Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Tonight he’s back on his first time with Rumlow.

By then he had been living on the island for twenty-eight long days, and he had already been raped by Pierce’s guests on two separate occasions. The first one had been overexcited, keeping the whole thing mercifully brief. The second one had been squeamish, forcing himself, pushing Bucky away after a quick hand job. Rumlow, though, grinned seeing him like a man about to enjoy an expensive cigar.

There was a hook in the ceiling; he was the first one to notice it, let alone use it—he cuffed Bucky on a chain short enough to have him standing on his very tiptoes. Through the haze of drugs that kept him pliant on those first weeks, Bucky was still hoping for something quick. But then Rumlow pulled out an anal hook from his own suitcase, with a long rope attached, and Bucky’s stomach dropped when he understood this man had come prepared for the game. Had been told ahead, and planned out the encounter.

“Oh, yeah,” Rumlow crooned, seeing his eyes widen. He pushed his fingers through Bucky’s hair, still short enough by then. “You’ll see, I’ve got it all planned out. Just gonna work on your posture a little.”

Bucky was strictly gagged and could only groan when Rumlow spread his cheeks and pushed the hook against his hole without anything like lube. The fat rounded end was as slick and shiny as metal could be, but it still felt so rough it might as well have been wrapped in sandpaper. Bucky gritted his teeth and focused on letting it in. Resisting made it worse; this he’d already figured out. Rumlow shoved even harder and the thing finally popped in. When he let go, it weighed inside Bucky—enough to make him feel awful, but not enough to slip back out.

Rumlow then took the rope attached to the hook and tucked it into Bucky’s leather collar at the back of his neck, folding it over. All he had left to do was wind the slack around his hand and pull. At first, of course, it tugged the hook farther up Bucky’s ass. But then it was as far up as it could go, and Rumlow was still pulling, meaning he was now pulling back at Bucky’s collar, strangling him. All Bucky could do to alleviate it was arch his back, which was goddamn fucking hard since he was already on the very tip of his toes. Panic reached through his drug-fueled daze as his lungs began to twist in earnest. Rumlow kept the rope taut, listened to him choke through the gag, watched him arch his back more and more, until Bucky felt he was about to break his spine.

“Proper posture,” Rumlow repeated. “Is that as far as you can go? C’mon, bitch.” He let the rope go for a few inches, just enough for Bucky to inhale raggedly through his nose, as much as he could; then he gave it a vicious pull again.

This time it felt like it went on for hours. Bucky’s thoughts went wild and aural with hypoxia. Is he going to kill me? Did Pierce give him the green light to kill me? It wasn’t fair. He hadn’t given up yet, hadn’t surrendered. He tried arching his back some more and felt he would just break his spine; the ache was almost worse than the choking, radiating into his whole back. He couldn’t beg. He was strung up all the way, driven to the extreme limits of his physical capacity, stuck.

He went away, and came back to himself lying on the floor with the hook still up his ass, the rope bound taut to his collar. He wasn’t gagged anymore; his hands had been re-cuffed in his back. His own coughing fit had stirred him.

“See, now he’s much calmer. I always say, you gotta take ‘em at the throat.”

Rumlow was talking, Bucky dimly realized, to the cameras in the ceiling. He was putting on a real good show.

“Now he’s going to suck me off. Aren’t you, Jamesy? They say warm come’s good for a sore throat.”

Bucky did not react fast enough, so Rumlow grabbed the rope linking the hook and collar, pulled him up by the throat indeed. “What do you say, bitch? I can string you up again for another round.”

Struggling and coughing, Bucky managed at least to get his knees under him so he wouldn’t start choking again. He hurt too much, he was too dizzy. Now that the agony in his spine had receded to a throbbing pain, he realized how much his ass ached from the unyielding steel. But he didn’t even have the luxury of cataloguing his hurts; Rumlow slapped him hard enough to jerk his head to the side.

“I’m not gonna ask again. Are you going to suck me off?”

“Yessir,” Bucky rasped on automatic. He couldn’t focus his gaze. His cheeks were warm and wet. He didn’t remember crying.

Rumlow’s erection was tenting his pants, already close to Bucky’s face. He unzipped himself one-handed then blessedly let go of the rope and seized Bucky’s jaw instead, gripping hard to open his mouth. “Good. Now say ahh.”

Bucky hardly had any time to catch his breath before he was stuffed full. He would like to think that back then he entertained the thought of biting off Rumlow’s cock; but he just sucked him off as well as he knew how, hoping only to finish it before he could be hurt again.

Rumlow got off the island a much richer man that time, promising to be back.

*

Now Bucky opens his eyes.

He is soaked to the bone in the memories. He lets them wash off him like slime and focuses on a different memory: stabbing the motherfucker.

Already his heart is pounding down to a slower pace. He’s broken free of his paralysis. He got his thoughts back on track. He takes a deep breath. I killed him, he’s dead. Whoever said vengeance was futile didn’t know shit.

The visions come every night. Bucky doesn’t have the luxury of calling them nightmares. They are wholesale memories, without surprise, mechanically unrolling from beginning to end. It started very soon after he was freed, maybe two or three days later at most, after the exhaustion let up enough that he was actually falling asleep instead of simply passing out. He’s tried a few things to distract himself, to change the track, but his brain is obsessively running the film of these past three years and it’s all Bucky can do to watch. At least he’s getting some sleep, is what he said to his therapist, who did not laugh. Probably didn’t realize Bucky was trying for a joke, because nobody expects him to joke.

Sometimes it feels like the nights are what’s real, and he’s dreaming his humble freedom by day. But even if that were true, well. If that’s the escape he gets, he’ll take it.

He was so convinced that he would never escape in any way. Everything happening to him feels wrong and disconnected somehow. Why am I still here? He can’t fathom what to do with himself now. Like a farmer given a plot of scorched earth. He goes through the motions of planting seeds and watering them but he knows nothing can grow.

Sharing these feelings in mandatory therapy was probably what got him on suicide watch. Bucky gets it. Everybody expects him to be too broken to function. He probably is. So for now he’s here, in this massively expensive military hospital. They can’t just let him die even though it’d be simpler for everybody, and it’s not like he can be sent back to his family, either. The psych ward is playing it safe, and he doesn’t even mind. Really, he doesn’t. For the past three years, he put all his energy into keeping himself alive. It’s kind of nice getting help with that now.

He does wish it were less lonely. Nobody visits his small room. Of course he gets a lot of human interaction, what with two therapy sessions a week, plus medical, plus a few tactful orientation sessions for legal procedures. Also, he’s being retired from the Army and he doesn’t really have a say in it. That one stings the most, because he was going to leave. Resign after his last mission. They couldn’t even give him that.

But he’s not being tortured. He’s got a window, even; he can see the hospital courtyard and a bit of sky. And they gave him a tablet to play solitaire and Candy Crush. So why should he complain?

He doesn’t talk a lot in therapy. He doesn’t have anything to say. And it’s not like he needs to be told what happened to him was wrong. He knows it was. He knows why it happened to him, too. Why he was taken, why he was tortured. There’s nothing he needs help processing, nothing he needs to come to terms with. He can even force himself to sleep in an actual bed, even though he grits his teeth and tosses and turns a lot. He can tell nobody knows what to do with him. That’s fair; he doesn’t know, either.

His therapist very much wants him to discuss Steve Rogers. Bucky very much does not want to do that.

Because if he did, what he would say is: He said he’d stand by me. So where is he now? And he just knows they’d draw all sorts of unhealthy conclusions from it. Because apparently everyone knows what Rogers did to him during those three fateful days. So in the end he says nothing, just stares at his besocked, slippered feet until the half-hour is over. Twice a week until he can go back to his room.

*

The siren is surprising at first; then Bucky remembers it’s a military hospital.

It doesn’t sound like a fire alarm, but he pokes his head out of his room just to make sure. The nurse rushing past just tells him to stay in your room, it’s being dealt with. It’s not a real proper way to address PTSD-ridden veterans, so it must mean the alert is real.

For a wild second Bucky thinks they’ve come back for me—but even with anxiety beating against his ribs, this stupid fear can’t take hold. He’s not important; he was just a toy. If Pierce really had the means to strike back, it would be at SHIELD or at the military or by threatening to leak state secrets, or something. Not by coming back for damaged goods, for a sex slave he was planning to kill soon.

And Pierce cannot strike back. Pierce is under military custody and undergoing extended interrogation in a Special Forces facility somewhere.

The fireproof doors have automatically unlatched and closed in slow, heavy arcs. They’re still wobbling a little at the end of the hallway, which is now completely empty. Bucky hesitates. Leaving his room unsupervised would mean losing privileges. But he doesn’t have many of those anyway.

He takes a step out of his room, and that’s when the fireproof doors slam open.

Well—no. It feels like they should be slamming open, the way the shock travels through Bucky’s body. But what truly happens is that a man in jeans and a leather jacket guiltily slips in and helps the door close again behind him. Then he looks up and sees Bucky and freezes.

And it’s Steve Rogers.

Bucky has known the guy three days, and not in the best circumstances. He hasn’t let himself ask any questions about him. Somehow, though, at this moment, there’s still one thing he knows.

“The siren’s you, right?”

Rogers has gathered himself some. He nods. “Afraid so, yeah.”

His voice is strong and deep and makes Bucky’s stomach twist. He grips the doorknob to his room a little tighter.

“Buddy of mine said the alarmed sign was fake, nurses used the door all the time for their smoke breaks. Guess he had it wrong,” Rogers goes on. “He did know where to find you, though.”

He’s come to see Bucky.

He broke in to see Bucky.

Bucky hates knowing that his voice would tremble if he asked What took you so long. Instead he asks, “Visiting hours not good enough for you?”

“I’m not on your green list. I know that,” Rogers says quickly. He takes a breath. “But—I just had to come. To make sure. I didn’t want you to think I forgot or never even meant to—”

He trails off when he sees the look on Bucky’s face.

“I have a green list?” Bucky says, more or less steadily.

Rogers seems very relieved for a second. “You didn’t know? You didn’t want me to stay away?”

“Why don’t I know I have a green list?” Now his voice is shaking, damn it.

The siren is still blaring; Bucky had stopped hearing it for a second.

“Can I come closer,” Rogers asks.

Bucky nods, not trusting himself to speak anymore.

Rogers comes closer, and Bucky sees him take in the clothes he’s wearing—the shapeless sweater, the track pants without laces—and look into his room to find it furnished with soft-edged things. His lips press into a tight, unhappy line.

“You’re on suicide watch,” Rogers says. “Like I thought. They just locked you up again.”

Bucky feels light-headed. It is what they’ve been doing. He’s been telling himself it was for the best, he just had to submit, wait it out. Fragile patient, to be monitored with care. Apparently couldn’t be trusted to decide what visitors to allow. Might unbalance himself.

Rogers glances away from the room, back at Bucky. “Now, if you actually don’t want me here—”

“I don’t have a problem with you,” Bucky says, which is what he’s been burning to tell his therapist. “Why would I? You saved me.”

And you’re keeping your promise now. But this one he doesn’t want to say.

“It’s not all I did to you.” It’s subtle, but Rogers just squared his shoulders like he’s facing a court martial.

Bucky fleetingly hopes the guy’s got a therapist, too. Better than his own, preferably. “Are you trying to say sorry?”

Rogers’ shoulders square up another notch. “I wouldn’t dare to ask forgiveness.”

Bucky knows he’s not impressive at all, pale and drawn and wearing baggy clothes. He also knows he could still obliterate Rogers with a few choice words right now. It’s obvious in the tightness of his jaw, the line between his brows, the way he rigidly waits for his punishment.

Pierce was going to make Rogers his slave next. Bucky doesn’t want to imagine how that might have turned out.

“Pal,” he says softly. “You don’t qualify.”

“The first night,” Rogers begins.

“You didn’t know.”

“That’s my point.”

“If you didn’t know, then we were both being abused.”

Rogers looks at him for almost a full ten seconds. “All right.”

Bucky watches him close. “That easy?”

“It’s like you just said. You know better.” Bucky’s pretty sure Rogers is lying, but he seems determined to at least pretend he’s dropping it. For now.

“All right,” Bucky echoes.

Rogers nods. Then he says, like they’re not still standing right there in the hallway in the middle of a hospital-wide state of military alert, “So, you wanna get out of here?”

Bucky blinks.

“I’m not saying leave town,” Rogers adds. “Just. I don’t know. Go for a walk around the block or something.” Amazingly, he blushes. “I don’t mean—I just mean, it’s not right for you to be cooped up in here. And I said I’d be by your side whatever happens. So. Whatever you feel like doing. I’ll help.”

“What if I want to kill myself?”

Rogers does stop at that. Then he just asks, “Do you?”

He heard Bucky beg for death back on the island. Bucky remembers meaning it, too. He had been waiting to let go for a long time.

He raises his chin. “No.”

And Rogers, again, says: “All right.”

Bucky exhales shakily, doesn’t question Rogers’ belief in him. The whole thing is just too fucking absurd. The siren is still blaring. “Right. Like you’re gonna bring me to Starbucks at the cost of your career.”

“Starbucks, huh? That’s easy. There’s one just four blocks over.” Rogers shrugs off his leather jacket. “Put this on, it’s chilly out. Don’t you have anything better than hospital slippers?”

Bucky’s already putting on the jacket on automatic. It’s warm from Rogers’ body, and it smells of Cologne. Everything feels like a dream.

“Okay, so let’s go,” Rogers says. “If my friend didn’t completely bullshit me, we can get out through the nurses’ break room. There’s a fire escape.”

And he just turns away. Bucky follows, keeping his eyes on Rogers’ ridiculously large shoulders stretching the fabric of his shirt. The hallways are empty, no matter how many fireproof doors they walk through.

“You didn’t answer me,” Bucky calls to Rogers’ back. “About your career.”

“This is my career.”

“Breaking out nutjobs?”

“Doing the right thing.” He actually just said that. He looks curiously at Bucky over his shoulder. “Why nutjob?”

Bucky wants to point out they’re in the psych ward. But Rogers’ question is so earnest it undoes him again. Why is he here? He doesn’t belong here. He doesn’t want to be here. Maybe the reason he can’t believe he’s free, even a month later, is because he isn’t.

“Did anybody call you crazy?” Now Rogers is frowning like he’s thinking this break-out thing is too tame. “Is that something you were told?”

“No, I—” The siren makes it hard to think; a few minutes more and he’ll get a headache. “Just—what’s expected. What’s assumed. I guess.”

They’re still walking, they’re through the nurses’ break room—Rogers’ got a card thingy to swipe, meaning his friend is a nurse or a doctor at this very hospital—and the room is completely empty, of course, since there’s an alarm on. The fire escape is right there behind the window. And beyond is the greatest goddamn thing Bucky’s ever seen: New York City.

It’s a sad, overcast November day, the skies so blurry they’re swallowing up the top of the skyscrapers. He could just fucking cry with joy.

He must have teared up or let out a breath or something, because Rogers’s face softens and he says, “Come on.” He opens the door, letting in distant honks and the taste of rain. “Let’s get you some fresh air.”

Chapter Text

They don’t actually make it to the Starbucks, because four blocks away is three blocks too far—and too loud and cold and Manhattan. Part of Bucky drinks it up, but Rogers, who’s acting like his protection detail, says, “Overwhelmed?” and Bucky has to nod, because he is feeling on the verge of something and he’s not sure if it’s laughter or tears.

So Rogers steers him into a small coffee shop, the kind that’s just one room smelling like they painted the walls with medium roast. They’re in the middle of the day; it’s relatively quiet. Rogers sits him on a table by the wall.

“Do you know what you want?”

Bucky is actually still trying to process whether he really just fled the hospital, thank you. New York keeps tugging at his attention, too; getting to watch regular traffic through the glass doors feels like a feverish miracle. He can’t look away from the pigeon pecking the sidewalk by the entrance. So, yeah, taking in the massive menu over the bar is beyond him right now. Some of these words he doesn’t even know.

He shakes his head, and Rogers must understand how he’s feeling because he doesn’t insist on how this is Bucky’s choice and he must make his own decisions. As if picking a coffee blend, or a tablet game, could erase the past three years. Instead he just heads to the bar and lets Bucky breathe for a little bit.

The barista is eyeing Bucky’s hospital get-up suspiciously, maybe trying to decide whether she should call someone, and Bucky wonders how long they have before they’re caught. He looks at his hands on the tin table, turns them over and sees the puffy scar bisecting his left palm. It healed like shit despite Roger’s first aid on the chopper, because it was so jagged and uneven.

Rogers comes back with a little tray supporting a cup of good honest coffee and a cup of something suspiciously pale green. Bucky quickly folds his fingers and stares at him.

“Here’s something classic and something fancy,” Rogers says, sitting down. “Keep the one you like best.”

“What is that?” Bucky asks, peering at the green thing.

“Matcha latte. Green tea with milk. I know they weren’t in fashion three years ago, so.” He pushes it towards him. “Thought you might want to try.”

Bucky sniffs it. Then pulls it close. Then takes a careful sip. Then takes a huge gulp and promptly burns himself. “Fuck—ow, fuck.”

Now Rogers is pushing a cup of cold water towards him, like he’d planned for that too. “I take it you like that?”

There’s something about the sweet-and-bitter taste that’s going right to Bucky’s hindbrain and telling him to drinks gallons of the stuff. Maybe it’s just because it’s the first new thing he’s had since he got back. Maybe it’s because he burned the roof of his mouth and it’s moving him to near fucking tears because it’s been three years since he last did that, too. Pierce never fed him warm food.

If he starts crying with emotion every time he stubs his fucking toe, he’s not gonna go far.

He puts down the glass of water and cradles his latte. Rogers is looking at him steadily. His eyes are very blue. Bucky had noticed it before already. It briefly reminds him of the shower, of the harness biting into his upper arms, Rogers crowding him close, kissing him so deep. How Bucky made himself relax, thinking: this one might go easy enough.

“What am I doing here?” Bucky asks. His voice is shaky again. “You didn’t steal me from a military hospital just to get coffee.”

Rogers turns his own cup in his hands, frowning at it.

“When Sam got back from his tour—after he’d lost Riley,” he begins, “they also put him on suicide watch. SHIELD, I mean.”

Bucky waits for the rest.

“And he wasn’t suicidal. He was just grieving and he needed to be home, not—there. But they’re worried about statistics and internal politics and…” Rogers waves a hand. “It’s not a good look to lose an operative after a sensitive mission, so they play it safe. I kept thinking they’d do the same to you.”

He looks up at Bucky.

“Don’t get me wrong, you shouldn’t be doing this alone. But you are free. You don’t have to let them bully you.”

Bucky opens his mouth, lets a few seconds go by. Then he asks: “Do you want to fuck me? Is that why you came for me?”

Rogers pales. But all in all he seems like he expected this question, which is strange, because Bucky has no idea why the fuck he said that. Or maybe he does—wanting to see if Rogers really is prepared to take him on, to face the possible consequences of reconnecting with him. All that fucking baggage weighing down on them both. Bucky would stay far away from himself, if he could.

“That’s not why I came for you,” Rogers answers, steady on.

Words are strange things. Rogers isn’t really confirming or denying anything here. But Bucky finds he doesn’t want the clarification. Suddenly, he feels tired of mind games. He’s been playing them for three years.

“Then what do you want?”

“To make good on my promise. Do what I can to help.” Rogers’ eyes turn serious. “And if that means leaving you alone, just say the word.”

Bucky’s hands clench around his paper cup. He doesn’t want Rogers to leave him alone. It’s the only visit he got in three weeks. But it scares him like hell, because of what his therapist might have to say about that. It scares him because he wants it too much, because he’s been waiting for it ever since he woke up alone in a hospital room.

He’s almost relieved when three men in black suits march in through the door straight for them and tell Rogers he’s under arrest.

*

Rogers looks like he expected that, too, so he doesn’t put up any sort of fight. He does ask that they allow Bucky to finish his latte, but unsurprisingly, that doesn’t happen. They’re both carted off and put up in separate cars. Bucky’s driven back to the hospital and hurriedly stored in a room—not even his own, yet with the exact same view of the courtyard.

He waits and waits as the sky darkens, but nobody comes for him. Eventually, he folds himself under the thin blankets and sleeps like utter shit.

The next morning, a nurse shows up and tells him he’s to go to therapy, as everyone agreed it would be better if Dr. Everett Ross was here to help him recap the events of the day before. Bucky doesn’t say he didn’t even have breakfast yet—or dinner the night before, for that matter. He just follows, and he’s not sure what he’s thinking. He’s not sure whether he thought of anything at all since the day before, as if everything inside him is still faintly reeling from the outside, from the taste of matcha, from the blue of Steve Rogers’ eyes.

As he sits on his usual plastic chair, he does wonder where Rogers is now. What’s being done to him.

There’s a man in a black suit present at first, while Dr. Ross walks Bucky through his debriefing. Not that Bucky needs being told how to debrief, since he was in the Special goddamn Forces, but—that doesn’t matter. He tells the truth, because he’s not sure why he would lie. Eventually the man stands up, nods and leaves the room. Dr. Ross stretches back and sighs.

“You have to understand,” he says, “that what Captain Rogers did was very problematic.”

Bucky looks out the window. Now that he’s paying attention, he realizes he really hates this goddamn view. “Are you talking about yesterday’s coffee or last month’s fucking?”

Ross looks taken aback for a moment; then an expression uncomfortably like hunger appears on his face as he slowly pulls out the iPad he uses to take notes during sessions. “I’m glad you’re finally letting us put this subject on the table.”

Rogers put himself on the table, crashing back in like that. Bucky scrubs his hand over his face—his right hand; with the left one he’d poke himself in the eye for sure. “How come everyone knows he fucked me, anyway?”

“Because he put it in his report.”

Bucky blinks at him. “His report?”

“This is one of the reasons I absolutely needed to discuss him with you. We need you to reread his report and confirm that it’s truthful.” He hesitates. “In your own time, natur—”

“Show me,” Bucky demands. “Now.”

Ross pops it out of his briefcase and hands it over. It’s ten neatly written pages. Bucky reads them all in one go, his good hand shaking. It’s all there, all brute fact, those three days Rogers spent saving the world and, incidentally, James Barnes.

Everything except their second night. Their blanket fort, what Bucky asked and what Rogers gave.

After the account of their first night he wrote: I believe it constituted sexual assault and am prepared to face the consequences of these actions. When Bucky looks up again—it’s been nearly twenty minutes of complete silence—Ross is looking back at him with eyebrows slightly raised.

“True, it’s—it’s all true, but—” Bucky puts it away. Both his hands are shaking now. “What do consequences mean?”

“To which part are you ref—”

“Rogers. What are you going to do to him?” With no answer forthcoming, he goes on, “Is he facing charges? I’m not pressing charges.”

“So you disagree with his assessment of your encounter?”

“He did what he—there was no other—he got me out.” Bucky wants to say he would have forgiven Rumlow if he’d gotten him out of there. But it doesn’t feel like something he should say out loud. Weakly, he repeats: “He… he got me out.”

“He’s currently in military custody for breaking into this hospital to abduct you,” Ross reminds him.

“You didn’t greenlight him. And you didn’t tell me I could greenlight him. So you didn’t leave him much choice, did you?”

“That’s an interesting point of view. Let’s talk about choice.”

Bucky stares in amazement for a few seconds. Then he says, “You’re right. It’s a good thing to talk about. For one thing, I didn’t choose you.”

Ross’ face is priceless. “I’m sorry?”

“I’m saying I want another therapist.” He’s shaking and he realizes this time it’s with anger. It’s growing unimpeded now. And why wouldn’t it? They can’t punish him for it. He’s not on the island. His rage can’t be squashed and tortured out of him.

Rogers was right. He’s free. He went through hell for three years. Why is he letting these clowns boss him around?

“And I want to be released from suicide watch. Actually, I want—I want to be released altogether.”

His thoughts are rushing with sudden possibility. He’s got money, certainly—three years of back pay and whatever kind of pension they give decorated, disabled, ex-POW Special Forces veterans. He still doesn’t know what he can possibly do with his plot of scorched earth, but he’s certainly not going to find out from the inside of his psych ward room. He’s going to boot himself back into the world even if nobody thinks he’s ready.

And why wouldn’t he be ready. The world can’t be worse than where he came from.

Ross looks alarmed. “We can’t just release you, James. You still need medical and mental care—”

“My name is Bucky. And I will get care. On my own goddamn terms. I was going to leave the Army. You decommissioned me. So why am I still here?” Bucky’s a little out of breath. “You can’t have it both ways.” He gets up. “I’m leaving. And I’m not pressing charges against Rogers. And I want you to release him from custody.”

And he wants another matcha latte.

For a start.

Chapter Text

It’s so fucking weird sitting there in the waiting room, where people come and go freely, like he wasn’t locked up in the psych ward of that very same hospital just a week ago.

That’s how long it took for Bucky to go over Ross’ head and get assessed for release. Rogers’ careful report indicated Bucky said, in the chopper, that it would be simpler for him to have died. Bucky still thinks that. There’s no contradiction between wanting to live and knowing his life leads nowhere. But this time he didn’t say it out loud. So now, he’s free. For real.

“Excuse me. Are you Bucky Barnes?”

It’s a black man, good-looking, with a faintly familiar gap-toothed smile. An old memory from high school pops up in Bucky’s brain: the French call it dents du bonheur. Happy teeth. Bucky can’t believe there was a time in his life where he just went to high school. Who’s that kid in his memories? It can’t be him.

“Uh, yeah, that’s—that’s me.” He hesitates. He was told someone would come for him. “Is… Is Rogers not…”

The man sighs in a put-upon sort of way. “Steve’s still in custody till the end of the week. Wouldn’t let us bail him out.”

“Why not?”

“Because he considers it funding the prison system.” He raises his eyebrows as if to say: Yeah. This is what we’re dealing with.

“Till the end of this week?” Bucky repeats to make sure.

“Uh-huh. They can’t really punish him after he managed to bring down Pierce. He’s untouchable right now. But they can keep his ass in extended custody to remind him he’s an idiot. Don’t worry, I can assure you he’s perfectly happy in there. His only regret was not being able to see you out.” He gets his phone and shows it to Bucky. “Here, take a look.”

Flipping through his photos, Bucky finds a lot of pictures of Rogers, some selfies of him and the man together. A red-haired woman also features a lot. He finally understands why he’s being shown this just as the man says “I’m Sam Wilson, by the way,” and it clicks in his brain.

“I—I know,” he says, handing the phone back. “You didn’t have to show me that. I don’t need proof. I remember you.” Yes, of course he knows that smile. Lieutenant Colonel Wilson. Must have been promoted since then, especially since his husband died in action. “You and Riley…”

Sam’s smile doesn’t actually go away, but seems to lose a bit of its shine. “Yeah.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It was a long time ago,” Sam says instead of It’s okay. “So, you good to come with me? I was thinking lunch for starters. Where’s your stuff?”

Bucky’s bank is still in the process of understanding he’s alive. Even the clothes on his back were given by the hospital. He assumes this was all meant to give him cold feet. Or maybe they’re actually glad, after all, that he’s removing himself from their responsibility. No longer their problem.

“I don’t… have any stuff,” he says.

Sam doesn’t miss a beat. “Right. Let’s go, then.”

Bucky gets up and goes.

*

He’s very quiet during lunch. Mostly he’s devoted to absorbing his surroundings. He heard a lot of stories of veterans turning agoraphobic, but he spent the last three years in a box, sometimes literally, and he can’t get enough of New York, of the people, the cars, the sidewalks, everything. He said yes way too quickly when Sam suggested eating out.

As he sits there, though, discomfort seeps in. At first he thinks it’s just the stress of being outside—especially since this time, nobody will come and drag him back to his safe, silent box of a hospital room. But then he notices that his shoulders hitch up whenever certain strangers get too close. The waitress is okay, the Indian waiter too. But the guy sitting behind Bucky—perfectly normal guy, too, just here to eat with his family—agitates him to the point that he ends up switching seats with Sam. He doesn’t explain why, and Sam doesn’t ask. As a whole, Sam’s pretty great at giving him space. He’s not even trying to fill the silence.

Bucky does his best to calm down. All right, so he’s afraid of men. White men specifically, that’s becoming clearer by the second. That explains some things about how he reacted to certain people in the hospital. To Dr. Ross. Every time one of them walks in, his gaze snaps up to them like they’re here for him. New client. New night. New video for Pierce’s collection.

He didn’t notice on his coffee shop outing a week ago; he just thought he was being generally overwhelmed by his first time outside in three years. Also he was with Rogers.

Bucky looks down at his plate. It’s still half-full. The rage that carried him through the past week has abated, and now that he’s out, he doesn’t know anymore. He was naively hoping things would keep moving by themselves after he launched himself into the unknown. Instead they’ve just grinded to a halt again. He doesn’t know what he’s supposed to be doing, to be feeling. He’s right in the middle of the world but he still can’t access it.

What a waste.

Whenever his thoughts go down that road, though, he finds himself thinking about the little room.

Pierce had brought him there naked, leashed and muzzled. It was a very small room indeed, hardly bigger than a broom closet but perfectly clean and empty. With the exception of two things: a folding chair in the middle. And a noose hanging from the ceiling.

“Now, I know this is a rough sight, James,” Pierce had said, holding Bucky’s leash. “But I don’t want to lie to you. After a long period of use, it’ll simply be kinder to put you down. You’ll see.”

The sight had made Bucky tear up. He hated himself for it, to this day. Tear up like a child, when nothing was even being done to him at the moment. But seeing this had destroyed his last shreds of—not hope, not even that. Uncertainty, maybe. Not knowing what would come next gave him the illusion of life. Now he knew how it ended. With him kicking futilely into the air while Pierce watched.

“Don’t worry, you still have a few good years ahead,” Pierce had said—and Bucky hadn’t known whether to think such a long time left or such a short time left. “But I wanted it ready for when the time comes. I asked for Mr. Rumlow’s advice, you know. He thought it might be fun to have you drowned. But this way seems a bit more dignified, don’t you think? A proper execution.”

Bucky was glad he had the muzzle on; that way he was not expected to speak. He only had to let the tears fall.

Pierce sighed. “I knew this’d be a shock to you. All right, listen, here’s what we’ll do. If you ask me for this sooner, I’ll grant it to you. How about that?”

Bucky had blinked, then looked up at him.

“I’ll kill you when you ask,” Pierce had made clear. “Even if you ask me tomorrow. Don’t think I’m unmoved by how hard this all is for you, James. That way you still get a bit of control.”

A child shrieks at the other end of the room and Bucky blinks, startled. His half-plate of food is staring back at him. He’s in New York, he’s with Sam. Now his memories take him spiraling even in the middle of the day.

It would maybe have been better to stay in the psych ward. It would definitely be simpler to be dead.

“You okay, man?”

But he didn’t ask to go into the little room then. And he’ll be damned if he closes that door on himself now.

“Yeah,” he says, and digs in.

*

After lunch, Bucky mumbles his wish to find a matcha latte and Sam graciously obliges, scrolling down his extraordinarily flat smartphone whose model Bucky doesn’t recognize. Three years gone and it feels like seventy. Whenever this particular anxiety starts to squeeze at his chest, though, he just has to look around. So much of New York is still the same. But that feels weird, too. How can anything still be the same, as if he’d never left? As if nothing happened? Did these people really just go on living while he was being destroyed? And is he really back, now, just walking around the place? He feels like he’s going to go insane after too much of this. Or maybe he already is. He wouldn’t know how to tell.

They find his latte and then they go for a stroll in Central Park. The weather is still moody and it’s the middle of a work day, so the place is relatively calm, just a few tourists and quickstepped businessmen.

“Okay, first things first,” Sam says. “Do you have family you can stay with?”

“No.”

Sam seems startled by the abruptness of the answer, but doesn’t question it. He must be aware that nobody visited Bucky in the hospital, even though his family had surely been notified and put on his green list. “Okay, so we’ve got to find you a place. That was always in the works anyway, but in the meantime I’ve got a couch you can crash on. If you’re cool with it.”

Bucky looks up at him. “A couch?”

Sam’s expression has gone carefully blank. “Yeah, you know. Just until you land on your feet.”

Bucky wants to laugh, only it wouldn’t be a very pleasant sound. “That might take a while.”

“Hmm. Steve tell you what I do for a living?”

Retired, says Rogers’s voice with a muffled storm in the background. His naked body is warm against Bucky’s. His hands and mouth have been everywhere on him.

“Retired,” Bucky says.

“Yeah, I'm retired from the field. But I’m a military therapist now. Specifically for black-ops vets ‘cause my level of clearance lets them actually talk about their experiences.” He glances at Bucky. “My point is I know it can take a while. I’m not just naively hoping you’ll be gone in three weeks.”

Such a long time left, Bucky thinks. Such a short time left. He has no idea how to fill three weeks of his life. He has no idea how to fill the rest of it.

“Why would you offer at all?” he asks.

“Because Steve asked me. Because he doesn’t have a monopoly on doing the right thing. Because you were in Riley’s squad. Because I’ve been in a bad place too. Take your pick.”

They walk in silence for a little while. Bucky’s cup is empty. He notices a recycling trash can for cardboard and carefully drops it in.

“Is he going to be all right?” he asks.

“Who?” Sam blinks. “Steve? I told you, jail’s like a summer home to him.”

“No. He…” Bucky thinks of Rogers’s face when he came for him at the hospital. The way he squared his shoulders as if in front of a firing squad. What he put in his report. I believe it constituted sexual assault. “He should be getting help too.”

Sam falls silent, looking at him. After a while, he says, “He’s getting help.”

“They made him do some bad shit.”

And performing is worse than receiving, Bucky knows. The memory of rape makes his skin crawl but it does not bring him shame. What haunts him are the things he did. The begging, the cowering. Whenever he broke and sucked cock, licked boots, drank piss, anything for a few seconds without pain.

“I got his back,” Sam promises quietly.

Bucky nods. Then a thought occurs to him, and he looks up. “Are you together?”

Sam chokes on his Americano. “God, no.”

“You seemed so close in your pictures.”

“He’s—” Sam stops himself. “He’s not really my type.”

Bucky remembers Riley very well. He was a blond brick shithouse too. With green eyes instead of blue, but he and Rogers could have been brothers. Sam must mean something else than looks.

“Hey, you know,” Sam says. “While we’re talking about Steve. I guess you’ve figured it out by now; he really, really believes that saying—if you save a man’s life, you are responsible for him.”

“Okay?”

“What I mean is—he would probably do anything for you. Including backing off. You keep that in mind.”

“He’s told me that already,” Bucky says. Everyone seems to expect him to want Rogers to back off.

He shivers in the chilly wind; the clothes from the hospital don’t quite fit him, and are too thin besides. He thinks of Sam’s plan—to find him an apartment. And then what? He thinks of Rogers locked up in jail. He thinks of Rogers coming for him, again. I knew they’d just lock you up. But Bucky’s free now, he really is. If only he felt any different than before.

“I’d like to go get him when he gets out.”

Sam blinks, then smiles his lucky gap-toothed smile. “Sure. We can do that.”

*

That night, Sam’s “spare couch” turns out to be an entire guest bedroom. On a thirteenth-floor Upper East Side penthouse, no less. He did say shrinks for black-ops vets were hard to come by.

Bucky’s very thankful, because a couch in the open with people passing him by would have been—not ideal. This, he supposes, is the ideal room for him. It’s very private but very large, too. Also the windows don’t open, and there are no cords on the curtains. Definitely the home of a social worker.

Sam took him shopping and paid for everything. Bucky kept the receipts for when his bank account gets unfrozen, so he can pay him back. He’s bought toiletries, jeans that fit him, combat boots, three plain shirts and a grey hoodie. A blue coat. Everything else in the store felt like a mirage. He couldn’t fathom why he might want to own any of these things. What could he do with a decorative mug. Maybe learn how to make a matcha latte for himself. Then drink it and then what.

Then what.

He goes to bed. He can see New York twinkle and glow outside the window. In a way and despite the blankness he is horribly, desperately happy.

*

The rest of the week goes by slowly. Sam buys him a phone and then gives him his number. He also keeps buying Bucky all the matcha lattes his heart desires. The receipts pile up; Bucky keeps them all inside his new wallet. Which Sam also bought.

After several days of shopping, all his earthly belongings can still fit into a backpack. That’s a backpackful more than he had before. He mostly spends his money on experiencing things. Make the most of it—that feels like a sacred duty, like he owes it to his past self, the one that would have given anything for three minutes in the open air. He still feels like he’s faking; even more so, maybe. But he might as well fake it.

He gets a hot dog from a street vendor and eats it religiously. He sits for a whole afternoon in Central Park. He walks into nearly every movie theater he sees. He doesn’t mind being boxed up as long as he’s sitting unnoticed in a large crowd, but every time, the story feels like it’s happening behind a pane of glass and the emotions can’t get through. Even the one rape scene he accidentally stumbles upon doesn’t seem to reach him. All he can think about is that the actress twisting under the man’s weight clearly doesn’t know anything about how this stuff really feels.

He does feel a bit nauseous after, so he leaves the theater with his popcorn still full.

The nights are still bad. He tries, one time, to sleep in short bursts so the memories won’t have time to start, but the next night he’s so exhausted he doesn’t hear his phone’s alarm and sinks straight into a bout of oral training. When he wakes up, he can still feel himself choking and gagging on what they’d shoved into his mouth for him to suck on.

During the day, while Sam is away and Bucky’s too tired to go out again, he thinks. Manhattan is New York, but home is Brooklyn. Has been ever since Bucky was forced to leave Indiana. He thinks about that: his own place in Brooklyn. Pokes and prods the thought. How expensive is it, these days? A place of his own. He will have to find it and rent it and furnish it. Which will keep him busy for a while.

Sam finds him a few candidates for a new therapist. Bucky flips through their business cards, looking for one who isn’t a fucking white man. Sam tells him they’re all experienced in helping victims of human trafficking, anyway, so he can’t choose wrong.

Bucky hadn’t thought about it like that. Human trafficking. The words feel so detached from the reality of what he went through, yet it probably does apply. He wonders, not for the first time, how much Pierce paid to have him.

Then he sorts through another pile of business cards, for physical therapists this time. The surgeon all but told him his left arm would never have feeling in it again. But it’s worth trying. If only to keep busy. He needs to keep busy, to utilize his free time. He needs not to waste it. He needs not to be a waste.

He calls the physio, but he doesn’t call the therapist. He can do that later.

*

In the dream—in the memory—he’s brought to a client’s room. His hands are bound, his genitals still smarting from the day’s session. He is bent over the bed, his underwear tugged down, his plug pulled out of him, soon replaced by a cock that’s big enough to make him gasp despite how many he’s taken before. He didn’t even have anal sex that often before he came to the island. Now he’s intimately acquainted with the intrusion, the burning ache, the slow impaling. He tries and he tries to relax, and as always he feels like a failure—if only he was better at self-discipline, this wouldn’t have to hurt as much. Three years and he still tenses up. The last few inches always hurt the most; there’s that moment when he thinks his body just can’t take more, and then he’s made to take it anyway. And then the thrusting. This time it’s slow, so slow it doesn’t hurt that bad after a while, and he’s been drugged for arousal so his body starts winding up. The man raping him doesn’t say anything, just keeps pumping him. He lets Bucky rub off on the sheets when the pressure builds up, doesn’t forbid it or taunt him for it. Somehow it feels more authoritative than Pierce’s pleasantries or Rumlow’s slurs. This silence. Guiding him with his hips and hands like one guides a horse. Surveying his progress, his slow climb to pleasure, despite the pain and the fear and the exhaustion. He needs no words, only his body, for Bucky to know he owns him. Bucky forgets all else. He doesn’t need to think about anything else for now. He’s under control, he’s doing what’s expected, he doesn’t hurt anymore. In the middle of it all, there’s a place where he can let go.

The next day he’ll learn that man is named Steve Rogers.

Chapter Text

Sam was overstating things when he said Rogers would take to jail like a duck to water.

Bucky feels a pang when he sees him. Sure, it’s only been two weeks, but he seems drawn in a way Bucky recognizes only too well. He also looks like he’s in serious need of a shower. Male sweat is also something that sets Bucky on edge now, so he doesn’t get too close.

“Bucky!” Rogers looks happy to see him—not surprised; of course Sam kept him updated. “You did it. You’re out.”

“So are you, now,” Bucky says.

“Wasn’t that long.” He’s smiling. He didn’t smile at all on the island, and now it seems to be his default expression for Bucky. It transforms his face so much. “Congratulations.”

“He’s been staying with me,” Sam tells Rogers. “Bank says his account will be up and running soon.” He nods at the taxi waiting. “You wanna come over for a bit or should we just let you go home?”

“I thought you lived together,” Bucky says. He knows they’re not an item, but they are close and they have so many pictures together and Sam’s apartment is so big he just assumed—

“Oh, no,” Rogers answers. “I’m over in Brooklyn.”

Something is happening to Bucky’s insides. He’s not sure what. It feels like fear and craving all at once. “I’m from Brooklyn, too,” he hears himself say.

“Really?” Rogers lights up. “That’s great. Maybe you can come—uh, come walk around the place with me sometimes.”

He almost said Maybe you can come over, Bucky’s pretty sure. But then he didn’t say it. The twisting feeling in Bucky’s stomach intensifies. Sam is okay to live with, apparently, but Rogers doesn’t even dare offer him a drink at home. Because what if he rapes Bucky again. Is that it? Is that the implication here?

Bucky’s afraid of white men, now. Why isn’t he afraid of Rogers? Why doesn’t he hate the way he smells? He can smell him now. Sweat indeed, and leather, and cologne that’s transformed into something else over a few days of skin chemistry. He looks and looks at him, and he doesn’t know. He doesn’t know. Just that his insides are corkscrewing and it feels a lot like fear but also he doesn’t want it to stop. He wants it to overpower him.

As soon as he acknowledges it, the urge repulses him. His dream memory of the night before pulses in his head like a migraine. No. No more of this. He’s free. So what if he’s not used to it? He’s gonna have to break the habit. It’s just one more thing to break.

*

“I do believe we shall manage without anesthesia,” says Pierce, in the dream.

In the dream, in the memory, Bucky’s strapped to a gynecological chair that keeps his legs firmly apart. He’s trying desperately to close them, making frantic noises behind his gag, eyes wide. God, he doesn’t like that one. There’s no dignity to be found in that day, no saving grace for him.

Pierce is slowly rubbing his stomach with one hand, holding up Bucky’s erect cock with the other. The injection to force Bucky to get hard was already atrociously painful. Now the man who’s been hired to pierce him is coming with sharp, shiny instruments Bucky can’t even name.

He can’t beg, and it wouldn’t change anything if he did, and anyway the needles are piercing him through already and he’s throwing his head back, letting out choked-off screams when the ring starts sliding into place. When he thinks it’s over, when he feels Pierce lift his tortured cock so the man can access his balls—this time Bucky begs and begs and begs. But he’s gagged, so it doesn’t make a difference, and the needle is going back in already.

And then abruptly he’s awake.

As he sits there, panting and shivering, waiting for his heart to calm down, he wonders why this keeps happening to him—it’s not normal, he knows that. He used to run around with people who had PTSD coming out their ears; he even kept a friend company after a nightmare one time. And they described actual fucking dreams, confusing bullshit that invariably called back to a certain situation, a certain state of mind, pregnant with underlying terror and helplessness. This, he would understand, even accept. But those movie-reel clips?

His brain, on a roll, suddenly presents him with a childhood memory—a movie marathon he did with friends in high school. It’s so out of left field it helps him shake the spiral. It feels like something out of someone else’s life. Why in the name of fuck is he thinking about that now.

But in the next breath, he realizes the connection. Back then, after eleven hours and twenty-three minutes of uninterrupted movies, his brain felt ready to leak out of his ears. And when he went to sleep after, he was unconscious, but it didn’t feel like dreams; more like his brain was working overtime to process massive input. That’s the familiar thing, the same feeling.

Well. If Bucky’s brain is trying to unpack and process the past three years, he’s not likely to sleep normally anytime soon.

Sighing, he gets out of bed and shuffles out into the hall. He’s parched, and so drenched in sweat he’s probably going to need a shower. It’s when he gets to Sam’s living room that he remembers Rogers didn’t go back to Brooklyn for the night.

He’s not sleeping either, lying on the couch with his head cricked up against the armrest, frowning at the small blue light of his phone screen. When Bucky announces himself by shuffling his feet a bit louder, Rogers looks up; then he sits up and swings his legs off the cushions like he might vacate the premises entirely for him.

“Don’t go,” Bucky blurts out. He hesitates, then adds, “I don’t mind you around.”

Rogers meekly brings his legs back on the couch, lying back against the armrest. “No, I—I know that.” He looks up at him. “Sorry. I don’t have a great history when it comes to reading you right.”

Of course he was lying, back in the hospital; of course he’s still stuck on that first night. That’s fine. Bucky understands being stuck on things.

“You thought I was working for Pierce,” Bucky says, walking around the couch to go get his glass of water. “You couldn’t take that risk. You made a compromise. And you know what they say about those.”

“I don’t, actually.”

“A good compromise leaves everyone equally unhappy.”

Amazingly, Rogers laughs, low and raspy. “Wow.”

“You really never heard that?”

“I swear, I didn’t.”

Bucky’s lips are trying to smile. “Where have you been?”

Rogers shakes his head, smiling back, and it’s—it’s nice. A silence stretches between them, broken only by the purring of the fridge.

“I’m afraid of men now,” Bucky says slowly. “I think.”

Rogers blinks.

“White men. To be precise.” Bucky walks to the couch so he can perch on the armrest by Rogers’ feet. He looks at them and thinks of wrapping his fingers around Steve’s ankle. Touching feels like something they should not do. “I’m not afraid of you, though.”

Rogers nods. “I’m glad. If I can be—if you let me help—I’d like that.”

Bucky wrinkles his nose. “You know I’m going to get help. A lot of help, for the rest of my life, probably. And besides…” He doesn’t want to be harsh, doesn’t want to sound like a fucking cliché, but—“You don’t seem like you pity me and I’d like you not to start.”

“Pity you? Bucky, I’m in awe of you.”

Bucky shouldn’t fish for such ridiculous praise, but the dream-memory keeps replaying in his head, pain and mortification still fresh. He’s in desperate need of something that’ll make him feel a little less shitty about himself. “Oh yeah? How so?”

“You,” Rogers says decisively, “are the most resilient person I’ve ever met.”

Bucky looks at him, sitting there shirtless in the blue glow of his phone, looking so painfully earnest. And he feels a catastrophic urge to collapse. To say, I’m not strong. I’m not resilient. I have no idea what to do with myself. I need you to make all my choices for me. I need you to dress me and spoon-feed me and decide of every minute of every day for the rest of my life. And you can do what you want to me. As long as I don’t have to be free for a second longer.

He got used to not making choices. He let those SHIELD therapists box him up in the psych ward. When they put him on suicide watch, he didn’t really try to prove them wrong, not until he got angry. He needs to stay angry to think straight. He’s enraged at himself now, for wanting this, for thinking at least Rogers might be a good master to him. It’s a sickening fantasy—not in the least because of what Rogers went through. How dare Bucky even think of anything involving him.

Maybe it would be better for Rogers to stay far away from him, after all. But Bucky can’t tell him that, because he can’t ever explain why. And Rogers doesn’t deserve whatever blame he’d put on himself.

“Thanks,” Bucky finally croaks out. “You know. You’re not too bad either.” He gets a soft snort in answer, and that noise, that quiet fondness—it undoes him. “Do you actually want to go around Brooklyn with me? Help me find a place?”

Rogers lights up. “I’d like that. Very much.”

Bucky knows this is a terrible idea. But he’s been so alone, for so long.

*

“I like this one,” Rogers says as they follow the real estate agent inside. “Good lighting, quiet enough. Nice view.”

Bucky nods, dazed. He’s still not sleeping well—or sleeping at all, really, going into every night with clenched teeth. This place is the third one they’ve visited this week. He feels nothing. They’re just blank walls and floorboards, sparkling countertops, pristine appliances. Boxes. He has no opinion on the view as long as he can actually see outside. The real estate agent jabbers on. Rogers makes interested noises, asking questions, pointing this or that detail for Bucky to notice. Bucky is so thankful he’s here. He’s doing exactly what Bucky shamefully wants from him: taking over.

All three potential apartments are much nicer than anything Bucky’s ever had. It was only ever his parents’ house and then the end of high school and then the army. And then the island.

His bank account has finally come to life, and sprouted a couple of zeros just like he suspected, so he can afford this. Still, it’s not enough money to last him forever, so he picks the cheapest place of the three. The fact that it’s also the closest to Rogers’ is not much of a coincidence.

“Good choice,” Rogers approves when it’s all done. The agent’s stepped out to make a call. “I can come back with you to sign the lease, if you want.”

Bucky does his pathetic best not to accept too fast. “Is it okay for you to take that much time off?”

“Oh, I’m on indefinite leave.” He’s looking around the empty rooms of Bucky’s new palace. His voice echoes strangely off the blank walls. “Don’t think they’re sending me back right away.”

“You have a therapist, right?”

Bucky still hasn’t called his new one. He doesn’t care if that makes him a hypocrite. It’s not like Ross was helping in any way. But if Rogers talks to a therapist about Bucky, they’ll probably recognize there’s no health to be found in that relationship and tell him to get the hell away. Bucky hopes someone tells him eventually, because it sure as hell won’t be him. Maybe Sam will start to notice.

Rogers shoots him a quick smile. “Yeah, I do have one. Can’t say I like it much but—I can feel it’s necessary. I keep going back even when it feels like she’s scraping me raw.”

That settles it, really. Bucky doesn’t want to be scraped raw. Not anymore. What he wants is for Rogers to pin him to the bare floorboards. Order him to forget about the apartment and come live at the foot of his bed.

He rubs his face with both hands. He needs more fucking sleep.

“It’s a form of courage,” Rogers goes on, still wandering around the empty room. “Opening up. Confronting yourself. That’s why it’s so hard, I guess.”

Bucky has no courage. “Do you want to help me shop for furniture next?”

*

The next day Natasha Romanov enters the picture, and Bucky realizes he should have been careful what he wished for.

She’s the redhead who was on those pictures with him and Sam. Of course, she’s already been briefed on Bucky; she shook his good hand with a knowing look in her eyes. And then the look didn’t go away. She won’t stop watching his every move. It’s making Bucky acutely aware of how horribly obvious he is. He was too used to Rogers’ obliviousness. Now that they’re touring IKEA together, the three of them, he can feel Romanov’s eyes piercing his back every time Rogers is talking to him. Every time Bucky asks him to choose something for him.

“Red plates or blue?” Rogers asks, pushing the cart.

Make a choice. It shouldn’t be so hard. Just pick one.

“I don’t know, what do you think?” he mumbles.

“I like blue,” Steve answers.

“Okay. Blue it is.” His heart is beating in his ears. He can feel Romanov’s gaze drilling into his back.

“I like the blue ones too,” she approves, and puts them in the cart.

Bucky is trying his hardest here, because he doesn’t want to do the expected thing and just break down. But if he’s honest with himself, the background narration of his life is just his own voice repeating again and again I don’t want to make friends and find a job and rebuild it all. It’s too much work. It’s too big. Too difficult. I can’t do it. I don’t want to.

God, to be Steve’s dog. Getting up when he does. Following him everywhere. Sleeping where he says. Being fed and washed by him. Not having to think, ever.

But no. Bucky will keep calling him Rogers in his mind and will not indulge in such fantasies. Wishing to be a slave again would be a fucked-up thing. Wishing for Rogers to be his master would be a double fucked-up thing. Bucky’s not fucked up. They didn’t break him. He didn’t go to the little room. He can still be normal. He’s not anyone’s dog, not anymore.

Natasha Romanov keeps looking at him.

*

“To Bucky’s new apartment!”

“To Bucky’s new apartment!” Sam and Natasha yell, sloshing champagne everywhere.

Bucky manages a small smile and lets them pour golden bubbles in his flute. He’s actually never had champagne, somehow. It looks a lot like piss in a glass, but that’s not the kind of thing he can say out loud. Especially since they’d know exactly why he’s able to make that comparison.

Bucky used to fight when people tried to make him drink bodily fluids, but after a while he stopped fighting. On all fronts, he always eventually stopped fighting. Even the lone victory he clings onto—his survival—is flimsy at best. He did ask to die, back when he thought Rogers had wrapped up his mission. At the time, it felt like enough. License to retire.

Champagne does taste better than the alternative.

Natasha Romanov is here again. Of course; she helped pick some furniture. She was a part of this. It’s only the second time Bucky’s seen her, and he’s doing his best never to be alone with her. He’s afraid of what she might say. Maybe it’s because she gave him her card when she came into the apartment.

He couldn’t stop her; she just slipped it into his hand by way of hello. He took a look at the small rectangle of paper. She’s a social worker like Sam. She doesn’t deal in veterans, though.

Bucky pushed the card down his pocket like it was burning his fingers. He’ll tear it up to pieces and throw it away later. He can’t do that now. She’s watching him. He knows what she can see. He tries not to look at Steve while she’s watching him.

He tries not to call him Steve in his head.

Rogers is a bit flushed with alcohol already, smiling and laughing more easily than usual. He keeps looking for Bucky with bright blue eyes, beaming at him. His friends are drunkenly exclaiming over the furniture they chose together—or rather: the furniture Bucky had Rogers pick for him—and Rogers keeps loudly approving of everything they point out, explaining why those curtains, why that table, why this chair. He talks about a piece of furniture resembling one he saw at the Met, offers Bucky to go there with him on Tuesday. Bucky says yes. It’s not like he’s able to say anything else.

That last one, the chair, is particularly noticeable, a daring designer thing made of thick black curved silicon tubes stuck together. Bucky was secretly glad Rogers picked that one, because it struck him as the perfect pierce of furniture to tie up someone. It's only the edges, with an open back, an open seat. If he were strapped to it, people could access every part of his body.

He doesn’t know why he keeps having those ideas. When he thinks of actually going through with it, he wants to be sick. No. Never again. Never. And yet there are all these intrusive thoughts of Rogers doing those things to him. And it somehow feels like something he actually wants. Maybe because it’s safe to imagine, because Rogers won’t ever touch Bucky again.

He watches Steve drink and laugh, and he thinks of being his dog.

Chapter Text

“Are you doing the dishes?” Bucky asks.

Rogers looks up, his hands covered in soap suds. “Ah. Yeah. Thought I’d…”

Sam and Natasha are gone, both excusing themselves from the clean-up. They have jobs, not like Rogers, not like Bucky, both living in limbo. Bucky takes a step inside the kitchen. “Why are you in the dark?”

Rogers blinks. “I don’t know. Uh, didn’t notice, I think.” He scrubs the back of his damp hand against his jaw as if to wake himself up. “Champagne went to my head.”

Bucky turns the lights on. “Thanks for the housewarming party.”

Rogers shields his face. “Thank you. You know, it’s your place.”

He’s wincing, so Bucky just turns the lights off again; the glow from the living room is seeping in, anyway. Rogers lowers his hand with a grateful smile. “You, uh, wanna help me out with those?”

“Sure,” Bucky says automatically. But he doesn’t move.

Rogers came to his party wearing a navy blue shirt. He’s rolled up his sleeves to his elbows to do the dishes. It strains just a little over his shoulders, over his chest. It falls in a perfect tight line over his back. There are particles of dish soap sparkling in his hair somehow.

Bucky takes a few steps towards him and stops again. He hasn’t touched Rogers once since they left the island. But now he’s going to push his hands where Rogers’ hands are, in the warm water. Grab for a cup, a glass, feel their fingers brush together. Their shoulders press together, maybe.

Suddenly he can’t stand it anymore; it hurts and burns like a living thing scrabbling in his belly.

Rogers looks up again. “Bucky?”

The rage that carried him out of the hospital is back all at once. He wants to break the goddamn blue plates Rogers’ been washing. He wants to break everything in the apartment. He wants to break Rogers and then break himself. Because he can’t do this anymore, he can’t.

And he shouldn’t have to pretend. He’s free, or so everyone keeps telling him. That means he’s free to wreck everything.

Bucky steps into his space, backs him hard against the sink. Rogers stammers, “What—Buck—”

He’s only slightly taller; all Bucky has to do is grab him at the collar and pull him down and crush their mouths together. It’s not a kiss, it’s something raw and awful like an open wound. Steve’s stiff, not touching Bucky, not even to push him away. He reaches behind to steady himself; his hand bumps into the dish rack and a glass falls off, shattering into a million pieces.

Bucky backs off all at once, panting. Steve is staring at him, petrified, chest heaving.

“Bucky,” he manages. His face is a picture of shock. “Bucky.” He breathes hard for another few seconds, then says, “We’re—we’re both drunk.”

Bucky lets out a sound that was supposed to be a laugh. He’s feeling sick. “You don’t need that as your excuse.” Tears are blurring his vision already. “Just go.”

Rogers—he can’t ever call him Rogers anymore, who the fuck is he kidding—Steve doesn’t move. It seems he can’t take his eyes away from Bucky.

“Go away,” Bucky grinds out. His eyes are burning with tears. “And stop fucking looking at me like that. You said you’d never pity me.”

“Pity?” Steve repeats like he doesn’t know the word.

“What the fuck else are you supposed to do after that?” The tears are coming, catching in his throat. It’s horrible, it’s leaking everywhere, just like in the chopper when he couldn’t stop crying, what happened to numbness from shock, why is he so fucking vulnerable, flayed so bare, still? He tries to muffle himself, tries to wipe his eyes, but it all comes out. “If I’m messed up enough to want—if I’m—” He’s pressing the back of his hand to his own mouth. God, he’s going to throw up.

“It’s not messed up to want someone close,” Steve tries.

Anger simmers again in the pit of Bucky’s stomach. Is this how Rumlow felt when he raped him? Did he also experience this blind, vicious need to break things? “Is that not messed up? You’d fucking know. I know you want to fuck me. You always have. You liked what you saw on the island. Don’t fucking lie to me this time. Do you want to fuck me?”

Steve looks like Bucky stabbed him.

Then he says, “Yes.”

Bucky swallows a sob but there’s another coming out to take its place, and another, and another. There, he got what he wanted. He’s overpowered someone who couldn’t defend himself. He really is like Rumlow right now, and it’s the worst thing he’s ever felt—which is saying a fucking lot.

Steve folds the towel he was using to dry and carefully sets it on the counter. “I’ll leave.”

“No.” Bucky’s exhausted. All his anger’s left him at once and took everything else out of him, too. He can’t fake it anymore. “Don’t leave. Don’t leave.”

Steve has that crease between his eyebrows again. “Bucky—”

“Don’t ever leave,” Bucky breathes, and this time he’s saying it. All of it oozing out like pus from a wound. “I’ll do whatever you want. Please. I’ll do anything—just don’t leave me here like this. Just don’t make me do this. Don’t leave me ever again and you’ll see—you’ll see, I can make it good—”

“Bucky. Bucky. Please stop talking.”

Bucky stops talking.

“Come here.”

Bucky goes. He’s shaking with all his limbs, he’s going to fucking throw up, but he goes. He made Steve say he wanted to fuck him, he took that ugly potshot; and he offered him anything he wants. Whatever happens now, he will let it happen. And he won’t be able to say he didn’t ask for it.

He gets pulled into a hug.

Blind anger tries again to rear up inside him—now Steve is trying to fucking hug it out, and Bucky should break free, laugh in his face, punch him in the teeth, beat him till he bleeds. Instead he finds himself clinging to him, suddenly overwhelmed by the closeness of him, his weight, his warmth, his smell, clinging so tight he’s ruining his beautiful navy shirt, and he never really stopped crying since this whole mess started but now he’s sobbing so hard it’s difficult to breathe.

Steve just holds him tight, there in the dark kitchen. There’s this feeling of attentiveness to him; it reminds Bucky of when Steve fucked him that first time. The way he pinned him there and made him climb to orgasm, never leaving him a single chance to stray away, to find an out. This single-minded focus. And how fucked up is Bucky, to think about rape when someone’s holding him in comfort?

But it was Steve both times. It makes sense to compare Steve to Steve.

After a long while, his sobs abate, in stops and starts, leaving him shaking and cold, and more than a little nauseous. When he begins to feel dizzy, he pushes away from Steve, who lets him go.

“I’m going to be sick,” Bucky declares weakly.

“That’s okay. Got a brand new bathroom.” He guides Bucky out of the kitchen, grabbing the rubber band that was around the fresh herbs they cooked with. “Put that in your hair.”

Bucky ties up his hair. Steve’s pushing open the bathroom door. The toilet inside is bright shining white, and the tile is cold under Bucky’s knees when he goes down. He throws up the nice food they prepared together.

When he’s done, Steve hands him a glass of lukewarm water. Bucky swills, spits. He hands the glass back and gets up and watches Steve flush the toilet.

“What now?” Steve asks when it’s all gone.

Bucky can’t stop shivering. He wants a hot shower, but he’s exhausted. He doesn’t want to be in the same room as Steve but he also can’t bear the thought of him leaving.

“I just want to sleep.”

If only he could.

“Okay, Buck.” Steve’s talking very quietly. He’s not touching him anymore. “I’ll be on the couch.”

*

Several memories collide in his head that night, interspersed fragments of different scenes that leave him gasping when he wakes up, trapped in layers and layers of pain and humiliation and despair.

It’s barely dawn. Through his open bedroom door, he sees a bucket of glass shards. He can hear Steve’s deep breathing. He’s swept up the kitchen, he stayed the night.

Bucky doesn’t move for what feels like an hour, listening to him.

Then he gets up, puts his shoes back on—he slept in his clothes—and walks silently out of his apartment, grabbing his coat and clicking the door shut carefully behind him.

*

Walking alone in Brooklyn is kind of overwhelming even at this early hour. It’s another cloudy, chilly day, and Bucky’s glad because it lets him burrow in the nice coat Sam bought him.

It’s a long walk, nearly fifteen blocks. He gets lost a few times; he still hasn’t really got a good handle on smartphones, with the maps and all. It’s not like he used one every day when he was in the field before his capture. And after that, well.

Still, when the damn thing rings, he manages to pick up on his first try. “Sam?”

“Hey, man.” Sam sounds very relieved. “Where are you?”

“Out.” Bucky screws his eyes shut. “I mean, I—I went out. For a walk. I—why? What’s wrong?”

“I just got a call from Steve. He’s freaking out pretty bad. But he didn’t want to call you himself in case it freaked you out more.”

Bucky scrubs a hand against his face. The avenue is too loud so he ducks into a quieter street, with only a few trucks unloading crates. Just life going on like it did for the three years he wasn’t there. He’s awash with the need to wander New York forever, lose himself in the everyday normality of it until all his hurts have dissolved in clouds of steam and street food smells. Maybe become of those mumbling hobos pushing a filthy cart around. He always used to wonder at these people; now he understands the need to stop trying and just let your mind slip.

“Bucky?”

“Yes. Sorry. I didn’t think Steve would freak out.” What did he think would happen? What else could he do, finding him gone? “Did he… did he tell you what happened?”

“He mentioned you kissed him.”

Bucky withers with shame. “Yeah.”

“He’s scared he handled it badly.”

“He—he didn’t. It’s all on me. I tried, I was trying, but it’s all—” He’s tearing up again, damn it; he swallows hard, exhales. “I made him say things. Do things. It’s not his fault. It’s never been his fault.”

Sam doesn’t react right away. Eventually, he asks: “Do you know what Steve is?”

It’s a really weird question. Bucky blinks at his phone, momentarily forgetting Sam can’t see him.

“At first I thought you knew,” Sam goes on. “Then I thought maybe you didn’t. I went back and forth like that a little while.”

“What do you mean, what he is?”

“There’s a reason he was the one SHIELD sent in. Not just because he was a white guy and he already had the clearance. They could have upgraded someone better at undercover than he is.” He hesitates. “Look, this is a conversation you should be having together. I just feel like it’s been eating him up—maybe eating you up too.”

Bucky exhales shakily again. “Thanks, Sam. I—thank you for everything you’ve done. I really mean that.”

“You’re scaring me right now,” Sam says, and Bucky abruptly realizes what he means.

He laughs, shaky and weak.

“I don’t want to kill myself,” he answers. “That’s the problem. If I had it in me, I would’ve done it already. Or I would’ve let them kill me a long time ago. Maybe right off the bat. It would’ve been so much easier.” He wipes his eyes again, tugs his coat tighter around himself. “I’m trying to find another way. I’m really trying.”

“Okay,” Sam says, measuredly. “You obviously don’t want to tell me exactly what you’re doing, and that’s fine. Just tell me you’re not going to harm yourself.”

“I’m not.” It’s a bit of a lie; he doesn’t expect it to be pleasant at all. But that’s not what Sam means, and the poor guy doesn’t deserve Bucky being cryptic at him. “Can you tell Steve I’m all right? Tell him I’m sorry.”

“Okay,” Sam repeats. He does sound a bit reassured. “I’ll call him right now. But you should text him, too.”

“You’re right. I will. Thanks, Sam, you—you’ve been so much help, with everything…” He huffs another shaky laugh. “God, I hear it. I do sound like I’m about to jump off a bridge. I swear it’s nothing like that. I just want to say thank you.”

“I hear you, man. You’re welcome.” He pauses. “Please take care of yourself.”

*

steve. i’m sorry about everything. there’s something i have to do. i promise i’m not going to hurt myself. please don’t feel guilty for what happened. you saved my life. you saved it so completely i’m still trying to wrap my head around it. nothing either of us do can ever change that.

Chapter Text

Bucky turns off his phone and takes a deep, deep breath before pushing open the door.

There was some construction outside; he taps the dirt from his boots. When he looks up, the two women who were pinning flyers to the corkboard have stopped to look at him.

“Yes?” says the white, brown-haired one. She has a sharp face and a direct, unfriendly gaze. Her nametag says JONES. “If it’s for a delivery, it’s in the back.”

“It’s. It’s not.”

The other one, a black woman with carefully knotted hair, is looking at him too, now. Her eyes are less aggressive than those of Jones, but only some. Bucky looks at her nametag. RAMBEAU.

“I’m looking for Romanov,” he says. “Natasha Romanov?”

“Sir,” says Jones. “I think you have the wrong address.”

“No, I… I know this is the place. Please, I just need to… find her, or someone who knows her. I don’t mean to disturb.”

Romanov gave him her card and he slipped it into his pocket because he couldn’t throw it away while she was looking. And it ate at his brain all night. Then he wrecked everything with Steve. When he woke up he remembered the card and it was suddenly shining like a fucking beacon in the mess he’d made of things. Now he’s come. Now he’s here. This is the harm he’ll do to himself, the thing he didn’t want to do until he had no choice.

“Excuse me,”—it’s Rambeau this time, “but what are you here for exactly?”

“Group therapy,” he blurts out. “On the card, it says—it’s every Wednesday.”

Jones watches him without expression. “Is this a joke?”

“Jess,” says Rambeau quietly. She hasn’t looked away from Bucky. “Sir. Are you aware this is a women’s shelter?”

Bucky’s throat goes entirely dry.

“I…” When he speaks again, his voice wavers horribly. “I thought it was a—a r-rape shelter?”

They just keep looking at him.

“I thought…” The card Romanov gave him burns through his pocket. Domestic Violence and Abuse Shelter. He had it all wrong. She just gave him his card as an introduction thing. Or maybe so he’d have her number. It wasn’t a challenge or an invitation.

Suddenly Jones’ barely veiled hostility makes sense.

“I’m sorry,” he says. There’s a sinking feeling in his stomach and it’s not stopping, like it’s going to sink all the way down to the earth core. He has no idea what he’s going to do now, but he has to get out of here. “I thought—I’m sorry. I’m leaving. I’m sorry.”

He turns around, but his vision is so blurry he can’t locate the door before Rambeau’s voice stops him. “Wait—hey, wait.” She jogs to him. “Hold on. Come take a seat for a sec.”

Bucky lets himself be led to a worn-out chair.

“Hey. Take a deep breath.” She waits for him to do so. “That’s better. How did you find this place?”

“Romanov gave me her card. I really thought…” He looks away to keep the tears back. “I don’t know her. She’s just a friend’s friend. We never even really talked, I—”

“What’s your name?”

“Bucky.”

“I’m Maria.” She looks at him. “You didn’t know this was a women’s shelter?”

“I swear I didn’t know. I wouldn’t have come. Everyone here must be afraid of men.” He laughs joylessly. “I’m afraid of men.”

Maria looks at him for a second. Then she looks up at Jones, who answers with a little gesture Bucky can’t interpret and leaves the room. Maria turns back to Bucky. “Okay, take another breath. It was real brave of you to come today.”

“Stupid,” Bucky mumbles.

“No. There aren’t any male shelters, really. I’m sure you could find some support group if you looked closer, but in the meantime, we’re kinda it.” She looks up and over Bucky’s shoulder, getting a sign for something. Then she looks back at him. “Okay. You can join us for today.”

Bucky blinks. “What?”

“Jessica talked to the women here today and apparently they don’t have a problem with a man attending. I have some ground rules if you want to hear them. Are you up for it?”

Bucky would rather go lie down in the middle of the avenue and wait for a truck. Except that’s not literally true. He still doesn’t want to die. He’s desperate not to die. But he can’t go on living like this, which means he still has to fix this. Fix himself. Somehow.

He nods mutely.

“Okay. Three rules: you don’t raise your voice. You don’t interrupt people. You don’t question people’s stories.” Her gaze is searching. “Good?”

Bucky nods again. “Good. Not an issue.” He swallows. “I… Thank you.”

“You're welcome.” Maria does look like she’s pitying him. But from her, he doesn’t mind so much.

*

When Bucky steps into the room, four pair of eyes look at up at him. He swallows on a dry throat.

“Hello. Um. My name’s Bucky Barnes. Thank you for letting me be here today.”

“But of course,” says a girl with platinum hair and a Russian accent. “Come take a seat.”

He does. The circle is wide enough that he can put two empty chairs on each side of himself. To his left is the Russian woman—Yelena, says her handwritten nametag—and Jessica Jones, who’s still keeping an eye on him. To his right are Maria and Carol, a blonde who smiles at him. Not too wide, just being polite.

“Go on, then,” Jones offers.

They’re all looking at him. Bucky shrinks. “I don’t want to intrude.”

“Hey, come on,” Carol says, not unkindly. “You’ve come here for a reason, right? Go on. We’re listening.”

Yes, he did come for a reason. He doesn’t want a therapist; he just—he can’t. Even if Bucky still saw Dr. Ross regularly, he would never, ever tell him about the ugly things he wants, so what’s the point? But here, now, it’s not just him trying to defend himself against a solitary judge. They’re just people who went through something similar. And they actually invited him to join them, even though he shouldn’t be here at all. Maybe they won’t judge him too much.

One way to find out.

“Okay, so… I’m—I’m a veteran. I was—captured. During my last tour.” He stops, because he feels unsteady already. “They sold me into human trafficking.” That one is easy enough to say without stuttering; it still feels so rote, so disconnected from his existence. “And I was a captive. Prisoner. Slave.” Deep breath. “Sex slave. For about three years.”

Silence. They’re all staring at him. From their expressions he can tell they weren’t expecting something like that. Suddenly, he asks himself: what the fuck am I doing here? What am I expecting them to say?

“We believe you,” Jones says, which is when he remembers the third rule: don’t question people’s stories. “Keep going.”

“Right.” He swallows hard. “I was rescued three months ago.”

“Three months?” Maria looks shocked. “Three months is nothing.”

And it calms him a bit. Because—she’s right. He’d never really taken the time to consider it, but. Three months is nothing.

“I was rescued by an undercover agent—Steve—who was there on a completely different mission. He shouldn’t have—he nearly died getting me out, but he—”

He stops. He never tried to really imagine how Steve was feeling during those three days. How he made the unthinkable decision to jeopardize his obscenely important mission just for Bucky’s sake. It humbles him all at once, and a live coal of shame burns in his stomach at the thought of what he did to Steve the night before, what he forced him to say.

“I guess he just couldn’t leave me there,” he says eventually. “And now—he’s—around. I don’t have a lot of friends. I think maybe he’s the best friend I have. And I can’t—”

There it is. The precipice.

“I want him,” Bucky manages to say.

The women exchange looks. Rambeau is the one to speak. “Is that a problem because he’s a man?”

“Oh—no.” Bucky laughs mirthlessly. “Been out of the closet since I was fifteen. My parents threw me out of the house and everything.”

Rambeau takes it in stride. “Then is it because you don’t think people might want someone with your baggage?”

She’s obviously trying to bring Bucky’s issues back on familiar ground for the group, which is actually kind of nice. Once again, Bucky had never considered that. People, in the abstract. Dating and trying to communicate the enormity of what happened to him to a potential partner. It’s a thought so laughable it just makes him sad.

“No. Just… The thing is… Before he rescued me, he…” God, this is hard. He doesn’t care, really, what they might think of him, but he doesn’t want them to hate Steve. “He was undercover—he was isolated there, he had to play along—”

“He did it to you,” Jones says brusquely.

Bucky closes his eyes and nods. “Yeah. But. He didn’t know. He even asked me if I wanted it. I couldn’t say anything.”

He swallows. There’s a silence.

“Just so you know,” Maria says, “none of us feel, like, at all qualified to give you advice about any of this.” Everyone nods vigorously. “But what I feel like saying is… I don’t think it’s fucked up to want him around. And that doesn’t really matter anyway.”

Bucky blinks, more puzzled than anything else. “How can it not matter?”

Maria doesn’t answer, looking at Jones who seems to accept being handed the question. “I’ve also wanted to be with someone who’d been badly affected by all my shit,” she declares. “Don’t ask me how it went, that’s not the point. The point is you can’t blame yourself for wanting. Because you can’t control what you want.”

He huffs. “Yeah, I’ve come to realize that.”

“You can detour through alcohol and drugs if you feel like it,” she goes on. “You can cut your forearms to ribbons and starve yourself to the bone and try all kinds of other shit to suppress what you want. I’m telling you right now—none of it works in the long run.”

“I feel like everyone expects me to be like that,” he says. “To… to break down. I’m trying so hard not to. I’ve tried building back something but I can’t—I can’t, there’s nothing. Except him. I want him. I want him to…” His words dry up. “I want to belong to him. So he’ll take care of things for me. So I don’t have to.”

He’s welling up again. There. He came here and he confessed his appalling secret to total strangers and it’s not making him feel better at all. He feels horribly ashamed, and almost angry that he’s put them through this ridiculousness, wasting their time, loading them up with the enormity of his trauma, for nothing.

“And I know that’s too much to ask,” he bites out, since none of them seem inclined to point out the obvious. He came here hoping they’d be nice to him; now he’s wishing they’d be crueler. “I know that’s putting too much on him.”

“I still don’t think it’s wrong,” Maria says. When he looks at her, she shrugs. “Why wouldn’t you want help? And why wouldn’t you want the one person that made you feel good in the middle of a shitty situation?”

Bucky blinks at her, letting a few tears roll down in the process. Once again, an angle he hadn’t considered. This one is making him feel unsteady. He doesn’t like the idea that he’s clinging to Steve just because Steve was the one there. It seems to cheapen Steve as a person, as if Bucky would have gotten just as much attached to anyone that saved him.

But the truth is nobody else would have saved him. It was only ever going to be Steve.

“I think you should just talk to him,” Carol intervenes. “Sorry, that’s nothing original. Just the number one advice for any problem. And if he doesn’t understand, then at least you can move on. I know it’s like, a shitty risk to take, but.” She shrugs. “Gotta get out there, man. Stop going in circles.”

“Right,” Yelena concludes. “Get out there. Like Jess and Carol said—there is no true way around the feelings. Your only option is run screaming at them. You said you did not want to waste time with coping mechanisms. You are tired of stalling. So. One thing left to do. Barrel through.”

“Sorry we can’t help much more than that,” Maria offers.

Bucky exhales.

“No. It’s—it’s good. Just—saying things. Out loud. So—thanks.”

They must understand that very well, because he gets a few smiles back. Jessica doesn’t smile, but she does hand him a tissue, and he blows his nose mostly so he can hide his face for a few seconds. Talk to Steve. Of course he has to talk to Steve. He didn’t need to come all the way here to hear that.

Except he did.

His stomach twists. God, but he doesn’t want to do it. Steve shouldn’t be dealing with his shit. Steve should have been allowed to ride off in the sunset. But he promised to come back, and then he did come back and Bucky latched onto him like the desperate creature he is and now here they fucking are.

“Have you talked to your therapist about all that?” Rambeau asks. “What did they say?”

Bucky looks up quick and wary. “I… don’t have a therapist.”

They all sort of stare at him.

“You gotta, man,” Carol says eventually.

“I did go. I really did try. It wasn’t good.”

“Bad shrinks happen,” Jessica says. “You have to try again. Or do you want to make that Steve person shoulder all your troubles?”

“No.”

“What’s your phone number?” He mumbles it to her and she texts him a contact. “Try that one.”

Bucky blinks at her. “I—thanks, I—”

She waves her hand. “You’re welcome. Time’s ticking. Yelena, tell us about your week. Did you manage to go on that date or not?”

*

Bucky doesn’t speak much more after that. He digests the amount of speaking he did do, and listens to everyone else. As the session goes on, he finds himself answering their own anxieties and doubts, a few words at a time. He half-expects them to tell him it’s not his place to speak up. But in fact they seem to welcome what little he’s got to say. It’s strange, to realize he has something to contribute, something that’s of value to them. Just saying he experienced something similar seems to help.

It’s awful to know they’ve all been through it. It’s hard not to feel sorry for himself and multiply it by how sorry he is for all of them. But also it’s a faint shock to see all of them talking about it now, sitting quietly in a circle. They’re on the other side of it, somehow.

And then the subject bounces around on what movies they’ve last seen, and it feels like they’re being pulled from the dark pit of what they’ve discussed, gradually brought back to the light, slowly enough that it doesn’t hurt their eyes. Carol looks at her phone and says, “All right, it’s time,” and they all push their chairs back.

Bucky does too, realizing he has no idea who was leading the session in the end. His bets are on Maria Rambeau, but he kind of doesn’t want to know. He wants to keep feeling like they were just friends talking together.

“Hey,” Maria says as he puts back his chair. “Are you feeling better? You looked a bit wild around the eyes when you came in earlier.”

“Um. Yeah. Better. Thanks.” Just saying that makes his eyes burn again. He feels like he hasn’t stopped crying on and off ever since he kissed Steve. On top of everything else he’s feeling, it’s getting plain annoying.

The good thing is that Maria’s seen him cry so much in the past hour and a half that she doesn’t seem alarmed. Bucky wipes his eyes, again, and says, again: “Thank you for letting me be here. I hope I wasn’t—I hope I didn’t—”

“You can come back,” she says. “Maybe just call first.”

“Thank you.” It’s odd. Two hours ago they were complete strangers, and now she knows so much about him.

“That was kind of a lot, huh,” she says, echoing his thoughts. “I don’t normally ask this, but. Can I hug you?”

He thinks of what he must have looked like earlier, coming through the door miserable and bleary, throwing the last of his courage into the attempt only to be told he wasn’t welcome. He nods, and she pulls him in.

It’s been three years—no, longer than that—since a woman last held him. He’s shocked to realize she’s smaller than him; he’s not used to that. He hugs her back, then sniffs and lets go and laughs as he wipes yet more tears. “I think I’m getting dehydrated.”

She’s kind enough to give him a smile. “Go drink some water. And have a night off before you call him.”

*

He does take the night off, though of course he has to suffer through another bout of flashbacks—they’re fragmented again, leaving him with a bad taste in his mouth but no precise memory to feel miserable about. That’s probably the best he can get these days.

After his shower, he turns on his phone again. Steve’s answered his text with I’m glad you’re all right.

Bucky stares at the small message for minutes on end. Then, finally, he calls.

“Hey,” Steve answers.

The speech Bucky had tentatively prepared evaporates. “I’m sorry,” he says, his voice only barely steady. “I’m sorry for everything, I don’t know how…”

“Can we not do this on the phone?” He sounds cautious. Maybe he thinks Bucky doesn’t want to see him at all. “We could go back to that coffee place?”

“Okay,” Bucky exhales. “Okay.”

Chapter Text

Matcha lattes make everything better. Though today will certainly put that to the test.

Bucky got to the coffee shop an hour early. The thought of arriving after Steve, feeling his gaze between his shoulder blades as he stood in line for his drink—Bucky couldn’t risk that happening. He’s gotten up for a refill twice already, distilling the bittersweet matcha down his throat in little gulps, like it’ll keep him alive if he can only pace himself.

The place’s busy, but not packed. It’s late morning now, people coming in for a hot drink on a cold day, taking it to go more often than not. Bucky watches them from the corner table he wedged himself in. He’s never been like them, busying himself with an adult life of his own. He fell straight from high school into the army. He remembers hoping he’d get there someday, remembers how glad he was with his decision to leave Special Forces. Just one more mission.

He’s shaky—of course the night wasn’t restful yet again, and the images linger—but he feels almost calm, waiting for Steve. It’s so bright all around him, floor-to-ceiling windows encasing him in an alcove of light. There’s the taste of matcha. And then suddenly the door opens again and Steve’s here.

It’s like all the air got sucked out of the room to be replaced with his personal aura. Even the sounds seem muffled. He’s wearing jeans and his brown leather jacket, nothing that should make him stand out, yet all the people around him seem to be made of cardboard. He does what Bucky couldn’t do, goes to stand in line for his drink, and Bucky realizes that he’s not calm at all, that he’s never been calm, that he’s been panicking the entire morning and he’s only just noticing now.

There’s not much of a line, really, and it only takes Steve a minute to get his coffee, black again. Then his eyes—they’re so blue, even at a distance—flick around for Bucky and find him at once. He crosses the room and gets to Bucky’s table and pulls a chair and Bucky nearly gets up and runs out.

But he doesn’t, because the light’s caught in Steve’s hair to make it shine gold and he’s trying to smile at Bucky and he’s here; he’s come for Bucky, again.

God. Bucky wants too much. He can feel it again, the ache in his stomach. And the thing is, he can’t even reason against what he wants; because if Steve made all his decisions for him, then these awful dilemmas, this constant struggle of the self would go away. Maybe Bucky would suffer again, but at least he wouldn’t be making himself suffer.

Never mind that it would destroy Steve, to be the one to hurt him instead.

“So,” Steve says after a few silent seconds. “Talking?”

His voice is soft and deep as usual. Bucky could listen to him for hours. Bucky should just apologize and leave. But it’s too late for that. He kissed Steve. He can’t keep it buried anymore, can’t just let it fester inside. He’s got to deal with the mess he made.

“Perhaps I should go first,” Steve goes on when Bucky keeps saying nothing. “The other night. I don’t know if I’ve done something, or—maybe I shouldn’t have stayed to do the dishes…”

“You didn’t do anything.”

“But I did,” Steve says steadily. “I saw the look on your face change. When I asked you to help me.” He hesitates. “At first I thought—I thought maybe you didn’t want to be told what to do anymore. But then, well—”

“Stop,” Bucky pleads. “Stop.”

Steve stops and doesn’t try to speak again, even as Bucky gathers himself for almost a full minute.

“Steve—I’m sorry,” he finally says. “I’m sorry for scaring you. For doing what I did. For making you say—for taking it all out on you.”

Steve stirs his coffee. “I’ll take that apology for the scaring bit. It was a relief when Sam got back to me the next morning.”

“That won’t happen again. I can promise you that—at least that.”

“I appreciate it,” Steve says, and just like that, it’s dealt with. He meets Bucky’s eyes. “As for the rest.”

Bucky feels his stomach make a triple knot. Steve holds his gaze for a moment, then puts his hand on the table between them, palm up.

“What do you want, Bucky? I’ll give it to you if I can.”

The knot tightens to the point of nausea. Bucky looks at Steve’s hand like it’s a gun to his head. He has tried so much not to touch him, not to so much as look his way too long, or call him by his first name, not even in his mind.

“You can’t say that.”

Steve is perfectly calm. “Why not?”

“Because it’s not—I don’t—” Too many words are cramming up his throat. The walls of light around them seem to be closing in. He can’t look away from his proffered hand. “Do you even have any idea what you’re offering me?”

“I’d like to have more than an idea. It’s why I’m asking.” Steve pauses. “But if I had to guess, from everything you said and did the other night… I’d say you want things to be simple again.”

Bucky stares at him. He’s fully clothed, still wearing his coat, even, but just now he feels like Steve stripped him bare.

“When we had sex,” Steve says very quietly. A woman walks past them, coffee in hand, rummaging in her bag. He waits till she’s gone to keep going. “That second night.”

“Yes,” Bucky breathes. He remembers; the storm, the cold hard floor, the blankets to make it softer. Steve’s mouth on him, the way his tongue folded around the piercings so even those felt good for a few mindless seconds.

“You asked for it, and I gave it to you. And neither of us wondered what it looked like, or what anyone would think. Neither of us wondered if it was right, if it was healthy. We just did it. Things were simple.”

Bucky is going to fucking cry again. He can feel the ache in the roof of his mouth.

“Is that what you want?” Steve presses.

What did Bucky say to Steve the other night, for him to have understood so well? Horrible, vulnerable shit. Don’t ever leave. Don’t make me do this alone. He swallows. When he speaks, his voice’s shaky. “I miss—I miss—”

He feels like he’s about to say I miss Pierce, and no matter how much he wants to live, he’ll have to actually fucking kill himself if his mouth ever shapes those words.

“I miss—someone—taking charge.”

Steve looks at him for a few seconds after that. The weather’s mercurial outside; clouds had come, but now they move away from the face of the sun once more, and the great encasing windows flare up so brightly it’s almost unbearable, tracing Steve’s lines in pure white fire. Bucky’s hands are shaking; his eyes are burning.

Then some clouds come back and Steve’s fingers curl up a bit. “About taking charge. There’s something I have to tell you. Maybe Sam already did.”

“He said to ask… what you are.”

Steve nods. “I don’t know how to say this. I don’t know what you’re familiar with.” A pause. “I like to—be in charge. In the bedroom, I suppose.” He winces. “I’m saying this wrong. It’s not about sex.”

Bucky blinks at him. “Are you trying to say you’re a top?”

Steve laughs, short and unexpected, like he’d forgotten Bucky’s queer, too. “Sure. Sometimes. But no.” He takes a bracing breath. “Okay. Let’s try this. A lot of the shit they did to you. I do like to do that. Except. You know.” A muscle works in his jaw. “Consensually.”

Bucky waits for his own reaction, but there’s nothing. He’s not surprised. It’s one of the awful things he yelled at Steve, that he enjoyed what he saw on the island, and it didn’t come out of nowhere. Bucky remembers the third day very well; Steve had to impress Pierce, and impress him he did. He had his own ideas about slave training, too. And that’s not the kind of thing you just improvise. Not convincingly anyway.

It’s difficult to reconcile the idea of Steve with the vague clichés of sadomasochism that were all Bucky knew, before Pierce put him through a stricter education on the subject. But he doesn’t have to reconcile it at all.

“It doesn’t matter,” he says.

Something flickers in Steve’s eyes. Uncertainty; hope, maybe.

“Steve, what I made you say the other night,” Bucky says, tripping over his words in shame. “I… I needed to hurt someone and you were there. But it doesn’t actually matter to me. What you like or—want. It’ll always come second to what you did. And you saved me. And that’s what matters.”

And you can’t control what you want; Bucky’s acutely aware of that. But you can control what you do and oh, the things Steve has done, in his selflessness, his unquestioning courage. The risks he’s taken. The least Bucky can do is try and return the favor.

And that implies shaking off his miserable, ludicrous fantasy. How literally childish, to wish for things to be simple again, for someone else to take charge. One way or another, it won’t last forever. Eventually, Bucky will find himself having to make his own choices again, and he’ll be even more unprepared for it, having hidden away instead of putting in the work.

Recovery is work. And everyone at SHIELD seemed pretty convinced recovery for Bucky would be impossible work. It’s hard not to agree with them. He’s tried to believe, he’s tried to fight. He’s been fighting so hard for so long already, though. He’s so tired. He can’t help wishing for a moment of rest.

But not at the cost of Steve’s peace of mind. Not at any cost on Steve’s part.

Steve’s hand is still on the table between them. His blue eyes are still on Bucky’s face, tracking his expressions. Slowly, his fingers open again.

Bucky shakes his head. “No. No. It’s too much. I can’t make you do that.”

“Bucky,” Steve says quietly, “you wouldn’t be making me do anything.”

“It’s sick. I’m sick.”

Steve pauses. Then he says, “You’re not. Or I am, too. This has been a refuge for me all my life, a place where things are clearly defined. I was afraid you wouldn’t see it that way, once you knew.” He works his jaw again, then relaxes. “I was afraid everything about me would make you sick.”

“Not you,” Bucky exhales. “No. Never you.”

They look at each other for a few seconds.

Steve takes a breath. “Now, obviously, the both of us doing something like that together is… what a lot of people would call a terrible idea.”

Bucky’s shocked when he suddenly realizes Steve’s fingertips are faintly trembling. All at once, he sees it: a fear equal to his own, behind Steve’s controlled façade. Maybe also the same terrible hope, the same desires. The same self-hatred. The same island.

“Yeah, they would,” Bucky murmurs.

“Well, what the fuck do they know,” Steve says, and his voice is trembling too. “They weren’t there.”

Bucky forgets his good resolutions—he grabs Steve’s hand and Steve’s fingers interlace with his own and squeeze, hard enough to stop them shaking. It sends a shock through Bucky’s entire system. He feels like he’s reached for the sun and actually caught it. A glowing ball of nuclear fusion suddenly right there in his arms. What does he do with it. What if it kills him.

“Tomorrow?” Steve offers quietly. “Or—maybe the day after that.”

Bucky stares. “The whole day?”

“If that’s too much—”

Tears start rolling down Bucky’s cheeks. He wipes them before Steve can start worrying. “Sorry—it’s just—it’s not too much. It’s so much more than I ever even…”

Steve squeezes his hand tighter. “It’s okay. You can have it, Bucky. You can have anything you want. And I know it won’t be easy. But I do think we can try. If that’s what you need from me.” His eyes are so blue. “We can try.”

Bucky’s latte’s going cold and he can’t pick it up with his bad hand, not when it’s shaking that much, but that’s not enough to make him let go. It’s too late now. He won’t let go anymore, not until Steve makes him.

Chapter Text

It’s not going to work.

That’s the thought that keeps going through Bucky’s mind as Steve asks him a series of questions while their lattes go cold, for—as he put it—calibrating purposes. Where did you sleep? In a wooden box at the foot of Pierce’s bed. What did you eat? Cold food in a dog bowl. How did you wash? They hosed me down. How did you shave? They waxed me. What happened when you fought back? You saw what happened. What happened when you gave in?

Everything else Bucky could answer, but not that. Because it would be admitting that he did give in, all the time. He doesn’t want to talk about the rewards, the pleasure and the relief, the endless thanks he sobbed into Pierce’s lap. So he says nothing, and Steve doesn’t ask again.

Bucky still feels drained by the end of the questioning, and when he finally dares to look up, Steve himself doesn’t look so good, despite the encouraging smile he tries to give. And Bucky thinks—It’s not going to work. He knew that when he arrived at the coffee shop; he knew that before he clasped Steve’s shaking hand. He knew that when Steve asked him next, So what exactly do you—and Bucky shook his head and stammered No. You choose. You have to choose for me.

Hence the questions and the pained look they brought in Steve’s eyes. And Bucky knows he should back out now, now. But at the same time, how could he, after Steve’s already begun to put in the effort? He can’t treat this lightly. He can’t do this to him. So he doesn’t say anything, and they go back home, finally parting ways.

They’ve settled on Saturday. Which means Bucky has two days to change his mind. To tell someone who’d stop them, if he won’t do it himself. Sam, maybe. Natasha Romanov, for sure. To call that therapist whose number Jones gave him. All he has to do is pick up the phone, speak a few words. It’s so easy. So why can’t he do it?

*

On Friday, Bucky tidies up his apartment like he won’t ever come back. There’s not much to tidy—he’s only lived here for a week—but he puts everything away, does his laundry, does the dishes, vacuums the floors. He feels like he’s going off to jail, or to his own execution. He feels like he’s going back to the island.

*

He sleeps horribly, trapped in a loop of his first gang rape, when he was tied face-down on a table and couldn’t even see how many people were still waiting to fuck him, when he started feeling like he’d been there forever and it would last forever.

He ends up getting up at 5am and taking an hour-long shower. He can’t eat a thing.

He puts on his coat, make sure he has his wallet, then leaves, taking care to lock the door. Once he’s downstairs he heads straight for the nearest coffee shop—he has them all memorized in a mile-wide radius—and asks for a coffee. Not a matcha; he doesn’t want to taint it with the taste of his own fear. But he needs the sugar and the caffeine. If he gets through the day he can get himself a matcha as a reward.

His hands are shaking again. He doesn’t know when the prospect of a day as Steve’s slave turned from something he wanted too much into something that feels like an internal injury. He tells himself it’s stage fright and drinks his coffee entirely unlike a normal person, standing in a corner of the shop, not sitting down because he took a cup to go, but not going back outside either. Once he’s done he carefully puts the empty cup down on a table people just vacated, and it feels horribly like leaving a last testimony of himself before he disappears.

How is it possible, to be so terribly afraid of something, and to head for it regardless? He walks down the stairs to the subway, buys a single ticket, goes through the turnstile, all of it on automatic like he’s watching himself on a screen. He waits for a local train, because Steve only lives four stops away. An express passes him by, then a second one. As the wind of their passage blows his hair back, he finds himself thinking, I don’t even know him. Not really.

Steve likes what he saw on the island. He likes doing that stuff to people. He said so himself—

Turn away, Bucky thinks to himself. Turn back, walk away.

The local train comes and he climbs aboard.

One stop. Two stops. Three stops. Four stops. The doors clack open; he gets out and climbs the stairs slowly towards the light. Once he’s outside he has to check his phone. He’s already entered Steve’s address into it the day before. He feels like he’s been set up by his past self. He can’t remember what he was thinking.

What if he fucks me, he thinks suddenly. There’s not enough air around for him to breathe. If Steve fucks him, regardless of how, Bucky just knows he will have some sort of breakdown. He hasn’t even touched himself since he left the island. But when he tries to negotiate with himself—maybe he can tell Steve upon arrival that he doesn’t want sex at all, maybe they can just do something else—he meets with a wall of steel inside.

He can’t choose. It’s all or nothing. He’s been wanting this. It’s been driving him mad. Well, now he gets to have it. And no matter how scared he is, he will go. He will go and get what’s coming to him.

*

When he knocks on Steve’s door, he can’t feel his body, and it’s not because of the cold. Only when Steve opens the door does Bucky realize he’s never been to his place before, precisely because everyone seemed to think if he did, Steve would fuck him again. The irony doesn’t help a bit.

“Ready?” Steve asks.

Bucky’s nausea rises to such a sharp peak that for a moment he thinks he’ll actually throw up. But the next second he shoves it all back down and thinks with intense, knife-sharp clarity: I didn’t come all this way for nothing.

So he nods, and Steve, as always, doesn’t question him.

“All right. I’m going to give you a minute,” he says. “I want you to go in the bathroom and take off all your clothes.”

It’s like Bucky’s blood turned to ice water. Suddenly he is calm. This is all right. He knows how to do this. When it happens, he will be able to go away in his head. And Steve probably won’t physically hurt him; he didn’t, that first time, not too much. He might even make him come, especially if he has pills or poppers at hand. Coming would be good. Feel good. Maybe.

Steve derails his spiral by giving him a Macy’s paper bag with string handles. “Come out when you’re ready.”

*

Bucky undresses entirely first, folding his clothes atop the toilet seat. When he’s naked, he gingerly takes the paper bag and pulls out what’s inside.

Steve can’t have bought that at Macy’s.

It’s a sensible black jumpsuit, thick hardy cloth lined with white fluff inside. The front closes with a dozen straps held shut by tiny flat buttons. Across the back, a single word has been professionally embroidered in white thread.

ROGERS

Bucky stares at the jumpsuit for a long time. Then he puts it on. It’s very soft, and he knows it’ll keep him warm. Doing up the buttons takes him the better part of five minutes; his bad hand is no help. Undoing them will probably take even longer.

His hands slow down when he realizes that it’s the whole point.

It’s a jumpsuit. Not pants someone can pull down; not a shirt someone can tug off. And it closes with a hundred small buttons. On instinct, he tries pulling at the ones he’s already done up; then he tries harder, and they still don’t give. When he looks closer, he sees that someone’s re-embroidered them all twice over. No one can take this thing off him in a hurry.

Warmth touches his numb fingertips again, and he manages to take a deeper breath.

“Bucky? Everything all right?”

“Uh—yeah,” Bucky calls back. “Yeah, I—just a second.” He finishes up with the buttons, which still takes him another whole minute. Then he opens the door.

Steve is waiting for him, not even trying to disguise it. Bucky feels the full focus of his attention like a physical touch, something that keeps him upright and together. Now that panic isn’t blurring his vision anymore, he gets a proper look at Steve. No special clothes for him, just a white t-shirt, a pair of jeans.

This is all wrong, part of Bucky says. If he’s being Steve’s slave right now, he should be averting his eyes, keeping his hands in his back. He should be going to his knees, opening his mouth, emptying his mind. Getting ready to endure.

But no: this was being Pierce’s slave. Steve will expect different things from him.

“Any questions before we start?” Steve asks when Bucky’s silence lasts.

“No,” Bucky says. Never ask any questions. But then—“Yes. How do I call you?”

Steve watches him for a second. “Sir,” he says.

Bucky wonders at that decision. Sir felt like it might be off-limits because of Pierce, and part of Bucky does flinch at the thought of putting himself back in that mindset. But it’s what he’s come for—and his mouth is already shaping the well-worn words.

“Yes, sir.”

“Good,” Steve says.

Pierce would have said: Good, and it would have been paternalistic, falsely debonair, always with an underbelly of cruelty. See how easier things are when you don’t fight. Steve says: Good, and it’s a simple acknowledgement that he’s been heard right.

“Now, come here. I’ll give you the tour.”

Steve just walks away, expecting to be followed. And Bucky does follow. It sort of feels like he’s in hospital care, or in the army, or at school; that’s to say a place where his submission is a de facto assumption, not a thing to be conquered. There’s no fight to be had, no violence lying ahead. By his willing presence he is already agreeing to the rules. Whatever those will turn out to be.

“Here,” Steve says, opening the door on what probably used to be a walk-in closet. It’s got a small, narrow window. There’s a camp bed and nothing else. “I expect you to spend the night. You’ll leave in the morning.”

Bucky hadn’t planned for this; yet this is what will be happening. He gets dizzy with the sudden rush of relief at someone else managing his schedule. “Whatever you want, sir.”

“You’re not allowed to get out once I put you in there. You’ll have to wait until I come get you.”

Bucky nods. He feels easier the more things are mapped out for him, coming together in his head.

Steve seems to notice he’s eager for information; he closes the door again and walks down the hall, motioning him to follow. “Here’s the kitchen. I’ll feed you. If you’re hungry outside of meals, you have to ask me.” He turns to motion at the bathroom across the hall. “You’ll be allowed a shower and bathroom break before bed. You won’t be supervised during, but you’ll only have a ten-minute window. Sounds good?”

It’s a rhetorical question, but it’s always safer to answer. “Yes, sir.”

“Good.” Steve waits for Bucky to meet his eyes. “About punishments.”

Bucky stands a little straighter. The word alone makes his heart beat faster, but he isn’t afraid. Not really. Not that much.

“I think the rules are simple enough to follow,” Steve goes on. “If you break one accidentally, you’ll have to explain why it happened, and we’ll talk about how to make sure it doesn’t happen again. If you break one on purpose…”

Bucky holds his breath. Steve opens his hands.

“…that’s a safeword.”

Bucky blinks. Then the full meaning of it hits him. He came here to have his choices taken away and that’s exactly what he’s getting. If he rebels, well, that means he doesn’t want his choices taken away anymore. That means the whole thing stops.

And that’s real powerful incentive not to break the rules.

“Got it?” Steve asks.

Bucky knows his lines, for which he’s grateful. He feels a little dazed. “Yes, sir.”

“Any questions?”

Never ask any questions. But no. He has to constantly remind himself that Steve isn’t out to trick him. Bucky can answer frankly. He can ask about the one thing he’s obsessing about.

“What… What am I going to do all day?”

“What I tell you to,” Steve says easily.

Bucky feels a shiver race up his spine. He just nods.

“Oh,” Steve says. “Forgot one last rule. You listening?”

“Yes, sir.” The repetition is almost soothing now.

“Okay. Whatever happens, you’re not allowed to beg.”

Bucky blinks again.

“I’m your master,” Steve elaborates. “I’m here to provide for you. If you need something from me, you just ask. I’ll either give it to you or explain why you can’t have it. If you feel the need to beg, something’s gone wrong.”

Bucky can see the logic. He nods mutely. Then he opens his mouth, hesitates.

“Say ‘sir, I have a question’,” Steve instructs.

“Sir, I have a question.”

“What is it?”

“Are you—” The jumpsuit is nice, the intention behind it is nice, but it’s not armor. It won’t stop Steve if he decides to take it off after all. “Are you going to fuck me?”

Steve gives him a long look and fear twists in Bucky’s stomach when he thinks he’s done it—he’s made it happen by asking about it. God knows he fell into that trap enough on the island.

For a moment the world sways around him. What is he doing here. Why is he reenacting all this, putting himself back there during the day, when he’s already back every night? He tries to breathe; he tries to remember it’s all fake. Steve’s made it clear he’ll stop if Bucky makes him stop.

The thing is, Bucky’s not certain at all he could make anyone stop. He’s tried and failed before.

“Not today,” Steve eventually says.

Bucky exhales. It’s a good answer. One that secures him yet keeps him on his toes for next time. If there’s a next time. Bucky has no idea if he hopes there will be, or if he dreads it happening. He can’t think about that now. There’s no room in his head for anything but the present.

But now he’s wondering again what Steve is going to make him do all day, and Steve must feel his tension because he heads for the living room. “Did you sleep okay last night?”

“I think I managed a few hours,” Bucky lies, following. “Maybe.”

“Did you have breakfast?”

“I had coffee.”

He wonders if Steve is going to make him eat and then sleep. He doesn’t want that. After all this build-up, he doesn’t think he could just go and take a nap.

“Lie down on the floor,” Steve says. “Right here in the middle of the room. On your back.”

Bucky does, feeling disheartened. Steve watches him critically. “Spread your legs just a bit—hip-wide. Yeah, good. Set your hands on each side of your body. Are you cold? Need a pillow, maybe?”

“I’m fine,” is all Bucky says. He hasn’t called him sir. Already he’s falling back into his old patterns, testing his owner’s boundaries, trying to find ways to express his discontent without getting punished. What the hell does he want? Just the minute before he was sick with fear at the thought of Steve touching him; now he’s getting angry at the thought of Steve staying away. He can’t keep it together—he shouldn’t be here, not when he might blow up at any moment, in one way or another, and take Steve with him—

“Okay,” Steve says. “You have one minute to wiggle around if you’re uncomfortable. And then you can’t move anymore.”

Bucky cranes his head to see him. “I don’t understand. Do I close my eyes to sleep?”

“No. I want you to stay still,” Steve says. “Awake and entirely still.”

Bucky suddenly, vividly remembers this is how Steve tortured him on the island. He isn’t using restraints this time either. His argument for that flashes back into Bucky’s mind: I want him to train himself.

“Your one minute starts now.”

Bucky shifts his position a little, trying to find one he can stay in for hours. Snipers know how to stay still, but snipers aren’t usually flat on their back. He can’t look around that way, can’t see Steve’s face or what he’s doing.

“And done,” Steve says. “So—here we go. You can breathe, blink, all that, of course. For today you’re also allowed to talk. But that’s it. You don’t even move your head. Got it?”

“Yes, sir,” Bucky says.

“Good.”

Then Steve turns on his heel and leaves.

*

If Bucky were on the island, he’d have a vibrator up his ass. He’d be on camera to make sure he didn’t move; when he inevitably did, there would be more torture, maybe a cane or electric shocks, against which he’d desperately try to stay still, and fail again and again, earning himself more torture, more punishments.

Here there is nothing. He’s just lying down, looking at the ceiling. And somehow it’s almost worse. He’s hyperaware of the way his breaths shift his head just a little; he’s itching to open and close his fingers, to arch his back, stretch. Fidgeting suddenly feels almost as necessary as breathing.

He’s not being watched, exactly, but he isn’t left alone either. Steve sometimes walks by, apparently tending to his regular Saturday morning business. At one point he seems to be doing paperwork. At another point he puts on the radio for the morning news—Bucky got here so early, they’re only just now coming on. He gets a call from Sam. Bucky only hears his half of the conversation, but he’s breathing suddenly a bit faster. Steve has him pinned in his living room, and Sam has no idea.

At one point Steve steps over him to get something from the shelves by the couch.

Sometime later he asks him, “Are you cold? Do you need to go to the bathroom?”

Bucky resists the urge to crane his head. “No, sir.”

“Are you bored?”

Somehow the question is unexpected. Bucky considers. He’s still too full of adrenaline to truly be bored; he’s been busy tracking Steve’s movements and keeping a lid on his own body. He does feel a bit wary when he imagines staying like that for hours. But surely it won’t be hours.

“Not yet, sir.”

Steve snorts. “All right. Keep at it.”

And that’s all. Steve keeps moving around, doing things Bucky can only infer from the sounds he hears. Boredom still doesn’t come. Bucky’s still hyperaware that he is restraining himself because he’s been told to. Every second is a test. So far he’s passed them all, but it’s no guarantee against failure in the next moment. He keeps checking himself against the need to fidget. It’s not so urgent now but he still feels like his body might betray him at any time, twitch or shiver or—God forbid—sneeze.

He feels like he’s developing new ways to sense the floor underneath him. He watches the sun creep across the ceiling. It’s a beautiful morning. And he’s spending it inside doing nothing at all. Just staying perfectly still, lying on the floor, in someone else’s home, incongruous, taking up space. Usually he’d be panicking about wasting his time, wasting his freedom. But he’s not free today. None of what he does is his fault. Nobody can blame him for how pointless this is. He’s not in charge. He’s off the hook.

His thoughts wander, but he doesn’t fall asleep. He just is. At times, he gets this feeling he sometimes experiences at night, like he’s just missed a step in his sleep; like his body almost moved on its own and he caught it just in time. When that happens, he’s out of his daydreaming, back to high awareness, measuring his breaths and checking every part of himself to make sure it’s behaving, staying put.

He’s growing more and more restless, though he’s careful not to let it show. How long has he been there? How much longer is this going to be? He could be doing more. He could be put to better use. It feels like he was peaceful just the moment before, but now he’s had enough, he’s got the point, he wants to move on. He feels like he’s vibrating, like his entire body is going to buzz apart. What time is it? Is Steve really, actually going to make him stay perfectly still for an entire day? Because he doesn’t want to take any risks? Because the only thing to be done with Bucky is putting him away?

“Sir,” Bucky blurts before he can stop himself. “I have a question.”

His voice feels so loud in his ears that he instantly cringes, expecting a blow. Steve’s there instantly. Bucky can’t actually see him, but he can hear his bare feet on the carpet. He doesn’t sound angry when he says, “Yes?”

Bucky struggles for a second. “How much longer?” he finally lets out. “Please. Sir. How much longer?”

“Why are you begging?” Steve asks.

Bucky freezes. He forgot.

“I’m sorry, I…”

“I don’t need you to apologize,” Steve says calmly. “Answer the question. Why are you begging?”

“Because—you’re just leaving me here,” Bucky says. Despite his frustration, he checks the tension thrumming underneath his skin; he doesn’t want to twitch, to jerk his limbs, to disobey. “Is that all there is?”

“I’m still unclear on why you felt the need to beg,” Steve insists. “If you asked, I’d allow you to move.”

“I don’t want to ask for anything. I want—I want to do what you want.”

“Then stay put.”

Bucky screws his eyes shut. But even as he battles mounting frustration, he keeps thinking about Steve’s question. Why did he beg? Because that used to be his only course of action: debase himself in hopes to sway another man’s choice for him. He doesn’t have to do that anymore. In fact, he’s forbidden to do that. Steve wants him to ask.

But Bucky can’t ask—

“What would make it easier?” Steve asks.

Bucky reopens his eyes, surprised to find them a bit blurry. He blinks a few times. This is new for sure: being offered to design his own torment, to make it more bearable. Is that also a way to make him a participant—to make sure he’s training himself, so the training will stick?

“Uh,” he rasps, uncertain. “I don’t know. I—” He stops himself from craning his neck and suddenly realizes what he wants. “Can I—can you let me see you?”

“Sure thing.” Steve sits down cross-legged next to him and leans over. “Hi.”

Bucky exhales, moving his eyes to look at him. Steve looks—calm, relaxed. In control. It calms Bucky, too.

“Sorry, Buck,” Steve says in a quiet voice. “I know it’s a lonely thing to put you through. But I thought you might need to be left alone a little at first.”

“I’m not a cat.” He wanted to sound scornful but didn’t quite manage.

“I don’t know. I control everything about you and here you are in a new environment. Treating you like a cat makes sense to me.”

He’s being kind, even with his teasing, and it’s getting to Bucky way too easily; he closes his eyes so he won’t start welling up again. This is ridiculous. He’s only been made to stay still.

“I thought you’d break much earlier,” Steve goes on.

“I didn’t break,” Bucky says tightly. “I didn’t move.”

“No, that’s true, you didn’t.”

“I can still keep going.” Bucky meets his gaze, trying to be defiant despite the tears in his eyes. “I’m pretty sure you know I’ve gone through worse.”

Steve gazes back. Then he asks: “What was the worst moment?”

Bucky closes his eyes again. He doesn’t want to answer. But despite himself, he’s already weighing options. The night he was pierced. The first time he was pushed into a guest’s room to be raped. The first time they made him watch the footage afterwards, laughing at his panic, at his struggle. A lot of first times, but a lot of second times, too, when he knew exactly what was coming and it only made it worse. Or the quiet moments when he couldn’t help being so terribly aware that he was going to die there, that no one would ever even know.

Except he knows none of those is the right answer.

“The little room,” he says under his breath.

“What’s the little room?”

Bucky swallows thickly. He’s not going to fucking cry. “It’s where Pierce was going to kill me. He brought me there once, in the beginning. To show me. It was ready, with a noose. He was going to hang me. Every day after that I knew it was there and waiting for me.”

He doesn’t say how it robbed him of something essential, made him hollow after that, weaker despite his best efforts. Like a pit of despair had opened in his stomach. How he became terrified of himself first and foremost, now that he was at risk of killing himself with a word, with a single moment of weakness. He wonders how Steve will react. He expects pity, or horror, or more of that blankness Steve took great pains to broadcast when he was questioning Bucky two days ago. He doesn’t want to see any of that, so he just keeps his eyes closed.

But what happens instead is the tiny beep-beep of Steve’s phone going off.

Steve stops the alarm and says softly, “You can move now, Buck.”

Chapter Text

It feels like being welcomed back among the living. Bucky takes his time to sit up, to stretch. When he gets up at last, Steve makes him shuffle towards the kitchen and sit down. Someone knocks on the door.

“Food,” Steve says at once, before Bucky can begin to get anxious.

Steve goes to open the door, and there’s a man with a paper bag and Bucky can smell it, hot takeout food. It was timed just right. Which confirms that Steve planned out the whole morning in advance.

When Steve opens all the boxes of takeout on the table—it’s Thai, or maybe Vietnamese—Bucky realizes he’s ravenous. He watches Steve load his plate with a bit of everything then set it in front of him.

“Do you know how to use chopsticks?”

“Yes, sir.” Bucky actually prefers them these days, because he only needs one hand to use them.

Steve gives him a pair. “Have at it, then.”

The food’s so good he wants to cry. Everything makes him want to cry. He feels bare. He feels dazed, like he’s just completed a motionless marathon. The tension he’s held for all morning is unwinding, setting everything loose inside.

Steve eats quietly next to him. He refills Bucky’s glass before he’s completely emptied it. He assembles a second plate when Bucky’s finished and sets it before him. Bucky obediently starts eating again, more slowly.

“More?” Steve asks when he’s finished again.

“No, sir, thank you.”

Politeness comes naturally, easily. Back on the island, he was fighting himself every step of the way, struggling not to act the way he was being trained to act. To be consenting takes an unexpected weight off his shoulders. It’s like he’s redoing the whole three years in easy mode.

“All right,” Steve says. “Please do the dishes.”

Bucky gets up and does the dishes. There’s not much of them, just the glasses and the plates Steve put the food in. Standing there at the sink feels like an odd mirror of the night he kissed Steve. He remembers the broken glass and keeps cleaning and drying with extra care, putting it all neatly away.

He never did chores on the island. Chores were for servants, people paid enough not to ask questions about him, not even when they were leading him around naked, getting him back in the morning frazzled and in shock, sometimes still bleeding. But now he finds he craves more of this neat work, something mindless he can do without questioning the task or why it’s given.

Once he’s done and glancing hesitantly at Steve for what comes next, Steve smiles and points at a chair which he must have brought out while Bucky wasn’t paying attention. It’s a simple kitchen chair, nothing like the designer hollow-seat oddity Bucky has at his place. But it’s right there in the middle of the living room.

 “Take a seat,” Steve says, and Bucky does.

Steve briefly walks off into another room and comes back with a black leather sports bag. Just seeing it ramps up Bucky’s adrenaline, blowing apart the fragile shreds of peace he’d managed to hold together. His fingertips are getting cold again, his stomach trying to eat itself.

“You look nervous,” Steve observes.

Bucky quickly glances down. “I want to do what you want.”

The main difference between Pierce and Steve, he reflects once again, is consent. This time, though, this observation brings Bucky no comfort, because it means that his master is first and foremost himself. And he is an unyielding, merciless master to himself. He will make himself go through whatever Steve has in store for him, no matter the cost. Because it’ll still be better than this boundless world outside where he’s in charge of his own life, where the impossible work of healing awaits him.

Bucky hears Steve zip open his bag and rummage into it. Then something comes into view: a thick, padded blindfold. Bucky can spot glinting metal in the bag, chains and other implements. He looks away.

“This is reminding you of the island,” Steve says, still in neutral tones.

“I want to do what you want,” Bucky repeats.

“I want you to actively help me not trigger you.”

Bucky exhales and tries to settle himself, to keep his voice level. “I’m fine. Everything reminds me of the island.”

Steve doesn’t answer that, just leans forward to fit the blindfold into place. As the world goes dark, Bucky realizes the truth of what he just said. Everything reminds me of the island. He wonders if there is a single day in his future where he won’t think of the island or Pierce or Rumlow or anything at all from these three years of his life. Just one day with a free mind. What a thing that would be.

“Breathe,” Steve reminds him once he’s in complete darkness, and he does. Or he tries to.

Next Steve comes with handcuffs. As far as Bucky can tell without seeing them, they’re straightforward police cuffs, clinking metal, not for struggling, which would only be harmful. Again Bucky feels that this is the mood Steve wants for today: to leave no room to the possibility of fighting. Take it out of the equation entirely, remind Bucky that he came here of his own free will.

Steve cuffs his wrists to the chair, then his ankles with another pair of cuffs. Bucky closes his eyes under the blindfold and focuses on the feeling of Steve’s touch, fingers just brushing his skin before they’re gone.

He hears another chair drag on the floor behind him. It creaks when Steve sits down. He’s very close, all up in Bucky’s space. “Just this,” he says. “Try to relax.”

Bucky makes an effort already. “Yes, sir.”

Steve stays there. Bucky’s hyperaware of him, as if he’d been skinned raw, to the point that he begins to wish for something else to happen—anything to distract him. But nothing comes, and eventually he realizes this is just more stillness training.

He feels anger rise inside him, irrepressibly, even as he tries to curb it. He managed more or less this morning, but now it overflows, burningly slow like lava. Of course, he doesn’t let it show; he’s stifled deeper rage and wilder despair. But he boils over inside with anger at Steve, who said they could try but fucking lied in the end, just sitting there while Bucky’s cuffed to a chair as if that changed anything at all, as if he hadn’t gone through worse, as if Steve himself hadn’t put him through worse—

“Tell me how you’re feeling,” Steve says.

Bucky opens his eyes under the blindfold, finding himself breathless like he’s just yelled at someone for hours. The chains are drawn taut; when did he start pulling at the cuffs?

He debates what to say. Okay would not be a lie, because it’s not like he’s in pain. But he is rigid with rage and once again, even though he knows it didn’t lead to anything good last time, he thinks—why not? At least something will happen. He’s been desperate for something to happen. He thought today would be it.

“Angry,” he answers.

“Really. Why?”

“Because I don’t see the point of this,” Bucky bites out. He pulls at the handcuffs again, sharper, with a sudden jingling sound. “You can’t just make me lie on the floor or cuff me to a chair and call it a goddamn day—”

“Oh, you’re really angry. At me,” Steve observes. He sounds unruffled. “Because I’m being too soft on you? Is that it?”

“I think you’re playing it safe. Sir.” Oh, good, he’s tearing up again under the blindfold. At least this time it’s tears of rage.

“How so?”

Bucky scoffs. He’s pulling pretty hard at the handcuffs now, so they’re biting into his wrists, at least. God, he’s got to do all the work around here. “You’re not doing anything to me.”

“Objectively, that’s not true.”

“You’re not—this isn’t—” Bucky has to stop and pick words through his anger. “Anybody could fucking take this.”

“Ah,” Steve says. When he speaks again Bucky abruptly realizes he’s sitting very close. “So you’re saying it’s not painful enough?”

Bucky shuts right up.

It was exactly the same on the island. He couldn’t keep his fucking mouth shut and then he regretted everything when the punishment came. No punishment was harsh enough that he fully learned his lesson, though. He always did it again.

“Do you want to be hurt?” Steve says.

Bucky can feel him, a hairbreadth behind. It occurs to him that he’s pulled on the cuffs pretty hard and neither them nor the chair gave an inch. He is trapped; he just didn’t realize it fully till he started fighting.

“I asked you a question,” Steve goes on. “Or are you spiraling?

“I’m—not spiraling. Sir.” Bucky tries to sort through the mess of leftover anger and sudden ice cold fear and confused, burning anticipation. Does he want to be hurt?

The fear wins out all at once. What if Steve takes him up on the challenge. What if he puts him through the most painful thing he can come up with—and Bucky knows Steve’s no slacker when it comes to torture.

“I don’t—I don’t want to be hurt. Please—please don’t hurt me. I’m sorry, please don’t hurt me, please don’t hurt me—”

“Stop,” Steve says quietly.

Fuck. No begging.

“It’s all right.” He can feel Steve grab the back of the chair, like a substitute for grabbing his shoulders. “Bucky. I’m not going to do anything. It’s all right.”

Bucky swallows his panic and says nothing. He’s trying not to let Steve hear his ragged breathing, but maybe his attempts at hiding it are even more pathetic, so he gives up and lets his head hang down, lets it all wash through him.

“It does sound like you’re spiraling to me,” Steve says.

Bucky shakes his head. When did he start breathing so heavily? And so fast? He’s still wetting the inside of the blindfold, burning tears crushed directly into the felt. It’s not tears of rage anymore. He feels like a complete fool. What is he doing? Why did he come here? He needs something that Steve can’t give and shouldn’t give. Doesn’t deserve to give.

“I’m sorry,” he mumbles.

Steve pauses, like he’s considering whether to forbid Bucky from apologizing, too. “Why?”

“For getting angry.” He breathes out. He’s past anger, past panic, too. All that’s left is shame now, tears still thick in his voice. “I don’t even know what I want.”

“It doesn’t matter what you want. I’m in charge.”

Bucky laughs, shaky. “But that’s not true. We both know that’s not true.”

“Sure it is,” Steve says lightly. “For instance, I’m not going to hurt you today. No matter how angry or frustrated you get. That’s not going to change.”

“But you like hurting people,” Bucky says, leaning against the back of the chair. Steve’s still grabbing it, so Bucky can feel his fingers digging into his back, through the jumpsuit. The small contact makes him ache. “Don’t you? This isn’t fun for you.”

“I’m not doing this for fun.”

Little by little, Bucky’s managing to make himself believe no punishment will come, even though he blew up. It’s new. He’s been allowed to breathe to the end of his shaking. He swallows the fear, as well as he knows how.

“About something you said earlier,” Steve goes on. “Anybody could take this. I know you can take a lot. I was there.”

Bucky exhales. Yeah, Steve was there with him. What do they know. They weren’t there.

“So your resistance to pain isn’t being put to the test here. It never will be.”

It makes sense, but a feeble version of Bucky’s earlier anger moves inside him. “I don’t want pity.”

“It’s not pity.”

“I don’t—I mean—I don’t want to be coddled.”

“Why not?” Steve asks frankly. “Don’t you deserve a bit of coddling?”

“I… I don’t need it,” Bucky fumbles. “I can get by. I’m not—I don’t need handholding.”

What the hell are you even saying, he thinks to himself. You’re here because you want Steve to make all your choices. How is that not handholding?

“Need, no,” Steve approves. “But want?” When Bucky doesn’t answer, he huffs at himself. “If Sam or Nat could hear me, they’d slap me around the head. I’m complete shit at letting myself get taken care of. So I do understand how you feel.” Bucky hears him shift in his own chair. “But I’m your master, here. I don’t have to be fair.”

Bucky’s almost stopped shaking.

“Anything to add?” Steve asks.

“No, sir.” He feels almost calm.

“For the record, you’ve earned a reward for telling me you were angry. I need you to keep telling me that kind of thing.”

Pierce gave Bucky rewards too. The best one he got was a week with no penetration of any sort. Somehow he doubts that’s what Steve has in mind.

“What would you like?” Steve asks.

Bucky angles his head as if to look at him over his shoulder, despite the blindfold. “A matcha latte?”

Steve laughs. “All right. Let’s go.”

Bucky doesn’t get it at first, but then he hears him getting up and there’s clink of the cuffs being opened. “What, now?”

“Yeah. Why not?” His wrists cuffs fall open; Steve gets to work on the ankle ones. “Nobody said you’d have to say inside the whole day.”

Bucky’s heart beats faster at the thought of getting outside, feeling the air on his face. He blinks when Steve removes the blindfold, looks up at him, disbelieving. Steve looks back, and his blue eyes seem darker somehow with consideration.

“I know all of this isn’t what you expected,” he says quietly. “But is it what you hoped for?”

This isn’t a question a master would ask their slave, but right now Bucky doesn’t mind. His heart still hasn’t completely calmed down, but it’s on its way. Someone else might have tried reproducing what they saw on the island. Someone else might have strapped Bucky down and fucked him since it was what he seemed to be asking. But Steve is a tactician, and Steve will find ways to make him feel under control, even while barely touching him. And Steve—Steve cares for him.

“It’s not what I hoped for at all,” Bucky answers. “It’s better.”

Steve almost smiles, and for a wild moment Bucky thinks maybe this can work after all.

Chapter Text

They find a matcha latte, and then Bucky drinks it on the way back, walking slowly in the cold that flushes up his cheeks. He’s very aware of wearing the black jumpsuit under his coat and boots; he can feel the underside of ROGERS against the top of his back. His latte tastes perfect and he doesn’t think of much, just walks down the sidewalk with Rogers’ shoulder brushing his. Even as they climb up the stairs to his place, they don’t speak.

“How are you feeling?” Steve finally asks as they step into his apartment.

Bucky takes off his coat. “Good.”

“Are you still angry?”

He flushes some more. “No, sir.”

“Take a minute,” Steve says. “Then go and shower. Your night clothes are in the bathroom already.”

Bucky goes. There’s a toothbrush waiting for him on the edge of the sink.

He showers and dries off, in a light daze. When he’s done, he opens the paper bag sitting by the sink and finds another jumpsuit, pressed and clean. He puts it on, button after button. It feels almost meditative, now.

“Did you use the toilet?” Steve asks him when he comes out.

“Yes, sir.”

“Then you can eat, brush your teeth and go to bed.”

There’s a sandwich on the tabletop. It can’t be more than 8pm, but Bucky really is exhausted, and Steve must have seen it. He eats the sandwich in three bites, detours by the bathroom to try out his toothbrush, then goes to his room and sits on the camp bed. There isn’t a blanket. He actually doesn’t mind—he might sleep better on something that doesn’t feel like a real bed. The room is warm enough he won’t need to cover himself up, anyway.

“What are the rules in here?” Steve asks, standing at the door.

Bucky meets his eyes. “I can’t leave the room until you come get me.”

“Good. Sleep tight, Buck. I’ll see you in the morning.”

He closes the door behind him. Bucky waits for a few seconds, then lies down, listening to the bed’s faint creaks under his weight. For a moment he just lies still, thinking he’s been still nearly all day and he has no reason to be so very tired. And then he falls asleep so suddenly it’s like someone’s knocked him out.

*

Waking up the next morning feels strange.

It takes him a little while before he realizes what’s amiss. And then he realizes that he slept through the night, without dreaming.

He just lies there, letting the feeling expand inside of him like the rising sun. Everything around him is still, reminding him of his own stillness the day before. It makes him feel more than ever like he’s out of time, out of his own life. This is what he wanted, so badly.

After a little while, there’s a knock on the door. “Bucky? Are you awake?”

He sits up on the bed and calls in answer, “Uh—yeah.”

The door clicks open. “Morning,” Steve says. “Sleep okay?”

“I really did,” Bucky says, still caught up in faint wonder. “I… I don’t usually…” Then he remembers himself. “I did, sir. Thank you.”

Steve smiles and turns away. “Put on your clothes and come join me for breakfast.”

After he’s left the room, Bucky spots his regular clothes folded on the floor behind the door, waiting for him.

He stares at them for a long time, somehow taken off guard. He was so terrified of the day before, it felt so difficult and so long at times, and now it’s like it lasted all of two seconds. Bucky doesn’t want to put his clothes back on. He doesn’t want to go back into the world. All he’ll be doing is wait for the next time to come again.

“Bucky?” It’s Steve on the other side of the door.

“Oh—yes, coming,” he calls in answer. He gets up and dresses. It feels like getting back into civilian clothes after months in the field; odd and ill-fitting like they don’t reflect the idea of himself in his head.

When he gets out, Steve’s waiting for him. “There you are.” He pauses, then asks, almost hopefully: “Did you like the jumpsuit?”

Bucky nods. “I liked your name in the back.”

“Okay. Good.”

“It was all good,” Bucky goes on, stumbling a little over his words. “It was… I—I want to keep going. I want to come back next Saturday.”

“Good,” Steve echoes quietly. “We can do that.”

“I probably shouldn’t tell my therapist about all this, though,” Bucky says. It’s such a fucking stupid thing to say. He doesn’t have a therapist. But he doesn’t want Steve to know that. He should have said nothing at all instead of pretending.

But Steve surprises him. “No, you should. I’ll tell mine.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. It’s their job to hear the weird stuff and the tough stuff and the fucked-up stuff. Maybe they’ll disapprove, sure. And, I mean, it’s always good to have a second opinion on things. But they can’t force us to stop if we want to keep going.”

Bucky’s slightly stunned by the idea of ignoring what his therapist might have to say. He realizes then that he’d been thinking of a shrink as yet another master. Someone who’d rule his life against his will, try to get him to bend. Someone who’d try and convince him that they knew best. It’s certainly what Ross felt like.

“All right,” he says slowly. “Maybe I will.” Then he adds, “But we shouldn’t tell Sam.”

Steve does pause at that.

“No,” he answers eventually, drawing his chair. “Maybe not right away.”

*

They eat breakfast quietly, without speaking much. Bucky’s trying stupidly to make it last. He already knows he’ll do nothing at home for the rest of the day, and nothing the day after that. If he asked to stay for good, would Steve let him? Would he allow him to go back for his black jumpsuit, to put it on again and forget his freedom once and for all?

“Will you be all right getting home on your own?” Steve asks.

Bucky nods. “It’s just four stops.”

*

“Take it easy,” Steve says, watching Bucky put his coat back on. “Call me if there’s any problem, particularly if you feel depressed. It might mean you’re dropping. Coming down wrong. But if you’ve slept okay, I’m not too worried.”

Bucky supposes the day before did qualify as a high of sorts. He’s not sure he’d be able to spot depressed amidst the mess of conflicting things he’s feeling at any given moment. “I will.”

“Good.” Steve hesitates for maybe the first time. “And—are we still going to the Met on Tuesday?”

Bucky’s heart leaps in his chest.

“Yes,” he says. His relief is so unexpected and so great it dazes him. “Yes. I thought… You—I thought you might not want to see me anymore—casually, I mean—”

Steve blinks, wary. “If that’s what you want—”

“It’s not,” Bucky says quickly. This is stupid; he just spent an entire day with Steve, he’s still talking to Steve, and already he’s scrambling for the chance to see him more. “I don’t want to stop hanging out just because we’re—doing this, now.”

“Great. Okay,” Steve says, relieved. “Me neither.”

They look at each other, for just a tad too long.

“Thanks, Steve,” Bucky says. He hasn’t called him sir, so that’s it. The day’s officially done. “For—everything. Agreeing to do this.”

“Thank you,” Steve replies softly. He doesn’t say for what. “Get home safe, Buck.”

*

Bucky actually walks home, just because it’s something to do with his time. He even walks around the block one time before going into his building. He climbs the stairs and unlocks his door and finds his apartment pristine and untouched.

The smell of his sick fear from the morning before still seems to hang in the air.

He dutifully reheats himself some lunch and texts Steve that he got home okay. Then he eats and cleans his plate and then finds himself sitting on his new couch, staring into space.

He felt so many things in the past few days. He’s cried so much he felt dehydrated at times. Now he’s got what he wanted, and it didn’t destroy him, and it didn’t destroy Steve. This is the best outcome Bucky didn’t dare hope for, and he should be elated. But the weekend was difficult and fraught. The truth was, Bucky didn’t like it—except for the part where he was unconscious—and he doesn’t think Steve enjoyed himself, either. I’m not doing this for fun. But he used to do it for fun. Now it’s become this therapeutic thing they’re both putting themselves through. Maybe it’s good, maybe it’s necessary, maybe it’s allowing them both to process their trauma. Maybe this is going somewhere. Bucky knows he’s going back next Saturday, because he remembers not wanting to leave, despite everything.

But now he feels nothing at all, and that’s the worst part. It’s just like when he forcibly left the hospital, thinking somehow that the momentum would last, carry him somewhere. He’s still in the same place, though. He’s always still in the same place.

Maybe this is dropping.

It would be nice if it were, because then he could call Steve. Get him to come. Or better yet, go back to him. Curl up in that little crack of a moment when things weren’t so damn awful all the time. The taste of matcha and Steve smiling at him when Bucky told him he wanted to keep going.

He looks at the sun coming down, the cut of orange light descending on the wall. His windows are very thick, his walls silent and blank.

*

On some level he knows he’s fallen asleep on the couch. On another, he’s on the wooden horse, his arms stretched up behind him, wrists bound together to a chain from the ceiling. If he moves, he’ll slip and fall and dislocate both his shoulders. It happened to him the first time he was made to ride the trestles. So now he carefully doesn’t move; and the pain between his legs radiates into his entire body as he keeps crushing his crotch under his own weight, a little bit more with every passing second. It somehow seems to take on shape and color. Nauseous green shifting into white-hot pink behind his eyelids. The worst part is that he can’t pass out. He can’t slip off. So he’s the one actively keeping himself awake and trapped inside that palpitating, bulbous nebula of agony. He dreams of giving in. Dislocating his shoulders again, breaking them, even, suffering through infinitely worse pain than the pain he is in now, if it’ll just mean letting go.

Chapter Text

“Wow,” says Dr. Banner.

It’s the first thing he said in over two hours. Bucky’s throat hurts from talking too much.

*

When Bucky realized Jessica Jones’ recommendation was a goddamn white man, he nearly turned around and walked right back out of the door. And seriously, why the fuck didn’t he check before getting there? Why the fuck did the thought not even cross his mind? He should have seen this coming.

Maybe he was too focused on actually making it happen. It was one of the hardest things he’s ever had to do, simply because it required so many active steps on his part. Deciding to call. Making the call. Talking to the secretary on the phone. Making the appointment. Fretting about it the whole morning. Talking himself out of canceling. Finding out how to get there. Physically getting there.

He still saw it all through. Because after coming home from Steve, he realized he wasn’t going to stop feeling like this. So he had to do something. Just like when he went to group. There were no other options left, short of killing himself, and he doesn’t want to die. He so desperately doesn’t want to die.

So, yeah. Even though Bucky got cold sweats entering Banner’s office, he couldn’t let himself just leave without even trying. He made himself stay, and of course Banner noticed he looked like he’d rather not stay, so he asked questions and Bucky had to start explaining, and one thing led to another and as the story poured out of him, surprisingly, his brain gave up on ringing the alarm bells.

He supposes it’s good to know that prolonged exposure actually works on lessening trauma. Or maybe it’s all just Banner, who looks so mild and rumpled it’s impossible to imagine him hurting anybody. Oddly enough, he’s sitting in an office chair—the big, comfy, padded leather kind—but without the desk to go with it. It’s like someone walked in and stole it one day, and Banner couldn’t be bothered to replace it. He’s propping up his notepad on his folded knee. He looks out of place in this room, which is almost aggressively neutral, full of plants and books about things like modern architecture or Indian food.

“All right, and so, that, that Saturday with, uh, Steve,” Banner goes on in his soft voice, flipping through the notes he took as Bucky spoke. “How did it make you feel?”

Bucky shifts in his own chair, swallowing around his raw throat, and frowns. “Did you seriously just ask me that?”

Banner blinks at him, politely.

“I mean—” Two hours of talking and all he gets in return is the one cliché that’s so desperately overdone even lowly sitcoms wouldn’t use it anymore. He feels sort of cheated. And he has to speak his mind this time; he won’t be meek and silent again. He won’t let another Dr. Ross happen to him. “I just mean, that’s kind of a cliché question.”

“Is it?” is all Banner says, vaguely. “All right, um, let’s see—did simulating your trauma in a controlled environment improve your relation to it in any way?”

It’s Bucky’s turn to blink. When he processes the question, he looks away, now wishing he’d kept his mouth shut. “I don’t know.”

“Well, that answer’s a bit too cliché for me,” Banner smiles. Bastard. “Come on.” When Bucky still says nothing, he presses, “You told me you were terrified going in.”

“Yeah,” Bucky murmurs.

“Did that fear verify itself later on?”

“Are you trying to ask if we fucked?” That question again, as if he can’t help flinging it at people. Maybe to make sure they won’t fling it at him. Shit, now he’s overanalyzing himself as he goes. This is what being in a shrink’s office does to him.

“Oh, well, sure,” Banner answers. “Let’s go with that. Did you?”

“No.”

“Did either of you want to? I’ll rephrase,” Banner says at once. “Did either of you express any intention towards sex?”

“I asked him if he would and he said no.”

“Were you disappointed?”

Bucky swallows. That’s unsteady ground for him.

“I… I think I wanted him to touch me.”

He remembers Steve’s fingers brushing his wrists as he put on the cuffs, how every little contact seemed to burn him. He wanted it and was afraid of it at the same time. Steve must have sensed that. Looking back, he made a point of touching Bucky as little as possible.

“Hmm. Why not ask him outright for that, then, instead of going through with this very complicated set-up?”

Bucky says nothing.

“Ah, but I forget,” Banner says, now flipping through his notes backwards, “this all started because you kissed him.”

He feels a shiver of shame. “I shouldn’t have.”

“How, uh, how is playacting your abuse with him any better?”

“It’s playacting. It’s not… it’s not real.”

Banner gently kicks off the floor to spin slowly in his office chair. “Not real, yes. And that’s what you want more than anything—to opt out of your real life.”

“Listen,” Bucky begins preemptively, wearily, “I know doing this with him could be triggering. He knows. It’s a risk we’ve decided to—"

“Oh, I don’t care that much about triggers.” Banner’s gentle spinning has brought his back to Bucky; he’s talking to the window now, but he doesn’t seem to have noticed, absorbed in his notes.

“You… you don’t?”

“Well, you don’t seem to care about them right now. We can work on them later if your priorities change.”

Bucky blinks. “You’re definitely not like my previous therapist.”

“Hmm,” Banner says again, noncommittal, spinning ever more slowly. “What you do want to work on—stop me if I don’t get it right: you came here because you were worried that doing this, reenacting your, well, your slavery, was wrong.”

“I… Yeah. Essentially.”

“It might be, but probably not in the way you think—ah…” His chair’s stopped; he looks up and seems mildly surprised at finding himself facing a wall. He pads across the carpeted floor to swivel round and face Bucky again. “Sorry. What was I saying? Yes—opt out from your real life. Don’t get me wrong, a holiday’s nice from time to time. But you’re putting yourself in a position of waiting for the weekend every week.”

“A lot of people do that. Don’t you own a I Hate Mondays mug?”

“I rather like Mondays,” Banner says mildly. “I rather like my job. I know a lot of people don’t, and that’s, well, that’s terrible. But you have this luxury of organizing your life as you see fit, for now. And you’re choosing to schedule it in a way that means six days of suffering, one day of reprieve, six days of suffering, one day of reprieve… Why? Your so-called real life, you’re turning it into a waiting room.”

Bucky has no idea what to say.

“You told me,” Banner goes on, “that when Steve came for you in the hospital, he made you realize you were free.”

Slowly, Bucky nods.

“Well, I’m hoping to prompt this realization again.” Banner splays his hands. “You are free. Your real life should be your ideal life. As far as practical limitations allow, of course.”

“I can’t ask Steve to be my master all week long,” Bucky mumbles.

Banner listened to his entire story without flinching. He didn’t bat an eyelid when Bucky word-vomited a torrent of horrible details for two hours. He looked unmoved by the concept of a rape victim reenacting their own trauma with, technically, one of their abusers. And he tackles Bucky’s objection with the same equanimity now. “Oh, would you say that’s your ideal life?”

Bucky tries to think about it. He remembers desperately wanting it, on Sunday morning, when it was time to leave. He imagines putting on the black prisoner outfit, the one that says Rogers in the back, every day. Having only ten minutes to shower. Sleeping alone on the camp bed, without being allowed to leave the room, knowing Steve’s just next door. Being blindfolded or forced to stay still, being cuffed to a chair, waiting for Steve to touch him, to tell him what to do, feeling that restlessness again, having him so close and not being able to—

“I—no. It’s—no.” He scrubs a hand over his face.

“All right,” Banner says quietly. “Then what is?”

Bucky doesn’t say anything for a few seconds. Then he shifts on his chair. “You know, when I told you the entire story, I expected you to call Steve a monster.”

Banner doesn’t seem to care Bucky didn’t answer his question; he’s swiveling his office chair back and forth now, one foot trained on the carpet for leverage. “Steve advised you to tell a therapist everything,” he points out placidly. “That wasn’t very monstrous of him. Of course, it could have been a bluff, something to seem harmless. You know him better than me. Would you call him a monster?”

Bucky remembers his terror as he went to Steve’s apartment. The things that went through his mind. He must have been really far gone, if he went as far as to be afraid of Steve, Steve, who bandaged his bloodied hand in the chopper even though Bucky couldn’t feel anything, and then held it firmly in his own all the way to the continent, and promised him anything in the world.

“No,” he says under his breath. “No. I wouldn’t.”

“All right. Well.” Suddenly Banner smiles. “I think maybe we’ve got all we needed for today. Care to make another appointment?”

*

Bucky walks home feeling more than strange. Mostly, he’s relieved. Banner is nothing he expected, and talking for so long felt good, like shifting mud in water. But experience has taught him the mud will only settle again, and in the meantime everything’s blurrier than ever.

The first question Banner asked him was: What are you hoping to get from therapy? right before he switched gears and asked instead: Why do you look like you’re about to make a run for it? Bucky answered the second question, which took him two hours, so he never got around to answering the first one. What he wants is clarity. He wants to know what to do.

He’s too weary to risk falling into another nightmare that night, so he sets his alarm to wake him up every twenty minutes. As a result, he’s feeling pretty frazzled the next morning as he walks to the Met. He’s still thinking about Banner; he still doesn’t see things clearly at all. But all of his doubts and hesitations, of course, dissolve with what he sees when he walks up to the museum: Steve waiting for him, beaming, haloed with sunlight.

“Hey, Buck. Good to see you.” He gets closer. “I’ve already bought our tickets. Well, yours—I have an annual pass.”

“Of course you do,” Bucky says, taking the ticket from his hand. “How are you?”

Steve gives him a knowing look. “How are you?”

“I asked you first.”

He gets a smile in answer. “I’m fine, Bucky. I’ve… been thinking about last weekend a lot.”

“Me too.” Bucky exhales. “Um—I told my therapist everything.” And nobody has to know it was just their first session.

“That’s great. So did I.”

“Really? What did she say?” Bucky winces. “I shouldn’t be asking you that.”

“That’s fine. She said I was being an idiot, essentially. But then, she always says that.” He pauses. “Can I ask what yours said?”

“He asked me how it all made me feel.”

“Hah. That’s a bit of a cliché.”

“Right?” Bucky says, and wonders whether Steve disguised his answer too. He probably did; it really is too much of an intimate question.

“Okay, so,” Steve walks up the Met’s stairs, Bucky following, “I know this place by heart—what do you want to see? Van Gogh exhibit?”

It’s a bit hard to miss, giant banners unrolling from the façade, Vincent’s autoportrait in a straw hat fixing passersby with a wary stare. A selection of his works has been brought from all over the world on top of those the Met already owns. It feels like a one-in-a-lifetime thing, exactly the type of stuff Bucky wants to be doing with his real life. “Sure. Let’s do it.”

He’s actually kind of looking forward to seeing again the paintings he knows. He remembers them pretty vividly from his one Met high school outing. Will he still like looking at them? Or will they leave him indifferent now, like going to the movies does?

Steve’s here, so Bucky doesn’t care that much one way or another.

*

Except as it turns out, Van Gogh now fucking triggers him.

The people around pretend not to notice Bucky’s choked-off breaths. Steve sits with him on a bench and hands him a tissue to dry his tears or hide his face. They’ve changed rooms, they’re now surrounded by slightly boring Dutch oil paintings, but Bucky can’t stop seeing Wheatfield with Crows.

Van Gogh went off in a field to kill himself, and when the gunshot cracked into the air, crows probably took off across the sky, just like they do in the painting. It’s like he looked forward into time at his own death. It’s like he already knew he could only end up there.

Bucky closes his eyes as hard as he can, but he can see a little room and a chair and a hanging noose, and he sees it painted in nervous, feverish brushstrokes, slashing through his mind.

Steve’s arm is around him. Bucky’s doing all he can not to burrow into the embrace.

“Should we go?” Steve asks quietly.

“No, I—” God, they’re in public. They were supposed to have a nice time together. This never happened before, when they were visiting apartments and shopping for furniture. He was still holding it together then. But ever since he kissed Steve, Bucky’s done nothing but fall to pieces, crumbling slowly like a castle on the beach.

“How about a green latte thing?”

Bucky manages to smile. “That’s not what it’s called.”

“Taking that as a yes.”

They reconvene in the museum’s café. They don’t have matcha, and Bucky’s regular latte probably costs eighteen fucking bucks. He’s stopped crying, but he’s still shaky.

“I’m sorry,” he says. “I feel like I keep breaking down in cafés all over New York and somehow you’re always there to see it.”

“You’re all right, Bucky.”

Bucky turns his cup in his hands. When he speaks again, he’s only barely aware he’s actually talking out loud.

“There are times when I think I am all right—like it was all a big nightmare and I’m just feeling disoriented for a little while longer than usual and it’ll pass any minute. I’m acting normal and saying normal-sounding things and feeling so close to normal, but at the same time I can feel my brain trying to comprehend what happened and it can’t, it can’t, and what if it never does?”

He hears himself and feels a sudden rush of self-loathing. Why is he saying that now? Why couldn’t he spit that out in therapy, now that he has a therapist and everything?

“And I would like to stop talking to you about it,” he bites out. “It can’t be doing you any good, to be brought back into this again and again—”

“I want you to talk to me,” Steve says. “I can take it.” He hesitates, then says, “I’m mostly fine. Really, I am. I got you out. It doesn’t fix things, but it’s closure.”

Bucky exhales, deeply, shudderingly. “Right. And I killed Rumlow.”

“You did,” Steve says with dark, solid satisfaction.

Bucky’s suddenly struck by the fact that Steve was in Special Forces too. That he’s probably killed people. It shouldn’t be so comforting, but right now it’s letting him breathe a little better. Steve gets it.

“Keep talking,” Steve offers.

“I worry,” Bucky begins, and his voice is shaking too much, and really, what’s the point of having a therapist if he’s going to do this, he should be talking about this with Banner, Banner, not Steve, but the words are spilling out—“I worry I’m going to kill myself. I worry I won’t be able to help it.”

Steve says, “Wheatfield with Crows.”

“Yes. Yes,” Bucky answers, baffled and grateful that he understands. “I… I feel like I have to. Because if I get over what happened to me—” It becomes fully clear just as he’s saying it. “Then I’m a monster. No one should be able to get over something like that. I’m not allowed to get over it.”

Because how could he live on as though nothing happened, mocking the pain of all these women sitting in a circle? How dare he be so well-adjusted, carrying on with everyday conversations, shopping for plates and chairs and clothes? Pretending he never got walked around on a leash, showered in piss, stuffed full of fucking billiards balls? Trying to heal from such disproportionate, grotesque trauma, isn’t that grotesque? Isn’t that obscene? Why won’t he do the dignified thing, now that he can? Why won’t he stop wasting his time trying to build a normal life—as if anything could be normal ever again? Why won’t he just fucking die?

He stares into his latte for a while. Then he says, “I don’t want to kill myself.”

“Don’t,” Steve answers quietly. “I will never think you’re a monster.”

Chapter Text

Sam scoots his chair a bit closer to him. “Are you all right?”

“Yeah, can’t feel a thing. Kind of why I’m here.”

On the other side of the sheet, there’s a doctor pushing thin needles into Bucky’s left hand and arm, all the way up to his shoulder. Electromyograms are much more fucked-up than he ever knew. He’s glad he can’t see any of it. The sheet was Sam’s idea; it’s usually something they do for children, so they don’t get scared watching what’s being done to them.

For once, Bucky didn’t want Steve around. Not for a procedure so ridiculously reminiscent of the island. Not after he freaked out so badly in the museum. Steve deserves a break from him.

But going alone was giving him cold sweats, and Sam said yes at once when Bucky asked for company. He’s been rock-solid the whole time, backing Bucky up when he demanded a female practitioner and insisting to stay during the procedure.

“Thank you for coming with me,” Bucky says in an undertone.

“Anytime.” Machines beep softly all around them. People come and go. “You sort things out with Steve?”

Of course he’d ask that question. It’s been barely a week since Steve called Sam in a panic, worried that Bucky had gone out to kill himself. And since then, well. Does any of it count as sorting things out?

“We talked,” Bucky says, careful not to lie. “He forgave me. We went to the Met on Tuesday.”

The doctor turns a knob and there’s a tk-tk-tk noise that lets Bucky knows the needles into his flesh are being electrified. It doesn’t hurt, but he can feel his arm twitch minutely. It’s all very familiar. He tries to close his mind to the memories. At least this time they’re shocking the one part of his body that can’t feel pain.

“How are you doing?” he remembers to ask Sam, because they’ve only talked about Bucky so far. Everything is about Bucky, everywhere he goes, all the time. It’s exhausting. Don’t people find that exhausting too?

“I’m as fine as can be today,” Sam answers, then raises his eyebrows in the face of Bucky’s questioning look. “Oh—I thought you knew. I thought that’s why you were asking.”

Bucky’s arm is still twitching, but the acute and sudden feeling of having messed up is enough to take his mind off trauma flashbacks. “What’s today?”

“It’s the anniversary of Riley’s death.”

Bucky doesn’t say What the fuck are you doing here with me then? The answer is fairly obvious. If it were him, Bucky would probably also be trying to distract himself at any cost, even if the only alternative to reminiscing about your dead husband were watching a traumatized rape victim receive a series of electric shocks.

“I’m sorry,” he says. It feels woefully inadequate. It’s strange to know that Riley’s dead; Bucky was in his squad for a long time. In fact, if he’d stayed in his squad instead of changing rotations so he could pull out sooner, he wouldn’t have gotten captured. “I have nothing but good memories of him.”

Sam nods. “Thanks, man.”

“If I can ask. How did he die? Steve never told me.”

For a second he’s afraid he’s messed up some more, but Sam’s features soften. “You’ve talked about Riley with him?”

“While we were on the island.” Electric shocks aren’t enough to keep that memory at bay. The darkness and the warmth, the blankets on the floor. The storm in the background. The desperate starvation for news of the outside. Anything that would connect him to the person he used to be.

“I see,” Sam says, which means he’s not going to ask how it came up. He rubs his jaw for a moment before answering Bucky’s question. “Friendly fire, actually.”

Bucky stares at him. Sam smiles, as if to say he might as well smile. “He was on a rescue mission and the people he went off to save thought he was a hostile.”

“How…”

“They were desperate and delirious. No radio, didn’t even imagine someone might be coming. Trying to protect their people. Wasn’t their fault in the end.”

“Did they die?” Bucky asks quietly.

“No, I got to them next, pulled them out,” Sam answers like it’s nothing. “But it got me thinking about what we were all doing shooting at each other over there. And why. And you know, I couldn’t stay a soldier for very long after that.”

A machine gives a long beep. The electric shocks stop. Bucky feels little jerks that mean that, on the other side of the sheet, long thin needles are being pulled out of his arm. He looks at Sam. “Ever feel guilty?”

“About Riley?”

“About feeling happy again.”

Sam gives him a knowing look. He’s a therapist, too; he could answer something trite about one’s right to be happy. But he simply says, “Yeah, all the time.”

“Yeah?” Bucky asks a bit desperately.

“But then I just think about what Riley would say if he knew I was feeling that way.”

“He’d get pissed?”

“Oh, no, he’d be glad. He always hated it when I went and had a good time without him. So I go Fuck off, Riley. And it’s like he’s around again for a moment.” Sam gives him his gap-toothed smile. “She done acupuncturing your arm over there?”

“Yeah, I think so—oh, here,” Bucky says as the sheet gets removed. He quickly pulls his shirt back on and rubs at the jagged scar in the palm of his left hand. “Thanks for telling me all this, Sam. Sorry… sorry I asked.”

“Don’t be sorry. You seeing a therapist these days?”

Sam deserves the subject change, and it’s an enormous relief not having to lie. “Yeah. Uh, didn’t go with any of your recommendations in the end, sorry. Do you know a guy named Banner?”

Sam raises his eyebrows. “Dr. Bruce Banner?”

“Why’s that surprising?”

“I didn’t think he’d be your style. Thought you might appreciate someone a bit—” he hesitates, “softer. But I know for a fact he’s good, and if he’s working out for you, that’s all that matters.”

“I don’t know,” Bucky says, thinking of how vastly different Banner feels from Ross. “He’s soft enough for me.”

*

The next day is a Friday, but Banner requested to see Bucky again before he went back to Steve’s, so Bucky goes. The place is the same as it was on Monday, with lots of potted plants around, massive bookshelves lining the walls. An office chair for Banner, still no desk.

“So. What did you do yesterday?”

Bucky’s sort of relieved he has an actual answer. “Physical therapy.”

“And how did it go?”

“It… went. Sam was with me. They gave me the results right away. Uh, my left arm’s pretty much dead.”

He doesn’t even remember it happening, the nerve damage. It was during the first few months; Pierce used rope a lot in those days, liked to truss him up in mid-air and torture him without leverage, or leave him tied up around the clock. Bucky vaguely recalls noticing his left arm buzzing like it was filled with bees; he stopped paying attention to it when more pain came. The sensation ramped up, then lessened over time, which was a relief at first until he realized there was no sensation left at all.

“But it’s still functional,” Banner says.

“Yeah. So what? Is that a metaphor for something?”

“You tell me.”

Bucky exhales. He hasn’t come here to talk about his arm, so they might as well get to it. “I’m going back to Steve’s tomorrow. I’m not afraid this time. I’m even looking forward to it. I know I shouldn’t—”

“Why not?”

He stops, surprised. “What? Because of what you said, you—the whole putting my life on hold thing—”

“I didn’t say you should stop looking forward to what makes you happy. My point was rather that you should extend it to the rest of your existence.”

Bucky snorts. He thinks of the needles going into his arm, crackling with electricity to try and find an echo in his nerves, coming up empty. He is just like his numb, dead limb; he’s got the appearance of life, he’s functional. But that’s as far as he’ll ever go. There you go, that was the metaphor.

“I don’t think I can be happy,” he says.

“Why not?”

Bucky gives him a look. Playing dumb is also a therapy cliché; Banner seems big on those. “Because I’ve been raped constantly for three years.”

“Hmm,” says Banner, chin resting into the palm of his hand, his eyes on the small notebook propped up on his folded knee. “I don’t know, it feels a bit performative.”

Bucky blinks. “What?”

“The way you said it. I don’t think I can be happy. It’s like you meant I don’t think I should be happy. Because, as you said, you’ve been raped. So now you have to behave in a certain way. You’re not supposed to be happy. Am I wrong?”

Bucky stares.

He wasn’t going to talk about what he realized that day in the museum, because he didn’t want to risk being put on suicide watch again. But Banner inferred it just from his tone of voice, apparently.

“Well?” Banner prompts.

“I… I should be happy I get to die, now,” Bucky says. Part of him says he should keep quiet, keep it a secret, but the words seem to spill out on their own. “On the island, I was told I’d be killed when I asked for it. So it was a matter of pride not to ask. But it was also this… this reward that I’d get one day. This relief to come. So now—I should embrace it. Since I finally can. I should kill myself.”

“Hmm,” Banner says again, and Bucky’s surprised to realize he’s smiling. The edge of it shows just above his hand. “Yes, I can see the logic. But that’s hogwash, isn’t it?”

Bucky is reduced to staring again.

“You feel like you’re expected to be suicidal. You’ve even become aware that this feeling is something your abuser actively engineered for you. Yet it didn’t work. Even before you saw the pattern in its entirety, it didn’t work. You don’t want to die.”

Tears are coming. Bucky looks away. “You’re like Steve—you think I’m some sort of hero for enduring all this. For wanting to live still. But I’m not brave. It’s just I had no choice.”

“This is so blatantly untrue, I’m forced to call it performative again.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means,” Banner says patiently, “that you are a hero. Being suicidal or not has nothing to do with it. At this point it’s just fact. You didn’t choose to die even though you had that option—”

“I just told you, it was spite, he manipulated me into it—”

“Spite in the face of a monster is courage, though.”

“It’s not courage, it’s the opposite of courage, I was just afraid of dying, I’m still afraid of dying—”

“Ah, there, see? Your problem,” Banner says, “is that every time you’re at risk of thinking a positive thought about yourself, you spin it into something self-deprecative. I had no choice but to bear the torture. Well, fine, I had a choice, but I was manipulated into choosing the wrong thing. Well, fine, I chose the right thing, but for the wrong reasons. Do you see? You keep moving the goal posts, to your own detriment, and I’d like to know why. Now, you’ve told me a lot about Steve. You’ve told me a lot about the past three years. Can we go back a little before that?”

“What,” Bucky hisses, “how cliché can you get, are you seriously going to ask me to tell you about my par—”

And then he goes dead still.

Banner lifts his eyebrows. “Yes?”

Silence.

“I would like to hear about your parents,” Banner prompts. “I got the sense that they’re still alive and around, but they haven’t come to you, have they?”

There’s no point in deflecting. He’s not going to stop prodding. It’s all Bucky can do to speak his lines, so Banner can come to the conclusion he’s obviously already reached. The one Bucky’s just reached too, because it’s miserably evident, plain for all to see.

“They threw me out of the house,” he says, his voice scratchy. “When I was fifteen.”

“Hmm. Is that why you joined up?”

“Yes. I finished high school at a friend’s in Brooklyn. Then I just—I had no resources.” His eyes are filling with tears despite his best efforts. “I was a good shot so I got railroaded into Special Forces.”

“Which then put you in a prime position to be abducted by Pierce.” Banner reaches behind a potted plant and pulls out a box of tissues. “From afar it all looks like one long inevitable downwards slide, doesn’t it? No wonder you’ve come to treat it like one.”

It’s when Bucky tries to stop crying that he realizes he can’t. He was unprepared for anything from his earlier life to come up. He thought he was safe at least from that, shielded somehow by the enormity of his most recent trauma. But he realizes now that it was childish, wishful thinking, and he can’t breathe.

Banner hands him a tissue and waits out the worst of it.

After a full five minutes, he goes on:

“It wasn’t the island who originally trained you to be unhappy. In fact, I’d argue you were partially able to protect yourself—something you’re struggling with, this feeling you have of still being too functional, not being traumatized enough—precisely because you’d already gone through terrible hardship, and built defense mechanisms against it.”

When Bucky manages to dominate himself, still wracked by painful spasms, he manages a wet “Fuck you.”

Banner frowns a little. “Why?”

“Because I’m not—you can’t—it’s not—” Bucky gulps for breath, “this is only our second fucking session and you don’t get to summarize me by my fucking childhood.”

Like it’s that simple. Like he can be encapsulated by a few stereotypes he was just too stupid to analyze by himself. How does that make you feel. Tell me about your parents. Fuck that. Fuck that. And yet he knows, he knows Banner is right; he felt it instantly, the sudden fracture of realization. What he’s been feeling: an inevitable downwards slide. He’s been struggling his whole life to find his footing, only to have the carpet repeatedly pulled out from under him until that final collapse. As if he could only end up on the island, however much he struggled.

Wheatfield with Crows.

Banner’s pen is tapping against the edge of his notebook. “I’m sorry,” he says eventually. “I certainly didn’t mean to reduce you to what other people have put you through.”

Bucky’s still swallowing convulsively around more goddamn tears.

“My point, to the contrary,” Banner goes on very softly, “is that you’ve led a very difficult, unfair, and unforgiving life.”

“Stop,” Bucky breathes, screwing his eyes shut. He can and has endured torture, but not this—this soft voice patiently telling him the world ought to cut him some slack. Because it’s not true, it’s not true. He can’t ever start believing that. Look what happens when he gives himself but an inch. Look at what he’s doing with Steve. Doing to Steve.

“Now you’re feeling like it was all a foregone thing. And yet still you won’t let it fool you completely. It makes you angry. It makes you fight.” Banner smiles. “But it doesn’t even make you fight other people, only yourself.”

“I don’t…”

“And the way you fight is by taking action, despite this background feeling you have of it being a losing battle. You’ve done it when you left that military hospital. You’ve done it when you kissed Steve.”

“I shouldn’t have kissed Steve.”

“Why not?”

“We’ve talked about this—it’s because I don’t—I can’t make him—he doesn’t deserve—”

“He doesn’t deserve to be saddled with you?” Banner says quietly over him, doodling on his notebook. “You’re a burden, you’re a mess, you’re not a hero? You’re toxic and being near you will destroy him? You’re a monster?”

Bucky stops, panting.

Banner draws a line on the page. “Self-deprecation. We can work on that.”

“Oh—” Bucky’s attempt at sarcasm is strangled, “that’s nice, and how about working on, I don’t know, processing three years of fucking torture?”

“You don’t need much help with that,” Banner says very calmly. “You’ve already started to rebuild your life, so recently after escaping from a nightmare few other people would have survived. You only need support with one thing, and it’s not retreating every time you dare to take an actual step towards what truly matters to you.”

He hands Bucky another tissue. Bucky takes it and angrily wipes his face. He would dearly like to stop crying for just one day. He doesn’t even know anymore if he’s miserable or furious, or both, or neither.

There’s a new feeling in his chest, actually, a sort of bafflement at the way Banner just linked his past and present. Bucky remembers hoping against hope he’d feel familiar emotions looking at paintings he used to like. Thinking he had nothing in common anymore with whoever he was before the island. Now, Banner is apparently of the opinion that the island is but a fucking footnote in the story of his life.

It’s a real disheartening opinion, because of what it’s saying about how tragic that story must be overall. But it’s also—solidifying, in a way Bucky didn’t expect. Sobering. He’s still himself after all. He’s still connected to the time before, if only by threads of trauma and misery. For the first time since his capture, he envisions his life from afar and finds it, despite that goddamn nuclear strike mid-way through, uninterrupted. He’s alive; he’s never stopped being alive.

He breathes out, shakily, and tries to hide how deep Banner just reached. “Thanks for the sentiment, and all that. But good luck putting it in practice.”

“That I can help with. So, I may give you homework,” Banner says. “If you’re amenable.”

“What, like talk to three new people, go see a movie and buy myself chocolate?” he mumbles. His sarcasm is even worse than before; he just sounds defeated.

“Hm? No. The, um, the little things are very important, of course, I don’t deny, but you’re already doing them while also avoiding important matters, so it must all feel like putting a band-aid on a fracture. Which explains your recent frustration.”

Bucky rubs his face. He’s so very tired. “What homework.”

“When you go to Steve’s tomorrow,” Banner says, “ask him to be kind to you.”

*

okay, so he’s not that soft, Bucky texts Sam on his way out.

He feels like his entire brain has been put through an electromyogram. He feels wrung. He feels—oh, fuck him. He does feel scraped raw.

He kind of understands what Steve meant by it now.

Chapter Text

In the dream, in the memory, he’s curling up in the wooden box, hearing footsteps come and go on the other side. He can’t stop tracking them, always wondering whether they’re coming for him, whether the lid will open and it’ll all start again.

His whole body aches, a low-grade throb through his back. He can’t breathe right in here. This is where he sleeps on the nights he’s not loaned out; he should be used to it, but no matter how hard he tries, he can’t relax—either because of the pain, or because of the way his adrenaline spikes whenever someone approaches his box. Every time he gets locked in, he always ends up wishing to be pulled out, so at least the waiting and the cramping will end; and yet every time it looks like it’s about to happen, he starts desperately wishing he’ll be left there for a moment longer, just another moment before it all starts again.

This time around, he hasn’t been put on a catheter, so he knows it won’t be long now. Yet it already feels like it’s been ages. He aches, and he aches, and steps come towards him for the thousandth time, but this time they don’t pass him at the last second, they stop in front of the box—the key turns in the lock, the lid opens—

And there’s daylight: he’s awake.

Daylight. He blinks, takes a few moments to breathe, then scrubs his face with both hands. Three years, and he might just have missed daylight the most.

*

Today is Saturday, finally. Bucky gets up feeling a bit strange about it, a bit tentative, still; but overall much better than he did a week ago. A bit hopeful.

They agreed not to start so early this time, so he’s still got an hour before leaving. He’s half-way through breakfast—that is, bread out of the bag and instant coffee; the only two items he’s got in his cupboard—when his phone starts buzzing on the counter.

His first thought is that Steve’s calling him to cancel; so when he sees that it’s an unknown number, he’s relieved at first. Then he wonders who on earth could be calling him.

Reaching for the phone, he taps the green button. A tinny voice rises out of the speakers. “Hello, James?”

Bucky stares.

“Dr. Ross here. Dr. Everett Ross. With SHIELD. Remember?” A pause. Then: “Right. Well. I’m calling to let you know that the trial will be held in closed court at the end of the year. Interrogations procedures on our end should be over by then, and the files—”

“What trial,” Bucky says.

“Oh! Hello there. I was half-afraid I was screaming into the void, ha. Alexander Pierce’s trial, of course. You’re not an official part of the proceedings as of yet but I thought it was only fair to let you know. I’ll email you the details—”

“As of yet?”

“You may be called in to testify,” Ross says carefully. “That’s if they decide to charge him with human trafficking on top of arms trafficking. They hadn’t been planning for that outcome but since we have you now, well, might as well cover all our bases. I’ll actually need to meet with you in the upcoming weeks to assess whether your testimony—”

“No,” Bucky says.

“—would be enough to—I’m sorry, what?”

“No,” Bucky repeats, heart pounding. Then he hangs up.

He throws the rest of his breakfast away, then puts his head in his hands and stays like that until his phone’s alarm startles him, reminding him it’s time to leave.

*

“Hey, Buck.” Steve, just like last time, is dressed casually, projecting calm. “Ready?”

All Bucky can do is nod. He doesn’t want to think of anything but this, now, here.

“All right. Come in.”

Steve walks towards the couch to sit down. Bucky follows and goes to kneel down at his feet. It’s okay. It’s okay now. He’s here, he can turn his mind off. A day of respite. And this time won’t be so fraught and angry, so laced with fear. Everything’s going to feel right, to be right—

“No—Bucky? Here.”

He blinks up and sees Steve looking surprised, pointing at the kitchen chair in front of him. Bucky stumbles back up, heart beating faster. Why did he kneel. This isn’t what they do.

“Sorry.” He sits down quick, keeps his eyes down, heart beating fast, like maybe if he stays very still Steve won’t notice how off that was.

“Are you all right?” Steve asks, and Bucky hears What the hell was that?

“I’m fine. Sorry.”

For a few agonizing seconds he thinks Steve won’t give him the black jumpsuit, won’t let him stay this time. But then Steve shifts on the couch. “Okay,” he says cautiously. “Well. I was thinking I might shave you before you change?”

Bucky tries very hard not to let his relief show. Whatever Steve wants, as long as he can stay. “Whatever you want.”

Shaving is—actually unsteady ground, for yet another grotesque reason; the electric buzz is just so similar to a vibrator. But he certainly won’t explain that now. After such a rocky start, he wants to preserve their momentum more than anything. And he can endure it, just like he can endure sleeping in a real bed or walking past a white man on the sidewalk. It’s a small price to pay for his mind going silent.

You may be called in to testify—

“I’m ready,” he says. “I’m ready now.” Anything. Let him be triggered, even. As long as he doesn’t have to think about anything anymore.

Steve gets the hint and goes to retrieve the black bag from the next room.

Bucky manages to keep himself under control while he’s being cuffed and blindfolded. After Steve’s done securing him, he rubs his knuckles along Bucky’s stubble, and it’s like an electric current across his skin, the faint catch of it. It’s too light; part of Bucky wants Steve to go all in, to hurt him or—do something to make him focus. Bucky’s mind is still too loud. He’s going to vibrate out of his skin.

There’s the sound of Steve pushing a stool close. First, shaving. Then Bucky gets to put on his jumpsuit. Trial, reward. That’s a system he knows. He exhales and tries to brace for it, to anticipate his automatic spike of panic every time he hears a buzzing noise.

Instead, a warm towel presses to his face.

He can’t hold back his sound of surprise. Steve comments, “Yeah, I like old-school best. I hope you don’t mind.”

Bucky says nothing, dizzy. No electric razor. No buzzing noise. He wouldn’t put it past Steve to have thought about the vibrator similarity.

Steve pats his face, then lathers him up and tilts his head back. When the razor comes, it’s soft and sharp, gliding like silk over skin. Bucky should be doing that at home, too. He doesn’t know why he never thought of throwing out his electric razor for a simple blade. Maybe because it would be a waste and he can’t ever waste things. He can’t be a waste.

You may be called in to testify—

He moves suddenly, in a reflexive jerk to physically chase the thought away; Steve jumps when the chains go taut, pulling the razor sharply away from Bucky’s throat.

“Bucky—”

Shit. Shit. “I’m okay. It’s okay. Sorry.” He can’t see Steve; he doesn’t know what Steve sees on his face. He forces himself to breathe normally. “I’m okay. Just. Go on. Please. Sir,” he finally remembers to tack on. Also remembers he shouldn’t beg.

But Steve doesn’t remark on his begging. In fact, he doesn’t say anything—just for a few seconds, really, but it feels like hours. Finally, the razor comes back, and Bucky exhales soundlessly.

Steve says in a quiet voice, “Try not to move.”

“No. Sorry.” Bucky closes his eyes hard under the blindfold.

The static in his mind only seems to be getting louder, because he’d been bracing himself for a tough thing that didn’t happen, so now he’s floundering without leverage. The fact that he’s technically feeling good doesn’t help with the confusion, either.

The only truly good moment is when it’s over and Steve uses his own aftershave on him. It smells just like his cologne, and that makes Bucky’s insides twist again. He’s reminded of the leather jacket Steve took off to give him that day in SHIELD’s hospital, right before opening the door on a burst of cold city air. How free his mind felt for a second. He wants to wrap himself up in the jacket, the smell, the memory.

“All done,” Steve says. “Are you asleep?”

“No, sir,” Bucky answers. He’s just done his best to stay perfectly still.

“Are you angry?”

It takes a minute for Bucky to even make sense of the question. When he does, he feels a stab of guilt. “No, sir.”

Steve’s trying so hard to go slow—even slower than last time. Bucky doesn’t know how to ask him for the opposite. He’s not sure he could take the opposite, but he knows he won’t be able to take this for long, either. Restlessness crawls under his skin. Gentleness disorients him. He’s wired to expect punishment after he’s been allowed to feel good. Well-being is either hard-earned or a trap. And he is restrained, after all. Defenseless. He briefly imagines Steve’s hands wrapping around his throat, squeezing the life out of him, making him first struggle and panic and then go limp with the lack of oxygen, able only to wait for his master’s satisfaction. Steve wouldn’t go too far. Bucky’s mind would go quiet.

Of course Steve does nothing of the sort. He takes off the cuffs but leaves the blindfold on. “Do you trust me?”

Bucky’s already answering “Yes, sir” before he’s even processed the question, because there is no other answer to be made.

“Okay,” Steve says. “Please undress.”

Bucky freezes.

But not for long. Even as fear races through him, his hands are coming up automatically to take off his sweatshirt. He does trust him. He does, and even if this is sex, so be it. He actually feels ready. He wants it like he wanted the choking. Anything. Anything.

Then he pops the button of his jeans and pulls them off, with his underwear, too. And suddenly it’s so very hard not to hide himself with his hands. To fold over himself in anticipation of—what usually comes. Even at home, he doesn’t usually stand around naked if he can avoid it.

He spends a few seconds in the dark, breathing shallow.

“Thank you,” Steve says—and his voice is too steady, too controlled, and Bucky just knows he wants him.

It gives him a rush so intense he gets dizzy. It feels like fear. But Steve won’t hurt him. He’s proved it enough. So Bucky can ride this feeling, this crackling awareness, even as it threatens to pull him under. It’s all right. This is all right. And it’s not new. He’s always known Steve wanted him.

“Hold out your hands,” Steve says, and when Bucky does, he receives folded cloth.

His uniform. He could cry with relief. Putting it on allows him to breathe a bit more deeply. He’s already used to the soft slide of the jumpsuit, to the little buttons forcing him to be patient, careful.

When he’s done, he stands still, only flinching a little when Steve touches him again, sliding his fingers through Bucky’s hair to take off the blindfold. It slips off, and Bucky blinks in the light.

Steve’s blue eyes are soft; they don’t hold Bucky’s gaze for long. “Good?” he asks as he puts the blindfold away.

Bucky’s shaking. “Good. I’m good. Thank you, sir.”

The uniform plus the aftershave: he can feel Steve everywhere on his body. Bucky also has this vivid afterimage of himself, naked before Steve, whose desire radiated so hotly from him Bucky could feel it on his bare skin. But nothing happened. He didn’t even see himself nude. It’s like the idea of sex happened between them, without any actual touching occurring, except for the slightest graze across his face, the glide of a blade along his jaw. And the churning in his stomach.

He tries to keep breathing. This is good. He’s good. It’s certainly taken his mind off things. He’s moving in the right direction.

“All right,” Steve says. “Are you hungry yet? We’re going to pick up something.”

*

Bucky sits rigidly in the back of the cab. He’s wearing his coat over his jumpsuit again. Steve’s sitting in front, chatting amiably with the driver. Bucky has no idea where they’re going, because it doesn’t matter. He only has to follow along.

They’re in Williamsburg. Up and down the avenue are sleek restaurants, upscale vintage shops and quirky eateries. He could throw a stone and hit seven different places that serve matcha lattes.

He’s been sitting still with his thoughts for too long.

You may be called in to testify—

The cab stops, jarring him out of his nausea. He steps out, willing the outside to make him feel better, but every little thing now just seems bound to make things worse. He follows Steve across the street, into a restaurant so very classy it has no visible name. Apparently, Steve’s ordered something in advance; a woman greets them with a nod and a smile and a box of take-out, the kind you’d bring with you to a five-star hotel reception, strong, glossy white cardboard with gold accents.

Bucky eyes it warily. He doesn’t like luxury much anymore.

They’re back into the cab within five minutes; they’re back to the apartment within twenty, during which Bucky stares out of the window and does his best to think of nothing, to put himself back on track.

After he’s closed the door, Steve puts the box on the table, then turns to Bucky. “Hold still.”

Bucky does. Steve takes off his coat for him, then kneels to unlace his boots, one after the other. When he’s done, he pulls Bucky’s wrists together in his back and cuffs him again.

“All right.” He pulls out a chair. “You can sit down.”

Bucky does, sitting gingerly on his chair with his hands bound. Steve’s opened the box. It’s all tiny bites of very fancy-looking food.

“I’ll be handling the pacing, if you don’t mind,” Steve says, sitting on his own chair and scooting closer to him. “Open your mouth.”

Bucky looks at him for just a second, then obediently does.

Steve, armed with chopsticks again, proceeds to feed Bucky the morsels of food one after the other, commenting every time on what he should be focusing on—thin, salty beef slices complimenting honeyed roast eggplant; dry goat cheese with black cherry jam; soft smoked salmon with cream on crunchy biscuit. Each one is unique and amazingly good.

Bucky didn’t think he would react one way or another to something like that. But the food is so excellent that the more he eats, the hungrier he gets, meaning he feels Steve’s control more keenly with every bite. Starvation is something Pierce used liberally.

“Stop,” Steve orders after a while. “You need a drink.”

It’s red wine, and Bucky lets Steve tilt his head back to press the glass against his lips. It’s never easy, drinking from someone like this. Steve’s thumb rubs across the corner of his mouth to wipe a droplet and Bucky automatically sucks it in.

He gets a flash of Rumlow, grabbing him by the hair, forcing his cock in. He pushes the thought away just as Steve pulls his finger out.

Bucky’s heart is pounding again. This is wrong. He’s been getting it all wrong. “I’m sorry—”

“It’s okay.” Steve’s very still now, staring at him. It’s not like this morning, though. He doesn’t seem concerned. In fact, there’s color on his cheeks that wasn’t there before.

He quickly looks away to gather a new bite of food. Bucky’s eyes flick down. Steve’s grey slacks are, under the table, noticeably tented.

It punches all the air out of him. Steve wants him. Just from Bucky sucking on his finger. Maybe even just from feeding Bucky. From having Bucky undress for him. Maybe he’s imagining what else he might have been feeding him, what he might have done while he was standing blind and naked.

And then strangely, Bucky feels something like—relief. Maybe he hasn’t been fucking it up as much as he thought. He somehow feels like he could do this. Like he can do this.

He knows exactly how it’ll go; he knows he won’t be hurt. This won’t register, really, on his personal scale. And he likes the thought of surprising Steve, of pleasing him like that. Give something back. It’s all right. He can show Steve it’s all right.

Steve’s having trouble picking up the salmon bite, biscuit crumbling under his fingers. “Maybe more—”

Bucky slides off his chair. He’s not thinking at all now, going to his knees, leaning forward. He’s so used to this. He can just let it happen, just go through the motions and let his mind go blank.

“Stop.”

He stops, instinctively obedient above every other impulse. He waits for the signal to go again. This close, he can smell Steve, sharply masculine, straining against his expensive underwear. Bucky knows if he pressed his mouth to the fine cloth, if he rubbed against it, he’d feel Steve’s cock twitch underneath, get just that much harder, eager to bury itself into his mouth—

A hand grabs his chin, tries to make him look up. “Bucky. Look at me. Do you know where you are?”

Bucky blinks, then blinks again. “Yes. I know. I just…”

He sees Steve’s face, and suddenly his own reasoning evades him like a dream upon waking. This made perfect sense just a second ago and now it makes none. How could he think for one second Steve would want this?

Steve lets go of him. “Bucky, I’m calling it. We’re done for today.”

“No! No—just—wait. I just—got lost in my head for a minute. But I’m all right—I swear. I promise you. We can do what you want. I mean—whatever you want to make you feel like we can go on. I can go on. I’m all right.” He catches his breath. “I’m really sorry.”

“Bucky, you don’t have to apologize, I’m just worried—”

“No, I am sorry,” Bucky insists. “I know you do want me. That’s why I tried it. But. I realized too late. After what they made you do. Maybe you don’t want to want me.” He swallows. “So. I’m sorry about that.”

Steve goes completely still. After a few seconds, he makes an odd move, as if about to let himself slide down to the floor too, to kneel with Bucky. But he changes course, stands up instead, and grabs Bucky’s arm to help him to his feet.

“Get back up, Buck,” he murmurs. “Come on.”

Bucky does, moving clumsily with his hands still bound. Steve’s hand on his arm is burning him. Bucky knows his eyes are still too wide, his desperation too obvious. If Steve sends him back home he doesn’t know what he’ll do.

Steve averts his eyes, turns him around and opens the cuffs. Bucky’s heart sinks. “Steve—”

“Let’s just take a moment,” Steve says. “Okay? Let’s both sit back down and—take a moment.”

Bucky sits back down. The feeling of having fucked up is metastasizing in his chest. Steve’s not looking at him; his eyes are lost in the middle distance. His leg is restless under the table.

Bucky can’t stand it for very long. The waiting was always what he hated the most. “Do you want me to go?”

Steve opens his mouth, then exhales, looking down. “No,” he says eventually. “Not if you don’t want to.”

Bucky doesn’t dare ask anything else, doesn’t dare breathe. He knows he’s not out of the woods yet.

“I just need you to tell me,” Steve says slowly, “what you need from me here.”

Anything, are the words on Bucky’s lips. Anything you want. But he has to pull his own weight here. If he wants to rescue this situation. He has to genuinely find something that’ll work. Something to make him snap out of it, to focus him back on Steve.

He doesn’t need to think about it.

“I think—I know,” he says, haltingly. “I think. Maybe. If you could.”

Steve is looking at him so earnestly. “Yes?”

“I know how it sounds,” Bucky warns with trepidation. “But. If you could. Hurt me?”

It’s obviously not what Steve expected to hear.

Bucky goes on quickly, “I just need to focus. My mind won’t shut up. I need—something that’s not stillness or patience or—I need something. Just. I know it’s asking a lot, just. Please.”

And that’s what does it; Steve’s features stiffen into resolve when he realizes he’s driven Bucky to begging.

“Stand up,” he says.

Bucky’s heart slams into overdrive on his next breath. He hopes it doesn’t show on his face as he gets up. Steve stands up with him.

“You want me to hurt you,” he says, in that calm, controlled voice Bucky’s come to know. “Is that right?”

Bucky can’t answer.

“I won’t torture you,” Steve adds under his breath.

Bucky nods. “Yes. I. Yes.”

He flashes back to his own panic the weekend before, when he was cuffed to the chair and suddenly convinced Steve was going to put him through unspeakable agony. But this isn’t what’s happening here. This is just some pain and he needs pain so his brain will shut up once and for all.

“All right. Bend over the table,” Steve says.

Bucky slowly bends over the kitchen table. This—is harder than he thought. Steve grabs his wrists and guides his hands on each side of his head, flat on the surface. Bucky can see his own sleeve move in time with his quick breaths. He tries to regulate his breathing. His heart’s going to beat out of his chest.

Steve’s hand splays in the middle of Bucky’s back, pressing him slightly down to the table. Bucky thinks briefly of the pool game, how hard Steve was holding him down while they raped him; he was good at it, didn’t let Bucky budge an inch. Bucky had finger-shaped bruises on his shoulders and arms afterwards. This isn’t going to happen either. There’s no need for force. Bucky’s willing. Submitting. He’s the one who asked.

“Keep breathing,” Steve says. “I’m not doing anything until you’ve calmed down.”

Calming down is a pretty fucking tall order, but Bucky does his best, closing his eyes, working on his breathing, focusing on the warmth of Steve’s hand in the middle of his back. He’s almost forgotten what’s led him to be in this position; the only thing that matters is that it’s about to happen, anticipation roiling and churning in his stomach. He just wants to get it over with, so it’s done, so he can move on to something else.

“Good,” Steve says again, minutes later, when Bucky’s breathing has sort of slowed down. “Are you ready?”

This is strange—just like last time, when stillness training was driving Bucky nuts and Steve asked him what would make it more bearable. Bucky can’t get out of what he’s being put through, but he gets to calibrate it. He’s participating, he’s complicit. Even now, this is what Steve does, how he operates, getting him to train himself.

“I’m not starting until you’re ready,” Steve says again.

“I’m ready,” Bucky breathes out, then flinches when Steve slaps the back of his left thigh hard.

It stings, and he only has time to wonder why Steve won’t go for an outright spanking—maybe because of the symbolic weight of it, the humiliation factor?—before the second slap lands, on his right thigh. His legs jerk a little; even through the cloth of his jumpsuit, Steve knows how to make it hurt. He’s practiced at this. Bucky keeps forgetting.

There’s another slap, and another, and another—hard enough to make Bucky breathe a little heavier, fingers clenching briefly on the table, eyes filling with tears. Part of him is shocked, floundering at being hurt again; he’d been thinking at least he never would be hurt anymore. The pain’s buzzing in his thighs, heating up his skin. It’s not unbearable, not by a long shot, not yet—

“All right, we’re done,” Steve says, and Bucky blinks.

He turns his head to look at him, breathless. “What? But…”

“I said I wouldn’t torture you. Do you remember what we talked about last time? This won’t ever be a test of your endurance.” Steve presses down on his back again. “I want you to keep position until it doesn’t hurt at all anymore. Then pour us two glasses of water and join me in the living room.”

Bucky keeps the position after Steve’s left the room, dizzy and breathless though it lasted for all of twenty seconds. Under the uniform, his thighs are still faintly burning. It takes him a very long time to calm down.

Chapter Text

They watch a movie. They have dinner. Steve makes him do the dishes, then sends him to take a shower. It’s all been very neutral as if to make up for this rollercoaster of a morning. Bucky hasn’t slipped up again; that is to say, he hasn’t had the chance, because Steve hasn’t touched him at all anymore. Which is fine. They hadn’t touched that much the last time, either. They’re back to normal.

Bucky’s exhausted by the time he puts on his night uniform and settles on the creaky little camp bed. It’s such a relief to finally be alone in the dark. It’s okay. He got through the day, and even if they were on very unsteady ground at times, the floor never actually gave under their feet. And that’s all that matters. Next time will be better. Next time will be good.

He closes his eyes and lets himself go.

*

In the dream, in the memory, he’s stretched out, wrists cuffed over his head. His hair has grown out, sticking to his temples, his cheekbones. His body’s gleaming under the harsh light, damp with effort.

The whip comes again. In a way, he can’t even feel it; there’s no space left for his consciousness. He’s just a thing that hurts, a thing that screams. Then it recedes and he’s gasping, huge lungfuls of air. There’s blood dripping off the back of his thighs where his flesh’s split open. The air is like acid on his raw flesh. All he can feel is a base, stupid terror, the ugly panic of an animal who knows he’s going to keep getting hurt.

But that’s not right. That’s not right. It wasn’t the back of his thighs, it was his ass, because after the thing with his arm Pierce got more cautious. There are nerves and tendons and arteries in his legs. Pierce wouldn’t have taken a whip to them. Yet the lash hisses down again and once the flare of white-hot agony is past, Bucky can feel the pain right there, the skin curling back like overripe fruit, more blood sluicing down his calves.

Dread pools in his stomach, dread that has no place in that memory. Because if that’s different—then it’s not a memory, it’s a nightmare. And Bucky knows, suddenly knows that it’s not Pierce torturing him, it’s Steve—

Steve—

“Bucky,” and his voice shatters the black walls of his nightmare, “Bucky? Are you awake? Bucky?”

Bucky’s on his camp bed, eyes wide open in the dark, trembling so much he rattles the frame. He’s breathing in ragged gasps, so shocked by what his own brain created that he could throw up. On the other side of the door, Steve sounds on the brink of panic.

“Bucky, I’m coming in—”

“Don’t,” he calls out just as the door opens. “Don’t. Stay away!”

If Steve walks in, he’ll be walking into Bucky’s dream, into Bucky’s poisoned state of mind, fully taking the place of his nightmare counterpart. Bucky can’t have Steve anywhere close to that—anywhere close to him—

Steve doesn’t walk in. Bucky was so convinced he would anyway that it throws his panic off the rails. Blinking sweat and tears out his eyes, still shuddering like mad, he props himself up on his elbow.

It’s dark, but a dim light spills in from New York at night. The door is slightly ajar. Through the thin opening, Bucky can just barely see Steve in the hallway, leaning hard with his back against the wall with a hand over his eyes. His other arm is wrapped around his middle, fingers digging hard into his side. He’s scowling, obviously trying very hard not to—burst into sobs or—make any noise. Trying to contain himself.

It’s like Bucky’s waking up a second time.

What has he been doing?

It’s not like he was in denial about it, either. He knew Steve still harbored trauma and guilt. He knew doing this would hurt him. Yet here is Steve now, trying to have a panic attack in silence because of what Bucky made him do.

Bucky’s mind rapidly shifts back through the day—he sees it through Steve’s eyes: how Bucky gradually spiraled out of control yet wouldn’t let Steve call an end to the whole thing, would only attempt things that made it all even worse, up to making Steve hurt him. Again.

He makes an effort to regulate his breathing. “Steve,” he manages to rasp. “Steve, I… Okay now. Steve. You can. Come in.”

Steve looks up for a second like he’s not sure what he’s heard. Even in the dark, he looks wild, his eyes shining with tears of his own. He hasn’t let them roll down, though. He never does.

Then visibly shakes himself and steps across the hallway to cautiously push the door open. When Bucky doesn’t flinch away, still lying there on his bed camp, Steve finally pads into the room.

He sits on the floor so he’s level with Bucky. They glance at each other for a moment. Steve’s lashes cast long shadows over his cheekbones when he looks down.

“I shouldn’t have hit you.”

“No—it’s me. It was me. I shouldn’t have asked you to hit me. It’s just—everything felt so off-kilter. I don’t know what I was thinking. I just wanted…”

He knows what they both wanted. Only now does he fully realize how foolish and destructive the attempt was. Pierce wanted to overwrite Bucky’s sense of self; he spent three years training him to feel inherently inferior, to the point that Bucky couldn’t even raise his hand to him on that last day, held back by manufactured instincts. Now Steve set out to retrain Bucky from that. He’s already begun to sacrifice his time, his money, his peace of mind, to that massive undertaking.

Bucky finally manages to say what he should have said much, much earlier.

“I don’t want to do this.” He swallows. “I don’t want you to do this anymore.”

Steve just nods.

Then he starts getting up and says, “Let’s get you out of this room.”

*

Bucky takes a burning shower, changing back into his day clothes afterwards though it’s only about 4am. He comes out of the bathroom to Steve sitting at the kitchen table. He’s made them both coffee. A lonely plume of steam rises from his cup.

He looks up when he sees Bucky. He’s a bit too pale. “There you are. What… what do you want to do now?”

Bucky wants to say: My nightmare had nothing to do with you, not really. He wants to say: I’m leaving because of what this is doing to you. But he’s dreadfully aware that he would sound like he’s lying. Trying to spare Steve from some imaginary truth. Anything he says right now will only make Steve more convinced that Bucky’s terrified of him. No matter how much he wants to tend to Steve’s burns, Bucky’s the one who burned him. Bucky’s the one who’s still on fire. The only thing he can do is limit the damage, even though he knows leaving will hurt him, too.

“I have to go home,” he says.

Steve doesn’t look away from him. He would be perfectly stoic if not for how his white-knuckled grip on his cup. “Okay. Just—is there anything else you need from me? Anything I could give you?”

Bucky feels like someone’s reached into his chest. “You’ve given me all you could.”

“But—” It’s awful to hear him hesitate. “Are you going to be all right?”

Tears seize up in Bucky’s throat. He should leave now, now that he’s announced he would, and Steve is obviously desperate to let him leave, to not make him feel trapped. But they’re also both desperate to make sure the other will be fine, first. Why can’t they just care for each other? How has it become so impossible? Maybe it was impossible from the start and they’re only just seeing it now. Sam knew; Natasha knew. Steve and Bucky didn’t want to believe it, didn’t want to stay away from each other.

Bucky simply has to be all right. Because if he just lets himself go now—if he stops looking for ways to keep on living—then it’s not just his failure anymore. It’s Steve’s, too. Steve hasn’t stopped carrying the burden of what he did on the island. How could Bucky ever add to it?

“Yes,” he manages to croak. “Yeah. I’ll be okay, Steve. I promise. You don’t have to worry about me.”

Steve nods. He’s so rigid. “I’m sorry for what I did wrong today.”

Bucky can’t say Steve did nothing wrong because Steve won’t believe him. Bucky needs to just leave, just leave him alone, but also how could he leave him alone like this? He has to say—he has to think of—he has to manage to say at least a fraction of what he’s feeling.

“Do you know, that second night,” Bucky finally tries. “On the island. With the blankets on the floor. When we…”

Just for a moment, Steve’s features seem about to lose their composure.

“I didn’t sleep afterwards,” Bucky goes on, voice unsteady. “I was just lying there staring at the ceiling and listening to the storm. You were sleeping next to me. I felt…” Tears catch in his voice again. How could he ever put words on how he felt? How can he explain being reminded he was human? “You saved me then. You didn’t even need to do anything else.”

The sky’s turning pale grey outside.

“Thank you,” Steve says softly. “Thank you, Buck.” He pushes back his chair. “I’ll let you go home now.”

*

Bucky goes back home in the cab Steve’s called for him. He gets to his apartment before 5am, and he’s feeling so heavy and empty at the same time that he just drops into bed fully dressed. When he closes his eyes, he expects Ross’ phone call to come back and haunt him again. It would be fitting. But instead, he hears very clearly Banner’s soft voice.

Ask him to be kind to you.

He’s so tired of crying, but he still starts crying again. It’s all been such a waste. Bucky dismissed Banner’s words because Banner didn’t get it. Except he did, better than Bucky, as always, and Bucky’s only seeing it now. He can’t remember what he originally wanted from all this; he can’t remember how he came to want to reenact the island, to ask for more orders, more cuffs, more pain. He didn’t know what he wanted, so he cast for what he knew—something familiar in this drifting vacuum he’s in. Except all he knows, all he’s learned, is how to contain and restrain and repress himself; and every time he thinks he’s found something else, something that might work, it evaporates, leaving him feeling more lost than ever. Banner’s talked about that, too: Bucky moving the goalposts for himself. But this time Bucky moved them for Steve, too.

And that’s what he can’t forgive himself for.

He can’t stand just lying there feeling like this, being so aware of what he did—so he pushes out of bed again, goes from one room to another, but his apartment is just a grey box bathed in grey light, everything blending together. There’s nothing for him to hold onto, his mind grasping at straws and coming up empty. There’s nobody he could call. He’s so completely alone. The designer framework chair sits in the middle of his living room, black tubes stuck together to shape an empty outline. In the corner of his eye it feels like a spider, a thing poised to start crawling around.

After five more minutes of increasingly restless pacing, as dark, wordless thoughts start flitting through his mind—stop, I can’t stand this much longer, I want it all to stop—Bucky forces himself to go back to bed, because what scares him the most now is himself. He’s been hurt too much for too long by too many people. He won’t add himself to the list. Sleep will come if he just doesn’t allow himself to move. He curls up, wraps his arms around himself like a straitjacket, turns his face into his pillow and lets the gnawing ache inside him take him whole.

He wants—

He wants for Steve not to have been hurt. He wants for Steve never to have met him at all. But also he wants Steve here, again, so much it’s tearing him apart. He wants to go back to the Met’s steps in the sun; to the chilly fire escape in the hospital; and even to the chopper as it took off from the island, Steve’s hand tight around his own. If he could only hold on to this feeling for more than just a few fleeting seconds. If he could only stop feeling so bad all the time.

Chapter Text

“You look dreadful.”

The sun streams gently through Banner’s large windows, reflecting off the glass skyscraper looming over his office. The plants have been recently watered, dewy beads shining on their leaves.

Bucky’s just sitting there. He’s not sure how he got the energy to drag himself to Manhattan. “Is that a way to talk to your patient?”

“You look dreadfully tired?” Banner offers mildly. “I don’t know, I thought this was how we rolled, now. You’ve said worse things to me last time.”

Bucky doesn’t really feel angry. He doesn’t really feel much of anything. He looks around the peaceful room and wonders how many people have cried and screamed in here. How many people have shouted Fuck you! at Banner like he did, in anger, in pain, for making them wade through their own mess.

“I have,” he says slowly. “Said worse things to you.” He looks back at Banner. “I’m sorry about that. That was over the line.”

Banner blinks a little. Bucky wonders if he’s genuinely surprised.

“It was over the line,” Banner says eventually. “And I was glad to see you cross it so freely. It’s important that you feel able to express your frustration here.” He smiles. “I suppose I would rather you pick different words, if it’s all the same to you, so thank you for apologizing now. But really, you don’t need to worry about it. There was no harm done.”

It’s such a therapist way to receive his apology, Bucky thinks. One wonders what it would take for Banner to really be upset. Not that Bucky wants to know. He likes Banner like this, mild-mannered and ruthless, inhumanly detached. The whole of Bucky’s trauma can’t make a dent on him.

“Now tell me,” Banner goes on. “How was your weekend?”

Bucky looks out the window again. The sun’s moved; the skyscraper’s windows aren’t blazing white anymore.

“He beat me. I asked him to,” he says quickly when Banner raises his eyebrows. “It’s what I thought I needed. At the time. But I had a nightmare afterwards, a really bad one, and—” He stops. He can’t. “Long story short, we’ve called it quits.”

He’s trying to be as neutral as possible, as detached as Banner, but his throat tightens. He hadn’t said it out loud before now. They haven’t texted each other at all since.

“I was asking too much of him,” he rasps. “And—and I know what you’re going to say. That I’m sabotaging myself. But I don’t want to hurt him. I don’t care if it makes me unhappy. I don’t want to hurt him anymore.”

He’s crying again, so that’s great. Everything’s just great.

Banner gives him the tissue box. “Okay,” he says. “So. What happens now?”

Bucky blinks at him through his tears.  “What?”

“You’ve decided that those, those moments with Steve, they couldn’t go on. What happens now?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know,” Bucky says, getting agitated again even though he’s not even done crying. “If I knew, don’t you think I would have—I just don’t know what to do. I can’t find a way forward. I can’t find a way out—”

Something lights up in Banner’s eye. “Say that again.”

Bucky stares, breathless, red-eyed. “I… I can’t find a way out?”

“Don’t lose that thread. A way out of what?”

“Of… of all this, of… the nightmares, the… the emptiness of everything…” He swallows hard. Just like last time, he knows what Banner’s getting at.

The truth is Bucky’s never been free. He’s still trying to find the exit. No wonder he went to Steve, over and over again. Steve’s the one who helps him escape.

He wipes his eyes. “My life. I’m trying to escape my life. And I don’t want to kill myself but I do wish I was fucking dead.”

Banner must really trust Bucky, or trust his own judgment, not to be more alarmed at Bucky’s little admission here. He actually looks like he thinks Bucky’s just made a lot of progress. Bucky doesn’t want to know what qualifies as failure.

There’s a silence while Banner scribbles down a few things on his notepad.

“All right, tell me one thing,” he starts again in his husky voice. “What did you like about doing this with Steve?”

Bucky shrugs despondently. He knows what he was hoping to like. “Not having to think.”

“What is it you don’t like to think about?”

“Everything. What plates to pick. What furniture to choose. What food to buy for dinner. What posters to put up on the goddamn walls, just—everything.”

“Hm,” Banner says. “Did you notice? Everything you just said is about your living situation.”

Bucky blinks. He had not, in fact, noticed.

“Going to Steve’s also meant leaving your own place,” Banner points out. “So, this apartment. I think that’s a lead. Is there something you don’t like about it?”

“I… I don’t… It’s an apartment. I don’t really have an opinion about it.”

“Well,” Banner says patiently, “you see, I think it would be preferable to feel unequivocally good about it. After all, that’s where a lot of your life takes place.”

When he puts it like that, it sounds so stupidly obvious.

“Do you feel good about it?”

Bucky doesn’t have to think about it for very long. “No.”

“All right, so, there you go. Drop the apartment.”

“And then what?” Bucky asks, incredulous. “Just get another apartment? I’ll hate that one too. I’ll hate all of them. They’re just,” his breath shakes, “boxes I’m alone in.”

“Maybe it’s time to think outside the box.” Banner shrugs when Bucky stares at him. “I’m sorry, you walked right into that one. It’s true, anyway.”

“What does that even mean,” Bucky says in frayed tones. “I need the box. I need structure. Without it I’ll just fucking fall apart. You don’t understand how close I am to falling apart. Steve was—Steve was all I had.” He has to swallow another convulsive burst of tears. “With him there, I could let my guard down, I could drift away—like I used to—” His throat closes when he hears himself. He takes his head in his hands. “I can’t drift away any more.”

Banner taps his pencil on the edge of his notebook for a little while.

“You mentioned nightmares,” he says eventually. “You’re not sleeping well?”

Bucky’s thankful for the subject change, even if the new subject is about just as bad. “I don’t sleep. I mean—I fall asleep okay enough. But I don’t dream—I just have flashbacks on flashbacks.”

“All right. I, um, I’m thinking maybe now’s the time to mention medication,” Banner says, kicking off into the beginning of a slow spin. “Replicative nightmares are something that can…” He stops his chair when he sees the look on Bucky’s face. “What is it?”

It takes a few seconds for Bucky to manage speech. “There’s a name for it?”

Banner’s gaze goes even softer, which gives Bucky the sudden urge to justify himself. “I just thought—in the army, I’d never heard of anyone else going through that—they’d all described actual nightmares, not—I thought…”

He trails off. He doesn’t know why he’s on the brink of tears again.

“Whatever it is you’re feeling,” Banner says quietly, “however uniquely awful it feels, I can guarantee you that other people have been there before you. Which means that other people have paved the way to healing. There is nothing special about any of us, thank God. And there is, I’d venture, a finite number of ways to be traumatized.” He’s not swiveling in his chair anymore. He’s looking Bucky in the eyes. “You can get better, too. This isn’t me cheering you on or wishing you well. I’m just stating a fact.”

Then he shrugs, posture slightly easing. “Of course, it takes some work. But the good thing about work is that it’s there to be done.”

“So—then—what can I do to sleep better?” Bucky asks miserably. “I don’t think a sleeping pill would…”

Banner shakes his head. “Not from what you’ve told me, no. I’m talking about adrenaline control medication. You see, ah, REM sleep is a time for the brain to process memories in an adrenaline-free environment. Kind of like therapy,” he smiles. “But post-traumatic stress disorder, which you’ve already been diagnosed with, causes the adrenaline to linger even at night. Meaning your brain replays those memories to try and process them, but ends up just keeping the trauma alive, the adrenaline fresh. Running in circles, really.”

Bucky nods mutely. That’s exactly how it feels like.

“So, as I was saying, there’s medication for that. The effectiveness varies in patients, but you won’t know how you react to it until you try.” He seems to be doodling in his notebook again. “And whether you choose that route or not, I’d also advise you to write your nightmares down every time you have them.”

“Write them down? Why?”

“Putting your feelings on paper is a simple but very effective way to help the brain process trauma. If you can’t do it while you’re asleep, do it while you’re awake.”

“Oh,” Bucky says. It feels too simple, too cliché again. Pills and a journal. But Banner’s proved the effectiveness of clichés already. “That’s—that’s something I can do. I can at least try. The meds and the writing.”

He doesn’t look forward to reliving his movie reel visions a third time, after living them in the first place and then dreaming them again. But he’s desperate for something concrete to do. He thinks maybe he can feel a door cracking open.

Banner nods. “Great. I’ll leave you till next week to think about the medication, any questions you might have, et cetera. And if you’re still decided, I’ll write you a prescription right away.”

“You can do that?”

“Sure I can,” Banner says placidly. “When it comes to buying a notebook, you’re on your own, though.”

Bucky manages a smile. He thinks maybe it’s the first time he smiled in Banner’s office. “All right. Thank you.”

Banner smiles back. “You’re very welcome.” Then he clicks his pen shut. “Shall we stop here today?”

It’s a rhetorical question—Banner always stops the conversation roughly around one hour’s time, except for that first session which just went on and on. Still, Bucky hears himself saying, “Wait.”

“Hm?”

“I just—I don’t understand. What did you mean, when you said drop the apartment? What else is there?”

Banner smiles at him again, all the way this time, eyes crinkling. “That’s, uh, that’s actually a really good question to ask yourself. So I’m not going to answer it. Work on that till next time.”

*

After he leaves Banner’s office, Bucky feels a bit better. Which isn’t saying much, considering the state he was in the day before. He feels like he’s walking on ice, like he could at any moment go right through a thin crust right back into that dark pit.

He doesn’t want to go home. Now that Banner’s made him think about how his apartment felt, he can’t unthink it. He can just walk around, for now. What else is there. He wishes he could talk about all this with Steve. Every time he remembers he can’t, it’s a fresh stab to the chest.

He wishes he had talked more about Steve. He never feels like he has enough time to talk about everything in therapy. He even forgot to talk about Ross—but maybe that’s because he doesn’t want to even think about it. And Banner’s questions led Bucky away towards other, yet unexplored subjects. It might have been on purpose. It was definitely on purpose. If Bucky feels marginally lighter now, it’s because Banner’s reminded him of what he nearly forgot, even as he tried hard to keep it in mind: that he can, and should, live on without Steve. He’s survived alone for a very long time already. He knows it can be done.

And yet, now that his thoughts are back into the wild, he can’t stop thinking about Steve, going over the events of last Saturday again and again. What could he have done differently? What should he be doing differently now? Should he contact him again?

Just to say he’s fine…

But Bucky still feels what he felt that night: that staying away from Steve, while not making either of them happy, will cause the least possible damage. He’s always known, really, that he should leave him alone. They’ve been through too much. They’re just retraumatizing each other. That’s what everyone seemed to imply they’d do, since day one; and experience seems to have confirmed that.

Bucky has to focus on himself. He has to sort himself out first, before he’s fit to be close to anyone, especially someone with a shared trauma. He’s managed to let go. It’s for the best.

His throat closes up at the thought that it might really be for the best.

Chapter Text

The nightmare ends when he opens his eyes.

Bucky wakes, sits up on the side of the bed and puts his face in his hands for a few minutes. Then he sniffs, wipes his eyes and draws his notebook to himself.

Second year, he writes. P has me cuffed down on my knees under the table. I have to hold his dick inside my mouth. He’s playing poker. The other players know I’m here. I’m drooling and he told me not to, so I’m going to be punished when this is over. It’s all I can think about. I keep wondering what he’s going to do to me this time. It’s hard to breathe and I’m sick to my stomach. I can taste him in my mouth. I can feel every wrinkle on his skin. They keep laughing around the table and I get the sense that P has just bet something involving me. I’m still drooling and I’m so scared but there’s nothing more I can do.

He clicks the pen shut. He tries to be as impersonal and factual as he can, writing down his nightmares. The notebook is two hundred pages, and so far he’s filled four, never leaving a line blank. He figures when it’s full he can see where he’s at.

It’s Saturday again. It’s been a quiet, lonely week. Nothing’s happened and Bucky hasn’t talked to anyone. He didn’t dare to call Sam, in case Sam asked him why he wasn’t hanging out with Steve anymore. So he kept doing what he was doing before, walking in and out of museums, galleries and movie theaters, wandering through miles of shopping centers without ever buying anything. At least it tires him out so he goes to sleep more easily at night.

Everett Ross has been trying to call him again. Bucky doesn’t dare block his number. He has four voicemails.

He’s waiting for Monday to come again, so he can tell Banner he wants get started on meds. He didn’t need to think about it, really; he’d already made his decision the moment Banner broached the subject. If they let him sleep, he’ll happily take any side effect. And then…

He still doesn’t know what then.

Putting the notebook away, he casts a glance around the blank walls. His dislike for his place is a stale, apathetic one that feels inevitable. So much that he didn’t even stop to notice it before Banner made him notice it. Same as when he pointed out that Bucky had arranged his life in a way that made happiness possible only on the weekends. Not that it even worked, in the end.

What else is there.

Steve. It’s the answer that comes readily, forcefully. Steve. Bucky doesn’t feel like life is something he has to put himself through, when Steve’s here. But Bucky will not give himself any leeway this time. Nobody should bear the full weight of his recovery, of his happiness. Nobody but himself. If he can.

He doesn’t have anything to do today, as usual, but he does need to go shopping for groceries, which is a painless enough exercise thanks to self-checkout. He’s just finished dressing and brushing his teeth when someone knocks on his door.

He goes entirely still. When the knock happens again a few seconds later, his pulse skyrockets. He berates himself as he walks to the door. It’s just a neighbor. It’s Everett Ross. It’s mail delivery. It’s Steve.

It’s Steve.

It’s Steve.

He opens the door.

It’s Natasha Romanov.

“Hey there,” she says. “I thought I’d come visit. Can I come in?”

Bucky stares at her, waiting for his usual dread; when it doesn’t come, he remembers he has no reason anymore to be wary of her. He’s let go of Steve. There’s nothing left she could take away from him.

He steps back wordlessly, lets her in and closes the door behind her. Aftershocks of his adrenaline rush are shivering down his spine.

“Do you want,” he says on automatic, “coffee? Or—coffee. It’s all I’ve got.”

“Coffee’s fine.”

“It’s instant.”

“It’s fine,” she repeats, and goes to sit on the couch, zipping her jacket open.

Steve’s picked everything in blue and grey and white hues, so Natasha’s hair is a vivid red blotch in the middle of the room. Bucky, who’s visited almost two dozen museums in almost four months, thinks it would make a good painting.

He makes coffee, which just amounts to boiling some water and stirring burnt powder into it. Then he brings two cups out of the kitchen and sits, too. Not on his designer chair. On a normal chair.

He wraps his hands around his cup and waits.

“Do you have any idea why I’m here?” Natasha says eventually.

Bucky hesitates. “Is it about the group therapy thing?”

She frowns. “Group therapy?” Her eyes go slightly wider. “Wait, the shelter? Did you attend?”

They didn’t tell her. Bucky feels a bit lighter, suddenly, and even more indebted to the four women in the circle. “I didn’t understand what you meant when you gave me your card. When I realized my mistake, I tried to leave, but they said I could stay. So… I stayed.” He turns his cup in his hands. “They were very nice.”

Natasha bites her cheek. And well, it was a mortifying experience, but Bucky’s lips feel like tugging up too, so he lets them; and Natasha gives him a smile in turn, which is a nice surprise. He feels like he’s only just meeting her for real.

“Well, I’m glad to hear it went okay,” she says. “And I’m sorry. I should have been clearer. But…”

“But I went out of my way not to be alone with you.”

She seems pleased by his directness. “You know, I did wonder about that. For a while, I thought maybe it was because I gave you my card when I arrived, but then I remembered you were like that from the moment we met. Now I have another theory—”

“I was afraid you’d notice the way I acted around Steve.”

She raises an eyebrow. “You didn’t even make me guess.”

Bucky doesn’t want to make people guess. Things are difficult enough already.

“Is that why you’re here, then?” he asks. “About Steve?” Maybe she has come to tell him to leave Steve alone, after all. He can tell her that it’s already done.

“I guess I’m just wondering why you’re not hanging out anymore,” she says. Her tone is light but her eyes are serious. “Did something happen?”

“I… can’t say.” What they did together failed, but Bucky still can’t believe Steve ever even agreed to try. It was such a selfless thing to do, and Bucky can’t have anyone thinking otherwise. “Just—we were trying out something, and now we’ve stopped.”

Natasha narrows her eyes, tapping on her cup.

“Okay,” she says bluntly, “was he domming you or something?”

Bucky stares at her. He doesn’t even realize his coffee’s dripping into his lap until he feels the wet patch on his jeans. “Shit—” he steadies the cup, wipes the rim however he can, never looking away from her.

“Steve’s an old friend, so it wasn’t a very difficult guess,” she says by way of explanation. “And see, that way, you kept his secrets. You’re not to blame.” She sits back. “Now I’m just trying to figure out why the hell he’d do something like that with you.”

“I asked him,” Bucky says at once. He doesn’t know for sure what domming means, but it’s not exactly a difficult guess either, and panic tightens his chest. “I was the one who asked. And I was the one to make it stop. He didn’t ask me to keep it a secret. He didn’t do anything wrong—”

She waves a hand to stop him. “Oh, don’t worry. I don’t doubt that.”

His relief is so sudden that it makes his ears ring. “You… you don’t?”

“I know Steve,” she says simply.

He swallows. Other people know Steve. Other people know how good he is; other people will vouch for him.

Natasha studies him. “You care about him a lot.”

Bucky nods. “That’s why… It was too much. For him. I knew it would be. I was so selfish.” He forces himself to relax his grip on the cup. “That’s why I ended it.”

She stares at him for a moment longer. “What did you ask him for, exactly?”

Shame is like acid in his throat, but he still doesn’t want to make her guess. “To take charge of me.”

“Was that all you settled on?” she insists.

“He… he tried asking me about specifics. But I couldn’t… I wanted him to choose everything for me.”

Natasha rubs her forehead like she’s getting a headache. “And he did.”

Bucky nods again, wordlessly.

She sighs, dropping her hand back in her lap. “You just wanted him to pick stuff for you, is that right? Like in IKEA with your plates?”

He knew she’d noticed that, and he can feel himself flush.

“But then Steve took that vague prompt you gave him,” she goes on, “and he turned it into some big production where he tried to solve all of your problems, all at once, forever—didn’t he?”

Bucky blinks. Saying yes would feel a bit… disloyal. But it is more or less accurate, and Natasha seems to read the answer on his face again. She twists her lips. “Like I said. I know Steve.”

“But—wait—what happened?” Bucky asks, actually worried now. “What made you come here? Is he all right?”

Natasha snorts. “Oh, don’t worry, he’ll live. It’s just that he’s been sleeping like shit for two weeks. Also very difficult to get a hold of. Sam noticed, too. I got the sense he was busy with some huge, complicated task. Wondered what it could be, since he was off work.” She gives him an eloquent look. “And when Sam and I finally went to see him yesterday, he was agitated. Cagey. Wouldn’t tell us anything—especially not when we asked about you. He specifically told me to leave you alone.” She shrugs. “So I thought I’d pay you a visit.”

Bucky’s shaking his head. “I… I never meant…”

“Don’t worry, I know,” Natasha says. “He did that to himself. Because he’s an idiot.”

Vividly, Bucky remembers Steve’s wry smile on the Met’s sun-flooded steps. When Bucky asked about his therapist. She said I was being an idiot, essentially. Steve knew from the start that the undertaking was too much for him, and he did it anyway.

“I should call him.” Bucky won’t give himself permission to do it, but maybe she will. “Do you think I should—just to make sure—”

Someone hammers on his door. Natasha raises an eyebrow. “Looks like you won’t have to.”

Bucky’s heart jumps in his chest.

“I’ll get that for you, shall I?” she continues, getting up.

When she opens the door, Bucky knows at once it’s him. He can’t even say why. All of the tension flows out of his shoulders and back, leaving him dizzy. Only then does he realize he really believed they’d never see each other again.

“Nat.” Steve, hidden by the door, sounds disappointed and furious—and also like he’s trying very hard to keep his voice down. "What the hell. I told you not to come here.”

“We’re just chatting.”

“For God’s sake, do you think he needs this on top of everything—”

She pulls the door fully open and when he sees Bucky right there on the couch, Steve stops dead.

Natasha throws Bucky a look over her shoulder. What she sees must satisfy her, because she zips up her jacket again. “All right. I’ll leave you both to it. Steve, please try to get the debrief right, at least. And Bucky, let’s get coffee sometime, all right? I’d love to get to know you better.”

Bucky should answer, but he’s too caught up in Steve standing right there. She’s already gone anyway, sauntering down the stairs.

Steve, looking pale, takes a step back like he might follow.

“Please don’t go,” Bucky blurts, standing up too quickly. “Just—please—don’t go.”

He goes to him and closes the door, as if Steve couldn’t just open it again to leave. They’re just a step away from each other now; Bucky can see how frazzled Steve really looks, how tense.

“I’m,” Bucky says. Too many words are crowding in his throat. “I’m… I’m glad you’re here.”

Steve’s expression crumples all at once.

Bucky never saw him cry, not even on the island, and to see him lose his composure now almost panics him. His first reflex is to reach out and pull him close; the next second, he realizes he did that so Steve could at least hide his face somewhere. It’s a stiff embrace, both of them bracing against its completion, but neither of them pulling back.

“Sorry—” Steve says into his neck in a horribly strangled voice.

Bucky would like to say that it’s fine, that he’s sorry, that it’s fine, but he knows he won’t be able to speak at all if he tries now. All he can do is stay there, in silent permission.

After a little while, Steve gulps wetly, making a clear effort to pull himself together. “I told her not to come. I told her it had nothing to do with you…”

“I guess she knew you were lying,” Bucky rasps, and since he can speak now, he seizes his chance to say what he has to say, finally. “Steve—it was too much. What you tried to do for me. I didn’t really understand at first, I would have never dreamed to ask for something like that—and I couldn’t stand making you feel that way for a second longer, it was too much responsibility, too much worry but now you’re f—” the word catches in his mouth, “you’re free.”

Steve looks up then. His eyes are burning. “I don’t want to be free of you.”

They’re so close it’s like they’re sharing their next few heartbeats.

Something has to give. Bucky leans in and presses their foreheads together. It’s that or kiss him, and—he can’t. Not like this again, rushed and thoughtless. He feels Steve’s shaky exhale on his mouth. They just stand there, catching their breath.

“I’m sorry about Saturday,” Steve murmurs eventually. “I don’t know what I could have done or—”

“Ross called me,” Bucky manages.

Steve’s eyes blink open; he inches back. “What?”

“Everett Ross. From SHIELD.” Every word feels like a razor blade. “They want me to testify in court against Pierce. On human trafficking charges. That’s why I was all over the place on Saturday. It had nothing to do with you.”

Steve stares at him, too many emotions flickering across his face. “You… Bucky, you should have told me, I…”

“I know. I couldn’t. I didn’t want to.” Bucky gulps wetly. “I’m sorry.”

“What did you say to him?”

“I just hung up.” Panic thickens Bucky’s words. “Let’s not—I can’t, I just needed to tell you now so you’d know—”

Suddenly he’s the one weighing against Steve. He can feel Steve’s arms come up around him, wrap up close in a proper embrace, neither of them bracing against it this time. Bucky leans in fully, closes his eyes. How does he always smell so good.

When Steve speaks next, it’s so quiet and reverent Bucky almost can’t hear. “I thought you didn’t want me to touch you.”

Bucky wishes he could sort out what he wants. He holds onto Steve’s shirt and manages to say, “I want this, now.”

Chapter Text

Bucky’s made some coffee again, if only to give Steve—and himself—a moment apart to regain some semblance of composure. His hands are still shaking, but he feels scrubbed clean of something, like he usually does after therapy. His hair is getting into his eyes; when he finger-combs it away, he catches his own wary gaze in the chrome kitchen hood.

He has no idea what he’s doing.

Part of him still insists they shouldn’t be around each other. But he’s always been too weak when it comes to keeping Steve at a distance. And he can’t help but think that maybe he’s not just deluding himself this time. Maybe. It feels different.

Coming back to the living room with a cup in each hand, he pauses next to the chair he sat in to face Natasha, then sits next to Steve on the couch instead. Their knees brush, and Bucky knows for sure, now, that Steve feels it as intensely as he does.

He silently puts the cups down on the coffee table.

“If I’d known,” Steve says quietly, “I would have held you more.”

Bucky idly wonders if he can make it through this conversation without crying again.

“I would have panicked,” he rasps. “The first day, I mean. And that second time… You couldn’t have done anything right, no matter how much you tried. I’m really sorry.”

He hears Steve swallow a bit too hard. “If we’re doing apologies, I’m sorry for making you undress.”

“Don’t—don’t apologize. Like I said, whatever you did, it wasn’t going to—”

“You know, I wasn’t looking, though.”

Bucky looks at him. “What?”

Steve’s keeping his eyes down. “I feel like I should say. When I made you change in front of me. I didn’t actually watch.”

“Oh.” For a moment Bucky doesn’t know what to say. “That’s… But—I thought I felt you—watching me. Wanting me.”

Steve seems tired. “I don’t need to look at you for that.”

There’s a silence while they both remember Bucky going to his knees, responding to what he thought was an invitation. Steve’s unmistakable arousal, even amidst the wreck of that day.

Bucky closes his eyes for a moment. Knowing that Steve wants him still feels like—too much of everything at once. It scares him, maybe, but it’s not Steve that scares him. He doesn’t know how to explain that out loud. He can barely get it to make sense to himself.

Steve clears his throat. “Natasha—” he interrupts himself to mutter, “I can’t believe she just showed up here.”

“How did you know?”

He waves his phone. “Oh, she let me know.” That explains how breathless he was when he got here. Did he run all the way? “But she was right. We should debrief.”

“Okay,” Bucky says cautiously. He owes him that much, really.

“The thing is,” Steve says. “The thing is—I was trying to do something, there. Overall. I don’t know if this is going to make any sense, but—”

“You wanted to decondition me.”

Steve stares at him.

“I can tell when I’m being trained,” Bucky points out in a soft voice. “You wanted to overwrite everything that’s been done to me. That’s why you had me call you sir. Right?”

“I was just—so arrogant,” Steve says, hoarse. “Thinking I could just… I can’t understand what possessed me to—”

“I can,” Bucky says. “I asked you to.”

Steve falls silent again, like he’d forgotten.

“And you tried to stop, when it got too much. You could tell things had gone off the rails. I’m the one who made you go on. I wanted everything from you,” Bucky breathes. “And—you actually tried to give me everything.” He has to smile. “I think we were both out of our minds.”

He presses his knee just a bit harder against Steve’s. For once, Steve is the one who seems too full of emotion to speak.

“Tell me one thing,” Bucky says hesitantly. “How… does it generally go? When you,” he casts for the word Natasha used, “when you dom people.”

Steve looks alarmed, but answers nonetheless. “I… beat people, mostly. With a whip or a cane. Or my hand. Like I did to you.”

“And they like that.”

“Yes. They do.”

“What about you? What do you like about it? I just want to understand,” Bucky adds quickly when Steve grows paler. “What we did, it went wrong because—because we both had different ideas in mind, and we tried to merge them into this… this huge all-encompassing thing. I never asked you anything about what you’re used to.”

Steve’s hands are clasped very tightly together. “For me, I guess… it’s about trust.”

This isn’t what Bucky expected. “Trust?”

“Yeah. The idea that I’m doing something to them that’s hard to bear. Difficult. Painful. And they have the power to make me stop, but they don’t. They let me. So I’m the one with the power—I’ve been trusted with it.” He seems almost to admit a sin. “That’s… a real high. For me.”

Bucky nods. “I’m guessing you didn’t get much of that from me.”

Steve gives him a smile then, half-fond, half-sad. “Are you kidding? Just from you showing up at my door, I was flying.”

He doesn’t seem to expect an answer, which is lucky, because Bucky wouldn’t know what to say.

“And I should have known,” Steve adds, “that it was too high. Too much trust. Too much at stake.” He shakes his head. “But—it’s like you said. I was out of my mind.” He meets Bucky’s eyes again. “What about you? What did you have in mind? Was there something else I could have done? Something different?”

It’s what he tried asking Bucky that day in the coffee shop. It’s what he tried asking again, the night it all went wrong. He deserves a straight answer now, even though Bucky’s cheeks burn with shame already.

“You were already doing it from the start.” When Steve looks confused, Bucky makes himself go on, “You picked everything in here. You even picked the apartment. Hell, you’re the one who got me to try matcha on day one. I liked you doing the work for me.” His throat closes up, but he forces himself to finish. “Rebuilding my life for me.”

“Oh,” Steve says, and then, “Oh.” He looks disoriented for a moment, then he adds, “But—Bucky, that’s not me rebuilding your life for you. Everything you just said—they’re just things.”

“You know what I mean.”

“No, I don’t think I do,” Steve insists. “Your apartment isn’t your life.”

Bucky looks at him helplessly.

“But,” he says, and his voice shakes when the question comes out. “What else is there?”

“I… guess that’s the one thing you’re supposed to find out for yourself.”

“But I can’t,” Bucky says, and there goes his resolution not to cry—“I can’t, goddammit! I’ve been trying to find the answer and I just have no idea where to start, I’ve been telling myself I should know, and my therapist has been telling me I should know, and I swear to God I tried but I got nothing, really nothing at all, so if you know—if you have any idea, can you please just give me a hint—” He hears himself and abruptly stops; screwing his eyes shut, he scrubs his hands hard over his face.

Steve says nothing, does nothing. After a little while, Bucky says tightly:

“Steve, I think—I think maybe you should go. I clearly can’t—fucking—help myself around you. I keep trying to make you carry all of my—” He swallows, “—all of me. That’s why I tried not to… That’s why we should stay away. From each other.”

Steve leans forward to grab one of the cups Bucky brought. He takes a sip and wrinkles his nose. “Instant coffee? Buck, we’ve got to get you the good stuff.”

Bucky stares at him. “Did you hear what I said?”

“Yes, I did. But really, I don’t know how you can drink this.”

“Steve.”

Steve puts down his cup, takes Bucky’s hand and brings it to his lips. It’s so strange, so unexpected; almost more like a mark of respect than a kiss.

Then, to Bucky’s wide eyes, he says: “I’m not leaving you. I promised I wouldn’t.”

He’s holding Bucky’s hand tight.

“I can’t give you the answer, because I don’t have it,” he goes on. “And you’re right: it was too much, what we tried. I can’t do everything for you. So let’s split the burden from now on. You deal with the meaning of life, and I’ll take care of the rest. You know, when you need it.”

Bucky’s shaking his head. This is just like that day in the coffee shop. They’re even holding hands again. And he may be weak, but in his mind’s eye he can still see Steve having a panic attack in the dark. He knows where that road leads.

“No. Steve, we can’t go back to—I won’t hurt you again. Never again.”

Steve just kisses his hand a second time, like he can’t help it. Bucky doesn’t know what to do with himself; he feels like there’s a bird’s fluttering inside his ribcage, trying to get out. Nobody’s ever done that to him before.

“I promise,” Steve says in earnest, “that I won’t let you hurt me. I promise that I will speak up. I promise you won’t ever have to be responsible for us both again.”

This—in a way, it undoes Bucky even more. He was so afraid, if he talked about his reasons for leaving, that Steve would protest he had never been hurt at all. He had it so wrong. He didn’t trust him.

And Steve surprises him again right away. “Will you promise the same thing to me? Because,” and here his voice wavers just for a moment, “I’m really not sure you enjoyed anything we did.”

“I did want it,” Bucky says at once.

“I know. Thank you. I know.” Steve’s eyes are a bit too bright. “But did it make you feel good?”

The question kneecaps Bucky the way Banner did, asking if he liked his apartment. At no point did Bucky go as far as to hope Steve would make him feel good; he only hoped for his mind to go blank.

“I… Yes. There was a moment,” he tries. “That first Saturday morning. When I was lying on the floor. Where I felt like I could just… take the time to breathe.”

“Just one moment,” Steve says, pained.

Bucky stupidly wants to laugh. Their expectations for this whole thing were so absurdly different it’s a miracle they got through that first time at all. And no wonder they crashed on the second.

“I felt good about all of it,” he compromises. “I was glad to be doing it. Both times, it made me hope I was going to feel better and just that hope was—a lot.” He squeezes Steve’s hand. “I promise. What you said. I won’t let you hurt me again. I’m sorry I made you hurt me in the first place.”

“Already forgotten,” Steve answers, so brightly Bucky can only believe him, which feels miraculous in its own right. “Does—does that reassure you? This promise. Does that make you feel like maybe we don’t have to stay away from each other?”

Bucky hesitates. Really, he still thinks he’s deluding himself. That he wants to believe things can go fine, but that they’re bound to go wrong. That he’s bound to hurt Steve again. But as he thinks that, he hears Banner’s voice once more—Oh, he doesn’t deserve to be saddled with you? You’re a burden, you’re a mess? You’re toxic and being near you will destroy him?

Self-deprecation. We can work on that.

“I can work on that,” he says, and Steve smiles at him.

Chapter Text

“So you’re talking to Steve again,” Banner says cheerfully.

“Yeah, I…” Bucky sighs. “I must seem pretty inconsistent to you. Going back and forth like that all the time.”

Banner swivels in his chair. “I’m of the opinion that we are only ever going forward. I mean, do you feel like you’re back to square one with him?”

“No,” Bucky admits. He doesn’t remember what square one even was. Over the course of a few months, he’s come to feel somehow like he’s known Steve forever. “We… I think we…”

He remembers leaning into Steve, pressing their foreheads together. He has no name for what he knows they’re both feeling.

“I think we’ve missed each other a lot,” he ends up saying. “You know. Even though it was just a few days.”

“Hmm,” Banner says. “Does that still worry you? This closeness?”

Bucky takes a deep breath to stave off his emotion. He doesn’t want to break down. He wants to have this damn conversation once and for all. “Just think of how we know each other. Do you think he needs that in his life?”

“As much as we like Steve,” Banner says, “he’s not my patient.”

“Please, just—answer me.”

Banner takes off his glasses to clean them. “It’s good that you’re aware you might hurt each other. It’s a reasonable and responsible worry. But let it be just that—a worry. Keep an eye on it; keep working on it, day to day, with me and with each other. But don’t let it deprive you of something you want. You’ve been deprived enough.”

Bucky swallows hard.

“Besides.” Banner puts his glasses back on. “You’re on the other end of this relationship, which had an admittedly brutal start. Yet you seem to want him in your life.”

“Yeah.” Bucky huffs. “It’s about the only thing I know I want. I think that’s why we’ve been going too fast.”

Banner looks quite interested by that. “Oh?”

“Yeah, we… When his friend came by my place two days ago, she said… we’d been trying to give each other everything. And—and she was right. It was too much.”

“Uh huh,” Banner says. “Tell me, have you thought about what we discussed last time? That whole what else is there question?”

“Why are you changing the subject?” Bucky asks, almost hurt.

Banner’s got that aggressively innocent look that means he’s trying to lead Bucky to water. “I’m not. What you’ve just said, about going too fast. Wanting too much. I’m just wondering if it applies to anything else.”

Bucky hadn’t felt irritation till then; maybe it was overdue. “What, are you saying I want too much from life?”

“Goodness, no.” Banner looks at the ceiling pensively. “But what do you mean by life?”

Bucky stares at him. “I think we’re off-topic.”

“Are we?”

“It’s too early in the morning to be this metaphysical.”

“Oh, I’m not being metaphysical at all. I’m talking about daily life. Where you live. We were talking about your apartment—what are you trying to put together, here? What are you going for?”

Bucky stays silent for a long time. Then he rasps, “Home.”

“Home?” Banner echoes, and it’s what makes Bucky break.

He wipes the first of his tears with a scowl. “Am I going to fucking start crying every time?” He takes a tissue without waiting for the answer. “Why are you making this about my childhood again?”

“I haven’t said anything about your childhood.”

Bucky respects that Banner is a professional, someone who’s good at his job and who’s already helped him a hell of a lot. Even with that in mind, it’s very hard not to tell him to go fuck himself again.

“They kicked me out so I’m trying to—what, go back? Recreate it?” he grits out. Yes, fine, he can see it. He wants an apartment because that’s what he’s always lived in. That’s the only shape of home he knows. When he couch-surfed his way through his last two years of high school, what he wanted the most was a place where he could settle down for good. It’s what drove him through the army, too, even though he was miserable there. The hope on the horizon, the end goal.

He thinks about the oppressive walls of his apartment. The designer chair and all the ways it would make his body vulnerable. His parents’ place on the outside, and the island on the inside. What a goddamn fucking nightmare he’s cobbled up for himself, really.

But what else is there?

“I…” he says almost pleadingly. “I really don’t know what else I can… I’ve always wanted a place of my own…”

“Remind me, how do you afford it? You were struggling before, I think?”

“Because—back pay and—” Bucky waves his hand, irritated. This isn’t what matters. “I have money now. I just do. Which is so stupid, by the way, I’d been working towards this my whole life and then all of a sudden—”

He stops dead.

Banner raises his eyebrows. “All of a sudden?”

Bucky stares at him.

“All of a sudden,” he repeats. “Too fast. I got there too fast.”

“Go on,” Banner murmurs.

“It was my end goal. There’s nothing else.” What else is there? “I started at the finish line. That’s why I feel like I’m stuck. I got everything I ever wanted—” We’ve been trying to give each other everything, “everything all at once. Too much, too fast.”

Banner is smiling at him.

Bucky just sits there, stunned. He feels like a great number of doors banged open in his mind, and now it’s drafty as all hell in there.

After a few seconds, Banner starts talking again. “Like I said. You’ve led a very difficult life. It’s no wonder you’re clinging to what you know. Change is a worrying thing, so you’ve had a bit of trouble deviating from the few models you have.”

“What—what else is there?” The question feels different in Bucky’s mouth. Now he knows what it really means. “I… I don’t know where to go from there. What else to want. How to…” He hesitates, looking at Banner. “How else to be happy.”

Banner waves an unconcerned hand. “Oh, don’t waste your time with that.”

“What?”

“Being happy. That’s…” Banner shakes his head. “You know, I have a bone to pick with self-development literature, really. Encouraging people to exist in a certain state of mind forever. What’s that all about? They stress themselves out trying to reach it, and if they somehow do, they stress themselves out trying to maintain it. I’ve never heard of anything more self-defeating.”

Bucky just looks at him.

“I think, maybe, you have been trying to exist in a perfect state—this ideal you’ve been carrying, untouched, from when you were young,” Banner goes on. “You always believed reaching a certain set-up would make you happy, and then you wouldn’t have to go anywhere from there. Now it’s been granted to you, almost out of the blue, but you’re not magically happy, and so you’re floundering. But really, this idea of frozen contentment just doesn’t make any sense.”

His eyes are soft, as always, but he’s looking intently at Bucky.

“People shouldn’t be things. They should do things. That’s what human life is, the doing. That’s what your goal should be, to find occupations. Something to set you into motion again. And of course, those occupations should be fulfilling, meaningful, and hopefully pleasant on the whole. But some days you’ll be happy, and some days you’ll feel something else. There’s a whole spectrum of feelings. I wouldn’t worry too much about that.”

Silence stretches for a while.

“Have I lost you?” Banner asks eventually.

“No. I… no.” Bucky blinks slowly. It’s a new angle. But the problem does feel more approachable that way. More concrete. He only has to find something to do. Happiness will come, or it won’t; he doesn’t have to hunt for it.

Of course, he’s been trying to do things. With the museums and the movies and all. But that’s just—killing time. It doesn’t engage him. He’s just been occupying himself while waiting for happiness to just happen to him. No wonder he’s been feeling trapped.

“I’m trying to think of things I could do,” he says finally.

“Oh, good. Found any? Maybe from before?”

The thing is that Bucky’s already tried to apply the question to his life before. And—even then, he wouldn’t have had much of an answer. He didn’t like being in the army; it was just his only option at the time. He thinks about something else Banner said, about putting his life on hold while he waits for the good part. Maybe that’s all he’s ever been doing.

“I was busy,” he says. He can’t really tell if he’s answering Banner’s question or explaining why he can’t answer it.

He’s not busy now, is he? This is the good part. No matter how awful he’s feeling. He has to make it the good part.

“All right, well,” Banner says after more silence. “We’ve given you a lot to think about. How about we stop here?”

It hasn’t been an hour, but Bucky nods, relieved. “Okay.”

“One last thing, though. Have you thought about medication since last time?”

“Yes. I still want it. I don’t really have any questions. I just want to try anything that might work.”

“Let’s go, then.” Banner gets out an antique smartphone and taps on it a few times. A printer hidden behind a potted plant comes abruptly to life and a single sheet of paper splutters out. Banner leans dangerously over to grab it, and holds it out to Bucky. “Here’s your prescription. I’ll let you get started and we can discuss how they make you feel as we go.”

Bucky folds it carefully and tucks it into his pocket.

*

Getting into the subway, his head still ringing, he stares into space for a while. What does he like doing. It feels stupid, in a way, that he couldn’t think of asking himself that. Except he subconsciously thought the doing was secondary, and that he had to work on the feeling. But, looking back, it’s true that Banner’s never been too worried about how he’s feeling.

What does he like doing? What has he enjoyed, truly enjoyed, since he regained his freedom?

He knows the answer, and it’s not a comfortable one.

The stations go by. Eventually, slowly, he takes out his phone and types out a text.

I need to go to the pharmacy tomorrow morning. Do you want to come with me?

There’s no service between stops. As the car slows down, his phone pings with Steve’s answer. Sure. I’ll grab us some coffee on the way.

Bucky keeps staring at his phone. That was step one. It takes him three whole stops to muster his courage for step two.

Finally, as if on their own, his fingers type it out.

What should I wear?

Steve sends a single interrogation point, then: Whatever you want, Buck.

But would you pick for me?

As soon as it’s sent, he gets scared and tries to cancel it, but they were at a station and it’s been received already.

He adds, shooting text after text, so quickly it’s riddled with typos, You don’t have to. It’s just an idea. Just for this one thing. I just never know what to wear. It takes me ages to choose in the morning. You don’t have to.

He’s between stations again; some of his messages don’t even send, which right then feels like the end of the world. Oh, God. He shouldn’t have done this in the subway. He shouldn’t have done this at all.

There’s a ping.

That grey henley you wear sometimes? With black jeans. And your blue coat.

Bucky’s fingers shake as he types back, Okay. Okay. Thank you.

Chapter Text

Steve’s waiting for him downstairs the next morning, breath slightly fogging in the cold. He’s holding two Styrofoam cups.

“I didn’t know what you wanted,” he tells Bucky as he gives him one.

Their fingers brush. Bucky can already smell the earthy scent of matcha. “Yes, you did.”

Steve’s eyes are bluer than ever in the clear winter light. It’s a cold, early morning. For a moment it seems like they won’t be able to stop looking at each other.

“Let’s,” Steve says, and Bucky says, “Yeah,” and they start walking down the street together, a bit awkwardly.

After a little while, Steve speaks again in a quiet voice. “I like your jeans.”

Bucky pops the cup’s lid. “You have good taste.”

“I was really glad you asked me. You can do that again anytime you want.”

Bucky’s holding his cup with both hands, ostensibly to warm them up; that way his fingers aren’t technically shaking. He can’t look Steve in the eye. “Are you sure?”

“I’m sure,” Steve says so warmly Bucky doesn’t really need his hot drink.

*

They take their time walking to the pharmacy, not talking much, Bucky savoring each sip of his latte. When they get there, Bucky peeks inside and retracts like a turtle. All three employees are white guys, and to top it all, one of them really looks like Rollins.

Steve catches on at once. “Want me to go in for you?”

Bucky’s too relieved to tell himself he should be able to do this. “Yes. Please. Thank you.” He hands him the prescription and a few bills. “I’ll just… stay here. Finish my latte.”

He closes his eyes, leaning against the wall in the sun, and tries to focus on the silky green taste and nothing else. Eventually, Steve steps out with a wrinkle between his brows, holding a little paper bag.

“Thank you,” Bucky says.

Steve doesn’t answer right away. It suddenly occurs to Bucky that Steve buying the meds for him also means that he, well, knows Bucky’s going on meds. Bucky doesn’t mind; he’d want Steve to know, and that way he doesn’t even have to tell him.

But the look on Steve’s face worries him. “What’s wrong?”

Steve blinks up at him. “Nothing. Sorry. I didn’t know you had hypertension problems on top of everything.”

“I don’t.” Bucky quickly checks that it’s the right drug. Apparently, it also serves as high blood pressure medication. “I need it for adrenaline control. For,” he hesitates, “for my nightmares.”

“Oh,” Steve says.

There’s an uncomfortable silence. Bucky’s only too aware of what Steve’s thinking about. He clearly knows he featured in Bucky’s nightmare, last time; Bucky must have talked in his sleep. Or maybe it was just because he shouted at Steve to stay away.

“They’re replicative nightmares,” Bucky says. “That means I usually relive stuff that’s actually happened. There was only one night where I didn’t dream at all. And that was the first night I spent at your place.”

Steve averts his eyes with a complicated expression. “You did dream the second night.”

“It doesn’t count. I mean it,” Bucky says softly when Steve looks down. “That one was an actual nightmare. The only one I’ve had so far. Don’t…” He struggles for words. “I can’t control what I dream about.”

Steve looks back up. “I never said it was your fault.”

“No, I know. You think it’s your fault. And I’m telling you, it was just a stupid dream. My brain made it up because I triggered myself and that’s all it was. It doesn’t mean anything about how I feel when I’m awake.” He meets Steve’s eyes. “Tell me you get it.”

Steve sighs. “I get it.”

“Do you really?”

He gets a half-smile in answer. “I can work on that.”

Bucky lets out a little laugh. “Fair enough.”

Now he knows what Steve works on in therapy, probably. He’s glad there’s a professional out there trying to get it into Steve’s head that not everything in the world is his fault.

“So,” Steve says in a praiseworthy effort, handing him the meds. “Do you need to take one of these now?”

“Um. I don’t think so. They’re night pills.” Bucky fishes an instruction sheet from the paper bag. “Yeah, that’s it. Take three before going to bed.” He takes the opportunity to check out the side-effects. Nothing too worrying, mostly dizziness. He reminds himself the pills might not even have the intended effects. All he can do is try and find out.

“Okay,” he says. “Well. I still have errands. If you want to come with me.”

“Of course. What are we buying? Is it proper coffee?”

“Sure, if you want,” Bucky smiles. “Mostly, though, I want—” He bites his lip. This is uncertain ground too, but it’s too late to backtrack now. “I want a razor. Like… like the one you shaved me with.”

Steve’s look is a bit more hopeful this time. “You liked that, then.”

Bucky’s head was too full of static for him to enjoy anything at the time, really. But he noticed the difference enough to make him want the same thing in his daily life. That’s got to count for something. “Yeah. I did.”

He wants to say, We can do it again sometime if you want, but asking Steve for dressing instructions gave him palpitations already. He has no idea where to draw the line or even if he should draw one. It’s exhausting, really, to be so wary of the road they walk together, frightened of it turning into a slippery slope again. But it’s better than not seeing each other. Anything is better.

“Okay then,” Steve says. “Good coffee and an old-fashioned razor. Lead the way.”

Coffee isn’t hard to find, and a bit of googling leads them to a hipster shop with an artfully mustachioed Indian man who knows way too much about razors. He talks Steve’s ear off, because of course Bucky’s letting him do that for him, too. And part of him feels guilty. But another part feels lighter than he did the last time this happened. Because now, Steve knows exactly what he’s doing and how it feels to Bucky. And he’s happy to do it.

Bucky ends up with a nice, ivory-colored razor, some cream and some aftershave, and a set of very sharp blades.

It would be easy, he thinks, to kill himself with them. That doesn’t seem to worry Steve, though the thought must have crossed his mind, too. And well, Bucky already had kitchen knives, anyway. Either he’s on suicide watch, or he isn’t. And he’s not. He doesn’t want to be. He wants to live, and that used to be a miserable wish, something that probably wouldn’t come true. He expected himself to give up. He felt like everyone expected him to give up.

Now, getting to live feels like something just crazy enough that it might actually happen. He has meds, and Dr. Banner, and Sam and Nat and group and—and Steve. Maybe he can get to a place where he won’t have to keep an eye on himself at all times. Maybe he can relax and think of something else for one day. Just one day.

They grab a sandwich on their way back and walk slowly, eating on the way, taking their time. It’s a nice day, but they get to Bucky’s building much too quickly, which means Steve is going to leave. It’s only 2pm. What is Bucky going to do the rest of the day?

“Okay then,” Steve says, as they get to the front door. “I guess I’ll see you soon.”

Bucky just stands there for a beat too long. When he realizes he forgot to answer, he also realizes that Steve hasn’t prompted him again. He’s standing there too, just waiting, and looking—hopeful? Cautious?

“Would you like to come up,” Bucky manages.

Steve hesitates. “We don’t have to…”

“Just—” Bucky interrupts, “as long as you’re not forcing yourself to be around me.”

Steve’s face loses some of that brittle cheer he’s held onto all day. He looks more tired that way, more vulnerable. “Nothing’s felt right since I came back,” he says, “except the time I get to spend with you.”

Bucky can’t speak for a few seconds. “You know,” he says eventually, “I’d been looking for a way to phrase that.”

*

Setting up Bucky’s new coffee machine takes them a surprisingly long time. They brew themselves a victory cup when they’re done. Steve’s perched on a stool next to Bucky, tasting the coffee and declaring it to be leagues better than the instant stuff. The taste’s all the same to Bucky, if he’s being honest, but he definitely enjoys the dark roast smell in the air.

He should buy matcha powder. He’s been thinking a lot about what Banner said, about how he’s been deprived enough. Also the whole putting his life on hold thing. If he likes something, and it’s not bad for him, he should just get it. Why not? As long as it’s not hurting anyone.

He doesn’t think asking Steve to pick his clothes hurt either of them.

“Are you still on leave from SHIELD?” he asks.

He should just enjoy the moment, but he can’t help being aware of how fleeting the time they spend together. Especially now that they’re openly just hanging out for the sake of it. He can’t get used to it if Steve’s going to go back to work soon. Bucky needs to know when that will happen, so he knows how long he’s got to cobble up some semblance of social life. So he won’t be too alone when Steve leaves.

But Steve takes a gulp of coffee and says: “Actually, I quit.”

Bucky stares at him.

“What,” he finally gets out. “When?”

“Administratively speaking, in three days. But I handed them my resignation shortly after I got you out of the hospital. I was angry they’d treat you like that, and—” He pauses. “And I don’t like much how they’ve treated me, either.”

This—can’t be about the week he had to spend in jail. Bucky tries to meet Steve’s eyes, but Steve is looking very intently at his cup.

“Steve, what do you mean?”

It takes Steve a few seconds before he starts talking. “I’m not a very good undercover operative. SHIELD said I was the best choice they had, which felt odd at the time. Sam helped me investigate, and—as it happens, they suspected things about Pierce. And they knew enough about me, about my private life.” He’s holding himself very stiff. “They thought I’d make a good rapist. So—I quit.”

Bucky casts for something to say. Everyone’s always so busy supporting him. With so many examples to draw from, there has to be something he can tell Steve. Something kind.

“You were terrible, though,” he says.

Steve lets out a noise that’s maybe a laugh.

“I mean… Steve, you saved me, even though I had nothing to do with your mission. You did the exact opposite of what was expected. You broke cover. I still don’t understand how you could find it in yourself to—oh—Steve,” he says, because tears are rolling down Steve’s face.

He doesn’t know what to say, so he presses their shoulders together. Steve sits there, somehow still very composed, just sniffing every once in a while. Bucky fishes in his pocket for tissues; he drew several at once during his last session with Banner, and they’re still bunched up down there. “Um. Here. Those are clean.”

“Thank you,” Steve says. His voice doesn’t betray the fact that he’s crying at all. Bucky’s never heard it shake except last time, when Steve barged in and just crumpled down. “They’re mint-scented.”

“Yeah. My therapist likes those.”

They sit together for a little while, as Steve quietly does his best to stop crying. Eventually, balling up his tissue, he gives Bucky a brave smile. “I kinda ruined the mood.”

“Following in my footsteps.”

Steve’s smile gets a tad more genuine. “You couldn’t ruin anything if you tried.”

There’s that fluttering bird in Bucky’s ribcage again. Part of him’s afraid at how easily Steve can make him feel things, when apparently nothing else can. Another part of him just wants to take his hand again. So he does.

Steve squeezes his fingers, and there’s a lot of things they could ask each other right then, about what this is and where it’s going, but it’s so much simpler not to say anything. They can just hold hands and pretend that’s normal, for now. It doesn’t hurt either of them. Bucky really hopes it doesn’t.

Chapter Text

It’s getting late in the afternoon, and they’ve been managing almost two hours of conversation with no tears involved, and Bucky’s very close to actually having a good day and of course that’s when his phone rings.

“Shouldn’t you answer that?” Steve asks.

“No. It’s fine.” Bucky wishes he’d stop feeling so sick whenever that happens. “It’s just Ross.”

Steve stares at him for about half a ringtone. “He’s still calling you?”

“I’ll answer him eventually,” Bucky says weakly. “I just can’t for now.”

“Can I answer it,” Steve asks.

Bucky freezes. He didn’t expect that. He should probably say no, because Steve’s done a lot of things for him lately. And this is a big thing. Definitely not a picking plates or picking clothes situation.

But Bucky’s been treating his phone like a time bomb for days on end, and he’s so tired of jumping every time it rings. He nods, and Steve instantly taps the green button.

“Ah!” Ross’ voice rises from the speakers. “Hello, James? Bucky? Listen, I’m really sorry to harass you like this, but I really need—”

“Everett,” Steve says in an extremely neutral voice.

Ross pauses. “Hello? Who is this?”

“Captain Rogers speaking. I’m afraid Bucky isn’t available at the moment. Can I take a message?”

“Rogers? Why are you answering Barnes’ phone?”

“I think I’ll ask you some questions instead. Did you tell Bucky he’d have to testify in court against Alexander Pierce?”

A short pause. “I’m afraid that’s confidential information.”

“My mistake,” Steve says politely. “Here I was thinking you could own up to something for once in your life.”

There’s the sound of spluttering on the line.

“Did you call him over and over again after he made it clear he didn’t want to talk to you?” Steve goes on. “You can claim confidentiality for that one, too, but I feel compelled to point out you just called it harassment all by yourself.”

“What, do you think I’m doing this for my own personal enjoyment?” Ross finally manages to articulate. “I’m well-aware this is a difficult topic for him, Rogers—I was his goddamn therapist, for Christ’s sake! We all have to do unpleasant things! Should we let Pierce slip out because Mr. Barnes was feeling too faint to take the stand? And besides, who are you to talk to me about harassment? Might I remind you that you’re the guy who kidnapped him from the hospital a few weeks after he got there?”

“Yes, I should apologize about that,” Steve acknowledges. “If I’d known you were the one in charge, I would have kidnapped him much sooner.”

Bucky can’t hold back a choked-off noise.

“Now, listen to me,” Steve goes on, still utterly calm. “I still have a few friends in SHIELD, and I’d advise you to stop calling this number.”

“Oh—oh, we’re doing threats, now?” Ross says in overblown disbelief. “Have you completely lost your mind? You’re the man who arrested Pierce—now you won’t let us get what we need to put him away for good?”

“The charges were arms trafficking and the evidence was paid for in ways you can’t imagine, no matter how many reports you read. Am I supposed to believe extra charges are absolutely necessary to condemn him? I have no idea why you thought I’d buy that. You said it yourself, I was the one they sent in.” Steve’s voice goes subzero. “Now explain it to me with small words. How dare you tell that lie to James Barnes?”

There is no answer whatsoever.

“Don’t call this number again, Everett. I will have you fired. Or I’ll find my way back to HQ and deck you. One of these for sure.”

And he hangs up.

For a few seconds afterwards, they just sit in silence staring at the phone. Bucky’s at a loss for words.

Steve catches his eye and looks away, rubbing the back of his neck. “Sorry. Ross was the one in charge back when they stuck Sam in suicide watch. I just don’t like the guy very much.”

“I don’t… I don’t like him either.” Bucky’s barely aware of what he’s saying. He’s trying to process what happened. “Steve, I—”

“I know, I got carried away. I didn’t even ask you if you actually wanted to go to court.”

“No, I—I don’t know.” Bucky feels sick all over again. “I want him to be charged with human trafficking.”

“I’ll testify,” Steve says quietly.

Bucky brusquely gets up. “No.” He goes to the counter as if to put distance between them. “No, I won’t—I won’t accept that. Steve, I knew this would happen, we’re doing it again—first you picking my clothes, then talking to the pharmacist, and now—”

“Bucky! Bucky.” Steve’s eyes are wide. “That’s not how I meant it.”

Bucky realizes he’s a bit breathless. “No?”

“I…” Steve seems to physically struggle to get the next words out. His back’s never been so ramrod straight. “I—was—abused—too.”

He casts Bucky a quick glance like he’s half-expecting him to object. When Bucky doesn’t, Steve swallows hard.

“I want to testify,” he says. “For myself.”

They stare at each other for a while.

“Oh,” Bucky says at last.

“So—there’ll be human trafficking charges too, whether you choose to get involved or not. Of course your testimony would probably weigh more than mine. But I’ll be doing it whatever you decide. It doesn’t all depend on you.”

“Oh,” Bucky repeats, weakly.

“And I’m trying to keep an eye on what I’m offering to do for you, I promise,” Steve hurries on. “I really liked that you asked me what to wear. It didn’t feel like too much to me.”

“No.” Bucky’s shoulders slump. “No, not to me, either.” He rubs his forehead. “Sorry. I freaked out.”

“Don’t be sorry.” Steve tries a smile. “It’s good to know we’re both watching out for that.”

“Yeah.” Bucky comes back across the room to sit next to him.

They just sit in silence for one moment.

“How about,” Steve says slowly, “I never offer. You have to be the one to ask me to pick things.”

Bucky looks up at him. “I… yeah. That sounds good.”

“And after I picked,” Steve continues, “you can still say no. Maybe on purpose, every once in a while. Fuck off, Steve, I want to wear brown shoes today.”

Bucky can’t help smiling. “Yeah. Okay.”

This is what Steve was trying to get him to do that day in the coffee shop. Set some limits. Bucky had rejected it whole; if he was the one defining things, it meant he still had to choose everything in the end, it took none of the stress away. Or so he believed. As it turns out, the more they define things now, the lighter he feels.

He takes a deep breath. “So what… what should I wear tomorrow?”

Steve smiles back. “Can I see your closet?”

They go to Bucky’s bedroom and Steve lays out an outfit for him. It’s nothing special, just a white t-shirt and blue jeans, but Bucky looks at the clothes on the bed and suddenly feels like the whole room’s spinning, because he used not to wear clothes at all—he was so used to this routine humiliation, to the point that he didn’t notice his own nakedness anymore, and now he’s back in the world, and those clothes belong to him and this room belongs to him and this apartment belongs to him.

How is he here? He feels like he can’t stop thinking about the island, yet at the same time it’s like he keeps forgetting about it, keeps being shocked when he remembers that it really happened to him. That now it’s all over. He survived somehow, and it’s all over.

“Bucky?”

And Steve’s there, standing in the sun streaming from the window. He’s another miracle entirely. Bucky could have been rescued and then left alone. Steve stayed, because he’s something else. Something more. Just looking at him feels transformative.

Bucky can’t control what his mouth says next. “I really want to kiss you again. Properly, at least once. At least someday.”

Chapter Text

“You told him that?”

“Don’t sound so pleased,” Bucky mumbles.

“But I’m extremely pleased,” Banner answers cheerfully. “This was a very important thing to say. What did he answer?”

“Nothing, just—I don’t know, what anyone would’ve said, that he’d be waiting for me to be ready—” Bucky takes a sharp breath. “I wish I hadn’t said that. Whatever he expects from me, I won’t be able to do it.”

“Are you talking about sex, now?”

“You’re a therapist. Isn’t everything about sex?”

“I’m wounded you’d think such a reductive thing of me,” Banner answers, deadpan.

Bucky huffs through his nose. They’ve only barely touched on the subject of sex before, really. But it feels like it has to come up now.

“I keep thinking I don’t ever want to have sex again. I’m done. And I don’t need it. But—” He struggles for words. “At the same time—I keep catching myself imagining how it’ll be when we—when we finally do it. Like it’s bound to happen. You know?”

“Hm,” Banner says. “Do you feel like it must happen for your relationship to be complete?”

Bucky shakes his head. “No. No. I know he wouldn’t mind if I couldn’t. But it was the best part of those three days on the island with him. And now it’s kind of like… this horizon I’m waiting to reach. The moment when we can have sex again. Where we can come together again.”

“So, yes, actually.”

Bucky shoots him a betrayed look. Banner raises his eyebrows. “Remember what we said last time about too much, too fast.”

Bucky stares at his hands on his lap. He knows what Banner means, and he remembers this reasoning making a lot of sense to him last time. But also he can’t help the anger, the pushback, like a child who doesn’t want to be told what to do. He’s not a child, and he’s been ordered around enough for several lifetimes.

Maybe Banner senses that it’s time to divert, because he asks, “How do you feel about your body?”

“I… don’t understand the question,” Bucky answers, glancing back up at him.

“Sexual assault victims,” Banner says with care, “sometimes describe feeling broken. Or empty. Like their body isn’t their own anymore.”

“I,” Bucky says.

He has to wait a few moments for more words to come.

“At first,” he finally says. “Before I was sold to Pierce. The—the preliminary training. I just didn’t understand what was being done to me. There was this… this huge wall inside my mind. Like nothing made sense. Like trying to picture a new color. I don’t actually remember much about that time.”

He feels that same blankness now. He isn’t even crying. It’s something he can just talk about like he isn’t there. He could probably piece that time together now if he tried, acknowledge what they did and why. But it feels safer to leave it all lying apart on the floor of his mind.

“Pierce was different. He wanted me to be aware… to process… If I was in a constant state of shock, it was cheating. It was too easy. He needed me to be able to fight back. He wanted me to consciously choose not to fight back, instead of just locking myself up inside my mind. So I began to feel like it was all…”

He can’t say words like mundane or routine. Yet he can’t deny a form of weariness appeared after a while. Since he wasn’t allowed to check out entirely, he got used to it. People can get used to anything.

Eventually, he just looks at his lap again. “I suppose three years is a long time.”

“It’s a very long time,” Banner approves softly, and now Bucky feels a dangerous urge to cry.

He doesn’t understand why he only feels that way when other people acknowledge what he went through. He feels like he should tell them to stop, like he’s been faking the entire thing and he’s suddenly ashamed of having tricked them.

“You haven’t answered my question,” Banner presses gently. “How do you feel about your body now?”

“I feel nothing special, really.”

“Do you look at it when you shower?” Banner asks.

“What? No.”

“Do you touch yourself sometimes?”

Bucky tenses. “No.”

Banner looks at him for a few seconds. “Does the word utilitarian make sense in connection with it?”

“I—I guess so,” Bucky says, relaxing. He was afraid to hear one of the words Banner’s just used, words like broken or empty. But this—yes. His body’s a utility. It’s what he used to interact with Pierce and the island. It’s what he uses to interact with the world now.

Since the violation wouldn’t stop, he had to at least make it feel like less of a violation. He doesn’t need Banner’s help analyzing that; it was very much a conscious process. He had to make his body neutral. He didn’t quite manage all the way—he still hurt, he still wished it would stop, but the feeling of desecration was mostly gone. And that’s how he survived, and that’s fine. He can still function that way. He doesn’t need things to change.

But of course Banner’s seen him waver the moment before.

“Do you think you could masturbate if you tried?”

Bucky grips the armrests of his seat. “No.”

“Why not?”

“Just—don’t ask me that.”

“Why not?”

He tries very hard to answer, to make this productive, but nothing comes out. What he wants to say, stupidly, is that he doesn’t want to talk about this because it’s private.

And that’s the gaping trap. His body can’t be something private. Because if it’s private again then all the memories in his brain are about violating that privacy. And he won’t be able to bear that.

“Just don’t,” he manages. “That’s enough.”

Banner shifts in his chair. “I don’t think you should have sex with Steve at all until you can touch yourself.”

Bucky gets up and leaves the office, slamming the door behind him.

*

He doesn’t even realize where he’s gone until he finds himself coming out of the subway. The next moment, he’s at the door. He watches himself ring like someone else’s moving his hand.

The speakerphone comes to life. “Hello?”

“It’s,” Bucky says. “It’s me.”

“Bucky?”

“Can you please let me in,” Bucky says. “I need you to let me in.”

*

Later, he’ll regret coming to Sam. He’ll feel ashamed of ruining his Monday afternoon like this. Sam possibly had clients of his own, or other plans. He didn’t deserve Bucky coming into his living room to have a breakdown.

“Bucky,” Sam says. “Hey. Are you okay?”

Bucky’s sitting on one of the living room chairs. He feels ice cold. There’s small gaps in his memory, like he’s been losing pockets of time. “I. I don’t know. No.”

Sam, he notices, is deliberately not sitting down to face him like Banner would. This isn’t him being a therapist. He’s leaning on the counter. “Where did you come from like that?”

“Banner,” Bucky manages.

“Straight from his office?” Sam purses his lips when Bucky nods. “Are you okay for me to let him know you’re here?”

“You… you have his number?”

“We’re colleagues. I know him a bit.”

“Yeah. Do that. I don’t want him to worry. I’m not mad at him.” That’s a lie. Bucky’s so angry at Banner he’s shaking with it. He can’t let it out, though; he can’t let out any of what’s inside. His voice doesn’t sound like his own. “I’m sorry to put you in this position again.”

Sam doesn’t answer, texting Banner. When he looks up, he says, “Did you eat something?”

“Aren’t you going to ask me what happened?” Bucky asks, again with this odd formal tone, this rigidity like he’s corseting his entire self.

“You can tell me if you want, but I ain’t your shrink.”

Sam seems deliberately laid-back in answer, but Bucky only doubles up on the stiffness. “I’m sorry Steve and I didn’t tell you about what we were doing.”

“That’s fine, man. You knew I’d tell you to stop, and you wanted to do it. I guess you had to try it for yourselves to realize it couldn’t work.”

That cuts off Bucky’s breathing. He thinks of what he told Steve, about kissing him, and what Banner told him, about having sex. He can’t bear this. He can’t contain all of it for much longer. He’s going to break. Something has to break. It can’t work. Sam just said. It can’t work and it was just a matter of time before he realized it.

“Can’t I just have this,” he says in a wisp of voice.

Sam looks at him for a moment. “What is it you want?”

It could sound accusatory, but he manages to make it sound like he’s simply curious. Bucky’s mouth shapes words without letting them out. Then he hears himself say the most pathetic thing he could possibly say.

“I wish none of this had happened to me.”

He’s back to square one. Watching the ceiling at the hospital, knowing he can’t do anything with himself. It’s too late. There’s nothing left. He’s a wasteland inside. When he tries to reach the way he was feeling the day before in his bedroom, with fresh clothes laid out on the bed, when he felt moved to tell Steve he wanted to kiss him one day, it’s like he dreamed that moment completely. He can’t possibly have felt this way, so close to free. Now he’s hit a steel wall again, and he can see his reflection in it; how broken he really is, still. He can see he’s only scratched the surface. He can’t possibly hope to leave an actual dent, much less break through. It’s useless. It always was.

“Can you give me some pills,” he says. “Please. I can’t do this. There has to be something. I can’t do this. I can’t feel like this.”

“Yeah,” Sam says in a quiet voice, “maybe it’s time for a break. You can go in the guest room.”

Bucky goes to bed fully dressed. He’ll wrinkle his clothes, but he can’t undress. It’s like ants are crawling under his skin. The mere thought of seeing his naked body disturbs him now.

Yeah. He’s got sexual trauma. What a fucking surprise.

He takes the pill Sam gives him, trusting like a child. Then he closes his eyes and wishes for nothing. To feel nothing at all.

Chapter Text

The sleeping pill traps Bucky between wakefulness and nightmares. Chased by the usual sensations of his dreams while still knowing himself to be dreaming, he tries to steer clear of the worst ones but there’s nowhere safe to run in his mind, so it feels exhausting even as he sleeps.

Eventually, though, he comes back to the surface and can tell he was in fact asleep, because now he realizes time’s passed, and he can hear voices, droning deep in the apartment.

It’s grey outside when he opens his eyes. Blurry shapes fall into place to draw the neutral, pastel furniture of Sam’s guest room. This is where he slept when he came out of the hospital. And now he’s back.

The light’s changed enough to let him know he must have slept all afternoon. Shame clutches at him. He has to say thanks and leave.

But he’s still so tired. He doesn’t want to get up. He doesn’t want to do anything. This moment is the only safe place he’s got, since he can’t think about the past and feels scared of the future. It’s all he can do to remain suspended there. Maybe, if he closes his eyes, he’ll go back to sleep.

He turns over and the covers flap over the bedstand, sending the lamp to crash on the floor.

He freezes. The voices have stopped. The moment didn’t last long.

A few seconds later, someone knocks on the door. “Bucky?”

Everything inside Bucky jumps.

He peeks over the covers, not sure if he’s imagined it. “S… Steve?”

“Can I come in?” Steve’s speaking quietly. “Or I can call Sam if you want.”

“No—come in,” Bucky says, struggling to straighten up on his elbows.

The door clicks open and Steve steps inside, closing it cautiously behind him. Thank God, he doesn’t look as frazzled as the last time he showed up out of nowhere. Sam must have not called him right away. He’s wearing jeans and a soft blue sweater.

Bucky scoots up to sit against the wall, moving to the side to give him some room. Steve blinks, but then he toes out of his shoes and climbs into bed with him, sitting on top of the covers.

They don’t say anything at first.

“Sam call you?” Bucky rasps eventually.

“Yesterday. Said no rush and I could come over in the morning if I wanted. It’s Tuesday,” Steve says, probably seeing Bucky’s confusion.

Bucky glances out the window again. That grey light—he thought that was nightfall, but it’s early morning. What kind of pill did Sam give him? When he glances at the nightstand, the box is still there, and it’s—really light stuff. The exhaustion was all his own.

“What did Sam say?” he asks, not looking away from the pills.

“Just said that you weren’t feeling great and that you needed to rest.”

Bucky snorts sadly. That’s Sam all over.

They sit in silence for a few more moments. Steve seems content just to be there, in no hurry whatsoever. From his aftershave to the barely perceptible sound of his breathing—everything about him makes Bucky feels calmer, safer than he did even as he slept. There’s the familiar twisting ache, too, in the pit of his stomach. Like if he could only just reach out, it’d be soothed forever.

“You always smell so good,” he says eventually.

Steve turns his head to look at him. “Thanks.”

Bucky knows what he wants to ask, but it takes him long seconds before he feels like he’ll manage to speak steadily.

“Can I lean against you?”

Steve blinks again, but then just says, “Yeah.”

Bucky does, and Steve automatically puts his arm around him, freezing for a moment as he clearly wonders if he should have. But Bucky presses against him, and so Steve even pulls him a little closer. Bucky can feel his heartbeat through his blue sweater. He’s been wanting something like this for so long. Why was it so hard to ask, so hard to get there? He doesn’t remember, now.

“I always tie myself up in knots thinking about you,” he says. “And then when you’re here it all feels so simple.”

“Same here,” Steve murmurs.

Bucky closes his eyes. “What do you worry about?”

“That you don’t really know anyone else, so you have no real choice about spending time with me.” He pauses. “Or maybe that I remind you of the island too much and you’d be better off if we just didn’t see each other.”

“You can’t have that last one,” Bucky says. “Called it first.”

“Yeah?” There’s a faint smile in Steve’s voice. “And what else you got?”

“I’m worried I won’t ever get better and you’ll have to deal with my breakdowns all the time. I’m worried I can’t ever have sex with you.”

He expects Steve to be at the very least a little shocked. But all he gets in answer is, “Why would that worry you?”

Bucky can’t speak for a moment.

“Do you remember what I asked for the night I kissed you?” he finally asks.

Steve doesn’t need to think about it. “Don’t make me do this alone.”

“Thought that’d scare you off.”

“I could also use you around, Buck,” Steve says in the light tone he uses for euphemisms.

Bucky reopens his eyes to look at the ceiling. “Aren’t you worried we’re just obsessed with each other?”

“Sure,” Steve says quietly. “Maybe that’s all love is.”

The words ring in the air for a minute. It feels like the room itself is holding its breath.

“Can I,” Bucky says, “try. Now.”

Steve’s embrace loosens. “I’ll stay still.”

Bucky sits up. His heart is beating faster already. Steve looks at him with those blue, blue eyes. Then he closes them when Bucky cups his face. He’s clean shaven, warm. He’s got very long eyelashes, and a slight bump in his nose.

Kissing him feels like someone’s just reached in to grab Bucky’s heart, so hard the world blurs. It’s so painful. It’s so easy. It’s the easiest thing he’s ever done.

Chapter Text

They come out of the room eventually. Sam’s waiting for them on the couch, his arm slung over the backrest, looking for all the world like this is absolutely how he’d always planned to spend his early Tuesday morning. Natasha’s here, too. She raises her mug at Bucky. “Told you we’d get coffee sometime.”

“I’m,” Bucky says. “I’m sorry for all this. You didn’t all have to come. Sam, I…”

Sam gives him a smile. “You shouldn’t apologize at all. I’m glad you came straight to me.”

There was only you, Bucky wants to say. He couldn’t go all the way back to Brooklyn, not without breaking down on the way, and he knew exactly one person who lived in Manhattan. I didn’t have anywhere else to go. But that’s not true. He could have in fact gone anywhere. He picked a place where people wouldn’t have to worry about him. Where they’d know where he was. And—he is glad for that, too. He’s glad he could be found.

“Don’t be embarrassed. Ask the girls next time you drop by,” Natasha says. “We all have breakdown stories.”

“If she’s being too flippant, I can splash her,” Sam adds. “Just say the word. Coffee’s cold, anyway.”

Natasha ignores him. “Come here, grab a mug. We’ll make a fresh pot.”

“You know, I actually have matcha in the kitchen,” Sam says. “Want that instead?”

Bucky’s never wanted it so badly in his life. “Please.”

*

They all sit together and mercifully talk about baseball, or maybe politics, or possibly the weather. Bucky can let it all wash over him and pretend they didn’t gather here because of him, because Sam rang the alarm again when he broke down again. He’s not sure how he’s feeling; last night was like there was a great raw, bloody-edged hole inside him, but now it’s like it’s been filled with marshmallow and he’s tottering between existential despair and stupid, bubbly joy. He’s just glad he has a cup to occupy his hands and conversation he doesn’t have to take part in.

“By the way,” Sam tells him quietly while Steve and Natasha are in animated conversation over something that’s probably not that important. “Banner texted back. He says he’d like you to call him, if you feel like it.”

Bucky’s still so angry. But he knows it’s not actually Banner’s fault.

“Yeah. Okay. I’ll… do that.”

He goes back to the guest room and sits on the bed. The room still feels saturated with the kiss, and it gives him strength. He calls, and it rings three long times. It’s not even 8am; maybe that’s too early.

“Banner.”

Bucky draws a breath. “Dr. Banner. Sorry to disturb you. It’s, um. Bucky Barnes.”

“Give me a minute,” Banner answers. Bucky can hear something rustle. He definitely was still in bed. “Thank you for calling me back.”

“You’re… you’re welcome.” Bucky doesn’t know where to go from there.

It’s Banner who breaks the silence. “I must apologize.”

“Do you?” Bucky’s anger is completely gone all of a sudden. “I hated what you said. But that doesn’t make it less true.”

“I’ve been very blunt.”

“I like that you’re blunt. It makes me feel like I’m getting somewhere.”

“Who wouldn’t enjoy that feeling? But I think you’re putting too much stock in it sometimes. Which might be part of why you’re constantly pushing yourself in every aspect of your life. And I got carried away this time, pushing back.”

“Well. It still brought me somewhere.”

“I’m glad you feel that way.”

“I mean I,” Bucky says. “I kissed Steve.”

There’s a short silence on the line.

“When did that happen?”

“Just… now. Earlier.”

“And how did that make you feel?”

Bucky can’t help smiling at the worn-out phrase. It’s like an olive branch.

“It made me feel free.”

“Well,” Banner says in a soft voice. “Perhaps I was wrong.”

“We weren’t talking about kissing yesterday, though.” Bucky just has to think about touching himself to feel a shiver of something deeper than disgust. Outright rejection. He can’t; he can’t, and that’s final. “But listen, I just… I can’t deal with all this. I’m not strong enough. So I’ll just take my body the way it is. I can function that way.”

“Wouldn’t you rather be fine?”

Never mind, there’s that anger. Bucky tries to control the exasperation in his voice. “What kind of question is that?”

“Remember what I told you,” Banner says. “You can get better. It’s just a matter of work.”

“But I’ve been working on it. And I thought I’d been making progress but I haven’t progressed at all.”

“Are you the exact same you were a month ago? Three months ago? Six months ago?”

Bucky doesn’t need to try and visualize where he was six months ago.

“No,” he says hoarsely. “No.” Then he scrubs a hand over his eyes. “But there’s still so much… And I’m tired. I’m really so tired.”

“I understand that,” Banner says, “very much. But you know, this isn’t a monolithic project you must complete all at once or abandon forever. Think of it as a million little tasks.”

“That’s not encouraging.”

“Isn’t it? What if someone advised you to eat all of the food you’ll ever eat in one sitting? You know, just so you can get that repetitive task out of the way. It keeps you alive day to day, so doing it all at once couldn’t possibly be harmful—”

Bucky rubs his forehead now. “I get the metaphor.”

“Good. I’m rather proud of that one.” Banner sounds, as always, just this side of serious. “Recovery’s the same. You only have to do exactly what you can stand every day. What you need every day. Never anything more.” He pauses, as if debating whether to finish his thought. Eventually, he says, “I know you’re used to being forced past your limits, but that’s over.”

He was right to hesitate; Bucky feels something hot and tight grip his throat. He swallows a few times until the feeling’s passed.

“As for the concrete side of things,” Banner continues, “before you walked out, I was gearing up to talk to you about another treatment that’s called EMDR, which can help a lot with processing traumatic events.”

Bucky’s read a few leaflets at the hospital. “Is that the one that involves focusing very hard on my worst memories?”

“The very same.” Banner pauses, then says, “Curse me out. I can tell you want to.”

“Fuck you,” Bucky mumbles. Then he sighs, because Banner’s right. That’s why Bucky will always be at least a little angry at him: he’s always goddamn right.

Bucky’s been desperate a lot, on the island. There were a lot of times where he wanted to give up, where he felt he couldn’t stand another day of this and he knew how it ended, anyway. The little room was always waiting for him. But he still told himself he could try just another day. Just in case. While he was still alive to try. He knows discouragement and hopelessness are as fleeting as everything else in life.

“Tell me more,” he says.

Banner explains in detail, and while Bucky recoils at the thought of immersing himself in the sensations he recalls from the island, he can’t help being intrigued by the idea of simple external stimuli. Following someone’s finger with his eyes, hearing sounds in each ear. It literally sounds like reprogramming his brain. And God knows that’s what he needs.

“Think about it. You can tell me next Monday if you feel like trying. But remember, too, that it doesn’t have to be right away. You’ve got time.”

Bucky hesitates. “So… I can come back Monday?”

“Bucky,” Banner says. “You’re not the first of my patients to just walk out. That’s not a failure on your part, and I wouldn’t even say it’s a failure on mine, even though it’s a sign of a rather brutal bedside manner that’s played tricks on me before.” He sounds slightly self-deprecating, but then he always does, like he’s constantly playing a joke on himself, inviting people to be in on it. “As for what happened afterwards, you’ve been great. You removed yourself from an overwhelming situation and got yourself to a good place. I know Dr. Wilson was very impressed. You haven’t done a single thing wrong.”

“Oh. Well. Okay then.”

“I’ll be waiting for you, same time Monday. And I’ll keep working on myself until then.”

“You… you’re very good. Really, you are.”

“Oh, I know,” Banner deadpans. “That doesn’t mean I can’t be even better.”

*

“Thanks, Sam,” Bucky says, coming back to give him the phone. Steve and Natasha have moved behind the counter to rinse their cups, bickering in a way that doesn’t quite manage to hide how attuned they are to everything Bucky’s doing. He can’t forget he’s the reason for this little gathering.

“All good?” Sam asks.

“Yeah. We… Yeah.” He sits down next to him. “Banner talked about someone named Dr. Wilson. I’m just realizing now that’s you.”

“Sure is. Two doctorates, baby.”

Bucky nods. “Also, I broke your lamp. I think. In the bedroom.”

“That’s okay, man.” He raises an eyebrow at Bucky. “Banner’s good but he is a little hard sometimes, isn’t he?”

Bucky should have known better than to try and change the subject. “Yeah, he is. But. I think that’s what I need. To deal with the hard stuff.” He pauses. “Did Steve tell you about Ross? And the trial?”

“Yeah.” Sam shakes his head. “I’m sorry, there’s nothing professional I can say about Ross.”

That makes Bucky smile, and that helps him go on. “I… I don’t know if I can testify. Seeing Pierce again—” He can’t even picture it; all he can imagine is falling apart completely. “I’m not sure I’d be much help.”

“You’ve got time to decide. And you’ve got options, too. They can interview you beforehand, record you, so you won’t have to answer questions before a jury. Or you can do a written testimony. There are precedents for assault trials.”

“Yeah. That’s right.” Bucky exhales.

“Was that what drove you out of Banner’s office?” Sam asks, carefully. “You don’t have to say, of course—”

“No. It was—something else. Island stuff.” God, he’s only ever talking about awful, depressing things. He has to find something funny to say next, or he’ll die. “You know me, I’ve got no shortage of things to have breakdowns over.”

That wasn’t funny at all, but Sam still gives him a laugh. “You should think of giving some of those things away.”

“No way. I’m a hoarder.”

Sam laughs again, and this time it feels more like it might actually have been funny. Then he turns to Steve and Natasha. “Okay, I don’t know about you guys, but I’m starving!”

They do brunch at a small place nearby, and then they walk around Central Park, the four of them; and it’s amazing how Sam and Natasha can keep the conversation going about not much of anything at all, light and fun and utterly unimportant. Night’s actually falling by the time they all reconvene to Sam’s place. They order pizza, they eat again, they chat again, and then Bucky starts feeling like he’s more than overstayed his welcome. He’s exhausted, anyway.

“I should… probably go home, now.”

“Whatever you like,” Sam answers. “You know you’re always welcome here.”

“I know. I really do.”

Steve’s ducked out into another room, presumably to retrieve his jacket. He was clearly waiting for Bucky’s cue. Bucky glances at Natasha. “Hey, um. Think I could go back to group tomorrow?”

She gives him a smile. “I’ll ask and let you know.”

“Thanks for… today. Both of you.” He knows they both have busy lives. “You don’t even know me that well.”

“We know you enough,” Natasha says, and she might have said more except Steve chooses this moment to come back, which gives Bucky the excuse he needs to get up and leave before he can make things any more awkward.

It makes sense they’d leave together, since they both live in Brooklyn, so Sam and Natasha don’t bat an eyelid. Maybe they wouldn’t even if they knew what happened between them that morning in the bedroom. They do trust Steve, and for some reason, they seem to trust Bucky, too, even though he’s brought nothing but disorder and gloominess into their lives. It seems that to put everything on hold for Bucky now equals doing the same for Steve, and vice versa.

It’s cold out; Steve stays close on the sidewalk. As they get into the subway station, Bucky says quietly, “I don’t want to go back to my apartment.”

“That’s good to hear,” Steve answers, pushing the turnstile. “’Cause I don’t want you to, either.”

*

As they walk to Steve’s place, Bucky feels Steve’s hand brush his own. The second time it happens, Steve’s fingers actually flick Bucky’s palm. It’s like he’s knocking on a door, and Bucky suddenly realizes he’s asking for permission.

He laces their fingers together, and Steve says nothing but squeezes back. It’s okay; it’s dark and cold out, there’s no one to see.

Climbing up the stairs makes Bucky’s heart beat faster, not really in a pleasant way. He only ever came here in a fraught, tense state of mind. But when the door opens on Steve’s apartment, all he can feel is relief at the thought that he’ll get to spend the night away from his own place. With Steve, instead of thinking about him.

“Where do you want to sleep?” Steve asks.

Bucky goes still.

Steve lets go of his hand to take off his jacket and scarf. “I won’t be able to pick that one for you.”

“No. I know.” Bucky unbuttons his own coat. “Let’s try and share the bed. If it doesn’t feel right I’ll just sleep on the couch.”

Steve lends him some honest-to-god pajamas. Bucky puts them on in the bathroom. Part of him regrets the jumpsuit, yet he wouldn’t want to go back to that cold, empty state of mind. He’s here as himself. He doesn’t have to call Steve anything but Steve. It’s not familiar ground as before. But that’s fine. Everything he’s familiar with is awful.

He takes his meds, then climbs into bed next to him. Steve shuts the light then turns to his side to look at Bucky. His face looks very soft in the blue glow from the window, and his voice is soft too. “Think you’ll manage to sleep?”

“Yeah, I’m pretty tired,” Bucky answers quietly, even though that’s not really what he was asking. “You?”

“Shouldn’t be a problem.”

Bucky wants to kiss him again. He wants to get close, disappear in his arms. But he hasn’t been under the covers with someone since the island, and he’s wary of himself. He won’t have Steve trigger him again. And he can’t rush anything with him. Not again.

Right now things feel okay enough. Steve’s feet brush under Bucky’s under the covers. Bucky finds them again, presses against them. “Good night.”

“Night, Buck.”

*

In the dream—

In the dream, in the memory, he’s sleeping next to Steve in the night. He can hear his heartbeat, slow and regular. The storm’s raging out, muffled behind the walls.

And he sleeps on.

Chapter Text

When Bucky opens his eyes, Steve’s already half-awake and watching him, heavy-lidded.

It’s very early, motes of dust suspended in the pale light coming through the window. Bucky still doesn’t like sleeping in a bed; he expected himself to like sleeping next to someone even less. But he wanted to be close to Steve, and—he’s fine. Maybe because Steve’s looking at him. People didn’t look him in the eyes often.

“Hey,” Bucky says quietly. “I had a pretty good dream.”

Steve’s voice is deep and hoarse with sleep. “The meds?”

“Maybe.”

Steve slowly reaches out. “Can I?”

Bucky nods, wordless, then closes his eyes when Steve cups his face. Steve’s thumb rubs across his cheekbone.

“Think I could hold you?” he asks quietly. “Just for a little while?”

Bucky doesn’t reopen his eyes; Steve would read something too raw in there. He does want that, so much, but apparently his brain’s decided that’s where it would draw the line today, because he thinks of arms pulling him across the bed, dragging him on top of another body, hands sliding down his sides to grip his thighs, his ass. His arms bound in his back, a thigh pushing between his legs; his breath quick and hot against the mattress, his face pressed close to Rumlow’s head so he could hear Bucky’s every hiss, every repressed whimper.

“I’m not sure,” he mumbles. “I want to, but—I’m just not sure…”

“What if you held me?”

Bucky’s eyes blink open. Steve is looking at him with an open expression, like he asked nothing out of the ordinary.

“I didn’t think you,” Bucky starts. Then he stops. Then he says, “You’d want that?”

Steve raises his eyebrows, but just nods.

“But,” Bucky starts, because it’s really the last thing he expected Steve to ask and he can’t even articulate why. “I. Okay. Yeah. Come—come here.”

Steve smiles and crawls across to him. Bucky lets him come half on top of him and pillow his head on his chest. He folds his arms around Steve, a hand across his back, another in his hair. And it’s weird, it really is, like they’re doing it the wrong way around according to some unspoken law.

But also Bucky likes it so much. To have him there, to be the one doing the holding, feeling him breathe under his hands. He slowly relaxes and ends up tucking his face into Steve’s hair, breathing him in.

“I, um,” he says. “Natasha texted me yesterday night. I have group today in, like, an hour.”

 “Okay,” Steve says.

“I was thinking. I could come back here afterwards. Maybe.”

“Okay,” Steve repeats with a smile in his voice, and then they don’t say anything else for a little while.

*

Bucky’s still very shy making himself known at the welcome desk, but as soon as he gives his name, the receptionist smiles at him. “You’re early. Go right ahead.”

Jessica’s the only one there already, setting up chairs. She gives him a short glance. “Barnes.”

“Um. Hello.”

“Give me a hand,” she says, so he does.

After a few minutes of total silence, he says, “I’m seeing Banner now.”

“Great.” Jessica doesn’t look up, unstacking more chairs. “How’s he working out for you?”

Bucky hears himself say, “He’s really annoying.”

Jessica snorts. “Yeah.”

“He’s really good.”

“Yeah.” Jessica sets down the final chair. “I should give him a call.”

“You… you’re not seeing him?”

“Walked out on our second session,” she tells him. “Never went back.”

Bucky opens his mouth, though he has no idea what he’s going to say, but that’s when Maria and Carol show up anyway. “Bucky! Oh my God, hi. We were wondering about you.”

“Hey.” He’s blushing, which is just stupid. “Sorry I didn’t come back before.”

“You don’t have to be here every week. Yelena’s not here today.” Carol smiles at him. “She’s got a date.”

Bucky smiles back. “That’s… that’s great.”

They all sit down around the circle and Bucky realizes everyone is staring at him again. “Um. I don’t have to go first this time.”

“Just go on already,” Carol says.

“How are things with Steve?” Maria prompts.

Bucky clears his throat. “We kissed.”

The girls cheer—“Way to go!”—or rather, Maria and Carol do, and Jessica almost smiles. Bucky can’t say he’s ever been cheered for kissing a boy. He’s childishly thrilled, like he’s eight years old again and facing rapturous applause after his recorder recital.

“Thanks. I… We… It’s still tricky. I mean. There’s stuff that’s just so fucked up. But we…”

He remembers how Natasha phrased it, the day she came to his place.

“We really care about each other,” he manages.

“That’s all you need, really,” Maria says.

Bucky’s not used to making people happy with news of himself, and he wants more of that feeling. “I actually came straight from his apartment today.”

If he expected more cheering, he’s disappointed. He just gets careful looks in answer.

Maria asks, “As in, you stayed over?”

“Yeah. Oh, but—we’re not sleeping together. Um. Yet.”

They relax slightly at that, and he wonders how many people before him tried to throw themselves back into sex only to have it turn out badly.

“So you want to?” Carol asks.

Bucky suddenly feels what he felt in Banner’s office two days before. Thin ice. He won’t be able to go very far on that ground. But it’s a valuable question, one he hasn’t really asked himself before.

“I don’t know,” he says. “I… Maybe I want to do it just to prove to myself I can.”

Carol gives the little head bob that means she’s been there.

“But otherwise, I don’t have—I don’t want—physically, I mean, I don’t…” He shifts on his chair, panic rising again like water in his lungs. He can’t. He can’t. He lets it out, gives up, changes course. “Anyway. Just. Sleeping with someone just to feel good about myself would be messed up.”

“I’d say that’s what a good proportion of straight men do,” Jessica deadpans.

Carol snorts. Maria’s not done, though. “Is that really the only reason you’d want it?”

“I…”

He can feel Steve’s fingers gently easing the plug out of him. He remembers Steve’s broad hands on his thighs, holding on while he took Bucky in his mouth. What his tongue did around the piercings.

“I used to like sex,” he says.

Maria nods. “Well. Just take your time.”

“I’m gonna have to.” Part of him still wants to give up on sex entirely. It would be so much less work. He doesn’t have to fix this. He’s had enough sex for a lifetime. There’s other things he could do with his life.

But, says a voice that sounds irritatingly like Banner, what he had wasn’t sex. He actually doesn’t have a lot of experience, discounting the island. Two fumbling boyfriends in high school, an on-and-off sex buddy in the army. That’s it.

He doesn’t want that to be it.

“But wait, I don’t understand,” Carol interrupts. “Are you guys living together now?”

“No, I… I mean, I don’t think we can… It’d be too soon. And I still have my apartment, I just… I really don’t like it.” Which reminds him. “What else do you think there is?”

“Sorry?”

“I mean… I always wanted to have my own place, but now I do and it doesn’t feel right. I just… can’t think of another way to live.”

“Living with someone’s a good start,” Maria says. “It doesn’t have to be Steve.”

Bucky stiffens. “I couldn’t live with anyone else.”

“I had this neighbor,” Jessica blurts out. “Couldn’t stand the guy. But just talking to him in the hallway helped.” She raises her dark gaze to Bucky. “If you need to be around people, there’s options. Rent a room, find a place with a nosy landlord. A shared kitchen. That kind of stuff.”

“And if you just don’t like living in one place, then don’t,” Carol says. “Go backpacking, or whatever.”

“Okay, but I’d still have to settle down eventually,” Bucky points out.

“Sure. Eventually. Are you in some sort of hurry?”

“I guess not,” he says, thinking about finish lines crossed too soon. “I… I’ll think about all this. Thanks.” He clears his throat. “Okay, someone else’s turn now, please.”

*

As they all push back their chairs, he sees that he’s missed a text from Steve.

I had to go out—might as well come to meet you

Another one says, I’m across the street.

He sees him as soon as he comes back to the entrance, through the glass doors. Steve’s waiting across the street indeed, obviously trying very hard not to seem like he’s lurking around a women’s shelter, and looking all the more conspicuous for it. Bucky can’t help smiling.

Maria raises an eyebrow. “What? Is that him?”

Bucky nods, glancing at her. “What do you think?”

She smiles. “I think your entire face lit up when you saw him.”

“Have you ever…?” He’s not sure what he’s trying to ask. Maria doesn’t talk about herself much in the circle, probably because she’s leading the sessions. “Do you really think we can…?”

“After Carol came back,” she says, “it took us a while. But we got there in the end.”

Bucky knows Carol was in an abusive, gaslighting relationship with some guy for several years; that’s what she talks about when it’s her turn. But he still has a hard time reconciling this idea with her. She’s so sunny, so sharp-witted. So nonchalant too, like nothing could reach her.

“Did you meet her at group?”

“Other way around,” Maria smiles. “I looked for group therapy, for me and for her, because I had no idea what to do. That’s how we met Natasha, and after a few years she offered me a place here if I’d only get certified. Said I’d gotten the hang of it. So I did a training course and here I am.”

“Lucky for me,” Bucky says.

She looks at Steve through the glass doors. “If you wanted to bring him too, I could ask the others.”

“I’m not sure group’s really for him.” Hearing other people detail their suffering would probably just make Steve feel even more guilty, as if he should have been there to stop it somehow. “I’ll ask, though. Thanks.”

“You take care,” she says. “Of you and of him.”

*

Steve glances up when Bucky crosses the street to reach him. “Hey. I hope it’s okay I’ve—” He stops, because Bucky’s come all the way close to kiss him; at the last second, though, he loses his nerve and kisses Steve’s cheek instead.

“Dammit,” he mumbles into Steve’s neck.

“Hi there.” He can feel Steve smiling. His hand comes up to cup Bucky’s face and he kisses him back on the cheek.

Bucky meets his eyes, a smile flickering on his own mouth. “Shut up.”

“I didn’t say anything.” Steve looks up at the women filing out of the building, Maria closing up for lunch break. “Did they mind I was here? I’m kind of hoping they didn’t even notice.”

“Maria did. That’s her right there.”

She looks up just then, sees them looking, and waves. Steve awkwardly waves back.

“She said you could probably come too, if you want,” Bucky goes on.

“That’s nice of her.” Steve looks back at him. “You wanna grab lunch?”

Bucky raises an eyebrow to say he fully noticed Steve didn’t answer the offer at all, and Steve’s deliberately earnest look says right back that he knows Bucky knows, and he’d rather they both pretend otherwise, thanks.

And Bucky’s struck by the realization of how well they know each other, now.

Pierce wanted to crack Bucky open, peel off his defenses. The farther he reached, though, the more Bucky’s self just recoiled, to the point that Bucky himself lost touch with some parts of himself as they retreated into limbo. He thought he was empty now, scorched earth, void of personality other than trauma. But it’s all still there inside him. It’s coming back out now that things are safe again.

He thinks of Carol, radiant and unflappable, and thinks maybe nothing’s ever lost for good.

Steve’s still looking at him with eyebrows innocently raised, but his expression softens when Bucky leans in again. This time it’s a proper kiss Bucky presses to his mouth, for all that it makes his heart pound so hard he feels giddy.

Opening his eyes, he sees the way Steve looks at him, and it’s beyond anything he can deal with right now.

He dives for the same lifeline Steve did. “Okay,” he says, “yeah, lunch.”

“Lunch,” Steve agrees softly. He flicks Bucky’s palm like last time, and Bucky laces their fingers together. It’s his bad hand, but that doesn’t matter at all.

Chapter Text

Bucky’s dreams are changing. They’re not gone, but they’ve turned into less of a steel trap and more of a drunken, unpleasant goo.

When he bought his notebook, he bought a four-color ballpoint pen to go with it, just because it was the one in reach. But now he’s glad he did, because he’s decided to use a color code. Black is for hard replicative nightmares: the movie reel clips that make him relive a specific time. Red is for soft replicative nightmares, like the one he had where Steve was the one whipping him: stuff that never happened but clearly stems from the island anyway.

Blue is for the dreams that, while still connected to the island, aren’t actually bad. When he dreamed about sleeping next to Steve during the storm, he wrote it down in blue.

And green will be for the normal, unrelated dreams. When they come.

His journal used to be all black. Now it’s less black and more red, confusing bullshit where he’s being chased naked through a winding maze, or where he’s spread out and helpless against an assault that just won’t fucking come, or where his parents are the ones to sell him to the island (thanks for that one, Bruce goddamn Banner, how very fucking subtle, fuck you). But there’s the one blue dream livening up the pages a little, and he likes to reread it first thing when he wakes up in the morning shivering and sick, with his head still dripping black or red.

He hasn’t spent two nights in a row at Steve’s, but he sure is sleeping over a lot. Sometimes Bucky manages to let himself be held in bed. Most of the time he’s still the one doing the holding. He’s more and more aware of how crushing it feels to be alone in his apartment, especially at night when he’s lying still in silent darkness.

Still, he can’t see himself asking Steve to live together. He doesn’t know for sure Steve would like that, for all that he’d probably accept right away—he’s clearly still struggling to deny Bucky anything at all. And Bucky himself is terrified of actually going through with it. Steve’s place is the only sort of shelter Bucky can access. What if he moves in and things start feeling wrong again? He won’t have anywhere to retreat to. He won’t risk ruining it.

He’s just finished writing his dream of the night—in red pen; he wants to believe that’s better than black—when his phone buzzes on the nightstand, which doesn’t scare him anymore because Ross hasn’t called him again since the day Steve tore him a new one. It’s just a text, anyway.

Hey Buck, I’m going for a run. I should be back around 10 if you want to come over.

I’ll be there, Bucky answers, and gets out of bed.

*

It’s a nice day, so he decides to walk to Steve’s place. He’s half-way there when someone taps him on the shoulder, making him about jump out of his skin.

“Sorry,” says a woman’s voice, and when he refocuses it’s—

“Jessica?”

“Didn’t mean to startle you,” she says, linking their arms. “Just keep walking.”

She’s pointedly looking straight ahead. Bucky blinks, looks at their linked arms, then back at her.

“Someone following you?” he guesses quietly. Women’s group has taught him a few things.

“Every other fucking day.” Her dark gaze lands on Bucky before flicking away again. “Don’t have time for this today. Saw you walking there.”

If Bucky had been told ahead of time one of the women in group would do this, Jessica Jones wouldn’t have been his first guess. Or his second. He’s actually kind of touched she trusts him that far. Even though she clearly hates every second of this and would rather go and beat up whoever’s stalking her.

“Fine by me,” Bucky says. “Five more minutes of this and I’ll start billing you, though.”

She doesn’t smile, but she doesn’t bite his head off either. “Where are you headed?”

“Steve’s.”

“I mean more which direction.” But she’s looking at him again. “Rogers again?”

“Yeah. You?” His question could mean a lot of things, and he can tell right away she doesn’t want to give any of the answers. “You don’t have to say.”

And she doesn’t. Her gaze softens a bit, though. “If you do want to bring him next time, we can cope.”

“Nah. Not his thing.” And Bucky realizes right then he couldn’t do that to them, anyway. They’ve accepted him, which was exceptional to begin with. He can’t repay them by bringing in more men. Even men like Steve. “Your creep still there?”

She looks over her shoulder again. “Doesn’t look like it.” She untangles their arms. “Thanks for that.”

“No problem.” He can tell she already regrets coming to him, showing weakness. He doesn’t want to make this any more awkward, so he adds, “Okay. Well. Have a good—”

“It’s like stepping into the pool,” she blurts.

Bucky blinks. “What?”

“Sex. You were talking about it last time. You have to do it by stages. Like going into cold water.”

“Oh,” Bucky says. “Um. Okay. Thanks.”

“Bye.” And she leaves.

*

Bucky finds Steve’s door half-open; he pushes it all the way, calling gingerly, “Steve?”

His voice comes from across the apartment. “Come in! I’m still in the shower.”

There’s the sound of water running in the background. Bucky comes in, closes the door and sits on a chair next to the couch, stretching out his legs as he exhales. He’s still a bit jittery from his encounter with Jessica, and so lost in thought that he doesn’t notice Steve until he’s edging out of the bathroom.

“Forgot to grab a shirt.” He’s wearing only jeans, still toweling the back of his head. “Sorry. Back in a second.”

“Wait,” Bucky says.

Steve, who was about to duck into his bedroom, stops on the threshold.

“Just—wait,” Bucky says, sitting up even as his heart begins to beat harder. “Let me look.”

For a moment, Steve stays frozen; then tension slowly flows out of his shoulders. He just stands there, the towel loose in his hand.

His skin is still damp from the shower, his hair too, a darker blond than usual. His bare chest rises and falls, gleaming faintly in the daylight. They stare at each other for almost a full minute, each second tenser than the previous one.

Then Steve comes closer, slow, and kneels on the carpet in front of Bucky, clearly so he won’t loom over him. He doesn’t sit on his heels, stays up on his knees.

“What are we doing?” he asks quietly.

Bucky manages to say, “I don’t know.”

“Okay.” Steve places his hands on Bucky’s knees, a steadying weight. “Is that fine?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay,” Steve repeats, and doesn’t move.

After another few seconds, Bucky reaches out and traces Steve’s collarbone, barely touching skin. He wishes his fingers weren’t shaking so much. Steve’s looking at him so intensely, staying still, except for his hands gripping Bucky’s knees a bit tighter.

Bucky’s finger comes down the middle of Steve’s chest, where there’s a bit of dampness still. He’s radiating warmth. When his hand moves to the side to trace his ribs, Steve squirms, and Bucky’s fingers curl back in shyness. “Sorry.”

“No. It’s okay.”

Bucky flattens his palm against Steve’s side. He can feel his heartbeat. He moves his fingers up again, trailing them across his chest, up to his neck, to his jaw, his cheekbone.

“Just—” Steve blurts.

Bucky draws back again. “What is it?”

“You can keep going if you want. It’s just that I’m—”

And Bucky sees it, though Steve’s jeans masked it for a moment. He’s at half-mast.

It scares him in an ice-hot flash, like swimming in the ocean and turning around to realize the shore’s gone. Steve sees it, gets up, moves away.

“Stay—don’t—” Bucky finds himself reaching for him as if to hold him back. But Steve’s not leaving: he catches Bucky’s hand loosely in his and simply sits down on the couch.

Bucky slumps in relief and scrubs his free hand over his face.

“Sorry,” he mutters.

“Nothing about it I didn’t like,” Steve answers in a low voice.

Bucky drops his hand and gives him a half-smile. “Yeah, you’re kinda easy when it comes to me.”

Steve just keeps looking at him like he hasn’t noticed it was a joke. It makes Bucky feel very helpless all of a sudden. Why? he wants to ask. Why the hell do you want me that much?

But people could ask the same of him, about Steve. People could say both of them are twisted up in their shared trauma, their guilt, their desperate need to make things up to each other somehow. Bucky used to be afraid that was true. Now he’s starting to think maybe that they’d have felt like that even without the island. If they’d crossed paths for good in the army. If they’d gone to school together when they were kids. If they’d met at any time, in any circumstances at all.

“What brought this on?” Steve asks.

“I don’t know, someone from group said… And when I saw you coming out of the shower, I just thought I could—” Bucky sighs. “I think Banner really was right again.”

“About?”

Bucky tries to think of words he’ll actually be able to pronounce. He manages to say, “You know, they—they’ve hurt me a lot.”

Worry pinches Steve’s face, and Bucky makes himself go on.

“I can’t… I haven’t been able to… by myself…” Oh God, he hates this. He’d rather be set on fire. But it’s Steve. He has to tell at least Steve. “And Banner said—I should be able to do it by myself—for myself—before I tried with someone else. With you.”

He stops, nauseous. He doesn’t dare looking at Steve, too afraid of the look he’ll find on his face; whether it’s horror or compassion, he won’t be able to bear it.

“Look,” Steve says, “if you think I won’t be happy unless we can…”

“No, Jesus, no, I know you’re not—”

“Couldn’t blame you for thinking that. What with me getting excited every time you so much as glance my way.”

“Don’t talk about yourself like that.” Self-deprecation, Bucky finds, is much easier to spot in others. He glares at the floor. “I like that you want me. I can’t fucking handle it but—I do like it.”

“Okay,” Steve says quietly. “For the record, despite what my dick’s voting for, I’m fine if it never happens.”

It scares Bucky a bit, to hear him say the word, and he thinks maybe that was on purpose. Still, he says, “I do want it to happen. Because I…”

He thinks of the explanations he attempted in group. To feel good about himself? Is that it? And would that be so bad? But that’s not it, he knows. That’s self-deprecation talking again, him admitting to the shameful reason because it must be the real one, the one he’d ordinarily try to hide, so he might as well own up to it right away. If that’s not it, then what? To feel complete? To feel normal?

He knows the real reason. Anger’s burning and swelling in his chest again.

“I want it back,” he says. “It’s not fair. Everything he took from me. I want it again. I want it back.”

Chapter Text

“It feels like you want to tell me something,” Banner says, swiveling slowly back and forth in his chair.

Coming back to Banner’s office hasn’t been as awkward as Bucky feared. He likes that Banner apologized, even though he still feels he didn’t really have to. And he likes that Banner let him apologize, though Banner said outright he didn’t think Bucky had to.

Now, of course, Banner is being Banner again, so laid back he’s almost horizontal yet much too sharp for anyone’s good. Bucky does want to tell him something, and he’s been gearing up to it ever since he woke up today. Of course, the words still won’t come out.

So he stalls. “It’s just—difficult.”

“Difficult because you think I’ll disapprove?”

Bucky swallows. Because, yeah. That’s exactly it.

“What, did you have sex with Steve or something?” Banner asks, mildly curious.

“No! Jesus.” Anger snaps him out of his spiral—and now he’s immediately wondering if that was a conscious move on Banner’s part. Probably. Banner likes to use anger; or maybe it’s Bucky who reacts well to it. Or both. “No. I—we—” He takes a breath. “We’re going to try. Probably. He said he was okay to try.”

He waits, all too aware that he’s bracing himself exactly as he would after talking back to Pierce. He disobeyed, after all.

All Banner does is begin to doodle on his notepad. “All right,” he says. “How does that make you feel?”

Bucky relaxes in stages. Yes. That’s all. Banner isn’t here to tell him what to do. He’s here to guide him. To ask questions and listen to the answers. How does that make him feel?

“If I’m going to tackle this,” he says, “then I’m going to tackle it.”

“You’re pushing yourself,” Banner points out in his placid manner.

“Not illegal, is it?” Bucky mutters mutinously. When Banner fails to react, he says, “Look—you were right, last time, on the phone. I need to push. Or else I feel like I’m going nowhere. If there’s a middle ground I haven’t found it yet.” He shifts in his seat. “But also—I can’t repeat the mistakes of last time. I have to protect Steve.”

“And yourself,” Banner says.

“Yes—yes, of course myself, too.” Bucky’s annoyed again, because that was implied, but—ugh. Never mind. “He’s the one who took a hit last time.”

“Remind me, what happened?”

It’s already a nebulous memory Bucky has to work hard to piece together. What he remembers most vividly is the night closing like a trap on them both. “He had a panic attack. Because I made him hurt me.”

“All right then. Try not doing that.”

“Sure. Thanks for that.”

Banner smiles. “You think I’m being obvious, but just because it’s a simple goal doesn’t mean it’ll be simple to achieve. How can you make sure he won’t be hurting you?”

Bucky shifts in his chair. Touché. And that’s why he brought it up in the first place. “I… don’t know. Just look at what happened last time. I was so determined not to make him hurt me, and I ended up asking him outright to do exactly that. I just—I honestly thought it would help me at the time. I… I guess I don’t always know what’s going to harm me—until it’s too late.”

“Could it be,” Banner says in a completely flat tone, “because you’re pushing yourself? Too much, too fast? I’m just spitballing here.”

“You know, you used to be much less annoying.”

“Hmm. I think you’re romanticizing the past.” Banner smiles. “Go on, though, pull that thread.”

“I don’t always know what’s going to hurt me ahead of time, so I should tread even more carefully,” Bucky reasons out loud, without enthusiasm. Then he sighs. “I know I should. But I already feel like I’m going so damn slow…”

“Because you are. Because in other circumstances, if the opportunity of sleeping with someone presented itself, you’d just go ahead and do it.”

Bucky rubs his face. “Yeah.”

“That’s what you’re working towards. Remember what you understood last time, about reaching your end goal too quickly and how that can be a bad thing. You want your relationship with Steve to go on for as long as possible, don’t you? And there’s so much to enjoy along the way.”

Bucky thinks of holding Steve in his arms, breathing into his soft gold hair.

“Yeah,” he says again, quiet. “Yeah, I know there is.”

“Give yourself some credit, too. You’re not doomed to repeat the same mistakes; in fact, I’ve yet to see you repeat a single one. Things went very wrong last time—meaning you now have strong guidelines for what not to do. And you’re good at communicating, so I wouldn’t be too worried.”

Bucky, whose gaze had slid downwards, looks back up at him.

“I’m good at communicating?”

“Of course.”

“I’m… really not, though. It’s almost impossible to speak sometimes. I keep getting… choked up and—having outright breakdowns—”

“Yes. Because you’re pushing yourself,” Banner repeats patiently. “Case in point—you’ve literally just made yourself tell me about your plans regarding sex, even though you would have clearly preferred not to bring it up again. Not necessarily a bad thing, this forcefulness, when it comes to communication.” His gaze softens. “Maybe just a little hard on you at times, though.”

*

Bucky’s still jittery and emotional, going back to his apartment. Therapy makes him feel cracked open, near tears even though he didn’t come close to crying this time. He breathes deeply to try and feel a little steadier, counting on the walk home to help.

Banner didn’t talk again about how Bucky should try masturbating first. And yet he may as well have shouted it. Bucky can’t stop thinking about it. He’s meeting with Steve after lunch. Before that, he could take a shower at home and… see how things go.

He really, really doesn’t want to do it. But if that’s what going slower means, well—it’s for his own good. Right? Which means it’s for Steve’s good, too. It’s something to do, something to try.

So when he gets home, he gets into the bathroom and gets naked, trying not to think too much about what he’s doing. The hot water will help; he didn’t often get hot showers on the island. Also the bathroom echoes differently, the tiles aren’t the same color. He’s fine. He’ll be fine.

He avoids looking at himself in the mirror, even though Banner implied looking at his naked body would be a good start—he just wants to get on with it. He steps into the bathtub, turns on the shower, stands under the spray and waits.

He just has to reach down. He doesn’t even have to look. Just reach down and—and hold it. He does it all the time when he’s using the toilet. Yeah. He can do that. He can pretend he’s using the toilet.

This must be the least sexy thought he’s ever had, so he doesn’t see how it could possibly lead to arousal. Anyway, even telling himself that, his hand won’t move.

“Come on,” he mumbles between his teeth, “come on,” and when he tries again to make himself do it, he feels a physical pain—like he’s about to pull a muscle, to rip something.

He gives up, leans forward against the wall, his back bowed under the spray. His throat is so tight it hurts, and there are tears washed down by the shower. He couldn’t even touch himself in the most literal sense of the word. He scowls, fights back more tears. Then he shuts off the water without washing himself. He wants to be dressed again.

*

“Hey, Bucky,” Steve says, opening the door with a smile on his face.

Bucky’s still so upset and frustrated, and seeing him makes him feel so awfully good despite everything, that he just starts crying.

Steve looks both baffled and deeply alarmed, like he’s wondering how he somehow managed to fuck up even saying hello, and Bucky stupidly laughs through his tears. “God,” he says. “I’m sorry. Just. Frustrating morning.”

“Come in,” Steve says. “Come in.”

He helps Bucky take off his jacket, gets him a box of tissues and sits with him on the couch. You’ll get tired of this, Bucky can’t help thinking. But that’s an issue for another time.

“Want to talk about it?” Steve asks.

Bucky blows his nose. “It’s nothing, really. Or nothing new.” He balls up his tissue. “Just—I tried doing what Banner said. You know—alone. And I couldn’t. I couldn’t even begin to do it.”

His eyes are burning again. It’s not being fucked up that makes him cry, otherwise he’d be crying all the time. It’s that he really won’t be able to share this with Steve, not anytime soon and maybe not ever. And yet he wants it so much. Why can’t wanting be enough?

Steve studies him for a few seconds. “Let me ask you something,” he says. “Did you feel like doing it? Alone, I mean? Were you eager to try?”

Bucky lets out a bitter noise. “Really fucking wasn’t.”

“But you still want to try something together.”

“Yeah, but I know that—”

“So there you go,” Steve interrupts. When Bucky looks at him, he shrugs. “Seems to me that you should try doing what you actually want.”

It’s so counterintuitive Bucky can’t compute for a second. No, he wants to say, you have it the wrong way around. I’m supposed to touch myself precisely so I can then allow myself to try something again with you. Banner said—

Banner said, Maybe I was wrong.

Steve smiles at his speechlessness. “I’m still up for it,” he says, “if you are.”

Bucky can’t help smiling weakly back. “Just like that?” He wipes a stray tear. “Aren’t you worried?”

“Why would I be worried? You’ll tell me if something feels wrong.”

God. Bucky doesn’t deserve that kind of trust.

“I’ll… do my best.”

It’s not a reassuring thing to say, and Bucky half-expects Steve to throw in the towel right there, but he doesn’t. Instead he says, “Okay. I do want to set some limits before we do anything.”

“Go ahead,” Bucky hurries to say. He’s learned his lesson about that, at least.

“No clothes off,” Steve says. “Not today.”

Bucky stares.

“What? But… So what, we…” he says uncertainly. “We’d just… make out?”

“If that’s what you feel like doing, sure.”

Bucky feels lost. “What else could we be doing?”

“I could give you a backrub,” Steve says without missing a beat. “Or you could give me one. Or we could slow dance, though I’m pretty terrible. Or cuddle and watch a movie. I can keep going.”

Bucky looks at him for a long time.

“You okay?” Steve asks.

“Yeah. Just…”

He can’t actually articulate any of the things he’s feeling. He finally gets what Jessica was trying to tell him about doing things in stages. What Banner kept telling him about slowing down and not pushing himself. Even though they said it again and again, he still didn’t truly understand.

Now he does. Everything Steve listed doesn’t scare him at all. Doesn’t make him feel like he’ll have to brace himself, grit his teeth to come through the other side unscathed. They’re things he actually would just enjoy doing.

Imagine that.

He smiles, belatedly. “I… I think I’d like to try the dancing.”

Steve lights up, then stands. “I’m warning you, I really do suck.”

“Yeah? Well, I’m pretty good,” Bucky says, taking his hand to get up. “Maybe I can teach you.”

“Does that mean you want to lead?”

Bucky shakes his head, putting his hand on Steve’s shoulder. “I know you like to lead.”

Steve wraps his arm around his waist, and they start shuffling in place.

“And I like being led,” Bucky adds under his breath. “Sometimes.”

“I know,” Steve answers in the same tone.

Though Bucky still doesn’t understand it fully, he’s so thankful for Steve’s tastes. Asking for Steve to take the lead every once in a while won’t hurt either of them. On the contrary, Steve loves it. Bucky can make some of his burden into a gift.

“What is this, though?” Bucky asks after a moment. “Some kind of… slow waltz?”

“I have no idea,” Steve says, twirling him and bringing him back. “I told you, I’m a terrible dancer.”

Bucky laughs. This isn’t serious. And it’s not sex at all. He should be frustrated, maybe even angry, like he’s been deemed too fragile for the real deal. But he’s so relieved, giddy. He’s pressed against Steve’s body, without an ounce of fear since Steve drew such a deep line in the sand. No clothes off! He can just enjoy himself, enjoy the feeling of being so close to him, without anything else looming on the horizon.

“Maybe some actual music would help,” Steve says, awkwardly dipping him.

Bucky doesn’t want either of them to let go. “You could sing something.”

“My singing’s even worse than my dancing. What song would even work for this?”

They’re shuffling slower than ever. “Unforgettable?” Bucky suggests.

Steve smiles. “Don’t think I know that one.”

“Of course you do. It’s Nat King Cole. It’s a classic.” Bucky tries to recall some lyrics. “Unforgettable, that’s what you are…”

“That’s vaguely familiar.”

“Unforgettable, in every w… No, wait, shit, that’s the second verse,” Bucky says. “Like a song of love that clings to me… Yeah, that’s it… How the thought of you does things to me… Never before has been someone more…”

He stretches the syllables to make Steve laugh, and he hears him laugh indeed, softly in his ear.

“Unforgettable, in every way… And forever more, that’s how you’ll stay…” He’s really singing now, not just making fun. There’s rust and cracks in his voice, but it’s okay enough. He can still do it. “That’s why, darling, it’s incredible, that someone so unforgettable…” He quiets down. “Thinks I’m unforgettable too.”

“Yeah,” Steve says softly. “Yeah, I do know that one.”

They’re very close, now, pressed wholly together.

“It’s a really cheesy movie song,” Bucky murmurs. “There’s always a kiss when it ends.”

And Steve kisses him, a cheesy movie kiss, with his arm still around his waist and his other hand burying itself in Bucky’s hair, at the back of his head. They’ve stopped shuffling; they’re just kissing, now, standing there together, enjoying it only for itself, catching their breath in each other’s mouth.

When they part eventually, Steve says, “I like your singing.”

Bucky’s heart is hurting him again. He manages to say, “I like your leading.”

Chapter Text

Bucky gets in the habit of singing again, after that night. He used to always be humming a tune before the island, he remembers now. To think he’d actually forgotten all about that. He feels like an archeologist of himself, used to unearthing frustratingly small debris and suddenly stumbling onto a whole, beautifully preserved amphora. That’s one thing to do with a plot of scorched earth: dig.

He’s way out of practice, and some notes can only be hit when you’re singing loud enough; he doesn’t dare, even when he’s alone, so with his quiet, crackling voice, sometimes he falls short. But that’s fine. He sings a lot of blues and jazz classics, stuff that’s slow and low, with stretching words where he can linger, take his time. It calms him.

He’s singing now, in his mind. He could sure use a bit of calm. His hands are shoved in his pockets, his leg is jittery as hell.

The chair he’s in is as uncomfortable as it is expensive, probably. And it looks very expensive. At least he’s alone in the waiting room. It’s a relief when a secretary comes in to call his name, even though it means he loses the song as he gets up.

“Well, I have to admit,” Ross says when Bucky walks in. “I’m wondering why you’re here.”

Despite the way Steve chewed him out on the phone last time, he doesn’t look apologetic in the slightest. If anything, he seems spiteful around the edges, ready to gain ground again. The last time they saw each other, Bucky was wearing ill-fitting hospital clothes and plastic slippers with socks. He could barely look up from the floor; he was too scared to talk about anything that mattered, in case it was twisted back against him.

He feels transformed, now, vibrating with an almost metallic energy. Maybe it’s just his leather jacket. Or maybe he really has come a long way.

He plonks himself down on the seat and says without preamble, “I’ll testify.”

Ross’ face lights up. “That’s a very good—”

“But I haven’t decided how. I’m not sure I can do a trial. I was thinking maybe I could record a testimony.”

“That… might not be so easy to implement.”

“I’m sorry to be such an inconvenience,” Bucky says flatly.

Ross looks exasperated, but he knows he doesn’t have a leg to stand on and visibly tries to be conciliating. “Listen—we don’t have to be at odds. We can just talk. Wouldn’t that be nice?”

“I’m not at anything with you. I’m doing what you wanted. And if you give me what I came for, we don’t ever have to talk again. Are you the one handling this whole thing or are there actual lawyers involved?”

It makes him giddy, to talk to someone in such a tone and not get immediately backhanded across the face. Bucky’s probably going to go and have a panic attack about it later, but the rush is definitely worth it.

“Of course there are attorneys,” Ross says. “I was only the one to contact you about the trial because I’m the one who knows you best at SHIELD.”

He looks much too satisfied saying that. The truth is no one else knows Bucky at SHIELD. Sam seems to be more of an on-and-off contractor, Natasha’s position remains a mystery, and Steve resigned. Not that Ross would have tried either of them, anyway, since apparently they can’t stand him and he can’t stand them.

“Give me a number and I’ll talk directly with them, then,” Bucky says.

“It would be better to have a therapist present,” Ross tries.

“I’ll bring my own if needed.”

“Who are you seeing these days?”

“Dr. Banner,” Bucky says, and then berates himself because why the hell did he answer? That’s none of Ross’ business.

Ross raises his eyebrows. “Banner? I wouldn’t have advised him.”

“I don’t care,” Bucky snaps.

“Are you sure you’re in a good frame of mind right now?” Ross asks in apparent concern. “You seem tense. Maybe you’re not ready for this.”

Bucky inhales sharply. This, he knows. Those three years spent under Pierce’s manicured thumb have been an involuntary masterclass in manipulation. Ross is trying to make him doubt himself so he’ll be more malleable.

Bucky’s happy to question himself for Banner. He’s happy to lower his defenses for Steve. Here, though, his determination must remain ironclad; he must blind himself with his own righteousness so he can make it through and get what he came for.

In a way, he knows he’s probably blowing things out of proportion. Ross may be an unpleasant, overzealous bureaucrat, but he isn’t Pierce by any means. Still, beggars can’t be choosers, and Bucky will latch onto anything that helps.

“The number for the attorney’s office,” he says.

“I really don’t think…”

“Give me the number. You wanted me to testify. Give me the damn number.”

Ross doesn’t seem pleased, and Bucky wonders—does he still believe he knows what’s best for Bucky? Is this whole thing hurting his professional feelings? Is that why he’s unhappy about being sidelined, when Bucky would rather expect him to gladly wash his hands of him?

Or maybe it’s an internal politics thing. Alexander Pierce is a big name and his condemnation will make a splash. Ross couldn’t stay connected to the case through Steve, who intensely dislikes him; it’s possible he was hoping to make himself essential to Bucky.

Whatever the reason, he finally seems to understand he’s out. “Fine. Here’s the card they gave me. But fair warning, we probably haven’t seen the last of each other—as your first therapist, it’s possible I’ll be part of the proceedings as a witness, myself.”

Bucky’s up and out the door before Ross finishes his little speech.

He almost takes a seat again in the waiting room, but then he thinks of what will happen if Ross comes out to take out his frustration on his secretary. So he leaves the office and walks for eleven blocks. A song clicks on again in his mind, helping him breathe slower, slower. It settles his nerves and brings him to Central Park.

He finds a quiet bench to sit on. It’s a grey, muted sort of day, but not nearly as cold as only just last week. Spring’s coming after all. Bucky takes a few deep breaths. Here’s that panic attack, but it’s subdued by his long walk—it’s more of an adrenaline comedown, really, and he can just let it shake out of him. He’s wearing his dark jeans again, a red henley and his leather jacket. More clothes Steve picked for him, clothes that made him feel stronger facing Ross, clothes that comfort him now.

Bucky could have asked Steve to come with him. Bucky could have simply called Ross on the phone. But he wanted to do this by himself, and he figured a meeting doubled as a test; if he could confront Ross and not immediately lose his shit, maybe he could talk to an attorney, and maybe he could do a testimony.

One step at a time, and all that.

When his hands stop shaking and feeling ice cold, he takes a few more deep breaths then gets out the card Ross gave him. It’s a number at the federal attorney’s office.

Bucky finds himself stumped. How exactly is he supposed to introduce himself? Is that even the number of the attorney who’s handling his case? What if he has to explain why he’s calling and who he’s looking for?

Well. One way to find out.

He calls, and the line rings only once before someone picks up. “Murdock.”

“Hello, I’m—James Barnes,” Bucky says, barely remembering not to introduce himself as Bucky. “Dr. Everett Ross gave me your number?”

To his intense relief, Murdock instantly says, “The Pierce case. Is that right?”

“Yes. Listen—I don’t know… I was asked to testify, but—”

“I’m very sorry,” Murdock interrupts. “I don’t have a lot of time right now and the last thing I want is to rush this. Can we meet today? Are you free for lunch?”

Bucky was supposed to eat with Steve, but of course he says yes. After hanging up, he texts Steve. I’m sorry. I can’t make it to lunch. Can I come over for dinner?

Steve isn’t long to answer. You can come over and stay over. Then he asks, Are you all right?

I’m fine, Bucky types back with a rush of warmth. I’ll tell you all about it tonight. I—

He wants to type I love you so bad that it blindsides him.

His fingers hesitate for a moment. He feels every word in his heart; he wants Steve to read them and know that he means them. Why not write them now? Now, and every day from now on?

But then he doesn’t. No, not like this, rushed in the middle of the day, before a meeting that’ll render him unavailable. He wouldn’t want to say it for the first time by text.

It’s okay. He doesn’t have to push, this least of all. They’ve got time.

And it’s not like they don’t already know, anyway.

He sends the rest of the text then checks the time. Only half an hour before he meets Murdock for lunch.

*

Murdock shows up with an assistant attorney called Nelson guiding him around, for a reason that immediately becomes obvious when Bucky catches sight of his white cane and dark glasses.

“Mr. Barnes,” Nelson says cheerily, shaking hands with him—he’s obviously used to blow past people’s shock upon meeting Murdock.

They all sit. Bucky holds himself very stiffly. Of course they’re both white men, and sharply dressed, too. Part of his brain still insists that at any moment, these strangers might reach out and set a hand on his thigh, or pinch him hard just to see him wince. Shove their fingers in his mouth, force him out of his chair and under the table, unbuttoning their neatly pressed slacks.

He can beat those thoughts back. He did it with Banner. It helps that Murdock’s blind and that Nelson has a very earnest manner. They also both seem very keen on being considerate with him, as probably anyone would be when dealing with a human trafficking victim. Because that’s what he is; that’s what they know him as. Bucky works on relaxing the line of his shoulders, though he has to remind himself to do it every few minutes.

“Should we order first?” Murdock offers. He’s got a pleasant, subdued sort of voice, and he’s extremely handsome. The voice helps; the handsomeness doesn’t. Rumlow was handsome too in his own way, and insisted Bucky was lucky for that.

Meeting new people—interacting so gratingly with them—makes Steve feel like even more of a miracle by contrast. I’m in love with Steve, Bucky thinks again. He hadn’t let himself think it before, not in so many words, though of course the feeling’s not new. It feels like something both helpless and luminous unfolding in his chest. He has to focus. His mind’s clearly trying to escape the situation at hand.

“I have to say, you look very different from the file,” Nelson says after they’ve ordered.

“The file?”

“SHIELD gave us all they had at the very beginning of our investigations,” Murdock explains. “I believe they included a picture of you.”

“You seem much better now,” Nelson adds.

Bucky vaguely remembers someone taking a picture of him in the military hospital, probably for his medical records. He doesn’t want to imagine how he looks on it. Just like in Ross’ office, he stumbles upon the discrepancy between then and now—to think that all this time he felt stuck, convinced he was motionless. And now he’s looking back and realizing how far he’s come.

Banner smiles in his mind. I’m of the opinion that we are only ever moving forward.

“I’ve had—I still have—a lot of help,” he says.

Nelson nods. He looks a bit jittery himself, like he’s not sure how to behave around Bucky and tries to project as much positivity as he can. Murdock seems steadier next to him, more inscrutable, but that might only be due to his dark glasses.

“I was very thankful you called me, Mr. Barnes,” he says. “We were told you wouldn’t testify. I’d been hoping to meet with you personally.”

He probably hounded Ross, who hounded Bucky in turn. Bucky realizes his shoulders have tightened again and forcefully relaxes.

“About that,” he says. “I… I need to know more. How important would my testimony be? Isn’t he facing arms trafficking charges regardless?”

“That’s a separate trial. Your testimony would indeed be crucial to this case,” Murdock says. “Now, don’t get me wrong; there is overwhelming evidence and an impressive pile-up of charges against him. Pierce will be pleading guilty. But if we want to obtain high restitution…”

“Restitution?”

“For you,” Nelson says. When Bucky keeps looking confused, he says, “You’re owed money. A lot of money. Even if we sleep through the proceedings, it’s very likely that you’ll end up with several million dollars.”

“But—what? Money for what?”

It’s Nelson’s turn to look confused, and it’s Murdock who answers quietly, “For the harm he caused you.”

Bucky’s speechless.

“We’re well aware this may seem insignificant to you, next to what he did. Perhaps even crude,” Murdock goes on. “But don’t see this as a pay-off. It just comes with the territory in human trafficking cases. He’ll also very much go to prison.”

“Wait,” Nelson says. “You had no idea at all?”

“No, I… I never imagined…” Bucky feels dizzy. “I didn’t think that far. I just wanted to make sure you’d have my testimony if it’s—if it’s needed.”

Something passes between Murdock and Nelson; they’re definitely surprised in a similar way. Bucky’s still reeling. Restitution? He thinks of the sum in his bank account and how he once reflected that it wouldn’t last him forever. Now he’s likely to get enough for several lifetimes.

“But,” he says, refocusing with an effort. “I’m not sure I can face him in court. I… I wanted to discuss other options.”

“Of course we can,” Murdock says. “Let me just say this first: you wouldn’t have to face him. Only his lawyer—and in such a case, with the defendant pleading guilty, they’re not likely to brutalize you on the stand.”

Bucky’s hands are slightly trembling again, but the rest of him isn’t. “Could you please walk me through everything?”

Chapter Text

It’s a dream, and he’s not sure what’s going on this time. He’s standing on a stage, under a blaze of light tinged with red at the edges, with a mike in his hand; he’s pretty sure he just sang something, and people loved it. Rumlow’s sitting in the back row, glaring at him. Bucky’s not afraid to see him there. He actually thinks it’s kinda funny.

The music revs, and the concert’s clearly not over but also he can just leave if he wants, so he goes backstage. Everyone he meets in the winding corridors is busy, carrying props and equipment, but friendly, saying hi when they pass him by. He keeps opening doors and closing them again, looking for someone, and when he remembers that he’s looking for Steve, he suddenly finds him.

“Bucky!” Steve’s so pleased to see him. “You were great up there.”

“Rumlow’s stuck in the audience,” Bucky tells him.

Steve snorts. “Serves him right.”

A few people pass by, yelling, “Are you guys coming to the afterparty?” Steve doesn’t seem to hear them, and in any case they don’t stop to hear the answer. Bucky doesn’t want to go with them, even though it would surely be nice. He wants to stay here, where there’s bustling activity but it’s really just him and Steve.

“Hey,” he says, pulling clumsily on Steve’s collar, “come here.”

“What?” Steve says, smiling like he has no idea where Bucky’s going with this but he’s totally up for anything.

“Come here,” Bucky repeats, then explains, “I want to kiss you.”

“Oh!” Steve says, lighting up even more. He lets himself get pulled all the way so that he’s backing Bucky against the wall to kiss him, except the wall is suddenly a wall of costumes on hangers and Bucky sinks right through it, Steve pushing him back and back until they’re both in a soft cocoon of silk, tulle and sequins.

It’s dark in there, cosy, everything colorful and sparkling. Bucky’s glad: nobody can find them and drag them to a party now.

Steve’s hands are sliding down his body, now, untucking his shirt from his pants, unbuckling his belt. Anticipation steals Bucky’s breath, heat coursing down his belly. They’re still kissing. When Steve pulls off his clothes, Bucky doesn’t feel naked. They’re both buried in clothing, anyway, and he thinks: this is so great. Usually I couldn’t do this.

Steve bites him, in the muscle between his shoulder and neck, and Bucky shivers with delight. He’s hard, and he can feel the line of his own erection pressing against the inside of Steve’s thigh. Everything is warm and good, and they should do it now, before the dream ends, because—right: this is a dream, which is why neither of them are worrying about the other. But now he can’t stop thinking about how it’s a dream, and Steve isn’t as firm and real as before, dissolving into heat in his arms, which sucks, they didn’t do anything after all, they were so close this time, but it was all a dream, and now Bucky’s awake, reality falling into place around him, getting realer every time he blinks.

He’s awake, he’s in bed with Steve. It’s morning.

He’s hard.

He gasps for breath, immediately startling himself with how loud he’s just been. Next to him in bed, Steve doesn’t wake up, sleeping on his stomach, his face half-buried in his pillow. The covers have slipped off, down to his waist. He wears a t-shirt and track pants to bed: Bucky can see the curves of his shoulder and bicep, the descending swoop of his back.

Bucky, still kind of breathless, stares at him like he’s never seen him before.

The languid, easy heat of his dream is stretching in his mind, coloring everything he sees. He’s still hard, and—he can’t be hard, not here, not in bed next to Steve. He pushes off the mattress as slowly as he can then crab-walks to the bathroom, feeling awkward and encumbered. He closes the door and leans back against the tiles whose coolness seep through his t-shirt.

“Just calm down,” he mumbles to himself. “Just calm down.”

His heart’s beating too hard, certain that something’s wrong. But in fact nothing is wrong, Bucky reminds himself. This is okay. Everything’s okay.

He exhales shudderingly.

“Buck?” Steve calls from the bedroom, still half-asleep.

Bucky realizes he’d been screwing his eyes shut, focusing on his breathing. He’s flagging now, thank God. He reopens his eyes. “I’m fine,” he answers. “Just. Gonna take a shower.”

*

“It was so weird,” he says. “At first I didn’t realize anything was wrong. And when I woke up, it still didn’t feel like anything out of the ordinary. It’s like—it’s like that dream reuploaded an old OS.”

“That’s the image you’re going with?” Banner says.

“What?” Bucky says, derailed. It occurs to him that Banner only ever takes notes on paper and has an old thick brick of a smartphone. “Do you not know what an OS is?”

“I suppose I do,” Banner sighs, sounding like he’d rather live in blissful ignorance and also in the Middle Ages. “Still, I would’ve said like wearing an old t-shirt again, or something like that. Analog metaphors just kind of feel more real, you know?”

“Can you be serious?” Bucky says, incredulous. “This is serious. Anyway, it’s my metaphor. And the OS thing really is how it felt. Like my old mindset just—came back. Reinstalled itself.”

“I see,” Banner says, because of course he really does see; it’s just that sometimes he likes to fuck with Bucky for no reason. “Is it permanent?”

“No. Yes. I… I mean, it fades away, you know. It was just a dream.” Buck’s silent for a few seconds. “But I do feel different. Like something’s shifted.”

Banner smiles. “Dreams are for processing things, as we’ve discussed. It’s not unheard-of to feel changed by them in meaningful ways, every once in a while.”

Yes, Bucky thinks. Yes, dreams are for processing, and he’s been taking pills to allow the processing to work better. He just didn’t think it would be—like that. This almost physical feeling, like his mind’s clicked into another gear.

“Also I…” His throat dries. “I was… I had an…” He didn’t feel too awkward waiting for it to go away in the bathroom, but it sure feels awkward to try and bring it up now. “I just—I’m attracted to him. To Steve.”

“You weren’t before?”

“I was, but—” It was just in the mind. He had forgotten how it felt for his body to want something, uncomplicatedly, without jumping through the hoops of reason. Steve’s very handsome; Bucky’s always known that in a sort of abstract way. Now he can’t think of anything else. This new mindset is sticking to him like glue. It’s horrible. It’s like puberty. He could barely look him in the eye at breakfast this morning, and kissing him goodbye make his heart hammer like it did the first few times they kissed, in that nice-but-also-borderline-triggering way.

“You look a bit freaked out,” Banner notices, mildly.

“I… I’m kind of—worried? It was hard enough to keep things slow before.”

“But nothing’s changed on that front. Steve isn’t going to start pressuring you if he notices you’re having a physical reaction. Is he?”

“Of course not. Never.” Bucky shifts in his chair, a little calmer. “Never.”

It’s not like his trauma’s gone, anyway. He’s not going to just jump Steve. He didn’t even dare touch himself for real in that bathroom, let alone try to come. But it’s—a start. A door he wasn’t sure would open again. His body is doing things all on its own. Apparently, it’s eager to get a move on, too.

“Shall we change the subject?” Banner asks after a long silence on Bucky’s part. “This only just happened—you might want to just let it simmer for a bit.”

“Yeah, I… yeah.” Bucky blinks. This wasn’t at all what he’d planned on telling Banner today, but of course he had to go and have a therapeutic dream right before therapy. He looks up. “Do you know Everett Ross?”

“Dr. Ross? Yes.”

“What do you think about him?”

Banner smiles in a vague sort of way. “I’m not the one who should be answering questions.”

“Right,” Bucky says, chastised. But he’s pretty sure that’s the therapist equivalent to pleading the Fifth. “Anyway, I… There’s actually a whole lot that’s happened.”

He tells Banner about Ross, then Steve yelling at Ross, then his visit to Ross, then Murdock and Nelson, then about everything they told him.

“You’d never talked about any of this before,” Banner notes.

It’s not exactly a reproach, but Bucky still feels guilty. “I… I had a lot of my mind.”

“You can say that again.” Banner tilts his head on the side. “A year, is that what Mr. Murdock said? That’s awfully quick.”

“He’s pleading guilty. There’s overwhelming evidence, all gathered already. And he’s in jail right now, without bail. Because he’s a flight risk and a—” Bucky’s mouth twists in something that’s not really a smile. “A danger to the public. So they fast-tracked it.”

“How are you feeling about all this?”

“I don’t know,” Bucky says honestly. “I’ll find out.” He takes a breath he wishes could be deeper. “Ross mentioned it would be good to have a therapist present. If… If I need you, one way or another…”

“Of course,” Banner says, in a tone that suggests his answer to that question was never in doubt.

Bucky swallows a lump in his throat. “Okay. Thanks.”

There’s a silence.

“You want to tell me something else,” Banner says eventually.

Bucky groans. “Stop doing that.”

“Sorry. It’s just that I’m so good,” Banner says with deadpan innocence.

“You’re good at something,” Bucky mumbles, rubbing his face. Then he exhales. “Yeah, there was something I wanted to talk to you about. It’s about EMDR and… and therapy, in general.”

“Go on,” Banner says.

Bucky goes on. Banner listens to him without saying a word, without reacting one way or another. He has no trouble at all reading Bucky, but he’s got a hell of a poker face.

“So—there,” Bucky says when he’s done. “It’s just… an idea. I’d have to—to talk to a few people and… set up a few things. And it wouldn’t be forever. But. It’s an idea.” He swallows. “Is it at all possible, do you think?”

“It’s very possible.”

Bucky stares. “Really?”

“Of course really,” Banner smiles.

“And… and you don’t think that’d be going too fast?”

“Quite the contrary. I’d say you’ve found your middle ground.”

*

Bucky goes back to his place—his place, not Steve’s. He sits down and clicks out his green pen and writes out his dream of the morning. It’s not completely unrelated to the island; Rumlow was there, for starters. But it wasn’t taking place on the island, it didn’t look like a distorted memory. It was a proper dream, and it was good, so yeah, Bucky’s breaking out the green ink.

He writes it all, down to the way he felt, that suffusing warmth. If he hadn’t already been in love with Steve, he thinks maybe he would have been then, waking up from that dream.

It makes him want to go back to it. Not necessarily to the dream itself, but to that blissful state of mind, where he can just—want Steve, and not feel anything complicated about it.

Small steps, he reminds himself. But sometimes you have to take a leap of faith.

Chapter Text

When he pushes Steve’s door open, the shower is running, like it often is. Steve tends to go for a run before Bucky shows up, and Bucky’s taken to just walking in, knowing the door will be unlocked.

“It’s me,” Bucky calls, taking off his shoes.

“Out in a minute,” Steve calls back. “Make yourself at home!”

Bucky takes a deep breath, then exhales, eyes closed. He thinks of his dream. Can he feel like this? Yes. He already does. Or still does. This isn’t like last time, trying to masturbate in the shower. This is something he wants to try. Something that tempts him more than it scares him.

Barefoot on the carpet, he pads to the bathroom and opens the door just a crack. “Steve?”

The shower stops. Steve’s voice echoes on the tiles. “Something wrong?”

“I want to ask you something,” Bucky says. “But—but you can say no.”

There’s a short silence. When Steve answers, it’s hard to tell whether he’s wary or hopeful. “Tell me.”

“Can I come in? I-in the shower with you.”

A silence stretches.

“I probably should have asked ahead of time,” Bucky begins. “I can just—”

“Okay,” Steve says.

Bucky stops, holding his breath. He almost asks Steve, Are you sure? But then he doesn’t. Steve never does, not when it’s something they’ve previously discussed, and they have already agreed to try something like that. When Bucky was ready. And apparently Steve’s ready when Bucky is.

Having to walk himself through those memories makes Bucky even more guilty for how he behaved during their short-lived reenactment weekends. Pushing and pushing without ever stopping to wonder how they both felt. No wonder Steve ended up having a panic attack.

But that’s in the past, now. This time around, Bucky made it clear Steve could say no, and Steve said it was okay to come in. So it’s okay to come in. Exhaling, Bucky steps into the bathroom.

It’s fogged up inside, humid and warm, and it relaxes something at the base of his spine, the small part of him that’s still scared of Arctic water whenever he exposes himself to a shower spray.

Steve’s there, behind the glass door. Bucky opens it and steps inside, keeping his eyes firmly on his feet, which isn’t a great start.

“Keeping your clothes on?” Steve asks.

“Shit. Yes.” Bucky somehow completely forgot about that. Definitely not a great start.

“No, I mean, that’s fine. If you don’t mind getting wet.”

Bucky stops. Keeping his clothes on is allowed. Anything is allowed.

“I… No, I don’t.”

Steve turns on the water again, a hot rain soaking Bucky’s button-down, making it stick to his skin, dampening his dark jeans. He blinks droplets out of his eyes. He’s still kind of looking at the floor or the wall rather than at Steve.

“You did that too,” he says. “On the island.”

He shouldn’t talk about the island. This isn’t the kind of mood he wanted. But what else could they both think of, being together here and now, like this?

“The shower was the only place I could think of to talk safely,” Steve says. “And… I wanted you to know that this wasn’t about…”

Sex. Of course. Except then of course it had to become about sex. Still, he did that again the second night, ruined his clothes twice in a row so he could tell Bucky: you’re not alone. I see you, and you’re not alone.

Bucky blinks under the water. He doesn’t want to cry. So he leans forward and kisses Steve instead.

It’s a hesitant kiss, his mouth dragging over Steve’s until Steve presses back into it. Bucky’s shirt is clinging to his chest, feeling too tight now, dragging uncomfortably against his skin.

“Could you,” he says against Steve’s mouth, tugging at his own front. “Could you take it off me.”

Steve leans back, just enough to meet his eyes, and Bucky feels himself mesmerized by that gaze, so suddenly aware that Steve is naked and hot and damp, and they’re pressed together in a very small space. He doesn’t feel afraid, but maybe that’s because his brain can’t quite believe what’s happening—maybe it’ll catch up in a second.

“Don’t feel like doing it yourself?” Steve asks quietly.

“I. I can’t,” Bucky says. He’s breathless already. He has to make an effort to speak coherently. “My bad hand. Buttons—it takes me ages.”

“I’m in no hurry.” Steve reaches up to his collar. “How about together?”

Bucky nods, overwhelmed. He feels like he’s losing the power to speak. He has to keep talking, though. It reassures Steve, and—it’s insane how much it’s reassuring himself. The words drag like sandpaper on his tongue, but then they’re out and he knows Steve’s heard them; even more importantly, he knows Steve will listen to them.

You’re good at communicating. Bucky realizes now that Banner simply meant: You’re willing to communicate. And maybe that’s much of the same thing.

Steve pops the first button. Bucky’s trembling fingers come up to help him. They undo button after button, not at all in the right order. Eventually, they get to a last one, and Steve pushes Bucky’s wet shirt off his shoulders, helps him tug it down his arms, until finally it’s off and falling into a bundle at their feet near the drain.

“Can I hold you?” Steve asks very quietly.

“Yeah.”

“Are you aware I’m…”

“Yeah,” Bucky says. He hasn’t been looking at Steve, much less under the waist, but he still knows. “It’s fine. It’s okay.”

Steve pulls him close, wraps him in his arms, his body flush against Bucky’s body, and heat envelops Bucky whole when their bare chests press together, like he’s suddenly standing in the sun. He can feel the line of Steve’s erection pressed up against him, but it’s not a bad thing. He trusts Steve’s smell, his warmth, his solidity. Any negative feeling his brain had cooked up from remnants of the island is gone now, eradicated after days spent together, hands brushing together, nights in bed together.

If only for this, Bucky thinks, all of the work of recovery is worth it; if only to be washing Steve clean of Pierce’s filth.

“Okay?” Steve asks, in a voice that’s shaking a little.

Bucky nods. He’s a mess, and his voice will shake more than a little, so he just angles his head for a kiss Steve readily gives him. Everything’s hot, with the steam rising in the cabin and their bodies pressed close, Steve’s broad hands splayed on his back, and for a moment it feels, wonderfully, just like his dream—this indiscriminate warmth, this sensation of being cocooned away from the world.

And just like in his dream, irresistibly, he’s getting hard, too.

His throat dries, his breath quickens. Steve stills. “Bucky,” he says, almost in wonder, and for some reason knowing that he’s noticed scares Bucky to death.

He stumbles back. “It’s not—I don’t—I can’t—”

“Hey,” Steve says, steadying him so he doesn’t slip on the tiles. “Hey. Keep breathing. If you need to step out…”

“No,” Bucky blurts. He screws his eyes shut, forcing a deep inhale. His body’s reaction still scares him; it feels like it’s leaping ahead, getting away from him, the way it’s coming alive, getting hungry for something his brain only half-wants. “Just… If you wanted to fuck me, I’m not sure I—”

“Bucky,” Steve says. “No. I don’t want that.”

Bucky blinks at him, interrupted mid-crisis. “What? But. You said you were okay to try sex.” He loved the slow dancing last time, but he didn’t think they were gearing up for a repeat session here. He asked to step in the shower with Steve. He thought the general goal was clear.

“I meant that,” Steve says. “But penetration—I don’t think I’m there yet.”

Bucky ducks his head under the spray. Steve waits for him to react, then, faced with silence, says: “Bucky?”

It’s ridiculous, Bucky firmly tells himself, ridiculous to be embarrassed about the word penetration like he hasn’t spent three goddamn years having any sense of intimacy stripped from him. But he can’t help his burning cheeks, and he hates it. He feels like a wide-eyed virgin, a prude. A pathetic wreck who somehow feels more comfortable with rape than with sex.

“Sorry,” he winces. “I just. I wish I could talk about it like you do.”

“Oh.” Steve sounds relieved. “It’s just that I’m trained to negotiate when it comes to that stuff, really.”

Bucky’s eyes snap up to his. “Trained?”

“Not in a bad way.” Steve turns off the water. Bucky hadn’t realized how much it covered their voices. He can hear Steve much more clearly now. “It’s just what kink teaches people. We’re playing with pain and restraints and humiliation—sometimes all at once. So we have to be able to talk clearly and directly about it first.” He hesitates. “If I sound maybe a bit blunt—”

“I’m glad you’re blunt,” Bucky interrupts. “I need help to—to talk—about all this. I… I don’t want to make you do all the work, I’m trying, I’m just… I’m not trained for that. Just. You know.”

“I do know,” Steve answers quietly.

There’s a silence. Then Bucky swallows hard. “You… you don’t think you’re there yet?”

This time, it’s Steve who’s looking away, staring at the wall. When he speaks, he’s visibly forcing himself.

“I like taking control of people. Fucking them used to be a part of that. But now, it’s all… I can’t masturbate anymore either, you know. Because my fantasies don’t stay fantasies anymore. I can’t help thinking about them happening in real life, to real people. And I feel awful for even… trying to get off, to even a fantasized version of that.” He shrugs, helplessly. “But it’s what I’ve always liked. I can’t magically start liking vanilla things. So I’m stuck.”

Bucky fumbles for something helpful to say. “You shouldn’t be ashamed.”

“Yes, I should,” Steve says, still looking at the wall.

Damn it, Bucky sucks at this. Stupidly, he insists, “No, you shouldn’t.”

“It’s you I think of,” Steve says. He looks like he’s trying to stare a hole into the tiles, now. “I try to at least imagine other people but they always turn into you. With the piercings and everything.”

He’s near tears, though just like last time, his voice is still entirely steady. Bucky himself is speechless. Steve is so different from him, and so different from Bucky’s meagre panel of former boyfriends. Even without the island looming over them, they probably would have had more than a few things lost in translation.

But then Bucky hears himself say, “Well. Good.”

Steve glances at him, uncertain.

“I’m all you can think of?” Bucky goes on. “I sure fuckin’ hope so.”

A smile flickers on Steve’s mouth, though he looks like he’s trying to force it away. “Bucky—”

“You can think of anything you want involving me,” Bucky says, a bit desperately. “I don’t care if it’s lowering me upside-down in a tub full of piranhas or—or whatever. They’re fantasies. You don’t need my permission but you have it. You have it. I’ll always know you and trust you in the real world, I…” He looks for words. “I’ve never wished for anything about you to be different.”

Steve looks dangerously like he’s about to crumble again, so Bucky takes him in his arms and, like last time, Steve tucks his face into the crook of his neck. They stay like that for a little while, shivering in the cooling shower. Bucky is still bare-chested, in his jeans, Steve still completely naked.

“Maybe,” Steve says when they part. “Maybe let’s not try the piranha thing right away.”

“Not right away,” Bucky approves. He can’t tell whether Steve’s cried, what with the droplets running down his face, and that’s probably how Steve likes it.

“So, we’ve both killed the mood for ourselves again, huh?” Bucky says.

Steve smiles. “We can try and start it up again, if you want.”

“I’d like that. Be nice to know I haven’t soaked my jeans for nothing.”

“Can’t let them dry, then,” Steve says, and turns on the shower again. Then he takes Bucky in his arms and kisses him.

At first it’s mostly an emotional kiss—maybe because Steve didn’t expect to confess himself, or to be absolved. He doesn’t cry his feelings out like Bucky does, so it’s hard to know what effect their bit of conversation just now had on him. But Bucky thinks—hopes—that maybe something shifted for him, maybe a weight was lifted. He wants to believe he can read it in the way Steve’s touch slowly changes, less like he’s handling spun glass and more like he wants Bucky to feel his fingers digging into the skin.

“Tell me if that’s too hard,” Steve breathes between kisses. “I don’t want to bruise you...”

“Don’t mind a bit of bruising,” Bucky rasps in answer. That’s not really a lie: he likes the way Steve touches him now, holding on tighter and harder than before. He wants to encourage it. But also, that’s not bruising. Bucky knows what real bruising is like.

Not that he’s going to say that.

Steve’s half-open mouth keeps brushing kisses along Bucky’s shoulder, and Bucky says, “Or a bit of biting.”

He remembers his dream; his subconscious was sure as hell trying to tell him something. People didn’t really bite him on the island, anyway, certainly not like—oh, not like that, teeth digging just enough to be felt, a focal point of sensation radiating from his shoulder, while Steve’s fingers keep digging into his back, holding him so tightly, closer to bruising now but so, so far away from hurting. Shivers cascade down his spine.

Bucky’s getting hard again. He’s slow to rise—three years of being force-fed Viagra will do that to a man—but the mechanics of his body still respond, which was a curse on the island and which might be a little bit of a blessing now.

“Can I be blunt some more?” Steve says.

“Please,” Bucky mumbles, eyes half-lidded.

“I’d love to give you a handjob.” Steve kisses him under the jaw. “Maybe out of the shower.”

Bucky swallows hard. “Yeah,” he says. He can do that. He’s still afraid, but—his body wants it, and his mind can’t be far behind. He loves Steve. He trusts Steve. “Help me—take off my pants?”

Bucky’s soaked jeans are heavy and hanging low already; Steve has an easy enough time unbuttoning them and pushing them down, while Bucky stands on one foot then the other, clinging to Steve’s slippery upper arms. Soon enough he’s just in his underwear.

“C’mon,” Steve says, and leads him out of the shower.

When they get into the bedroom, Bucky says from under his dripping hair, “I’m going to soak your sheets.”

“I don’t care at all.”

“Can we put on a towel?”

Steve glances at him, then says, “We can stop.”

“I don’t want to stop. I just want a towel.”

Steve nods. “I’ll go get a towel.”

He goes, and Bucky stays there, dripping, arms coming to wrap around himself no matter how many times he tries and remember to let them hang. It feels like losing his virginity again.

He’d lied, that day, playing it cool like it wasn’t a big thing, like he hadn’t gotten kicked out only six weeks ago for the very thing he was now about to concretize. As a result it was rushed and weirdly matter-of-fact: he remembers wishing the other guy would have touched him more, simply run his hands over his body like he wanted to share something with Bucky and not just stick his dick inside him. He remembers feeling distinctly unmanly for having those thoughts, yet having them anyway. He remembers feeling forlorn, standing there awkward and alone, exactly the way he’s standing now.

Then Steve reappears, towel in hand. He plops it on a chair, goes straight to Bucky and wraps him in his arms as if thinking he must be cold.

Steve’s still naked, solid and warm and damp, a wall of human heat. Bucky exhales in his neck. “Sorry.”

“Why sorry?”

“It’s you,” Bucky says, “I know it’s you.” He knows Steve will think this is about the island, but he can’t bring himself to say he was actually thinking back to his seventeen-year-old self and how bad he felt then. “I’m glad it’s you.”

“We can stop,” Steve says again.

Bucky decides to be brave. “Okay,” he says. “Okay. Yeah. Let’s stop.” He sags against him, suddenly on the brink of tears. “Sorry.”

“Don’t say sorry. Never say sorry for that. Thank you for saying that.”

Bucky looks up at him. “I just—I really thought I could do it.” It’s so important for him to know that Steve understands that. “I mean, it’s not like—I wasn’t forcing myself, I wasn’t pushing. Well, maybe I was a little, but I actually believed—up until now, it felt like—”

“It’s okay,” Steve says, quiet but definite. “I know what you mean. It’s okay.”

“But you’re still… You could go and—jerk off. And think of me. I want you to think of me. And I’ll just… wait here.”

Steve kisses him again. “Yeah, Buck,” he says, “I can do that.”

Bucky sits on the towel while Steve’s gone. He’s disappointed, frustrated with himself, but he’s also relieved—and a bit scared, retrospectively, because that meant he was afraid from the start, and yet he almost went through with it anyway. Almost made Steve do it.

But he didn’t. He stopped, this time. And Steve thanked him for it.

Steve comes back, wearing sweatpants and bringing a pair for Bucky; and maybe he did jerk off, and maybe he didn’t. Bucky’s not going to ask, but he opens his arms and Steve comes into them, pushing him back on the bed to kiss him. Bucky kisses back, and he thinks: I’ve got you. And with that, despite everything, he can’t think of today as a failure.

“I’m sorry about one thing,” he says a few minutes later when they’re both lying entangled together.

“What’s that?” Steve asks.

“The piercings. I did notice you liked them.” Hell, Steve managed to make them feel good even to Bucky, even on the island. “But they’re gone, now.”

“I figured,” Steve says quietly.

“They offered general anesthesia at the military hospital and I said yes. I didn’t want to be aware of a single thing.” He was still aware that someone had tampered with his body while he wasn’t awake to know it, and he had a couple of completely dissociated days after that, staring blankly out his hospital room window.

“I’m glad they’re gone,” Steve says, even quieter.

Bucky cranes his head to look at him. “I know you are,” he says. “I believe you.” 

Chapter Text

“Do you still think about death?”

Bucky really likes Banner’s office, likes being up high among the skyscrapers. This morning, the light’s pure and clear, the sky cloudless.

“Not like before,” he says.

Banner waits for him to go on.

“I… don’t feel anymore like it’s… expected of me,” Bucky says slowly. “Or rather—I don’t expect it of myself, now. Maybe strangers hearing about me would wonder what I’ve got to live for. But I don’t have to live for something. I can just be alive.”

He wants to live for something. He wants to have projects, to keep busy, to build towards the future. He wants to be in motion. But he also remembers what Banner said, once. I am of the opinion that we are only ever moving forwards. He is carried by the flow of time, by the breath in his lungs, by the sparks in his mind. To be alive is to be in motion. When he feels exhausted and small, when his dreams turn red and black, he can stop trying for a while; and even then, he won’t stop moving towards something new.

The silence stretches, and Bucky was half-hoping Banner would fill it, but he knows Banner can outwait anyone when he wants them to speak. The words come out as if by themselves. “I still haven’t told Steve about… you know.”

“Your projects,” Banner says.

“Yeah.”

“You’ve changed a lot in a few weeks.”

“I… I realize that.”

“Your relationship with Steve evolved, too—as inevitably as you did. As Steve himself did.”

Bucky nods, throat tight.

“What’s wrong?” Banner asks softly. “Afraid he’ll say no?”

“The opposite.” He shifts in his seat. “If I ask him… he’ll just say yes. He always does.”

“Out of guilt. That’s what you think,” Banner says.

“Yes. He still feels so guilty. I know he does. And the day he got me out, he promised he’d always be there—I don’t want that to be the reason he stays. Obligation, duty.”

“But you’re going to have to ask him eventually. And before you let him answer, you must make those fears clear. And trust him to mind them. Can you do that?”

“I’m really not sure. He’s got a self-sacrificing streak a mile wide.” Bucky hesitates. “But… we are getting good at this talking thing.” More words falling out by themselves: “We tried to have sex yesterday.”

Banner looks admirably neutral. “Do you want to tell me about it?”

“It was… difficult. We were both scared, I think. At one point, he asked me if I wanted to stop. And I realized I did, so I said yes.”

Banner raises his eyebrows. “And?”

“And… nothing. We stopped. And it was okay. You know? The last time things didn’t work out, it was like the end of the world. I was afraid we were destroying each other. This time, I knew—it doesn’t matter. We know we love each other. Everything else is just…” He stops. “Why are you smiling like that?”

“Am I smiling?” Banner folds his glasses, smiling indeed. “I do like to hear you use that word.”

“It’s not a big deal.” Bucky feels himself flush, stupidly, immensely. Love’s been an evidence for weeks, but he hadn’t—it’s really the first time he—and he’s never been in love before. It’s such a big deal. He’s never been in love before.

Banner looks at him for a few seconds. Then he says: “I’m terribly proud of you.”

Bucky physically can’t hear this without trying to deflect. “Bet you say that to all your patients.”

“Do you really think so?” Banner’s gaze is always soft, and yet it can feel so intense at times. “Do you think I would tell you something like this, and not mean it?”

Bucky’s cheeks are growing even hotter. From day one, he’s been badgering Banner for what he perceived as platitudes; and from day one, Banner’s been kindly but firmly demonstrating that platitudes, reinjected with sincerity and meaning, can achieve incredible power. He does mean it. Bucky knows he does. He just can’t…

“Fine, you—you don’t have to be so dramatic about it.”  

But Banner’s relentless. “I’m proud of you,” he repeats. “I’m in awe of the work you’ve done,” and Bucky just can’t.

It’s only after he’s left Banner’s office, after he’s walked five blocks, that Bucky finds enough courage to pull his phone out of his pocket and text with shaky fingers. You’re the reason for all the work I’ve done. You’ve helped me in ways I didn’t think I could be helped.

Banner isn’t long to answer. Who’s being dramatic now?

Fuck you, Bucky writes. And then: Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

*

Wednesday comes, and Bucky still hasn’t talked to Steve.

“Hey, Bucky,” Carol says cheerfully when he comes in. Maria, who’s on the phone, gestures hello at him. “Looks like it’s just the three of us today. Yelena’s on a date again.”

“And… Jessica?”

“We’re not sure. Sometimes she just doesn’t show up.”

“Want me to ask her?” he says without thinking.

“You’ve got her number? Sure, yeah.”

Bucky only has it because Jessica texted him Banner’s contact that one time. He hesitates, but she wouldn’t have done this expecting him never to text her; in fact, she must have been fully conscious of the risk it represented at the time, when he’s only realizing it now.

He pulls out his phone and types out slowly: Hey, it’s Bucky. The girls wanted to know if you’re coming today?

As soon as he’s sent it, he regrets it; “the girls”, doesn’t that sound a bit patronizing? And why not include himself—he’s also wondering if she’s coming… But if he had included himself, would that have sounded controlling, demanding, maybe?

Jessica never volunteered her entire story, but Bucky got the sense that she’d suffered a lot, and for a long time, maybe years, maybe like him. He can’t forget that she could be seeing a threat in him, just like he sees one in every other man he meets. And right there, staring at his phone, he thinks again of how Steve must be feeling around him.

Steve knows Bucky could see a threat in him. Steve knows Bucky has seen a threat in him. What did Bucky tell Banner? We know we love each other. He does know that. Can he trust that love to win over Steve’s guilt?

His phone buzzes. not coming on wednesdays anymore

Before he can react, there’s another text: got therapy

He blinks. His fingers move to ask if it’s Banner, but then he realizes it’s not for him to ask, and it doesn’t matter, anyway. He answers, carefully, That’s great. See you around.

it’s not great i hate it, she answers. seeya

“What did she say?” Maria asks.

Bucky fumblingly explains, and when he’s done Maria’s smiling like she thinks he had something to do with it. “Well then, it’s just the three of us. Do you want to make it a formal session anyway or should we go for drinks?”

They go for drinks in a small, cosy bar. Bucky nurses a beer and tells Maria and Carol about his plans. Maria keeps smiling at Bucky in that same way, like she’s giving him way more credit than he deserves. “I think it’s a great plan,” she says. “You found a solution on your own.”

“Not on my own,” he protests weakly. “You guys more or less gave me the idea…”

“What I’m wondering,” Maria goes on, “is why you don’t look happier.”

Bucky looks down. “I… still haven’t told Steve.”

“Scary,” Carol acknowledges. “You afraid he’ll say no?”

“I’m afraid he’ll say yes for the wrong reasons.” Bucky exhales. “But I’m going to tell him. Tomorrow.”

And he knows it’s true, this time. Because even if Steve does feel guilty—how could Bucky hold it against him? He has to trust him. He has to tell him, and hope only for the best.

“Best of luck, man.” Carol then looks at Maria, who seems to hear unspoken words, and nods. “Not to change the subject, but… we’ve got something for you.”

Bucky looks up, distracted from his mounting anxiety. “What?”

Carol looks like she’s trying not to smile as Maria hands Bucky a small ivory envelope. He looks at it, then at them. “What is this?”

“Open it.”

“Now?”

“Yes, now.”

Thoroughly confused, Bucky opens the flap and pulls out a neat, gold-edged card.

Dear Bucky

Please join us for the wedding of

Maria Rambeau and Carol Danvers

He stares at it for several seconds.

“But,” he says. “You barely know me.”

Carol opens her mouth, but Maria stops her with a gesture and asks Bucky: “Just answer this. Would you like to come?”

Bucky stammers for a few seconds before he manages to say, “Of course. Yes. I…” He stares at the card again. Then it fully hits him. “Jesus, you—you’re getting married! Congratulations! I’m so happy for you! Sorry, I…”

Carol laughs at his floundering and Maria grins, asking, “First gay wedding?”

“First wedding ever,” Bucky answers, which seems to surprise them. He can’t fight a smile of his own, now. “Seriously, you… you want me there? Isn’t it just for… family and…”

“Family and friends,” Maria answers. “It’s not going to be a stuck-up wedding, despite what the card looks like. Carol just likes shiny things.”

“And you can bring Steve,” Carol says. “Actually, please bring Steve. At this point I just can’t wait to meet the guy.”

*

For once, Bucky asked Steve to come over, instead of the other way around. He’s almost sick with nerves by the time the doorbell rings.

“Hey, Buck.” Steve leans in to kiss him hello, and Bucky kisses him back like it might be the last time—which it won’t be. Probably. Hopefully.

“I, uh,” he says when they part. “Steve, I have something to tell you.”

“What is it?”

“Just—let’s go sit down,” Bucky says. “If—if that’s okay.”

They sit down. Steve looks a bit worried. Bucky takes a deep breath, then says, “Pierce’s trial is a year away. That’s not very long, but it’s still… some time. And I was thinking about how to fill that time.”

“Okay,” Steve says, listening with that little frown.

“I can’t keep living like this,” Bucky says bluntly. “I just can’t. I’m going to stop renting this place.” Deep breath. “I’ve kind of been trapped all my life. Even before the island, which was—only the culmination of that. Ever since you got me out, I’ve been struggling to feel like I’m free… and maybe that’s because I still live the way I did when I wasn’t.”

Steve’s very silent now, looking at him.

“I had thought about leaving before,” Bucky goes on. “But I was afraid I’d just fall apart if I didn’t have structure. I had to do things the way I thought they had to be done. Now… well. I’m still terrified to try something different. But because of the trial I’ll have to come back. That’s a solid deadline. And in the meantime I can just… go.”

“Go where?”

“I haven’t really decided yet. I think I want to leave the country. Maybe Europe. I want to keep moving around. I want to… stop pushing so hard, and see what comes to me instead.”

“For a year?”

“For a year.”

“What about therapy?” Steve asks quietly.

“I’ve talked about it with Banner already. He thinks the whole project’s a good idea. And we can still do weekly long-distance sessions—we will,” Bucky says. “I can try EMDR on videocalls, see how that works. I’ll keep taking my pills, working on my journal.”

There’s a silence.

“Well, you sound like you gave it a lot of thought,” Steve says eventually, carefully. “And if that’s what you want to do, Bucky, I’m all for it. I really am.” He sounds like he’s trying to force his words to be true.

Bucky seizes both his hands in his. “Steve,” he has to be steady, he has to be clear, “I want you to come with me. Of course I want you to come with me.”

Steve clearly knows that’s not all there is to it. If Bucky was planning on leaving with Steve he would have said so right away and they both know it. His fingers twitch in Bucky’s hands, like he’s ready to pull his hands away.

“You don’t need to worry about me. Bucky, if that’s something you need to do alone, I’ll let you go.”

He means it. He’s always meant every word; he’s so genuine in everything he does. Bucky’s eyes burn him.

“I’ll let you go too,” he says shakily. “If that’s what you need. Listen—we’ve been through this before, You told me once you didn’t want to be free of me. But you have to be free of me. So you can make your choice freely.” Now, now is the time to say it all. “In that chopper, you promised you’d be by my side every step of the way. But this is such a big thing I’m asking now. Uprooting your whole life, for a year—maybe longer than that, if I don’t want to come back; it’s likely I’ll have the money to never come back if I don’t want to.”

Steve listens to him, just listens, and Bucky’s so grateful because he has to say this, once and for all.

“I don’t want you to be with me because you’re worried I won’t make it without you. Because you’re still feeling guilty for what you were forced to do. Don’t be with me because you feel like you have to.” His voice breaks. “But—but be with me. I love you. I don’t care why anymore.”

Steve’s welling up too. But he doesn’t look devastated; he looks relieved, and Bucky suddenly knows, just like when he looked out the window in that chopper taking him away from the nightmare. He saw the skies beginning to clear, and he knew like he knows now. The sun’s about to rise.

“Ask me to go with you,” Steve says quietly.

A thrill goes down Bucky’s spine, and he stupidly tries to stall, babbling, “You really don’t have to—if you can’t, I’ll find another way, I’ll come back sometimes, I want to leave but I don’t want to leave you, it’s not all or nothing—”

“Just ask me.”

Bucky takes a shaky breath. “Please, come with—”

“No,” Steve says softly, “don’t beg,” and it sends a little shock through Bucky’s brain.

If you need something from me, you just ask. I’ll either give it to you or explain why you can’t have it.

The fear he’s carried all week is gone, all of a sudden. He’s such a fool. Steve promised to stay by Bucky’s side, yes. But since then he also promised not to let Bucky hurt him. Bucky can't trust one without also trusting the other.

“Come with me,” Bucky whispers—and when Steve smiles, the sun rises over scorched earth, high enough for Bucky to realize that it stretches into a whole land, a whole world. He can see the horizon curve.

Chapter Text

It’s 5am—or so their internal clock says—when they land in Orly. Bleary-eyed and disheveled, Steve grabs both their bags and glances at Bucky, who’s curled up against the window and looks very pale, very tense. Bucky’s eyes flick up to him, then away; then he swallows, unfastens his seatbelt and stands up.

Customs take them a very long time. Steve silently prays they won’t get patted down; it happened to him on the way out of the country and Bucky’s spine went ramrod straight. It may have stayed that way the whole flight.

They picked Paris for their first destination because France is close enough to the way things work at home that they won’t get too disoriented right off the bat. Because they both remember a bit of French from high school, enough to go around. Because it’s a cliché romantic destination and Steve knows that Bucky desperately wants for Steve to know he’s all in.

There are times Steve wishes they hadn’t fallen in love. Their relationship would be complicated enough if they were both trying to build something as friends.

It’s Bucky’s turn to present his passport, then go through the metal detector. He walks forward like he expects it to vaporize him. It doesn’t beep; no lights start flashing. The employee doesn’t pull him aside. Bucky turns around and gives Steve a very small, very real smile.

Steve loves him so much he could burst with it.

*

Dr. Bruce Banner is waiting for them in the long, wood-paneled hallway. He’s sitting on a bench under a sunny window, reading a dog-eared paperback. When they step closer, he gets up to greet Bucky. “How are you feeling?”

“Good,” Bucky says tightly.

He looks good. He always does, but for today he bought a suit—the first suit of his life, he told Steve with a crooked smile—and had a trim. He’s still tan from the last month they spent abroad, his clear eyes seeming all the clearer. They’ve been preparing for this for the past three weeks, camping out in Steve's apartment without really moving back in, too busy with getting ready. And now they’re ready.

Bucky exhales. He also looks like he wants to throw up. He actually did almost throw up this morning. Of course they could never be completely ready.

“Thanks for being there,” he tells Banner.

“Of course.” The man turns his soft eyes towards Steve. “And you’d be Mr. Steve Rogers?”

“That’s me. Sir,” Steve reflexively adds. He shakes Banner’s hand, surprised by the firmness of his grip.

“It’s wonderful to finally meet you,” Banner says. “I feel like I know you already.”

“Don’t start,” Bucky inexplicably mutters under his breath.

Banner just looks affably neutral about that reaction. Steve isn’t sure he understands his deal, but it seems to be doing wonders for Bucky, who went from looking sick with dread to simply annoyed.

“Do you have your therapist with you as well?” Banner asks Steve.

“No, I’ll be fine.”

“Really,” he says, noncommittal again. “Well, I’m here if you need anything.”

*

Paris is wet and grey when they get out of the airport. There are buses running all around, rainwater dripping from their tires. People try to interest them in taxis, but Steve is an American abroad: he calls an Uber. They stuff themselves into the dark car and hold hands the whole way, without talking. Bucky still looks pale.

Their apartment building is in the 14^th arrondissement; not exactly Amélie-looking but definitely not modern either. It’s on the fifth floor and there’s no elevator, but they haven’t got a lot of luggage. Bucky punches the code in, the door opens and they walk up and up creaking stairs to narrow, ancient double doors, painted a nice if slightly flaking wine-red.

The key resists them at first; then it opens all at once and they walk in.

Hardwood floors. White walls, white ceilings with that kind of trimming all around, like on wedding cakes. An actual honest-to-god marble chimney, though it must not be functional anymore. Shelves with a few books in all languages, a big bed with colorful sheets, a tiny kitchen and an even tinier bathroom. There are windows on both sides of the apartment. Waves of tin roofs outside are shining with rain, glowing in the intermittent sun. Rainbow weather, Steve’s mom used to call it.

“What do you think?” Steve says after dropping the bags down.

Bucky’s managed to open the window after two or three tries. He’s looking outside, listening to the rain dripping out of the gutters. There are car honks, distant voices brought by the spring breeze. It’s chilly out, but the sun is warm when it touches them.

“If it doesn’t feel right,” Steve says, getting closer, “we can always change. We can go to a hotel.”

“No, I,” Bucky starts. He pauses, then turns to look at Steve and smiles, again, slightly wider than he did at the airport. “I love this place.”

*

“Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth?”

Maria, Carol and Jessica are right there, next to Steve. Or so he thinks—they introduced themselves outside, but now that the trial’s begun he couldn’t look away from Bucky if he tried. Bucky’s calm. He’s articulate. They drilled this a lot, a lot over the past two weeks. Murdock and Nelson have been very helpful.

Murdock is the one stepping forward now, without a cane or anything to guide him. This is his world; he knows where he’s going.

“Sergeant Barnes,” he says. “Tell us about the day you were captured.”

Bucky starts speaking, slowly and faintly at first. His words get a bit stronger as he goes. Alexander Pierce is not there. He’s held in this building, though, they’ll bring him later, when his victim has left the room.

Steve remembers strapping him to the gurney in the chopper. He could have killed him then. He hopes he never has to regret leaving him alive.

Murdock directs Bucky’s story with a few questions here and there, but otherwise he just lets him speak. When he’s done—what feels like years later—the defendant’s lawyer declines to ask further questions.

Steve breathes out. Just like that, it’s over. But then of course it’s not; many other people have to testify. Bucky gets up and leaves the box. He walks straight out of the room and Banner follows.

Steve sits and waits for what feels like more years. Should he go with them? But he should listen to this so he can tell Bucky about it later. More witnesses speak up; witnesses that corroborate every detail of Bucky’s story, almost in the order he’s told them, mostly thanks to banking records, account details, the things Pierce bought, the things he sold. One of them is apparently an actual former employee of the island, which kind of blows Steve’s mind. He can’t remember seeing him there. Was he the one bringing Bucky to his room at night? Is he going to prison too? Did he accept to testify as part of a plea bargain? Or was he also a victim that Steve didn’t recognize as such?

Every time, Pierce’s lawyer declines to ask further questions.

*

“Um,” Steve says over dinner.

Or lunch—or breakfast—well, it’s dinnertime here, anyway, and their internal clocks will just have to get the memo. He’s a bit sheepish that they ordered Vietnamese takeout; that’s not exactly adventurous. But coming here was plenty adventurous already. They can start experimenting with food tomorrow. Also, this isn’t at all the same kind of Vietnamese food they get in New York and it’s frankly way better. Does that have anything to do with being in France?

Bucky glances a question at him, wondering why he attracted his attention. He finished eating way before Steve, went into the bathroom for a little while and hasn’t said much since coming back out.

“I, um, have a present for you.” Steve gets up to get it from his backpack. “It’s not much. We could have probably found some here, but. Here.”

He hands him the little packet, which Bucky unwraps very carefully. Then he stares.

“It’s matcha,” Steve says needlessly. “I figured you might want… in the morning, or…”

Bucky looks up at him, then pulls him into a kiss.

He doesn’t usually initiate kissing; it’s even rarer for him to make it open-mouthed like that. Steve isn’t complaining—he could sink into this and never come back up, and the only reason he sharply pulls away then is surprise.

“What—”

Bucky’s smiling nervously. “I, um. I have a surprise for you too.”

Steve can catch glimpses of it when he speaks, flashes of silver. His brain is melting.

“I had it done a few weeks ago,” Bucky says. “I wanted to see if I could do it, and—well, I can. I had to wear it on and off so it wouldn’t close up. I guess I’ll be wearing it all the time now. It’s—it’s for you.” He hesitates. “If you don’t like it, I can…”

Steve surprises himself—and Bucky, too, probably—by pulling him right back in, so suddenly his chair screeches on the floor and something falls off the table. The piercing rolls under his tongue, smooth and slick in Bucky’s mouth.

“Christ,” he breathes when his brain reengages. “Christ, Bucky, you can’t do this to me.”

Part of him is trying to shrivel up with guilt. He shouldn’t like that. It shouldn’t go right past his thoughts, straight down. A severe, probably Catholic voice in his brain still insists that he shouldn’t be attracted to Bucky at all; certainly shouldn’t picture him straining, gasping, hurting.

But Bucky went and had a tongue piercing done. He’s the one calling up the memory of the island. He planned it out. He’s wearing it as a gift.

“I want to kiss you again,” Steve manages, still breathless.

Bucky’s pupils are huge. “Kiss me again.”

*

Before Steve’s brain can even process the word “Recess”, his own legs have already carried him out of court, across the hallway and into the small room that’s been opened to the plaintiff side. Banner’s here, sitting around a small table with Bucky, who thankfully doesn’t look too bad, just drawn.

They both look up when Steve comes in.

“Oh, hello, Steve,” Banner says as Bucky gets to his feet.

Steve opens his mouth to say he’s sorry he hasn’t followed Bucky out of the room, that he wasn’t sure he should barge in on a talk with his therapist, but Bucky’s already in his arms and Steve’s holding him very very tight. On second thought, speaking doesn’t sound like something he needs to do right now.

He closes his eyes. Someone is trembling; maybe both of them.

“You’re up next, Steve,” Banner says a few minutes later. “After that it’ll be Dr. Ross’ turn, then mine.”

Bucky turns a burning gaze to his therapist. “What about the defendant? What about—” He has to take a breath. “Isn’t he going on the stand? Isn’t he going to say anything?”

“If he does, it won’t be today. But I don’t think he will. You’ve seen how his lawyer was like.” Banner shrugs. “They know they’re beaten.”

Steve still has an arm around Bucky’s waist and can feel him coil up with rage. “I had to fight,” he says, voice rising with every word, “every goddamn day was a fight—I wasn’t allowed to give in, I couldn’t do that without losing my life, without losing my fucking soul, and he’s just going to fold and fucking let it happen? They’re about to destroy him! He’s not even going to try and fight? He’s not going to have a single shred of—of pride, of dignity?”

Banner shrugs again. “You expect him to be worth as much as you that way. But the truth is, not many people are.”

*

Steve kisses him again, hungrier still. There’s still a voice in his mind saying he can’t do this; Bucky was so tense, so scared the whole flight; he’s been so silent and reserved the whole evening; they’re both jet-lagged as hell, they need to stop, to gather themselves, to rest. To try again tomorrow.

“You’re not…” He reopens his eyes. “You’re not touching me.”

Bucky’s keeping his hands to his sides. His eyes blink open, lazily. “Oh. Yeah. Not used to it.”

Steve remembers leather harnesses, ropes and cuffs, and tries to steel himself against arousal. “You can do that now.”

“I…” Bucky hesitates. “I think I don’t want to.” He does catch Steve’s shirt before he can draw back. “I mean—like when you pick my clothes. I want you to decide. This time. I want—to obey.” He looks Steve in the eye. “Unless you wouldn’t enjoy it.”

Steve feels like he’s about to rip in half. Part of him is still desperate to hide what he feels. He cannot be like this around Bucky; he cannot be like this at all. But another part of him is rising, getting a bit louder each day, more daring with Bucky’s encouragement. That part is saying: I was always like this. And I never harmed anyone. They loved it. I loved it. It was my nature. It still is.

It’s raining again outside. They haven’t turned on the lights—it was still light, a moment ago, but now it’s getting darker outside. Bucky doesn’t look away. There’s yearning in his eyes, but of course he can’t beg. Steve forbade it a long time ago.

So don’t make him beg.

Steve’s brain recalibrates. Suddenly it all seems so simple. It’s what they both want. Who cares if it’s messed-up?

“Come on,” he says, and gets up. He draws Bucky along, and Bucky goes, his eyes still huge.

Steve has them both sit together on the edge of the bed, Bucky almost on his lap, perched on the mattress between Steve’s thighs bracketing his. His hands are pressed between his back and Steve’s chest. Steve just holds him there for a while, breathing against his neck. One of his hands comes up Bucky’s throat, under his jaw, making him crane his head back. His fingers touch Bucky’s lips, and Bucky readily sucks them in.

He did that once already, the day Steve tried handfeeding him, the day which ended so badly. The thought goes by in a flash, probably in both their minds. Steve lets himself enjoy the press of the piercing against the pads of his fingers; then he pulls them out. “All right?”

“Mmh.” Bucky’s nodding, eyes closed, breathing deeply.

“Are you afraid? Do you want to keep going?”

“I’m always afraid,” Bucky says drowsily. “I want to keep going.”

*

Steve’s time on the stand doesn’t feel real. Matthew Murdock is there, asking him questions. Steve is giving answers on automatic. He drilled this, too. For the first time, the defendant’s lawyer has questions as well. How could you be certain of consent? Were you not behaving in exactly the same way as Mr. Pierce’s other clients? And then, How could you risk the success of your mission? Wasn’t that going against orders? Eventually Murdock objects on the grounds that this is Alexander Pierce’s trial, not Steve’s.

“I do apologize for not doing that earlier,” Murdock says when he comes back. “I had to let him air those issues out.”

“It’s okay. I get it,” Steve answers. He does. He feels cold inside, but he can tell himself it’s fine, which is something he couldn’t do a year ago.

Ross is up next. He looks, Steve thinks ungenerously, happy to be the center of attention, up there in his box. Murdock goes and questions him on Bucky’s state of mind straight out of the island. Ross doesn’t do too badly. It’s just that the way he depicts Bucky—as a haggard, feeble victim lost without his guidance—raises just about every hackle on Steve’s body. He looks over his shoulder at Bucky, sitting in the audience, who looks deeply unimpressed and raises an eyebrow Steve’s way. It makes him smile, and suddenly it’s like they’re both laughing at this pathetic man, like it really doesn’t matter at all what he says.

“I’m okay,” Bucky says at recess. “Are you? I want to kill that lawyer.”

“I’m good. It’s like Murdock said. We had to air it out. Ross, though…”

“It is a bit funny. Him trying to be petty and self-important at a trial against someone who dwarfs him that way. I’m not even sure he realizes he’s doing it.” He pauses. “He hasn’t mentioned Rumlow.”

“No,” Steve says. He put in his report that Bucky incapacitated Rumlow, and that was it. But Ross asked Bucky about it and knows that it means Bucky killed him. Of course, it couldn’t have been more blatantly legitimate defense, but it was still something to worry about. “He’s not entirely stupid. Just very nearly so.”

Bucky smiles. Then he says, “Let’s go home.”

“Now? Don’t you want to see Banner on the stand?”

“No. It feels like I shouldn’t. He’s going to detail my therapy for everyone to hear and I don’t—I want to keep working with him. I don’t want to look behind the curtain. You know?”

*

Steve puts his hand on the inside of Bucky’s jeans-clad thigh. “I’m going to go higher,” he says, “slowly.”

He starts moving his hand, fingers brushing over denim. Bucky’s pressing back against him. He’s breathing a bit too quickly, flushed and probably exhausted. It was a long flight, and the week leading up to it was so tense and busy.

The rain’s pouring outside, now. Steve stops talking at this point. He knows Bucky can and will tell him to stop, if—but he doesn’t, he doesn’t, and eventually Steve’s squeezing him through his jeans, gently. Bucky exhales shudderingly. To be doing this—it’s like an out-of-body experience, except for how Steve is very much in his own body.

He realizes now that he didn’t truly think they’d do anything like that again. But here they are, and it feels so easy.

He pops the button and takes Bucky out of his underwear. Bucky isn't breathing as hard as he was a moment ago: his eyes have reopened. He angles his head to look at Steve in the corner of his eye. “That’s all?” he says, sounding still drowsy but also surprised.

Steve manages mock offense. “Hey, give a guy some time. I’m just getting started.”

“No, I mean—” Bucky’s smiling in the dark. “You know what I mean. I’ve been so—so obsessed by this and it isn’t… It’s just you touching me.”

*

They never go back to court. They’re not needed there, not anymore, and even if it does feel anticlimactic somehow, Steve thinks maybe it’s the best they could hope for. Some peace.

They spend the last week of the trial in Steve’s apartment, eating and sleeping and going on walks like two old men. Bucky’s staring into space a lot, always smiling at Steve when Steve draws his attention, but then falling deep into thought again.

“What are you thinking about?” Steve asks one day.

“I’m thinking about Paris,” Bucky answers. “That first night when it rained so much.”

Steve kisses him in the neck like he did back then. He doesn’t think that's what Bucky was thinking about, but he won’t ask again.

At three pm that day, Murdock calls them to confirm that Pierce will not go on the stand. He apologizes that the trial couldn’t give Bucky more definite closure.

“I’m relieved,” Bucky says after hanging up. “If he had gone up there I would’ve had to go back. I couldn’t let myself chicken out. That way…”

“He made that choice for you.”

“One last time.” Bucky smiles. “Maybe that’s closure.”

*

It’s dark, and warm, and it’s raining outside, and Bucky’s arching, gasping, clutching at Steve’s shirt.

“I want to suck you off,” he pants when he's done. “Please tell me I can suck you off.”

*

The testimonies are drawing to a close; verdict should be tomorrow. Then Pierce will embark to his other trial—the arms trafficking one, which will be much longer, much more complex. The next day, Bucky answers another call from Murdock and says, “All right. Thank you.” And then, “How much? All right. Thank you.”

He hangs up, then turns to tell Steve, “Guilty. Life sentence.” He lets a few seconds go by, then says in a voice that’s shaking just a little, “How about another holiday?”

*

“You want that?” Steve asks, and Bucky grins, disheveled, flushed with pleasure.

“Been thinking of it since I got this piercing, Steve. I can do it. I know I can.” He looks so happy. “I want to.”

*

Before they leave again, they have an invitation to respond to.

Carol is absolutely stunning in a three-piece suit, her waistcoat embroidered in gold. Maria, who’s rather sensible and butch on the daily, is wearing an absolutely amazing dress, overflowing with lace and tulle.

“Do you know someone dropped us an IOU for 10 million dollars as a wedding gift?” Maria tells Steve late that evening.

Steve laughs and says, “What?” Then he repeats, “What?” in a very different tone of voice.

“We’re gonna use most of it for charity work. Sponsor the creation of a male shelter, too. He didn’t ask us anything, but I’m sure he’ll like that.”

“Yeah,” Steve says, watching Bucky dance with Carol. “He’ll like that.”

*

When it’s done, they both lie there on the bed, catching their breath. It’s fully dark outside, now. The next day, they’ll have sex again. The day after that, they’ll leave the apartment, visit museums, eat some great food. The month after that, Bucky will turn to Steve and say, You know what? I haven’t thought of the island at all yesterday. Not once. The year after that, they’ll get on a plane again, now with the trial behind them. The year after that, they’ll come back. Or maybe they won’t. Who’s to say?

For now they’re breathing together in the dark, falling asleep, and they’ve made it out. They survived, they're together. That’s all the future Steve needs for now.