Chapter Text
The problem, Steve thinks, isn’t so much his motorcycle giving up the ghost on a lonely stretch of highway through a lonely stretch of the country. He doesn’t mind stretching his legs or the prospect of hitchhiking.
The problem is the roiling black blanket of storm clouds slowly spreading itself over the landscape headed his direction.
When he’d ditched the bike, it had been with the vague thought that he’d start walking long enough to hitch a ride to the next town. (He realizes belatedly that he’d have a better idea of where that is if he hadn’t left his map in his saddle bag). In fact Steve had felt a little bit of righteous vindication when he’d dropped a pin and sent the terse text message informing Tony: bike dead here. Feel free to have it towed if you think it’s worth it. While Steve had wanted to pick out a vehicle himself, Tony had insisted on providing him with one instead. And then insisted that Steve contact him and only him if there were any problems. So Steve’s not above the small petty satisfaction of dropping it back in Tony’s lap to deal with.
This road hasn’t exactly hummed with other vehicles since he left Oklahoma City, but it had seemed like reasonable odds he’d be able to catch a ride within an hour or two. But he’s been walking now for almost three without catching sight of another soul—and as the wind begins to whip his hair into his eyes and cut through his leather jacket, he realizes why.
In his pocket, the Stark phone pings a couple of times in rapid succession, and Steve pulls it out with an aggrieved sigh.
Stark, Tony: I’ll get somebody on it. You anywhere near Albuquerque? I got a guy in Albuquerque.
Stark, Tony: Nevermind, you’re in Oklahoma. Well if you can get to Albuquerque you can get the bike there. If not use that gold card on me, sorry bud.
Romanoff, Natasha: Tony says his bike died on you. Assuming you’re not waiting around for him to get his shit together. Let me know if you get into any trouble hitching (no I do not think you can’t handle yourself).
Steve huffs and twists to shove the useless phone down into his backpack where it’ll be properly muffled by his spare clothes.
One foot in front of the other, he tells himself. It’s an old mantra. One from the days when making a trek on foot even through the city was sometimes an ordeal for him, when he had to force himself just to make it home. Collapsing in the middle of a hike isn’t a likely outcome for him anymore. Technically, he could hoof it all the way into whatever the next patch of civilization is without breaking a sweat, even in a storm. But that doesn’t mean he’s excited about the prospect.
When he’d set out on the bike from the still half-destroyed tangle of New York following the rout of the Chitauri, Steve hadn’t thought he could feel any more alone out here than he did surrounded by the bustling chaos of being a celebrity Avenger. But there’s something about the vast emptiness of the horizon out here that gets into your bones. It’s like somebody reached into his chest and pulled out the lonely feeling there and made it into a landscape all around him.
Steve almost—almost—considers calling Natasha. For most of this trip the phone has felt like an annoying tether to everything he’s trying to get a break from, a fishhook connected to a line just waiting to reel him back before he’s good and ready. Now he thinks he might like having some kind of anchor as the clouds ahead begin to take on a crackling blue around the edges. But he doesn’t know what he’d say. Natasha’s offer, while he knows it to be sincere, was of the practical kind. To give tactical support if needed, not to chat. If he’d wanted her company he could’ve stayed at Stark Tower.
He sighs, breathing in a deep lungful of air, full of the scent of wet earth. As a kid, he’d dreamed about getting to travel like this (well, not exactly like this, but close enough). New York City is a world unto itself, then and now. And Steve had consumed photographs of these other places in his textbooks and the pages of National Geographic he’d flip through at the newsstand before the guy told him to buy something or shove off. It had all seemed so big. The plains (in sorry state then, but no less mysteriously fascinating), the Grand Canyon, Yellowstone, The Badlands. Like places out of science fiction.
In his days touring as Captain America: Dancing Monkey of the USO, he’d glimpsed bits of them through the windows of the tour bus that had only increased the longing. He’d sketched frantically in his little notebook, trying to memorize the lines and textures flying past him and thinking about what it would be like just to step off the bus and really drink his fill.
In that, at least, Steve can’t say he’s been disappointed. Things are wilder out here—nature asserts itself on a different scale unencumbered by the trappings of humanity.
For example, in New York the rain can creep up on a guy between the maze of buildings. Maybe you know it’s coming sometime, heralded by cloud cover—but it’s nothing like this, watching the line of it rumbling up to you in a hissing wall. Steve hunches his shoulders as the veil reaches him, shoving his hands into the pockets of his jacket.
He’s thoroughly drenched in a matter of minutes, and the shoulder of the highway is similarly liquefied under his boots, slipping and sliding away from his feet and forcing him to step back out onto the solid pavement of the road.
It occurs to him that whatever else being Captain America has brought him, Steve will never be able to take for granted the relief of knowing that pneumonia and whatever else are no longer sitting on his doorstep, waiting for an opportunity like this to barge in on him and take over his body.
Across the horizon, several bright forks of lightning light up Steve’s periphery, followed almost at once by a resounding rumble of thunder that seems to shake the very highway.
So it’s thanks to the thunder and the blur of rain (or so Steve tells himself) that he doesn’t hear the truck coming up behind him on the road until just before he’s forced to leap out of its path.
Steve’s boots slip again in the muddy rivulets running into the ditch beside him, and he’s thankful for the preternatural balance that keeps him from falling on his ass into it. But he’s distracted enough by it that he looks up surprised when he realizes that the truck is coming to a hard stop in the middle of the highway. The taillights flick on as the thing reverses, skidding to a halt again beside where he stands.
Steve waits with a bemused expression as the driver rolls down the passenger window.
"Hey buddy, you uh...noticed there's kind of a storm going on?"
Steve raises his eyebrows and can't help the huff of a laugh he lets out.
"Yeah...yeah I might have um—caught wind of it."
It's the driver's turn to give a startled bark of laughter.
"Weather puns? I'm surprised you're not a little more stressed man. You break down or something? Where the fuck did you come from?"
Steve shifts on the balls of his feet, taking a tentative step toward the truck to lean on the the open window, blinking rain out of his eyes to get a better look at the driver.
He's youngish, in Steve's estimation. Though he realizes that he doesn't have the best sense of that these days, what with the fact that age looked a lot different when he was growing up and also the fact that he's technically in his nineties and has accepted that time is meaningless. Still the driver looks maybe just shy of thirty, if Steve were forced to use his trained intelligence gathering skills to guess. Not quite shoulder-length brown hair falls shaggy around his face, and he's got a couple days worth of stubble on his cheeks and jaw.
Steve would normally be able to take in more detail than that at a glance, figure out who he's dealing with quickly and efficiently, but now--now he's distracted by the strange contents of the truck drawing his eyes away from its driver.
The whole back of it is filled with odd electrical equipment, little blinking red and green lights and a blue lit screen flash at different frequencies. It’s not any kind of farming or ranching equipment Steve’s familiar with, and that makes it unusual in this context.
Steve realizes that the driver's eyes are on him, eyebrows raised. "I—sorry, what was that?"
The driver laughs a little, and leans across the wide front seat to tug on the door handle, pushing the door one-handed so that Steve has to take a step back to let it swing open.
"I said—either way you'd better hop in before you float away."
Steve can't argue with that as another resounding clap of thunder booms around them. He climbs into the passenger seat and shuts the door, feeling instantly guilty for the pooling water running off of his drenched clothes and the backpack at his feet onto the upholstery and floor of the truck.
"Sorry about—I'm getting everything all wet."
The man shrugs. "Kinda the point of why you shouldn't keep walking around in it right?" He eyes Steve curiously for a moment. "So—where'd you come from? This is pretty hell and gone from anywhere to be on foot. Especially with that," he nods in the direction of the storm front, which is making faster and faster advances toward them as they sit talking. "Most people knew enough to stay indoors today. But you don't look like you're from around here...?" He trails off, leaving the question hanging in the air.
Steve shifts uncomfortably. "Was on my bike, just passing through. Broke down about...maybe fifteen miles back? Thought I'd start walking 'til I could hitch with someone but uh...not a lot of people out today. Like you said."
The man laughs again, good-naturedly. "You got that right pal. Where you headed?"
"Anywhere," Steve says, a little too quickly. "I mean, it doesn't matter really. Albuquerque, eventually, I guess. But I can find what I need wherever you're going, if you don't mind letting me ride along for a little while."
A crooked grin spreads across the man's face, and Steve is suddenly aware that he's quite handsome. City handsome even, in a way Steve hasn't encountered much out here. There's a sharpness to his face and his expressions that doesn't seem to grow organically in the soil of farmlands. He brushes the thought away as irrelevant.
"Well, where I'm headed is gonna be a bit of a mixed bag for you I'm afraid," he says, eyes bright over the sideways grin. "You know what they say when there's no way around it and no way over it?"
Steve's mind scrambles to catch what he's getting at, and his eyes flick to the now constant flash of lightning ahead. "You have to go through it?"
"Right on the money." He says, white teeth flashing as he turns back to the wheel and puts the truck in gear. He gives Steve a sideways look. "What do you say, you game?"
Steve plants his feet a little firmer on the floorboards. "I'm game."
"Then buckle in—it'll get a little bit worse before it gets a whole lot cooler, I can promise you that."
*
Bucky Barnes is a storm chaser.
He's been a storm chaser in one way or another for just about half his life—the product of a directionless youth growing up in Indiana, before his family relocated to the suffocating confines of Brooklyn. But he's had the pleasure of being paid to do it professionally for the last eightish years. And he's been paid well for the past two.
He loves it.
There's nothing like the headlong rush of driving directly toward something that has everyone else around you fleeing the other direction. It's a sense of invincibility and terror he hasn’t found to exist anywhere else. The utter human vulnerability clashing hot and sharp with the soaring arrogance of plunging forward despite all the evolutionary inheritance of your cells telling you to turn around and run. It's brilliant.
Normally, the kind of weather event he's got ahead of him today wouldn't necessarily light his fire like this. Used to be he'd only bother with electrical storms if there was something else to sweeten the deal. When he was freelancing as a photographer or occasionally for the local news, it was only tornadoes that really paid the big bucks (and he uses that phrase with full sarcasm).
But things have changed. And the lightning he can see snaking down to lick the flat horizon makes his nerves crackle with sympathetic electricity and anticipation.
It's been about an hour since he saw the last vehicle headed all-out in the other direction away from the storm—local weather channels have been warning everyone to be on lockdown since last night, so nobody is out and about braving the mess now that it's arrived.
Which is why he's surprised by the figure that appears as if my magic between sheets of rain, leaping out of the highway ahead of him before Bucky has to jerk the wheel to avoid him.
His delayed reaction as he registers how close he came to hitting someone in the last place he'd expect is to slam on his brakes, skidding to a stop in the middle of the road. He takes a deep breath as his heart thuds. What the hell is that guy doing out in this? On foot? Bucky deliberately unclenches his white-knuckled grip on the steering wheel and eyes the figure in his rearview, as much as he can make out through his back wiper. He’s no farmer, and he’s not a bum either. Even from here Bucky can tell that the leather jacket that he’s wearing is sleek, cut for style more than functionality. But it’s his posture more than anything that stands out. The jacket is stretched over incredibly broad shoulders, and he stands still regarding the truck, back straight.
Whoever he is and however inappropriately unperturbed he seems about his situation, Bucky doesn’t think he can leave him out here in the middle of all this in good conscience.
Bucky puts the truck in reverse. He backs up to a stop beside where the guy stands on the shoulder and rolls down his window.
"Hey buddy," Bucky calls, and the guy takes a tentative step forward, "you uh—noticed there's kind of a storm going on?"
*
Bucky's isn't certain that it's a good idea to take an unsuspecting hitchhiker out on a job with him. But he is certain that even if the guy has no idea what he's in for, he really will be safer in Bucky's truck than standing out in the open where Bucky had found him. Anyway, the guy said he was game. And Bucky can apologize later when he finds out just what he was signing himself up for.
Actually, Bucky thinks, eyeing him out of the corner of his eye as the truck hurdles along toward the heart of the lightning strikes, he doesn't look as nervous as he'd expect any normal person to be at the prospect that lies ahead. In fact, he doesn't look nervous at all. Bucky turns his head to consider him more fully, confident that the chance of there being any more obstacles to avoid in the middle of the flat, straight highway is unlikely.
Aside from the water dripping off of his clothes and hair, he looks remarkably put together. Up close Bucky’s initial impression of his leather jacket is confirmed. But now he notices the rest of the ensemble underneath it and his impression of "out of place" increases—absurdly the man seems to be sporting khakis, a light-colored button-down tucked in at the waist, and a pair of totally inappropriate boots. They're not made for mud or work, barely made for handling a motorcycle which is what he'd said he was on before he took off on foot.
"I'm Bucky, by the way," Bucky says, tipping his chin up at the guy, who glances over at him quickly. "Sorry, didn't catch your name?"
The guy swallows, an almost nervous expression on his face. "Ah—it's—nice to meet you. I'm Steve." He sighs, looking away out the windshield of the truck. "Steve Rogers."
It takes Bucky a moment to place why the name is familiar, but when he does he lets out a short bark of laughter. "Steve Rogers—Captain America? Are you shitting me?"
The guy—Steve—ducks his head. And that, strangely, is what convinces Bucky that he's on the level and not messing with him. He recognizes the gesture from the few news clips of interviews he got around to watching after that mess a few months ago in New York. He'd thought it was incongruous then, too—and oddly endearing.
"Yeah," Steve says heavily. "But I'm not on the job at the moment."
"No shit," Bucky says. "Not much to interest an Avenger out here."
"Think not?" Steve asks, looking over at him again.
Bucky shrugs. "Just my two cents. But feel free to correct me if I'm wrong."
"No, you're not wrong."
His tone is strained. Bucky turns that over in his mind. It's clear Captain America isn't happy about being recognized. Maybe he's not even happy about interacting at all. He certainly looks uncomfortable, with deep lines that set in around his mouth the moment Bucky had uttered the name.
"Steve then," Bucky says lightly, fixing his eyes ahead, "it okay if I just call you that?"
"I—yeah," Steve says, sounding surprised. "That's...that's good. Thanks. And thanks again for the lift."
"At the risk of sounding particularly uncharitable, don't mention it. I probably wouldn't have offered if there was any chance of someone else coming by to offer. And if you weren't in danger of bodily harm as the tallest thing on the ground out there in a storm like this." Bucky pauses. "Though actually knowing who you are, you'd probably have been okay."
Steve darts him a glance, and Bucky smirks back. Steve's concerned expression relents a degree, furrows in his brow smoothing a little as he tries out his own tentative smile.
"Probably. But in my experience what doesn't kill you sometimes still hurts like a sonofabitch in the meantime."
Bucky snorts outright at that, and Steve's face clears the rest of the way, the half smile giving way to a real one. "I'll take your word for it."
"Good idea—don't try this at home, as the kids say."
Bucky chuckles again, and it feels like the air inside the truck is lighter as some of the tension in Steve's frame evaporates.
"Hey about that," Bucky says, chewing on his bottom lip for a moment. "Um...I know I warned you we're going through the storm but that's not quite the...whole caveat. With accepting a ride from me."
Steve's body twists in his seat as he angles himself toward Bucky, throwing a sharp look at the bank of instruments and gadgets in the truck bed behind him. "Anything to do with all this?"
"Yeah. We're going through it but we're uh—gonna be making a pit stop first. In it."
Steve takes in a deep breath, but not an anxious sounding one. "Well," he says after a moment. "Not exactly what I was planning for my sightseeing today—but I'm still game. Guessing not a lot of people get this kinda tour when they plan their Route 66 road trip."
"No," Bucky agrees, "not a lot. I'll try to give you something to write home about, huh?"
Steve snorts. "You can try."
Bucky imagines that if he had picked up a hitchhiker who turned out to be Captain America on a clear day, he probably would have spent a little bit more time marveling at it than he currently has the capacity to do. But right now, today, his truck is steadily eating up the distance between them and the storm and he really needs to focus on that.
He has, all things considered, a fairly loose set of instructions from his current employer about what kind of data they ultimately want from him.
But Bucky isn't an idiot, and he is good at knowing when one of these storms is more than an average weather event.
Two years ago New Mexico had been ripped apart by strange forces which were then never spoken of again. A month after that, Bucky had been contacted by a representative from Blackstone and offered an absurd amount of money (and a few other ah—incentives) to basically keep doing what he was doing at dirt cheap freelance prices before. He's smart enough to know that when the wind takes on a certain unearthly tinge, and the lightning strikes hit with a force unlike anything he used to see in the old days--those are the ones he'd better make damn sure he gets in the middle of.
So he doesn't have even a few minutes right at this exact juncture to ponder the presence of a soggy Avenger in his passenger seat. That will have to wait.
A few minutes later the tuck breaks through the edges of the rain. The bank of clouds above and around them form a black, oppressive mass that hide the expanses of the horizon. Inside the storm, the landscape is lit with an eerie blue, and the silvery-green lightning forks down in a near constant rhythm on all sides letting Bucky know he's reached the right position.
"Hold on," he remembers to warn Steve.
He doesn't watch to see if Steve heeds him as he knocks the truck into four-wheel-drive and yanks the wheel to take them off the road into the muddy stretch of grassland beside them.
Steve's right hand flies up to brace himself against the roof of the cab, but that's his only apparent reaction to the turn of events.
The truck trundles along, engine roaring at the extra effort of pushing through the wet soil, until Bucky estimates that they're about where they need to be for the best exposure in the next two to five minutes. He throws the truck into park and shoulders his door open to leap out.
He drops the tailgate of the truck, reaching for his bundle of specialized rods. As he drags the heavy pile toward himself, he suddenly finds the weight lessening with the help of another set of hands. Bucky glances up sharply, and Steve looks back rather impassive.
"Tell me where you want them!" Steve raises his voice to be heard over the deafening thunder.
Bucky only hesitates for a moment, because a moment is all they have, before he lets Steve take the whole bundle into his arms, the weight apparently not even registering.
"This way!" Bucky shouts back, gesturing.
Steve scrambles after him, and catches on surprisingly fast as Bucky starts placing the rods, using the post driver to jam them into the soft soil at three foot intervals.
They're placing the second to last when they hit their first success further up the line, a bright tongue of lightning striking the third rod in the row, searing light crackling its way down the length of the wires connecting it back to the equipment in the truck bed.
Bucky can't help the wild, maniacal smile on his face as he watches.
"Come on!" he yells, tugging on Steve's arm, "Last one!"
Steve follows him at once, and a detached corner of Bucky's mind remarks that having an assistant unfazed by certified Weird Shit is pretty useful. With the last post set, Steve turns to him with no more than an eyebrow raised in silent question. Bucky wraps his hand around Steve's elbow and nudges him back toward the truck, the two of them setting back at a jog.
Bucky hops up to sit on the open tailgate and pulls the handheld energy reader into his lap.
"What now?" Steve asks, climbing up to sit beside him.
Bucky grins, squinting at him against the persistent flare of white all around them.
"Now," he says, turning to crook one leg up under him and tipping the screen of the reader toward Steve, "we enjoy the show."
*
Steve spares only a cursory glance at the screen of the device on Bucky's lap. He can guess well enough at its purpose, and it doesn't interest him quite as much as the vibrant, unbridled expression on Bucky's face.
So far this experience doesn't even touch the top ten strangest or most dangerous things Steve's done in his life. But he imagines that it would for most people. And he's fascinated by Bucky's response to it—something that looks a lot like joy.
Bucky tosses the device onto the tailgate between them, and fumbles in the pocket of his windbreaker, pulling out a slightly crumpled pack of cigarettes.
His hands are trembling a little and it takes several shaky clicks of the lighter to get his cigarette lit, hand cupping around the flame to block the wind. But it's not, as far as Steve can tell, from fear.
Bucky takes a long drag on the cigarette, red tip flaring bright as his cheeks hollow around it. For a moment Steve's eyes feel magnetized to the shape of Bucky's mouth and he notes again how sharp the other man's cheekbones and jaw are under the shadow of stubble. Steve looks away as Bucky blows out a long stream of smoke with a sigh of satisfaction. But his gaze is drawn back almost at once. Just professional curiosity, he tells himself. Only because he hasn't figured Bucky out yet, and it behooves him to determine just what kind of person he's traveling with, even if it's only briefly.
Bucky looks over, noting Steve's gaze on him, and he flicks ash away from the end of the cigarette before taking another drag.
"Sorry," he says, a lingering tendril of smoke puffing out with the words. "I know it's a bad habit—does it bug you?"
"Nah. My day everybody smoked everywhere, ya know. I'm still getting used to the fact that I'm not surrounded by a cloud of it everywhere I go these days."
Bucky laughs, and though the sound is swallowed by another roll of thunder, Steve tracks the ripple of it over Bucky's features—fine lines around his eyes crinkling as nose scrunches too.
"That's right, I forgot." He takes another long inhale. He nods down at the pack and lighter beside him, "You want one? Help yourself. We'll be here a little while yet."
Steve's going to refuse politely. It's not like he smoked much, even back in the day, not with his asthma, and even later in the army when cigarettes were precious and he'd decided he wouldn't start up a habit if other guys wanted them worse than him. But then his eyes flick again to the shape of Bucky's mouth dragging in another lungful, and there is something so appealing about it that Steve decides he must be craving a cigarette after all.
"Thanks," he says, reaching out to tap one from the pack.
Steve closes his eyes as he takes his first drag, savoring the new/old slide of heat at the back of his throat and the taste of tobacco on his tongue. God, when was the last time he'd smoked one? For a moment he can't remember. Then it hits him—of course. He'd been sitting in the back of a covered troop truck with the Howlers the night before they'd raided Schmidt's final base. He'd passed it back and forth with Falsworth, and he can picture each of their faces circled round, laughing and joking over the undercurrent of pre-battle nerves.
It wasn't so long ago, really. Only a lifetime.
Steve opens his eyes again, letting the hot flare of lightning striking the line of rods around them burn into his retinas instead to drive the memory from them.
He realizes Bucky's eyes are on him, and quickly schools his face into something neutral.
"Good?" Bucky asks. Steve wonders how long he was watching, and what he thinks he saw.
Steve nods. "Been a while."
"Yeah," Bucky says. "I only smoke on the job these days. I'd quit for real but I get too jumpy during this part, waiting it out. Haven't found anything else that works so well."
"I guess," Steve says, then clears his throat, blaming the cigarette for the rasp in his voice. "I guess it's pretty frowned on now."
Bucky shrugs, stubbing out the end of his smoke before reaching for another. "Yeah. I mean, I'm a millenial so I get it—I'm not a smoker because I haven't heard that it might be bad for you. Some things you just do anyway." He laughs again, and waves a hand around them as a particularly violent branch of light strikes nearby. "Guess that's a theme of my life choices huh?"
Steve's mouth quirks up in a wry half-smile, and he lifts the cigarette for another tentative puff. This one goes down easier, and isn't accompanied by quite the same assault of sensory memory, so he takes another. "Guess so."
They subside into silence for several long minutes. Bucky continues to smoke and Steve continues to try not to watch him. He has to relight his cigarette twice when he forgets about it and it goes out.
Bucky holds his cigarette between two fingers, Steve notes. Steve holds his high on the filter between his thumb and middle finger like they all used to when they were sharing. Or maybe it's because nobody smokes unfiltered anymore so there's more room to hold it loosely. It doesn't look weird or anything, it just seemed like something worth taking note of. Apparently.
After a while, the near constant flashes of lightning down the line of rods begin to ebb, forks of white blinking away further out over the horizon as the previously impenetrable mass of black cloud above them starts to shift and thin. Soon enough, Steve realizes he can hear the sound of his own breathing again, and that the wind isn't carrying away the smoke from his mouth with the same force it was a few minutes before.
Beside him, Bucky groans and stretches, arms reaching toward the sky to crack his back, half-finished cigarette dangling from his lips. He gives a huff as he relaxes, slumping back on one hand and taking a final languid drag on his smoke before stubbing it out.
"Guess we're pretty much finished here." Bucky glances over his shoulder at the bank of equipment in the truck. He twists around and pulls himself into a crouch in front of it, and Steve watches with renewed interest as he clicks open the sleek front of one of the machines. Bucky pulls out what appears to be a metal tube, about a foot in length and four inches in diameter, peering at a series of three green lights on the front. He nods decisively to himself and slides it back into place before Steve can get a really good look, shutting the door again. "Yeeeah good enough for a Wednesday." Bucky turns back to Steve and hops down to the ground beside the tailgate. "Let me clean up a bit and get this stuff stored, and then we can get out of here."
"I'll help," Steve says, discarding his own cigarette and hastily hopping down beside Bucky.
Bucky gives him a considering look. "Thanks," he says after a moment.
He sets off toward the furthest lightning rod, and Steve trails in his wake.
It takes longer to disassemble and store the equipment than it had to place it, but Steve imagines part of that feeling is down to the fact that they don't have excited adrenaline fueling the reverse process. Each lightning rod gets wiped down, the thick bundle of cables connecting them wrapped delicately around the stem before Bucky allows them to be placed back in their bag.
At last, Steve heaves the heavy duffel into the bed of the truck, and Bucky slams the tailgate shut with a grunt of approval.
They both climb back into their respective sides of the truck cab, and Bucky shucks his windbreaker, wiping the back of his arm across his forehead. Steve slips his arms out of his own jacket, tucking it on top of his backpack between his feet. He shoots a sideways glance at Bucky’s mud-splattered t-shirt before also undoing the top couple buttons of his shirt too. His clothes are still a little damp from his walk in the rain earlier, but between the efforts with the storm equipment and the still air in the truck, he feels quite warm anyway.
The engine revs, and Bucky sets the truck trundling back in the direction of the highway much more deliberately than the pace at which they'd left it.
"That was..." Steve says after a few moments of quietly speeding along the highway. There's blue sky in front of them now, and sunlight. It's still only late-afternoon, Steve realizes with bemusement. There's still half a day left up there ahead. "That was really something. You do that a lot?"
Bucky's mouth twists into a grin and he takes his eyes off the road to look at Steve. "Often as I can."
"Seems...exciting."
Bucky laughs, head tipping back against the headrest of his seat. "You know what? Coming from you that almost sounds like a compliment."
Steve ducks his head, smiling.
"Where are you headed anyway Steve?"
Steve shuffles his feet. "Like I said—anywhere. Just drop me off in the next town and I'll—I'll find my way."
"Sure," Bucky says, lightly. "But I mean after that, where were you on your way to? What are you doing out here and not..." he trails off, leaving the unspoken not in New York hanging between them. "Just, what brings you this way, I mean."
Steve chews on the inside of his cheek. "I don't—uh. Nowhere in particular I guess. I wanted to...see the country. Get out of the city for a while. I know things have changed all over and I wanted to see what this century's like not...not in New York."
He wishes that the words came out sounding more confident. He could force them to, if he wanted. He's been Captain America long enough to know what that soundbite ought to go like. But the thought of twisting it, even to sound less pathetic in front of this man he doesn't really know, makes him tired. Who cares if he doesn't sound like he has a good reason for any of this? He doesn't, and he is tired. He awoke from Death to find out that to keep living he’d have to fight an enemy using the exact same damn tesseract he’d plunged into the ocean. He’s fucking tired.
Bucky just hums in response, lips pursed in thought.
"You know," he starts, then hesitates, chewing on his bottom lip. "Ah, nevermind."
"What?" Steve asks, eyeing the nervous gesture.
Bucky huffs a laugh and shakes his head. "You said you’re making your way to New Mexico eventually, right? I was just going to say—the forecast is for some pretty interesting stuff, next couple of days. And then I’ve gotta be in Santa Fe sometime next week so I’ll be going out that way. If you don't have anywhere to be you could tag along. If you want. With me."
"Why?" The question is out before Steve even thinks about it. "What would you—" he cuts himself off before he finishes. But the smile on Bucky's face has already dropped, and it's obvious he heard the end of it (what would you get out of it) even if Steve didn't say it. Bucky's jaw clenches as he glues his eyes fixedly on the road ahead.
"Forget it. Stupid idea." He says tightly.
Steve's chest knots a little harder at Bucky's tone, angry at himself. He isn't sure when he became somebody who expected everyone around him to have ulterior motives. Maybe it’s from too much time playing at intergalactic politics cloistered away with a bunch of spies and superpowered types. He used to believe in people a lot more.
He reaches for something to say to reset the moment, but comes up empty-handed. If he could would he—would he be interested? In taking Bucky up on it? The storm had been a thrill, it's true. Thrill-seeking isn't really what he came out here for though. But it hadn't been a bad kind, not like the nauseous rush of a fight. It had burned clean. He had set out on this trip to be alone...but looking over at Bucky's tight grip on the wheel and thinking about the fierce, joyful abandon on his face as he'd worked, Steve realizes that may not be true either. He set out not to be with any of the people who'd surrounded him in New York. Spending a couple of days with someone unconnected to all that, someone interesting and new...it doesn't lack appeal. And he could always go his own way again if it turns out to be a bad idea...
Steve takes a breath to say something, smooth it over. But Bucky beats him to it.
"Look, I'm pretty good at my job, Captain," Bucky says, gaze still pointedly forward. "Don't get me wrong, you were more helpful than I'd expect any old hitchhiker to be. But I don't need anything from you."
Steve only partially registers the rest of what Bucky said as the sharp edges of "Captain" catch him like a kick in the teeth.
"It's still just Steve," he says, trying and failing from keeping his shoulders from going absolutely tense.
Bucky does look over then, and his frown eases somewhat.
"Steve, then," he says. "I don't need anything from you, Steve."
Maybe it's the use of his first name, or maybe it's the softening of Bucky's tone, but the declaration sounds much kinder the second time. Less, maybe, like a dismissal, and more like reassurance.
"I think," Steve begins slowly, trying not to sound hesitant. Imagine Captain America doing anything hesitantly. "I think I'd like that. If you mean it. I don't have a schedule or anything and I—I wanted to see something new. Definitely never done anything like that before." He tries out a tentative smile. It feels stiff, but not bad.
Bucky's eyebrows are still pulled together, and he chews at his lip again. "You sure? I mean...it's more of the same, probably." His brow smoothes as Steve nods, and an answering smile creeps over his face. "It really is pretty fucking cool—and hey!—we may even be in for a bit of a twister in the mix, in the storm front I'm headed toward tomorrow. When the conditions are right--there's nothing like it." Bucky stops, checking his enthusiasm, as if Steve might find it off-putting. (Steve finds it anything but.) "And you know, I'll be headed west still, and it’s not hard to hook over to Albuquerque before I swing up north. So I can get you back to—to your sightseeing."
"Yeah," Steve says, leaning back into the passenger seat, letting his stiff-spined posture relax into it. "I'd like that. Thanks...Bucky."
art by heyboy
*
They drive for some time after that, on a highway that seems to slice right down the center of the plain like a knife.
Just about the time the sinking sun begins to redden the fields spreading out on either side of the highway, a town finally grows up from between the wheat and grasses ahead of them.
A small corner of Bucky's mind sets itself ahead to keeping an eye out for a decent looking motel, maybe something with a diner nearby. In the wake of the adrenaline of going out on a job he's usually not good for much but eating his body weight in greasy carbs and falling face first into bed.
The rest of his brain, though, is screaming at him that he should probably be looking instead for a place to drive this truck into a fucking gully and make a break for it.
What the actual fuck was he thinking? Inviting a total stranger he picked up on the side of the road to tag along with him is one thing—it's a very Bucky Barnes level of stupid. He can definitely believe it of himself. But inviting a complete stranger who is also a national icon to—what? hang out? It's beyond even his habitual levels of impulsively dumb things to do. What was he thinking? What was he thinking?
Bucky chews on his bottom lip, and casts a sneaky sideways look at Steve, whose profile is looking especially coin-worthy in the golden glow of the setting sun.
He'd been thinking, in as much as conscious thought had factored into it at all, about how...forlorn Steve had seemed. Lonely, maybe. Weary, definitely. But how when they'd hit the center of the storm—the fun part, the cool part that Bucky lives for—it had also brought a real legitimate smile to Steve's stoic features. Bucky'd thought maybe the guy had actually enjoyed himself a bit. And that enjoying himself wasn't something Steve took for granted or got a lot of opportunities to do. Bucky's been tired and lonely before, and he'd also honestly had fun sharing his work with someone else who got a kick out of it for the first time in a good long while.
So he'd opened his mouth and asked.
And then it had set in how fucking inane all of those reasons are because sad-faced-Steve is Captain America. He's not out here alone because he had nobody who'd offer to spend any time with him, of that Bucky's certain. In fact more likely than not he's out here in the middle of nowhere alone to try and get away from all the people clamoring for his time.
But, says a small voice into the fray of self-flagellation going on inside Bucky's head, he said yes.
Really, that's what makes it all so perplexing. If Steve had left the conversation where Bucky had expected him to from his initial reaction, Bucky could have dropped him off and spent the next several decades of his life occasionally reliving the humiliation of having told Steve they could hang out if he had nothing better to do, and that would've been that.
But Steve had said yes. So Bucky circles back around to the beginning again with what the fuck was I thinking.
Maybe this isn't even happening. Maybe he actually got hit by lightning and never made it off the job. Maybe he's dead. He can't say Steve Rogers wouldn't potentially be who he'd like to spend the afterlife kicking around with. But he also isn't really certain he'd have qualified for heaven or whatever place that would happen so that feels unlikely. If he were dead he'd probably be stuck with like...his high school bully. Maybe just someone boring like a former Vice President. At best Bucky's lived an "eternal afterlife with Jake Tapper" level existence.
Bucky risks another look at Steve to reassure himself this weird fever dream is actually happening. A jolt of utter panic lances through him when he finds that Steve's looking back, and his head whips back around to the front way too fast to have been inconspicuous, embarrassed at having been caught. But wait—why was Steve watching him? How long was he doing that for? Bucky's brain shorts out and refuses to track a coherent thought about that any further.
Food. Sleep. A shower in between if he can convince himself to make the effort. These are the things he needs before he can properly think through what the next couple days (three? four? a week?) is going to look like with Captain America as his companion.
(It suddenly occurs to him that he's not...entirely sure Richardson or Blackstone in general will be happy about this. Bucky decides immediately that it's in everyone's best interest if he doesn't mention it when he checks in.)
Ultimately Bucky pulls into the parking lot for the first motel he sees, figuring there's a decent chance it's the only one in town anyway since the sign driving in boasted a population of 762 residents. The sign out front declares Vacancy (and color TV in every room!) and there appears to be a diner open across the street. Overall not the worst place he's ever pulled into.
Bucky's body suddenly feels like his bones have hardened into some kind of metal as he unfolds himself from the driver's seat. It's full twilight now, so he reasons that by the time they get a room and eat something it won't be a completely unreasonable hour just to go to bed.
Steve trails him to the door of the motel's main office, and Bucky notes bemusedly that he seems to be trying to shrink in on himself, shoulders hunched. It's not particularly effective. Even with his gold hair hanging lank over his forehead from its earlier rain-drenching and dressed in muddy khakis, he still carries a mantle over him that smacks of the heroic.
"You can hang back, if you want," Bucky says, again not sure what compels him to offer. "I'll take care of the room, if you don't want to um...talk with anybody."
Steve clenches his jaw, but he also nods emphatically, letting a heavy breath out through his nose. "Thanks."
Bucky leaves him behind to hover at the crooked screen door of the place. He puts on a smile for the girl at the desk, who perks up at the sound of the bell on the door. This job probably gets boring out here, Bucky doubts she keeps too busy. Also, Bucky can admit with all humility, he is pretty hot. The look of pleased surprise she's giving him confirms. Bucky's smile widens a little.
"Can I help you?" She asks, sitting straighter behind the counter.
"You sure can," Bucky says, letting just a little bit of an affected panhandle twang creep into his words. He feels self-conscious about it, knowing Steve's probably listening. But when you've had as many of these kind of interactions as Bucky's had living on the road, you get tired of explaining what the hell you're doing out here when your accent immediately gives you away. Sometimes he just doesn't feel like having that conversation, and a little linguistic camouflage goes a long way. "Lookin' to book a double. Just the one night. Got anything open?"
"Sure thing sweetie," the girl drawls back, and tosses her blonde ponytail over her shoulder. "Just gimme an i.d. and a quick minute, we'll get you right into somethin'."
Bucky digs his driver's license and Blackstone expense card out of his wallet and slides them across the counter. The girl accepts it, and starts tapping away into the ancient desktop between sidelong looks at Bucky. He smiles pleasantly but pretends not to notice or give off a vibe that he’s interested in beyond courteousness.
"And the other name for the room?" She asks, now not making eye contact. "Will that be Mrs. Barnes?"
Bucky smiles and shakes his head. "No, my buddy uh—" he halts, suddenly realizing Steve might not be thrilled about having his name on record. For that matter he isn't sure he wants Steve's name on record on a room he's charging to his Blackstone card. His mind scrambles, "Grant. Um, Grant Rogers." Bucky takes a moment to wonder at the fact that somewhere in the recesses of his memories he for some reason stored and was able to produce Steve's middle name. He's not going to examine that too closely.
The girl smiles broadly. "Well then here y'are James" she says, handing him back his cards and a pair of keys. "Number 107 all the way down on the right. Hope you enjoy your stay. And if you need anything I'm here 'til nine. Could always stick around too if I need to," she adds with a meaningful raise of an eyebrow.
Bucky smiles back with as much bland politeness as he can. "Thanks very much, I'm sure everything will be just fine."
"Okey doke, but you just let me know."
"Have a good evening!" Is Bucky's reply. She looks a little disappointed but not too put out, and Bucky chuckles to himself as he pushes back out of the creaky screen door to the front porch.
Steve starts back from where he's lurking behind the door, looking guilty, the tips of his ears going a little pink. "All set?" he asks.
"All set. You wanna head across the street first? I'm starved."
The diner isn't packed, but it's not quite as empty as Bucky had unconsciously expected it to be either. There's a couple people in booths that are clearly regulars from town based on their rapport with the one older waitress, and two guys at the counter who look like they're probably truckers on their way through.
The waitress shows Bucky and Steve to a booth near the back, and it doesn't escape Bucky that Steve automatically steps forward to take the side where he can face the door.
Dinner is a bit of a quiet affair. Bucky doesn't read much into Steve's silence, since it's not exactly like he's holding up his end of the conversation either. He's worn out and hungry.
And honestly, as much as he told himself he invited Steve along because Steve seemed lonely, Bucky's spent pretty much the past couple years on the road on his own as well. In fact the last job he worked with a team--a rare stint during tornado season with a local news crew--was nearing three years ago. So it's not like Bucky is Mr. Extrovert these days either.
They put away a greasy cheeseburger, fries, and a shake apiece (Steve orders his with an extra patty to boot though which is mildly impressive).
Bucky is halfheartedly swirling the last, melty remains of his chocolate shake at the bottom of his glass, contemplating whether he has space in his stomach to finish it off when Steve clears his throat awkwardly to speak.
"Um, listen," Steve says, eyes glued deliberately on making patterns in ketchup with a french fry instead of looking at Bucky, "I can uh...I can hang out here or—or make myself scarce somewhere else if you—the girl at the hotel seemed to be—anyway if you wanted, I wouldn't want to cramp your style or anything."
Bucky stares back at Steve for a moment as he fights his post-food haze, nonplussed. Then he barks a startled laugh.
"That's...that's generous of you. Thanks," he says, trying not to laugh any more because Steve is frowning at the french fry now with his jaw set stubbornly. "She doesn't quite have what I'm looking for."
"How do you know? She was pretty," Steve says, a mulish tilt to his mouth. "And she seemed nice."
Bucky nods, suddenly wondering how his life choices brought him to this unreal conversation.
"She was. And she did. Wrong shape though."
Steve does look up now with a perplexed expression. Bucky rolls his eyes and takes in a long-suffering breath.
"She's a she, Steve," he says. Still no spark of Steve getting what he's angling at. "I'm gay. I like men."
Steve's confusion melts at once and his cheeks flame instantly pink. "Oh. Okay." He snaps his mouth shut, looking embarrassed.
Bucky frowns, narrowing his eyes, and really hopes that Steve's flustered reaction isn't what he's afraid it means. "That gonna be a problem?"
"No!" Steve says, eyes widening. He makes a sort of aborted gesture with his hand toward Bucky, but pulls it back and just shakes his head vehemently. "No, not a problem."
Bucky sits back in the booth, crossing his arms over his chest, still feeling the little flare of defensive concern burning through him. "Okay," he says, flatly.
Steve clasps his hands together tight in front of him and hunches his shoulders.
"It really is Bucky, I mean it," he says, tone solemn. His eyebrows knit together with such a serious, defender-of-justice type expression Bucky can't help but want to believe him. "I'm just—not used to it being the kind of thing you can tell somebody you just met. That's all. Honest."
Bucky hesitates, but then uncrosses his arms, nodding. "Yeah. I hear you." He slides out from the booth, throwing a few bills onto the table to cover the meal. Maybe if Steve sticks with him longer than the next day or so he'll figure out how they should be splitting costs, but he rarely uses up his entire per diem allowance anyway so it's not worth it at the moment.
"Bucky—” Steve says, reaching out to touch Bucky's arm, the contact only lasting a moment before he pulls back.
"Don't worry about it Steve, we're good." Bucky says, not letting him finish whatever new stumbling apology he's forming. "Let's go get some rest huh?"
*
Bucky slips away with his toiletries bag into the bathroom as soon as they get back to the motel, leaving Steve alone to kick himself more thoroughly than he'd had a chance to at the diner.
Admittedly they are both a bit worse for wear between the rain and the mud and the sweat from the storm run, so maybe Bucky really was just anxious for a shower and to clean up. Steve still can't help fearing that Bucky was more anxious to escape Steve's company.
Steve can't blame him. He feels completely out of place as he perches on the edge of the second tidily made bed opposite from where Bucky had carelessly tossed his bag when they'd entered. It's an utterly bizarre situation they both find themselves in. Steve's not sure which of them he had shocked more by accepting the invitation in the first place.
It occurs to him that he could just leave. Sneak out while Bucky's in the shower and leave his key on the bed. Steve doubts Bucky would be surprised. But he'd also think it was because Steve was too uncomfortable over sharing space after Bucky had told him he was gay. It's not that, and the thought of Bucky assuming Steve is intolerant is intolerable. A lot of people have made a lot of assumptions about him since he came out of the ice, and one of them has consistently been that a man born in the early part of the twentieth century was going to be upset about certain advancements in sexual mores. He's decidedly not.
In fact if he's honest with himself, Bucky coming out to him so casually has increased his nervous awkwardness. But not for the reasons Bucky would probably ever guess at.
Steve sighs heavily and leans over to tug off his muddy boots so that he can at least sit properly on the bed and look a little bit less like he's planning to make a break for it whenever Bucky comes back out of the bathroom.
He kicks his feet up on top of the ugly blue bedspread and digs the heels of his hands into his eyes.
It's been a long while since Steve was actually…attracted to someone. And much longer since that someone was a man. Not in this century. And before this century there had been only Peggy for a long time, with her stunning wit and alarming brown eyes. He supposes that's one of the reasons there hasn't been anyone else yet. Peggy's wit is still stunning, even now nearing a hundred when she exercises it in urging him to take this second chance to get out and live.
But since he woke up there hasn't been time. Or space, he supposes. To just live or to notice someone new in that way. The only people he's really had the chance to interact with in any meaningful way are too wrapped up in the work. The closest he got was the five minutes when he'd met Agent Hill and noted distantly that she reminded him of Peggy with her dark hair and air of capable self-assurance. Then the airborne ship they'd been on had exploded and that was the last he'd thought about that. (It occurs to him now, thinking about Bucky's dark hair and bright, clever eyes that he may have a type).
But before crashing the Valkyrie he'd been Steve Rogers, and now it feels like the only person who survived and came out again is Captain America. And simple human things like attraction and affection aren't in Captain America's script.
So far from it, really, that the possibility hadn't even factored into his escape on this road trip. At best he'd hoped to be by himself and just remember how to exist as a person outside of his Avenger's mantle. To expect anybody else to participate in that process hadn't even entered into his deepest hopes. Which is why he'd been startled into accepting Bucky's tentative offer of something like friendship. And if there’s even a theoretical possibility of something else...the idea that he might, somewhere deep down, crave a connection with someone like Bucky isn't just startling, it's terrifying.
God, he needs to get it together. This really isn't even a thing. It would be completely unfair to subject Bucky in any way to him having a crisis over someone handsome just being nice to him.
Unfortunately Steve's fresh resolution to get himself in line is immediately put on temporary hiatus when the bathroom door clicks open and Bucky steps out looking sheepish in just a towel.
"Sorry," he mutters, crossing in front of Steve's bed to his own, "forgot to take my stuff in with me. Used to being alone."
You and me both, Steve thinks as he actively tries not to focus on the water dripping from Bucky's slicked-back hair down his back. It's a nice back.
"Don't worry about it."
"I'll get dressed and then it's all yours," Bucky says with a smile, turning with a bundle of clothes in his arms. "The water pressure doesn't even suck, which is a pleasant surprise in one of these places."
"Sounds great." Steve is pretty sure he manages a normal looking, totally appropriate smile in reply.
He halts whatever train of thought is threatening to leave the station as Bucky disappears again into the bathroom. Steve's gotten pretty good at that. There's a lot of things he just doesn't want to think about these days.
Instead he takes it as a cautionary reminder to gather all of his things out of his bag to take into the bathroom for his own shower. Luckily the backpack of supplies he brought with him when he'd left the bike behind was big enough to contain his toothbrush, two changes of clothes, and something to sleep in. If tomorrow's adventure in storm chasing turns out to be as muddy as today's though he's going to have to do laundry somewhere sooner than later. He definitely won't be able to wear today's khakis or shirt again before they're washed.
Steve sits for a few moments on the end of the bed with his bundle clutched in both hands, and jumps up the second the door handle clicks open again. Bucky emerges looking much more relaxed in sweats and a t-shirt, absentmindedly toweling at his hair.
"Have at it.”
Steve just swallows and nods, fleeing past him into the dense, steamed up air of the bathroom.
Happily at least Bucky was right about one thing: the water pressure is well above decent, especially for a bathroom tiled entirely in some ungodly combination of green and mauve. Steve stands with his shoulders hunched under the spray for several long minutes, letting the water wash away the mud and tension in equal measure.
He’s feeling considerably calmer by the time he’s climbed out and pulled on his sleep pants and clean shirt. Steve swipes at the fogged up mirror to clear a circle as he brushes his teeth, giving himself a long look. Even with his hair all over the place from drying it and his lips foamy with toothpaste, he can’t help but think he looks stern. He always looks stern these days. He reaches up and presses with his thumb at the ever present line between his eyebrows, trying to smooth it out. It sort of works.
Steve lets the condensation recollect again on the mirror, obscuring his face.
He exits the bathroom to find the room dim, lit only by the low yellow light of one of the two bedside lamps and the flickering glow of the television. The screen is turned to what looks like the local news, but the volume is turned down so that the words fade into a pleasant murmur.
Bucky is slumped most of the way down his pillows, face slack and remote control slipping from where his hand rests on top of the comforter. At the sound of the door shutting behind Steve though he starts back up with a sharp breath, and looks around with bleary eyes.
"Sorry," he says through a yawn, sinking back again, "falling asleep over here."
Steve smiles with a soft huff. "Yeah. I'm pretty beat too."
"Okay if I turn this off?" Bucky asks, gesturing with the remote. Steve nods and pulls back the blankets to climb into bed. As soon as he's settled, Bucky clicks off the table lamp as well, plunging the room into darkness.
There's a rustling of starched bedsheets and pillows as both of them settle down. Steve lies stiffly on his back for the moment, tracing the shadowy shape of the ceiling fan as his night vision adjusts, hands fisted in the blankets over his chest.
As he listens to Bucky's breathing in the quiet, Steve can tell that he's already dropping quickly back to sleep. So he mentally shushes himself, even as he opens his mouth to ask in a low voice, "Bucky, you still awake?"
"Rrmmm?" Bucky mumbles.
"Sorry," Steve says.
"What's up?"
Bucky's voice comes back a little stronger and more awake sounding with the question. So Steve sighs, thinking that if he woke Bucky up for this he'd better see it through.
"I really am sorry—about how I seemed, earlier. When you told me that you're gay." He pauses. Bucky doesn't say anything, but Steve can tell from his breathing that he's awake and listening. "It's good, you know? That you can just...tell somebody that now. That if you tell someone and they react badly it's bad on them. I'm not used to that. But I want to be."
Bucky heaves a deep sigh, and his blankets rustle as he rolls over. Steve can just make out the outline of his face against the bright white pillowcase.
"Yeah. Okay. That...makes sense. And I believe you. Must be...must be a lot. That you're still getting used to."
Steve nods, then realizes Bucky can't see it. "There is. But some of it's good stuff like...like that." He holds his breath for a moment, feeling like he's about to tip over a cliff and not sure he'll stick the landing. "I do too, you know. Like men, I mean. Sometimes."
There's a tense silence while Steve waits for Bucky's reaction.
"That," he says at last, then clears his throat, "that was not in your latest biography."
Steve lets out the breath he's been holding in a whoosh of soft laughter. "No, I wouldn't guess it would have been. Not like they actually talked to me to write it."
"I read it," Bucky admits, "when you came back, and it hit the bestseller list again. It didn't wow me. You're already doing a lot better with a lot less words."
Steve laughs again, finding that it comes easier each time, and this time Bucky does too.
"I just didn't want you thinking...well, whatever you mighta been."
"Yeah," Buckys says, almost so softly that Steve doesn't catch it. "You know, things are better. From like...the forties, or whatever. You can tell people. But they still don't always take it so good."
There's clearly a story behind that, and not one Steve has any right to press for. He waits, letting that sentence hang in the air, to see if Bucky offers it up voluntarily.
It's quiet long enough that Steve wonders if Bucky actually has fallen asleep again. Then Bucky sucks in a long breath.
"I grew up in Indiana 'til I was thirteen and we moved to Brooklyn," he says in a rush. "I knew. Before New York. But I didn't really know until then. And I didn't come out to anybody else until I was eighteen and getting ready to leave the house anyway." He clears his throat again. "Leave my dad's roof, I guess is what I mean. Wanted it to feel like I was making the choice, so my ma didn't have to um...see it. If I was gonna get kicked out. Turned out it was the right call. He didn't speak to me for a week. And then the next week I moved out. Now when I call my ma she can say 'dad says hi' and we can both pretend it's true."
"Where did you go?" Steve asks, a little breathless. It feels more intimate than he's earned, these confessions in the dark.
"Went to college for a bit. Dropped out after a couple semesters. I couldn't afford it on my own and it didn't seem smart to take out a buncha loans to keep going." Bucky's voice is weary, recounting an old hurt. "Bounced around the city a bit, worked some odd jobs. Eventually hit the road again, and found out I could make some money chasing storms. Not a lot. But enough for something I loved. And then...well, it's a lot different now."
"I'm sorry Bucky. It shouldn't've been like that."
"Yeah, well." Bucky huffs and flops back over onto his back so that he and Steve are lying in the same position, staring up at the ceiling. "My dad's old-school and shitty and baptist as hell. But it doesn't matter now. I am who I am anyway. And a little because of it, probably."
“I—thank you. For telling me."
There's a pause. "You too. I mean it."
Steve lets another long silence stretch. Eventually Bucky rolls over again onto his side, his back to Steve. Steve sighs and rolls over too, remembering how tired he'd felt back in the diner, and how much his body really does want to sleep.
"Goodnight, Bucky," he whispers before shutting his eyes.
To his surprise, he hears a softly whispered "Night, Steve," in reply.
art by heyboy
*