A/N: I gotta warn you guys this is gonna be a slow burn. So the smuts not coming right away lol I'm trying pace myself for once. Lol

My face was starting to hurt from all the smiling. It had been so long since I had been in a good mood about anything. It was all missions and therapy and training and the gym and now there was a girl, and she liked me. I could tell from the way that she blushed around me, and smiled, and flirted and when she had put her hand on my chest and leaned in I had sworn that she was going to really kiss me. I had been a little disappointed when she hadn't.

I was back at the compound quicker than I realized, lost in my thoughts, my time with Jade replaying over and over in my head. Steve was waiting for me the moment I stepped off the elevator, making the smile leave my face when I saw him leaning against the wall near my bedroom. How long had he been standing there? He straightened when he saw me approaching, I could practically see the excitement and anxiety coursing through him, his blue eyes wide with expectation and impatience.

"So?" He called before I had barely stepped off the elevator, alerting Natasha who came walking out of the common area to look at me expectantly as well.

I rolled my eyes at the both of them. I was not going to gush about my "date" like a school girl. I willfully played ignorant moving past them both without a word, going to my bedroom door and opening it. They both followed to my irritation. I sat on the edge of my bed and shed my leather jacket and boots. Steve and Natasha stood near the door looking at me impatiently

"So?" Steve repeated crossing his arms.

"So what?" I asked with a frown.

Natasha and Steve shared an eye roll. "How was the date Barnes?" Natasha questioned.

"It wasn't a date."

"She said no?" Steve visibly deflated, his features going to disappointment and then to sympathy. "Ah Bucky, I'm sorry. You were gone so long I thought for sure that she had let you take her out."

"No, we went to eat," I said. "We had breakfast for dinner. Apparently that's a thing. It was pretty good."

Steve's smile returned, big and proud, like I was his son and I just successfully gone on my first date due to his fatherly advice. "See! I told you she liked you," he turned to Natasha. "You owe Sam $20."

I scowled at the both of them as Natasha sighed in defeat. "You bet on whether or not she would go eat with me?"

"I didn't," Steve said shaking his head. "But they did."

I huffed. "Glad you get so much enjoyment and monetary value out of my relationships."

"So there is a relationship?" Natasha probed with an arched eyebrow.

"Well she went to eat with me when I asked her too," I started.

"Good. Good. And then?" Steve urged.

"And then she said she just wanted to be friends," I continued.

Steve was frowning and Natasha was still gazing at me with that calculated look, like I was giving her important intel on a mission. "Well atleast you put yourself out there and you had a nice night with her and it's a start. You dipped your feet in," Steve said determinedly, always trying to see the positive in all situations.

"Let me finish will ya'?" I grumbled rising back to my feet. "Then she flirted with me and gave me her number and kissed me on the cheek."

Steve's eyebrows went up. "Oh." His gaze turned to the only expert we had on the subject of women, Natasha. "Nat? Input?"

She shrugged. "Women are complicated, maybe she was hesitant at first and worried because you guys have already done it. She probably just didn't want you to expect anything."

"Expect anything like what?"

"More sex obviously. But her giving you her number in the end is a good sign. She let her guard down. Pretty sure she likes you. If she didn't she wouldn't have given you her number, definitely wouldn't have flirted."

I tried to hide how good that made me feel, keeping my face blank. I wanted her to like me, but there was still the ever present thought of potential danger in the back of my mind. What if she got hurt because of me? What if I hurt her? I wasn't lying when I had said that attachments weren't a good thing. HYDRA had nearly taken everything from me and there was no guarantee that they wouldn't come to do it again. Liking her made me vulnerable and her a target. Even as just her friend she was in danger, just knowing me put her at risk. Those thoughts dragged me kicking and screaming right back into my normal bad mood. Who was I kidding? I couldn't date. I couldn't be anyone's friend. Anyone close to me would get hurt.

"What's on your mind, Buck?" Steve asked with a pointed look.

I sighed. "She's in danger every time shes near me and I shouldn't risk her like that. I can't."

Steve and Natasha shared another look, Steve turning his gaze back on me, his face set in that 'you're about to get a speech' look. "Bucky, you deserve to live your life, after everything that HYDRA has done to you-."

"Which is exactly why I should stay away from her, because of everything HYDRA has and can do to me. They're still a threat. And I don't want to risk it. So it was nice while it lasted, but it's done," I said definitively. I had made up my mind. I wouldn't put her in that kind of danger. I wouldn't let her get hurt because of me. "Thanks for the encouragement. Now will ya' get out of here so I can shower?"

Steve frowned at me, but nodded after a long look following Natasha to the door.

"Oh hey, what does 'text me' mean," I called making him halt.

Steve smirked. "It's like sending an electronic letter through the phone. People talk back and forth like that a lot during the day. It's how they keep in touch. Why?"

"Jade asked me to do that when she gave me her number," I answered with a sigh. "Doesn't matter now, but I was just wondering. I had to smile and nod like I knew what the hell she was talking about."

Steve and Natasha laughed. I was not amused.

The first 3 days after my 'not a date' with Bucky I had been anxious for his text, checking my phone periodically, my heart skipping a beat every time it went off and I was ashamed at how disappointed I was whenever it wasn't him. Iris had said he was probably trying to play it cool, not to worry, that he would text me; and then 3 more days had passed and then a week and a week and a half and I knew that he wouldn't. I felt silly for how upset that I really was. I had to admit to myself that I had ended up liking the mystery man after all, despite my not wanting to date and all my reservations. And here I was ghosted and disappointed in the end.

"I should have known when he didn't really talk about himself very much or tell me about his past or what he really does with the Avengers," I shook my head at my own stupidity. "Here I was rambling the whole night and putting myself out there like a fool and he was planning to ghost me all along. No wonder he acted like he didnt know what the hell a cellphone was. He didnt want to take my number down anyway. I thought he was just being funny! This is exactly why I didn't want to date. This exact situation right here. I put myself out there and then he ghosts me after my plan was to ghost him!" I sighed.

Iris shrugged. "It happens. They cant all be winners. At least you got sex out of it?"

"Oh you mean the sex I don't remember so may as well not have happened?" I countered.

Iris frowned slightly. "Yeah…you got diddly then. Sorry best friend that really sucks. BUT you live and you learn and you move on to other men. Who knows, maybe you'll pick up a hot single dad on the field trip today?"

"No, no single dads, no men. I am going back to celibacy and focusing on work. If I want to be promoted to Charge Nurse in pediatrics I have to really prove myself before I apply for the position," I said putting my hands up. "I can't have any distractions. So it's a good thing James faded himself out."

"Fine. No distractions," Iris agreed. "Until you land that job, which you totally will, and you know it, and then we will go celebrate! And by celebrate I mean you can have casual sex again."

"You're impossible Iris," I passed her a dramatic eye roll.

"Plus it means more single dads for me," she joked with a wink.

We were accompanying Iris's twin nephews on their field trip to the Smithsonian Institute today due to the fact that Iris's brother couldn't attend nor could his wife. While I was an only child, Iris had a brother and sister, both with kids and as I had been Iris's best friend for the majority of her life I knew her siblings and their children well and was considered a part of Iris's family, the kids even called me Auntie Jade. So it was no surprise that Iris asked me to tag along, to keep her lack of a filter in check around the kids and to help wrangle them in. I was kind of excited as I had never been to the Smithsonian despite living in New York for most of my life and I enjoyed spending time with the kids.

I was put in charge of a group of boys that included Iris's nephew Dominic and four other boys from his class all ranging from 6-8 years old and of course the only thing they wanted to see in the museum was the Captain America exhibit. I made them save it for the last thing we would see before we had to regroup with the rest of the class, taking them to the dinosaurs and other prehistoric exhibits, which they breezed through quite impatiently before I finally relented and said we could head to the Captain America exhibit. They took off in an excited run, leaving me to chase after them, yelling for them to 'walk!', thankful that the Smithsonian wasn't too busy that Tuesday afternoon.

I caught up to the boys just as they reached the exhibit, hearing my phone ding and following them distractedly checking my messages until they stopped at the Howling Commandos display, awwing and oohing at the suited mannequins on display before dashing off to the large blank wall where a projector was playing real footage of Captain America and his team. The boys took a seat on the benches, captivated by the footage, eyes wide and entranced and I stood behind them, checking my emails, going through and deleting the junk mail until something caught my eye that made me do a double take.

I nearly dropped my phone as I saw Bucky on the black and white projected image, standing next to Steve Rogers, smiling, laughing, his arm around Steve's shoulder. His hair was much shorter, cut close to the head, and his face was clean shaven, he looked a tad bit younger than he did now, but it was him. It was definitely him. And he had both of his arms. What the… The image disappeared and I looked around quickly for anything else on Bucky, to confirm that I was really seeing what I was seeing and was not crazy; startling when I saw a large glass structure with Bucky's image on it and a paragraph of information, the words 'A fallen comrade' scrawled across the top.

I walked dazedly toward it as the boys jetted off to look at a display of things that were in Captain America's tool belt, already reading the paragraph before I reached the display.

James Buchanan "Bucky" Barnes
Born in 1916, Barnes grew up the oldest child of four. An excellent athlete who also excelled in the classroom. Barnes enlisted in the Army shortly after the attack on Pearl Harbor. After winter training at Camp McCoy, Wisconsin, Barnes and the rest of the 107th shipped out to the Italian front. Captured by Hydra troops later that fall, Barnes endured long periods of isolation, depravation, and torture. But his will was strong. In an ironic twist of fate, his prison camp was liberated by none other than his childhood friend Steve Rogers, now Captain America.

Reunited, Barnes and Rogers led Captain America's newly formed unit, The Howling Commandos. Barnes marksmanship was invaluable as Rogers and his team destroyed Hydra bases and disrupted Nazi troop movements throughout the Europe Theater.

Bucky Barnes
1917-1944

I looked up at the picture of Bucky again feeling my stomach sink.

Oh my god I slept with a nearly hundred year old man.

How the hell is he still alive?!

I felt my hand cover my mouth, my eyes still wide until I heard someone approaching behind and Iris' familiar voice.

"Oh the boys dragged you here too? They've been begging to come over here since we- HOLY SHIT IS THAT MR. METAL?"

Behind us there was a chorus of gasps from small children and a small voice called out, "Oooooh Ms. Iris said a bad word!"