach until he thinks Bucky is ready for it again. He can feel Steve's eyes on him, careful glances, trying to assess if he can bring it up again.

No, Bucky wants to say, don't talk about that again. I never want to hear about it.

Steve is right—they pose a bigger target together; they're more likely to find if Steve keeps this disappearance up. But if either of them is going to leave, it should be Bucky. Steve deserves a place like Wakanda, where he can have his peaceful life without having to worry about war and discovery, without having to be touched by the outside world. Anywhere else, Bucky knows Steve would have the unkillable urge to fix everything, but here… here they have everything under control—concealment, safety, shelter, food. Steve can let go for once.

"Thanks for breakfast." Bucky collects both their plates and takes them to the dishwasher.

"Hope it wasn't terrible." Steve thinks he's much worse of a cook than he is, and Bucky finds this too endearing. "I was a little tired this morning."

"Can't imagine why," Bucky says wryly.

Steve cracks a tired smile, the corners of his eyes wrinkling, and Bucky's stomach feels warm. Steve stands, but he's only heading to the bathroom.

"It was good," Bucky says. It's such a simple statement, and he wishes, not for the first time, he could tap into his old self. Old Bucky apparently was much more of a social butterfly. "You didn't have to get up so early."

Steve emerges from the bathroom, toothbrush in hand. The knowledge that Steve left his toothbrush and toothpaste in Bucky's bathroom last night gives Bucky more of a thrill than it should. It's unbelievable that he gets these little, stupid parts of Captain America—his early morning smile, the way he brushes his teeth and tries to talk at the same time ("I wanted to," he says, "You like the way I do eggs.") and the glimpse of his skin Bucky gets when Steve reaches for his razor, on the highest shelf in the bathroom cabinet.

And Bucky knows it isn't much. Just the lower half of Steve's face covered in shaving cream, the scent of Steve's cologne, the warm space on the couch where Steve was a moment ago, the extra pair of hands to cook with and the person across the table he can share a card game and a meal with.

It isn't as if they're married.

But it's enough that Bucky very acutely feels that he does not want to lose it.

Bucky follows Steve outside, flexing his metal arm—now two days old—and the fingers of his human hand. They've started taking long hikes since they landed, ones that run along the shielded border of Wakanda, where few people stray. They shouldn't go through the border—the government tells them not to—but sometimes they slip past it, taking advantage of their clearance to explore the jungles, eat lunch on tree trunks, and climb slopes steep enough that they give Bucky an excuse to ask Steve for a hand up.

"Ah…" Steve looks back at Bucky, forehead wrinkled. "Do you hear that?"

The countryside is usually the sort of quiet that is unsettling the first moment they step out, before they take a moment to breathe, but right now it's… not exactly. There's something going off, a faint booming noise that you have to listen for. But it's certainly there.

Steve looks Bucky's way for a moment, and Bucky points wordlessly in the direction they can hear the booms coming from, a muffled echo across the land.

"I'll go look." His voice is that deep, serious one he uses when he's talking to the other Avengers, or when he's talking to the Winter Soldier. He's already pulling on his cap."It doesn't sound like anything is breaking the shield. It might not be anything to worry about."

"The shield," Bucky echoes, glancing up, even though he knows he'll see nothing but the clear blue sky. "I'll go with you." His mask, the one he uses to prevent any facial recognition, is still in his backpack.

"What?" Steve turns to look back at him. "No, no you stay here. Get back inside." He's still using that voice, the one that's more of a command than a request. The one he knows Bucky won't disobey.

"Steve."

"Bucky." Steve reaches over and squeezes his shoulder, his voice brooking no argument. "We already talked about this; I'm not putting you at risk. Get back inside, keep your head down… don't do anything stupid until I get back."

A memory surfaces. "How can I," Bucky says slowly, "You're taking all the stupid with you."

A tenderness that takes Bucky's breath away flashes across Steve's face for a moment, and his hand tightens on Bucky's shoulder. "I'll be careful."

Bucky laughs again, and Steve's eyes light up. "No you won't."

"Just get back inside," Steve says, but he's smiling. "I'll be right back."

Bucky gets back inside like he's told, closes the door and turns on the shield, draws the blinds, and paces. If Steve were by himself, perhaps that wouldn't be so worrying, because God knows Steve can take care of himself.

But Steve isn't alone. Bucky's here, too, and Steve is practically incapable of taking care of himself and someone else at the same time—he just gives himself up for the other person, whether that be sleep, food… or, Bucky suspects, literally giving himself up.

Steve would do it.

Rifling through his bag for his mask and letting his hair down to further obscure his face, Bucky gets ready to follow Steve out, against Steve's wishes or no—

But just then the shield flickers down, and the door opens. It's Steve, moving swiftly in and closing everything up behind him.

One look at his face tells Bucky this isn't good.

"They don't know we're here," Steve says immediately, catching Bucky's look. His eyes flicker down to where Bucky's hands are still clenched around his bag. "I thought I told you to stay."

"I'm with you 'till the end of the line," Bucky says. He keeps quoting his old self; he wishes he had some new words of his own. But they make Steve's guard drop and his lips part, this quiet, happy surprise stealing over his face every time, and Bucky feels more like Steve's Bucky whenever Steve looks at him like that. "You're not going anywhere without me."

A warm look crosses Steve's face before he makes his way to the door connecting their two rooms, and it fades as he puts his hand on the doorknob. "I hate to say it, but I think we don't have a choice but to go somewhere else. They're asking for entrance into Wakanda. Wakanda's pretending to have authorization troubles, but they're going to have to let them in."

Goodbye proper bed, shelf of new-fangled gadgets, fridge full of food. "They're buying us time to get out of here."

"They're risking a lot."

"I know." Putting on his mask, Bucky zips his bag up again and slings it over his shoulder. "Well? Hurry up Rogers, your bags aren't going to pack themselves."

Something sparks in Steve's eyes, and for a moment he looks at Bucky, seeming to hesitate—but whatever he was considering, he seems to decide against it, and he disappears into his room.

When he reappears, Bucky's tucking the deck of cards into the front pocket of his bag. "Something to do while we're out there," he explains, waiting by the front door.

Steve opens it and steps through first. "Something to remember our vacation from the real world by." He pauses when he realizes Bucky hasn't followed him out, a puzzled smile on his face. "You coming?"

Bucky tightens his hand on the doorway, letting up only when he hears the metal grind. "Steve…" he says slowly, "Where are we going?"

Steve runs a hand through his hair, the blond glinting in the sunlight as he darts a quick look around, as if he's expecting someone to stop them any minute. "I don't know," he says, as if it's a confession, "There's no place that will… we'll just have to make do with whatever we can find. But we need to go."

Bucky nods, still not moving. He can see Steve's jaw twitch. "Promise me," he says quietly, "Promise me that wherever we go, we go together."

Steve blinks.

"Don't leave me." The words are hard to drag out, and harder to watch Steve swallow.

Something not unlike longing fills Steve's gaze for a moment, and then, before Bucky can even blink, he's enveloped in Steve's arms.

Bucky can feel him breathing, feel the warmth of him and the strength of his arms. He can't think; he's pretty sure his brain has taken a vacation. He closes his eyes and returns the hug, his heart full to bursting.

"We really need to go," Steve rumbles in his ear, and Bucky breathes out a sigh.

"Promise," he says again. "Please."

Steve runs his hand along the small of Bucky's back. Bucky thinks he's going to faint. This would be a terrible time to faint. "I promise," he says, voice thick.

"We need to go," Steve says for the third time, and this time Bucky steps out the door.

"I'll miss that place," Bucky says, gazing out the window of the ship that will drop them into the Australian countryside and watching Wakanda disappear.

Steve looks over at him. It reminds Bucky of the flight out of the airport, directly after the fight with the Avengers. The way Steve looked at Bucky then is the same way he's looking at Bucky now—a soft sort of expression, the slumping of his shoulders, the tension that falls from him when they're alone together. "I will too," he says. "That place made you happy."

"Felt safe," is all Bucky can manage around the warm feeling that erupts in his chest. He watches the pilot up front pull up a little radio and speak a string of numbers and letters. The shield opens for them, and Wakanda disappears into the illusion of a forest behind them.

Back then, the way Steve looked at him terrified him—Bucky realized during that flight that Steve would go to unimaginable lengths for him, would do things Bucky didn't want to think about Steve having to do, for Bucky. Getting arrested. Breaking people out of jail. Fighting his—well, Bucky wasn't quite sure what Stark was to Steve, but Stark had said they were friends—fighting people he cared about.

For Bucky.

Now, it doesn't terrify him so much. Now it makes his heart race and his hands clench, makes his eyes go to Steve again and again, as if they can't help it.

"You're sure you want to stick together?" Steve asks. He sees Bucky gearing up to protest and holds up a hand. "I know I promised, and I won't break that promise unless you tell me to. I want to be where you are, too. You… you can't imagine how much. But you might want to think about it a bit more; Captain America is a big name." Steve sounds almost resentful of it.

Bucky is silent for a long time. They can hear the whirr of the ship's engines, much quieter than American ones, the quiet clicking of the pilot in the front seat as he presses a button and a wall comes up between the cockpit and the rest of the small ship.

At this point, he would tell Steve they should probably split ways; it's for the best, since Steve keeps pushing that idea. But he thinks Steve is genuine when he says he wants to be where Bucky is.

"Did Bucky ever tell you…" he trails off, searching his memory one last time and coming up empty. "Did Bucky ever tell you how he felt about you?"

Steve stares. His tongue flicks out and wets his bottom lip, and Bucky's stomach tightens. "I… we were the best friends you could imagine," he says. "He told me so all the time. We weren't the kind of best friends who pretended we didn't care." His voice is rough, and his eyes search Bucky's face. His expression is almost guarded. There's something in there that Bucky recognises in himself.

"Did you ever…" Bucky falters. "I'm sorry, I remember most of it, I think. But I don't know what is and isn't in the parts I'm missing."

Steve's guarded expression softens. "It's okay. You can ask whatever you want. I'll try to answer."

"Bucky, he…" Bucky swallows and tries again, staring at his hands, his heart pounding. "Did he ever—did we ever kiss?"

There's a silence that seems to stretch for miles.

Bucky glances up at Steve. Steve is staring at him, his face the picture of surprise. He looks as if he's been shocked silly, his eyes wide and his mouth a little open. His cheeks are flushed pink.

"Wh—" he says, more breath than sound, "I—did we ever—"

Bucky raises an eyebrow. As nervous as he is, he's never seen Steve thrown this far off his guard, and there's something happy that lights inside of him—one more side of Steve he knows. There's almost something gleeful about seeing him this much at a loss.

And there's something joyful, too, about having asked. This thing that Bucky's been drowning in for—well, if you count all the years, probably upwards of eighty years—he's finally found words for it.

"Does that question offend your sensibilities?"

"Does—?" Steve's tongue dashes across his bottom lip again. "Bucky why… I mean—no! We didn't! We never did. Why…" It doesn't escape Bucky's notice that Steve's blue eyes are focused on Bucky's lips before they jump back up to meet Bucky's eyes. "Why do you ask?"

And Bucky is thinking about the way Steve gazes at him, and the way Bucky can make him smile so easily. He's thinking about the tenderness he catches in Steve's eyes sometimes, and the way he said he wanted to be where Bucky was, you can't imagine how much.

Bucky holds Steve's gaze. It feels electric. "He wanted to," he says quietly. "I wanted to. For years."

Steve draws a sharp breath. His eyes are a little wild, as if he's not sure what's going on, like he doesn't quite understand what Bucky's saying.

"The memories that I have of you… they're completely filled with it." Bucky cracks a smile, trying to act casual, despite the thundering in his chest. "Head over heels for you, Rogers."

Steve shifts abruptly, turning to face Bucky completely, his knees brushing Bucky's. His hands fumble in his lap, thumb tapping against the inside of his palm. He's nervous. The realization makes Bucky's breath catch. "What about now?" His voice sounds strangled.

Bucky's breath leaves him all at once. "Now?" he echoes dumbly.

And then he's unbuckling himself from his seat, grabbing Steve by his collar with both his human and his metal arm, pulling Steve towards him.

Steve sits there and lets him, his hands creeping up Bucky's sides slowly, as if he's half sure Bucky will disappear between his hands. His kiss isn't half so careful; he kisses Bucky like the end of the world is coming, his lips opening and his teeth nipping at Bucky's bottom lip, followed by a soothing sweep of his tongue.

He kisses as if he's been kissing Bucky for years, or like he's trying to give Bucky all the kisses he couldn't give Bucky before right now.

It makes Bucky go weak, it drags sounds out of Bucky's throat, it fills Bucky's body with fire. Steve's warm hands skate up his back, bracketing Bucky's ribs, pulling him down into Steve's lap. It's hot, he's bright. He's like a star, wrapping himself around Bucky. Bucky.

Of all the people, Bucky's the one in the back of a Wakandan ship, on the run, wound up in Steve's arms.

He feels like old Bucky. Just this close to exploding with giddiness, with joy. Because of Steve. Always because of Steve.

"Now, I'm—" Bucky half-tries to speak against Steve's mouth, running his hands through Steve's short hair, cupping the back of his neck. "Now I—"

But Steve doesn't stop kissing him long enough for him to finish, and that's fine by Bucky. "Now," Steve echoes finally, breathlessly, fingers tightening around Bucky's waist as if he's trying to resist pulling him back in again. "Now?"

"What the hell do you think?" Bucky messes Steve's hair up, fixes it, messes it up again. It's soft and pretty, and he's never been able to pet it like this.

Steve looks well kissed—flushed, his lips wet, his eyes bright—and almost amused. He has the sort of expression he gets when he's laughing at himself. "Well you never answered my question," he retorts, but it has no bite.

"Actions speak louder than words, you punk. Do you need another demonstration? Or do you want to wait until we have a proper room in Australia?"

Steve looks comically embarrassed, as if he wasn't trying to suck Bucky's soul out of his mouth a minute ago. "Don't know if we'll get a proper room, Buck. Just warning you."

"As long as you're not planning on leaving, I don't really care."

Steve holds his hands up in surrender, smiling sheepishly. "You win, you win."

"Louder."

Steve rolls his eyes, but he's still smiling. He threads his fingers through Bucky's hair and draws him back down. "Shhhh. You're being a sore winner." His thumbs trace Bucky's jaw. "Maybe we both won."

Bucky kisses him again, this time slower, easier, and when they break away, it feels as if they've settled into something new. We both won. As if part of the fight is over.

"Say it again," he demands, drinking in Steve's expression.

"I'll stay," Steve murmurs. "I'll stay with you."