Just stand. Just be. An eerie calm had settled over me when I was brought back to Wakanda. The Avengers went their separate ways and I came here. Because Bucky was here. Because this is where everything fell apart and I needed it very badly to fall back together. I knew how to do that, to start again. It was the convincing myself to go through with it that was proving the problem.
The roof, once a source of endless frustrations, now offered a tranquil peace that stilled my furious pulse. Hasina had been right.
The letter in my hand was Sally's resignation. It had been passed among the others for a few hours before it reached me and I had yet to unfold the pink pages. Opening it meant moving on. It meant I had to start planning the next chapter in my life? What was I supposed to do after the final boss battle was resolved? Move back to a quiet farm, marry Bucky and reproduce lots of mini Winter Soldiers?
T'challa generously offered for me to stay until the end of my days, stating that the Black Panther would protect any citizen within its borders regardless of their origins or past complications.
"I thought you hated this roof." Sam let the door leading from the stairwell thump shut behind him. He strolled over to me, stretching his well-formed arms high over his head, as if striving to reach the pristine sea of blue above.
His hand clapped over my shoulder, an anchor dragging my thoughts back down to earth.
"It's hard isn't it? Thinking about going through your life as normal? Doing the same things you used to even though you're an entirely different person," he chatted easily, warm brown eyes settling the unease threatening to spill past my lips in the form of sick.
Bucky made my heart take flight, but Sam grounded me, reminded me of humanity.
"I don't blame you. Any of you. You did what you thought was right, which is what I've been doing all along. Will you stay?" I asked instead of replying.
"Of course. We humans have to stick together. Natasha is prowling around down there somewhere, but I swear that woman is a species of her own."
I laughed softly, leaning in to his touch. This is what a friend felt like. They yelled at you when necessary. They supported you when you weren't going insane, but they were there always.
"I'm sure the Cat King can find you a job fitting your strong suits around here. Steve probably won't let you tag along on any more world saving missions, but I'll live text you with all the action going down."
"Do I get to keep a hoodie when you're gone?" I asked.
"I think that job falls to your…whatever the hell you and Barnes are now."
I shrugged to show I was just as in the dark as he was.
As if summoned by just the mention of his name, Bucky strode out to join us on the roof. His t shirt was wrinkled and his face had an impression on it from the nap he must have just woken from. Bleary eyes blinked down as me and lazy finger pushed his hair back into their loose bun.
"Hey," he said softly, nodding to Sam in acknowledgement.
"How do you take five hours naps, man? I'm lucky if I can pull that during actual night hours," Sam replied.
"I actually do productive things when I'm awake," Bucky clipped back.
I smiled, unconsciously leaning in to his presence. My shoulder brushed against his pec and his metal hand shifted to press against the small of my back, searing straight through my clothes and settling a flush against my cheeks.
"Just because you can bench a hundred more than me, doesn't mean I'm not pushing my own limits," Sam said. He bristled like he'd truly been insulted, but I knew the nature of their friendship was more complex than that.
"I bet even Haven could out bench you."
"That's true. I've been known to casually lift houses and whatnot when need be."
Bucky smiled faintly and leaned to press a kiss against my hair.
"Alright, alright, I get it. When you two start teaming up, that's my queue to leave." Sam waved a general sweep of his hand before jogging back downstairs.
Bucky shifted, grunting as he moved the arm trapped in a sling, healing from three different fractures. There was a cut across his collarbone whose stitches had yet to be taken out. We had not really spoken since I woke up to being newly human. I had done things, he had done things and sorting through the madness proved more of a headache than any amount of kissing could resolve. I opened my mouth to say something, anything to fill the silence.
Bucky, however, cut me off, chasing away whatever my words might have been with a breath halting declaration. "I love you," he said, voice gravel over the words, trying to stamp out their importance.
I glanced up at him, reading the truth in the icy burn that hardened his eyes into diamonds. There was something else entirely in the press of his lips, something holding him back from completely losing himself in the stated emotion.
"But?" I asked.
"I can't be a part of your penance."
"Penance? What does that even mean?"
"It means you feel guilty about the things you were forced to do and some of the things you chose. Trust me, I know the feeling from painful experience. And you're trying to make up for it by doing something good."
"Doing you is good?" I teased because I didn't want to admit to how right he was.
"You think that a relationship will make you whole, will stabilize you. Haven, I have a hard enough time keeping my own head on straight. I can't do it for both of us. Do you understand?"
"Yeah," I whispered. "I know."
Bucky rocked back on his heels, eyes tracing over the tree riddled horizon, teeth worrying over a split lip. "So…that's it? We're over?"
"We can be. Or we can go back to my room and pretend this conversation didn't happen, at least for the next few hours."
"That sounds reasonable," Bucky murmured, swooping to catch my lips against his in a kiss that would make even Romeo and Juliet jealous.
I whimpered against the feeling, relishing each press and tucking it away to remember when we could no longer do this. This was goodbye, but I would be damned if it let it be anything but sweet. Bucky deserved a decent ending to our story. I may not feel the same, I didn't know if I could ever open myself up to the vulnerability of love, but I cared about my sweet broken man.
Bucky growled in response, catching my wrist in an unrelenting grip, leading me back down the stairs.
My bedroom was exactly as I had left it when T'challa unceremoniously kicked me out of the country. The only difference was the gorgeous man stripping away layer after layer of clothing. We moved slowly, dragging this out as long as we could. Because, while we were both in agreement of the necessary parting of ways that needed to happen in our future, letting go was like breaking free of a rip current; I was content to drown with him for just a little while longer.
Once bare, save the sling that kept his arm steady, he tugged his hair free and glanced down at me, watching as I rid my body of the last barrier between us, my underwear. He held out a hand, and I set mine in it, letting his calloused fingers rub over the back of it. His eyes traced the path the locket took to settle between my breasts, cool against my flushed skin.
The moment hung in the air like a glider hanging on the last effects of a wind before it landed.
"I'm gonna miss you," he mumbled.
"Not yet."
I pulled him down to kiss me, taking care of his tender lips, hands brushing lightly over his pale skin, running over the ridges his muscles provided. He was a shooting star, slipping away faster than I could grab on. But I didn't want him to stay; we both had to move on. I just wanted to be blinded by him one more time.
His hand skimmed over my breasts, down my side and to my ass where he squeezed. "Turn," he instructed.
I did so with a shudder winding its way down my body. With wetness slicking my inner thigh, letting him know I was more than ready to offer up anything he might ask for. His hard on rubbed against me while his lips sucked bruises onto my neck and his fingers dug fresh bruises into my hip—all would serve as a reminder of him for days to come. Rocking back earned a covetous growl from his bared teeth. His brace scraped mercilessly against my bare skin, the fabric not intended from such friction.
"Bucky," I panted, I begged. His name was a prayer on my lips. I needed the ache between my legs to be resolved. I needed him to make my muscles sore and my body limp with bliss.
"Not yet," he repeated my words back to me with torturous intentions. His hand slid to my clit, circling slowly and deliberately. His nose nudged my neck to the side, teeth toying with the skin on my jaw. "I love you," he repeated. Not as a bargaining chip, not as any sort of coercion. He just wanted to say it. To keep it simmering in the air between us. Because no matter the miles between us or the status of our relationship, it would always ring true.
His fingers pushed inside me then, two metal appendages pressing against a deliciously sinful spot, the chinks readjusting and getting me off even more. My forehead fell against the door he plastered me to, my back arching down to meet his hands and the sweet tension they offered to relieve in painfully short doses. His heart slammed clean through my back and merged with my own. His breath fanned down my skin, igniting every place it reached.
The first orgasm was as blinding as the love itself. I turned on legs barely able to hold up my lightweight frame. He caught me up, pulling me into his arms, locking my ankles behind his back as he walked us back towards the bed.
With me on my back and him finishing off the perfect picture by hovering over me, I touched his jaw. "I love you too," I said.
Misty eyes and sad smiles were chased away as I kissed him yet again. He exhaled a silent sob against my mouth, fisting my hair and crushing out mouths and most delicate of places into one entity. His metal hand framed my face while he rocked into me, pelvic bones rubbing against my clit.
Moments passed or maybe years; I wished for a lifetime before I had to let go of my precious man. I peaked again, floating through the air like I was a part of it again and he traveled with me. And we returned together sharing a kiss that left me breathless in the best human way possible.
My phone buzzed with a text from T'challa and I sat up from bed. 'It's time,' it read.
I swept up shorts and a loose tank top before snatching up my prepacked bag. Bucky braced himself on his forearms, still tangled in the array of sheets on the bed, beautiful and captivating in his vulnerability. He just watched me for a minute before asking, "You're leaving?"
"For a while. Joy had unfinished work on Asgard I want to collect and continue."
"The god that's arriving today?"
"Thor? Yeah. The King and Captain already worked out my passage back with the bodies. I'll return when I finish."
"And you'll come find me?" he asked.
A fine line was made of my mouth when I pressed my lips together. "I don't know. I just know I have to finish this for her, you know. I have to see them home and properly buried. I have to find their daughter."
I unclasped the chain from my neck, tucking it into his human hand and closing his fist around it. "Your turn to watch after that."
Bucky reached out, grasping my hand in his metal one, pulling me in for one more soul burning kiss. He whispered out one word against my lips.
"Go."
That's all folks. Throw your thoughts and emotions at me!