"Why you little shit…"
Bucky doesn't believe it.
"You just now made captain? You weren't even a real officer yet?"
He leans back against his pillow, eyebrows raised, as Steve just shrugs.
"I was barely even enlisted, officially…" Steve shrugs. "It was sort of just a stage name at first." He drags over a chair and sits down across the back of it, pleased to see that Bucky's gotten a lot of color back and his cuts and bruises are mostly gone. Buck actually looks pretty good, all told. "Don't ask me how they came up with it. I just put on the monkey suit when they told me to - I didn't pick it out." Bucky snorts at that.
Steve holds up his newly acquired insignia, a sarcastic smirk curling his lip. "Worked out ok for me though, I guess."
Bucky shakes his head, but he's smiling.
"Good for you, jackass. Now will you quit tryin' to get yourself killed all the time?"
"I never try to get myself killed, sour-puss."
Steve sticks his tongue out like a five year old, earning an extremely put-upon eyeroll from his best friend.
He grins fondly, leaning his head down onto folded arms across the back of the chair. He still isn't used to holding himself like a big man. Every gesture is still that little guy trying to fit into the spaces between. The spaces left over. It feels strange to be given space of his own to fill.
"Any idea what they're keepin' you here for? You seem like you're doin' fine..."
Bucky shrugs.
"They won't tell me. Just that I'm not allowed to leave yet. Took some blood once or twice the first day, but that was the last anybody came near me with a needle - thank god." He gives a tiny shudder. Steve refrains from commenting on it.
Bucky never used to be afraid of needles...
"Somebody'll ask me questions every now and then, but mostly I just sit here on my ass, killin' time. I'm not even s'posed to get up, except to pee. And you'd think I was pretty damned interesting, seeing how much shit they've been recordin' about me."
"What do they ask about?"
"What don't they ask about is easier." Bucky mutters, slumping irritably against his pillow. "Been super fun tellin' like eight different guys the whole sob-story of what I can remember. Just what I wanna talk about, let me tell ya. Great times around here, Steve."
Steve feels his temper rising, though he knows he really should keep it in check. After the hell Bucky's just come out of, did they really need to make him relive it eight goddamn times? What on earth for?
He's just about to say as much when something that Bucky's said strikes and holds his attention.
"... What do you mean 'what you can remember'?" Steve asks slowly, tone carefully level.
Bucky's expression falls flat. He looks away.
"... I don't remember a whole lot before wakin' up in the truck." he says quietly. "And even then, it's kinda hazy sometimes. Everything b'fore that's…. just ...a mess. I got bits an' pieces of you, mostly draggin' me through the factory. Pretty sure I remember you jumpin' over a big explosion - mostly 'cause that's just the kind of stupid shit you'd do… But I got just about nothin' from before you showed up."
"You don't remember any of it?" Steve can't decide if that idea horrifies him or if he's relieved that Bucky's been spared the memory of what was done to him.
"I remember a few things-..." Bucky hesitates, looking like he can't decide if he ought to say any more. "I mean…" He takes a deep breath and swallows hard. "I… Steve, I really don't wanna talk about that shit anymore."
"Sure, Buck. 'Course." Steve's voice feels thick in his throat, and scratches like barbed wire. He makes himself smile, uneasy though it must look, and quickly changes the subject, dropping his voice conspiratorially.
"I... uh… I smuggled in some goodies from the guys, if you want 'em."
"God yes." Bucky's distant eyes are bright again as his head comes up. "Infirmary's got even shittier food than the 107th had."
Steve makes a show of checking over his shoulders for nurses, though they're in the only isolated bit of the entire infirmary. Apparently, it isn't just Steve they've been trying to keep Bucky apart from. None of the other men have been allowed any contact either.
"Jones sent you some candy," Steve tells him, setting the forbidden snacks on the edge of Bucky's cot. "Looks like some caramels and a chocolate bar."
Technically, Bucky's not allowed to eat any junk food while he's being monitored, but as far as either of them are concerned, that's a technicality to be quickly overlooked.
Steve produces a small, cheap, metal flask with a dent on one corner out of his jacket. "Dugan said to warn you, and I'm quoting here: 'it's cheap, strong, and mean, but it'll warm you right up'." He deposits it into Bucky's waiting hands.
"I knew I liked that big bastard." Bucky's smiling, however thinly, as he takes a sip. He immediately makes a face, then caps the flask and shoves it directly under his pillow where the nurses won't find and confiscate it. He's still grimacing when Steve continues.
"Dernier wanted me to give you some really awful girly magazines. I brought 'em, but I'm kinda afraid to touch the pages."
Bucky chuckles at that. "Kid, I ain't sure I wanna touch 'em either. Maybe if I get real, real lonely."
Steve makes a face, gingerly passing the rumpled pages over. Bucky tucks them in under the flask.
"Morita scrounged up some trashy science-fiction to rot your brain on." Steve continues, digging out a dime-store novel that looks like it's been kicked around more than read. "And Fallsworth said he'd get you 'a real drink' when you're back on your feet." He gives Bucky a small smirk. "He had a lot to say about Dum Dum's idea of quality liquor. Be glad you missed it."
"You kiddin' me? Sounds like comedy gold." Bucky laughs, settling back again with the novel in his lap. "Those two hated each other's guts for a while. Practically an old married couple now... Don't you tell 'em I said that or they'll both kick my ass."
He opens one of the caramels and offers the other to Steve, pointedly raising an eyebrow until Steve takes the candy and eats it. The chocolate bar is stashed away for later.
"How much longer you got 'fore somebody comes to chase you off?"
"He said I had an hour, so probably not a whole lot longer." Steve sighs, scruffing a hand through his hair. Now that he's here, he's really not looking forward to having to leave again.
He feels like a piece of himself is missing when Bucky's not there. They grew up practically in each other's back pockets, and the air just feels strangely empty around him whenever his best friend isn't there to help fill it.
"You need anything while I'm here?"
"Yeah, find me a pretty dame that's got a thing for guys in uniform, and have her come see me." Bucky grins at him, waggling his eyebrows, and Steve gives him a half-hearted swat on the arm.
"Gonna show her your dirty magazine?"
"Nah, that's for later, if I don't get a goodnight kiss."
"I don't seem to remember goodnight kisses including quite that much tong-"
"Excuse me, Captain Rogers?"
Steve chokes mid-sentence, nearly tumbling out of his chair in his haste to whip around, when a petite freckled nurse peeks her head around the curtain that divides Bucky's tiny area from the rest of the infirmary tent. He's sure his face has gone bright red, but he tries to keep as composed as he can manage.
"I'm sorry sir, but it's been just over an hour. The Colonel was very firm on the duration of your visit."
"No… that's… it's fine. I'll be right out."
She looks like she's about to say something else, maybe to tell him to leave right this minute; but instead she just nods reluctantly and disappears behind the curtain again.
"Very smooth, Steve."
"Oh shut up." Steve grumps, without heat. "How was I supposed to know she'd walk in right when I was making a dirty joke?!"
"Hey, maybe she'd like to hear it." Bucky shrugs, hands behind his head. "Tell you what. First thing when I get outta this dump, I'm teachin' you how to talk to women. You're hopeless."
"I talked to her!" Steve retorts, gathering his jacket off of the back of the chair and fussing with the box that contains his new bars - finding little reasons to linger before he has to leave his best friend behind again.
"Yeah, like she was about to bite your stupid head off."
Steve can hear the nurse impatiently busying herself not far away, watching for him to hurry up and leave. He can't drag his feet much longer or she'll come back to escort him out.
"I have to go before they drag me out by the hair." Steve sighs, "Take care of yourself, ok?"
"Got nothin' better to do until they let me off the leash." Bucky smirks. "I'll be fine. See ya on the outside."
Steve leans down to wrap his arms around Bucky's shoulders, still unused to needing to stoop. He feels his friend's arms wrap loosely around his ribs.
"Bye, jerkass." He mutters into Bucky's hair.
"So long shit-head. Stay outta trouble, least 'till I'm there to bail ya out of it."
"You know me." Steve grins, releasing his grip on Bucky reluctantly, and turning to let himself out.
"Yeah I do," Bucky calls after him, teasing laughter in his voice, "That's what I'm afraid of."