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Bucky always seems half frozen first thing in the morning and it takes Steve far too long to figure out why. His best friend – and ‘best friend’ doesn’t seem to cover it; what are they? Friends? Brothers? Something different altogether? – has only been living in the tower with him and the other Avengers for a matter of days. He doesn’t venture beyond the floor they’re sharing, and the few times others have come to them he’s been skittish and hyper-vigilant, and that’s if he doesn’t retreat altogether like a shy house cat.
Steve doesn’t blame him; he’s proud of him, so proud. He wants to bundle him up and hug him and soothe the fear and pain creasing up his face. He feels his hands reach and fingers twitch, desperate, but reins it in because he’s sure it’s not what Buck needs. His... Bucky, who’s been through so much for so long, losing himself, not knowing why or for how much longer.
What Bucky needs, Steve tells himself, is calm; to feel safe and secure and in charge for once. He needs to feel like he doesn’t owe anything, like he can depend on Steve without needing to do anything in return. So Steve keeps his feelings to himself. He’s there, always there, for anything Bucky needs – food, clothes, privacy, company, silence, noise, anything – but he always makes sure to keep a bit of distance, to keep touching to a minimum because he knows Bucky hasn’t had a choice, after everything that’s been done to him, in personal space and human contact.
So no, not unless Bucky initiates it. And he has, twice; after a nightmare and in a lull in a difficult conversation, reaching for Steve’s hand and holding his fingers like a child. And Steve had felt such affectionheartbreaklovelovelove he’d had to hide suddenly shiny eyes and force himself not to squeeze back too hard, to let go when, a long while after, Bucky had carefully slid his hand away. As if unsure if he’d be allowed. Steve’s eyes had never been so continuously red and puffy as they had been this past week.
It was Bucky’s fifth morning living with Steve – which, after the last few years was like he was suddenly living a dream he never wanted to wake up from – and Steve was mixing batter in a glass bowl very, very carefully. He did not want to face any more of Tony’s teasing if he managed to break yet another glass bowl by accidentally forcing a whisk through it with his insanely tough, domestically challenging super-strength.
He noticed Bucky appear behind him, silent and watchful and always apparently content to just be in the same room as Steve and watch him. There were many reasons why Steve compared his behaviour to that of a cat in his mind.
Steve didn’t say anything, always willing for Bucky to say or do something and to take his cues from that. Gently gently.
The quiet was comfortable though and it was only when he turned to get a frying pan from an overhead cupboard, taking the opportunity to watch Bucky, the way he always did – drinking in the sight of him, trying to make up for all the time he couldn’t, all the time he thought he never would again – that he saw, underneath the soft downy jumper and loose sweats swamping the thin frame, the trembles that rippled beneath, shaking the damp strands of hair around his face so much that they flung the occasional droplet into the air, like he’d found a new way to cry. And without further thought Steve was setting aside the frying pan and stepping into Bucky’s space, used to the way unexpected movements had Bucky’s eyes turning intense and watchful while his face shut down inscrutably and his body stilled.
Steve was sure Bucky never thought Steve would hurt him but the instinctive, trained response left Steve hurting all the same, especially because with it came the knowledge that even if Bucky thought he was about to be hurt, he would have the same response. To go still. Let it happen. Be good. Obedient. Steve wanted to be sick. Instead he enveloped each of Bucky’s elbows with his over-warm hands, bracketing him between his palms and rubbing up and down. Looking into those eyes and trying to find the truth.
“Bucky?” He asked gently. Gently gently. His hands found a rhythm, found the leaner muscles beneath all the fuzzy fabric. Bucky watched his face for something, searching. Looking for the right answer to give him. Steve, eyes never leaving Bucky’s, shook his head the barest amount, almost more of a tilt, but with the same almost-admonishing-but-not-quite look on his face, “What’s wrong?” he asked.
Now Bucky was tilting his head, just slightly, just enough to indicate confusion. Steve’s hands chafed up and down trying to generate warmth.
“You’re shaking,” he explained tenderly.
Bucky was still quiet, although his body tensed just slightly like he was trying to stop the involuntary response. Steve’s hands trailed down and fumbled through folds of over sized sleeves to find Bucky’s. His eyes shot wide when he found frozen fingers. Attention now on their hands, Steve fought the possessive sweater to uncover pale, pale skin. Those nimble, pianist-long fingers were quaking and white, clearly stiff and hurting and Steve wasted no time in wrapping them up in the steady, reliable warmth of his own. He looked up again, baffled.
“Why... how are you so cold? You just had a shower,” Steve wondered, eyes flicking to Bucky’s occasionally dripping hair as if to confirm. Bucky’s look of confusion wasn’t going anywhere and it was worrying Steve as much as any of the habits he was discovering Bucky had learned while away. Habits usually forced on him by others or by necessity; habits that never seemed to be in his best interests. There was a cold knot tightening in Steve’s stomach that suspected he’d found another. He lifted a hand, glacially slow, and his other took over the work of surrounding both of Bucky’s while he carefully, so carefully, palmed Bucky’s cheek and shivered at the iciness of that beloved face. A stray thought that this might have been how Bucky felt when he lay in the snow, left for dead and covered in his own blood seventy five years ago hit Steve like that hateful train and he felt his eyes sting.
“Bucky?” He murmured, heart breaking all over again. From his expression Steve could tell it upset Bucky to have done something to put that look on Steve’s face, to have done something wrong and not know how to fix it. Bucky’s face didn’t change beneath Steve’s hand but his eyes were helpless and he shook his head, not knowing what to do; what he’d done. Water dripped against Steve’s fingers from Bucky’s hair and he thought of yesterday morning. And the one before. And the one before that. Of Bucky’s heavy sweaters and huddled shoulders and damp hair. Of Bucky, always cold in the mornings. Of the icy droplets peppering his hand, protecting Bucky’s cheek from them. Frozen fingers slowly warming between his, but so cold, so cold. He should’ve seen so much sooner.
“You’ve been having cold showers, haven’t you?” He asked quietly, and Bucky’s continued confusion tied that knot in his stomach tighter. He started berating himself – he should be anticipating this sort of thing, what good was he to Bucky if he couldn’t even – but stopped himself, because that didn’t help Bucky either.
His thumb moved against Bucky’s cheek, callouses soothing soft skin, and felt his stomach tighten with something else when Bucky pushed his face into the motion, leaning into the touch and closing his eyes. Steve watched through a haze – loveyouloveyousomuch – and Bucky’s eyes opened, slightly darker, deeper, so trusting. Steve’s hand fell from his face but his grasp on Bucky’s hand tightened as he moved around him before leading him away, down the corridor.
Entering the bathroom first and flicking the light on he felt a renewed sense of gratitude to Tony. His friend was many things, not all of them positive, but he was unfailingly generous and secretly, surprisingly thoughtful. The bathroom was lavish, tiled with dark, warm colours that left one feeling cocooned rather than exposed. Steve paused and considered for a moment, eyes panning from shower to bathtub. But no, time for that later. This was about reinforcing a message and if Bucky didn’t do this now he might not tomorrow. And Steve never wanted to feel him that cold again. He’d happily spend the rest of his life warming him up.
What started out as an innocent vow to himself made his cheeks flush when combined with the question of how to proceed.
“Okay,” Steve muttered to himself, thinking on the best way to do things while Bucky watched, silent and looking curious as Steve prevaricated. He almost looked amused by the indecision on Steve’s face which filled him with a rush of hope. It spurred him on. “Okay,” he said again with more certainty. Then he motioned to Bucky’s arms and flicked a floppy sleeve. “Up.”
With a head tilt but no hesitation, Bucky lifted his arms in the air and, feeling unbearably fond, Steve lifted his own jumper over Bucky’s head. Folding it – badly – over one arm he turned to the sink and bundled it to sit on the edge, saying over his shoulder, “and the rest.”
He didn’t sense any uncertainty behind him and opened the frosted glass door of the shower to the rustling of clothes. The water warmed instantly against the wrist he held under it and the cozy bathroom became humid and foggy with steam. He stepped to the side without turning once he deemed the water warm enough, keeping his back to Bucky. He didn’t think his best friend would care if Steve looked – it’s possible he wouldn’t even notice, possibly the least of the violations he’s faced – but if anything that made protecting his privacy and his right to it more important to Steve. He kept his eyes averted. Bucky stepped forward, beside Steve, then over the threshold and into the water with a sharply drawn breath.
“You alright?” Steve asked quietly into the steam. Bucky hummed back after a moment’s pause and Steve wondered if the water was triggering old memories or was just finally relaxing muscles tired from always being tensed and ready. He smiled to himself and after a minutes indecision – he should leave, Bucky had it from here, he should go – Steve sat, back against the bathtub and facing away from the shower. In his periphery he could just make out the way Bucky was standing, braced forward on the wall, his forearms holding his weight while his head rested atop them and his hair, long brown tendrils streaming across his skin, curtained his face. He looked relaxed, like a cat in a puddle of sun, loose-limbed and sleepily content; all those impressive, hard-won muscles soft.
Steve had never seen him like this, certainly not in the time since he’d gotten him back. But maybe not even before. Before trains and ice. Back when they were two Brooklyn kids in the forties. Bucky had always been busy, moving, going somewhere. A lot of the time it was with Steve, or to help Steve, to get him out of whatever situation he’d gotten himself into, or to find something to help him feel better – asthma, sickness, anxiety, frustration, resignation – or find money to get them by.
It hadn’t occurred to Steve then to look at Bucky, really look, and question if all that movement and action was normal. If it was just who Buck was or if it was borne of a need to fix and help and make the world better. Steve could look back now with far older eyes and see how drained Bucky had been, how much he’d worried, the tension in the lithe muscles Steve had envied.
And he had to wonder if Bucky’s ever properly relaxed in his life and his chest aches with the thought. After everything, Bucky deserves, he deserves...
Steve’s daydreams of everything he wants to do and be and provide for Bucky comes to an abrupt end when said wet, heat-pinkened best friend steps into his space because Steve’s still sitting against the bath and as lavish as the bathroom is, it’s still not that big. Steve’s eyes go wide and cheeks redden in record time and Bucky’s standing, very naked, before him and Steve stands up and eyes forward soldier.
And Bucky’s smirking.
Bucky’s smirking at him, the same smirk he had seventy five years ago. The same- oh. Oh. Bucky, unashamed of his nakedness – and why should he be? – is watching Steve’s flushed face and determinedly-not-roving eyes and he’s smirking in a way that really can’t be mistaken for much else than what Steve knows (now) it is, and it’s the same fucking smirk as he’s always worn, always, when looking at Steve...
And Steve closes his eyes at his own stupidity, feeling a little like he’s just been hit in the face by something he was dumb enough to see coming and still failed to react to in time. He keeps them closed a little longer when he hears a soft chuff of laughter even while smiling because he made Bucky laugh. But he can’t keep them closed forever and Bucky must be cooling down and the point was to finally – finally – get him warm, so Steve grabs for the truly enormous fluffy towel he’d scooped up on the way past the linen cupboard earlier and shakes it out.
Bucky doesn’t move, doesn’t make a noise or bat an eye while Steve does this. Nor when Steve steps close and fluffily tackles him with it. Bucky seems quite content to stand still in the circle of Steve’s arms while his slightly larger friend pats dry arms and back and chest before enfolding him in all that fluff and, outside that, muscle.
Steve’s not usually so forward, not with anyone. But it isn’t anyone, this is Bucky; and Steve holds his fluffy warm Bucky-bundle close and breathes into damp hair – warm now – and feels a tension he hadn’t even noticed before, a tension that may always have been there, seep away.
And Bucky rests his head in the hollow of Steve’s shoulder and soft puffs of air find Steve’s neck and healing feels like a tangible, living thing between them, curling like steam through them both. Gently.
The end.