Chapter Text
Back at work on Monday, Bucky walked in to find Wanda there waiting, looking a little pissed.
"Pietro said you went to the hospital?" She said.
"Uh, yeah." Bucky took off his jacket and traded it for his apron. "But I'm fine. Really."
"Come here."
Bucky shuffled over.
She reached up and lifted back his hair to examine the bump on his head, nearly a week old. "Looks like it's healing okay. You are getting enough sleep?"
"Yes," said Bucky. Now that he had Steve to help him, he was sleeping just fine. No dreams. He wished he'd known that Steve's presence would help him sleep back in his own world – after last night, he had determined that this was not just a dream. It couldn't be. You couldn't fall asleep in a dream and have dreams. It was too real. In dreams you didn't lie still and listen to someone's heart beating while he stroked your hair for an hour. You didn't have to scratch an itch on your hip, only to have someone notice and drag your hand over to his hip. You didn't think about how turned on your best friend was making you and wonder why you had never even considered this. "I slept really good last night."
That was because Steve had slept over.
"Good. I mean, you look better. No more bags under your eyes." Wanda smiled, then slapped him on the arm. "Now why didn't you tell me you slept over at Steve's?"
"It just happened," Bucky said.
"I can't even with you," Wanda laughed.
He shrugged, smiling. It had never occurred to him to gossip about Steve with Wanda. Maybe the Bucky she knew did this, but he'd never had this kind of relationship with her. With anyone, really, except Steve. But he and Steve had never gossiped. They just had adventures, mostly caused by Steve getting himself in over his head.
Could he be the kind of person who chatted about a cute guy he liked? Could he be a happy kind of guy, like he used to be? He wasn't sure. There was too much history in his brain. It didn't seem fair that Wanda might never get her friend Bucky back, or Sam his roommate.
If this was a parallel universe he'd fallen into – which seemed more and more likely the longer he was here – there ought to be a way to fall back. To switch out.
As the first few customers of the day began to trickle in, Bucky thought about that. Switching back. He'd be going back to a cryostasis chamber. And while his moral center told him that was the right thing to do, for the sake of the happy, not-brainwashed Bucky who was currently trapped there as well as for the simple fact that he didn't know what would happen if someone read that list of words that gave them control over him, the bigger part of him didn't want to go back. What exactly was he missing? Here he still had his arm, and his sanity, and all his friends – the friends he hadn't really counted as friends.
He even had Steve.
But this Steve wasn't exactly his Steve, was he? Bucky wished he was, then he would have absolutely no reason to want to get back. He wished he could make this Steve and his Steve one person.
"James." That was Sharon's voice. He turned around.
"Hi," he said. He'd seen Sharon when he came in, sitting at her desk. She had looked stressed.
"You didn't punch your time card at all last week," she said.
"Oh." Bucky felt like an idiot. He'd never even thought about it, even though when he had worked, before he enlisted, he'd had to punch a time card. "Uh, should I... do that now?"
"You're still having memory problems, then," Sharon stated.
Bucky shifted his weight from side to side. "I think it's getting better," he said.
"Okay." Sharon sighed. "Come with me." She showed him how to punch his time card, and entered some kind of code to make it register that he had been here for a half hour already. Then she had Bucky fill out a paper timesheet to send into corporate.
Wanda had been out at the counter by herself the whole time, and Bucky kept shooting her apologetic glances. "Are you sure," Sharon said, after Bucky signed his name on the timesheet, "that you don't want to fill out a workman's comp form?"
"I'm fine," Bucky said.
"James. From what I've heard, you've been to the hospital twice because of this head injury." Bucky started to protest, but Sharon held up a hand. "I'm going to ask you this one more time: are you sure?"
He nodded, then wondered, Was it stupid not to? He had no idea how health insurance worked.
"Okay. I'll talk to Tony, but... he's probably going to get on your case about this. He's all worked up about the surprise inspection."
Bucky hurried out to help Wanda with the crush of morning customers.
For a while they worked almost silently, barely able to catch a breath while filling all the impossibly complex orders. Then, finally, there was a lull. "I'm sorry," Wanda said, leaning with her back against the counter.
"For what?"
"I should have showed you how to do your time card."
"It's fine." He wanted to change the subject. What gossipy thing could he tell Wanda? "Hey, did you know Barton has a secret admirer?"
That did the trick. Wanda's eye got huge. "He does?"
"Have you noticed a redhead chatting with him? Maybe in the afternoons?"
She hopped up and down. "Yes! I mean, I haven't noticed them flirting, but when she comes in she always takes a long time deciding, until Clint gets to the register. She's really pretty. Like she could be a model."
"She's Steve's neighbor," Bucky told her.
"Get out!" Wanda shrieked, which caused several customers to glance up from their coffees. Covering her mouth with her hands, Wanda bent over with muffled giggles.
Bucky found himself laughing. It was a strange feeling, like he was someone else, but Wanda's laugh was infectious. "Her name is Natasha, and apparently she was the one who told Steve about me."
"Wow, that's awesome. We're like a dating service!"
"I'm not sure Barton knows she likes him. Do you?"
"He's so funny. Lots of girls flirt with him, and he's just oblivious. There's this one girl who used to come in, she had dark hair, and she was so into him. And then I asked him about her and he was like, She's just a kid. She was plenty old enough!" Wanda thought about that. "She was legal age, anyway. And what's three years!"
They handled a mini-rush of customers, then returned to the subject of Clint and Natasha. "So did Steve tell you that Natasha had a crush on Clint?"
"Nope," Bucky said, then grinned. "She told me herself."
Wanda nearly dropped the iced coffee she was shaking. After handing it off to the customer, she said, "We need to get them together. This must happen."
Suddenly Bucky had a memory of Clint and Natasha fighting while they were at the airport. Maybe these two weren't friends? But after they fought, Natasha had helped Steve and Bucky go find Zemo.
It made him wonder. If relationships in a parallel universe were to mirror those in his own universe, where did Steve and Bucky's relationship fit? Maybe if Steve were to meet Peggy in this world, or Sharon (the thought of both women together in the same room pierced his brain like an ice pick), then Steve would realize his romantic feelings lay with one of them rather than with Bucky. Maybe his strong feelings toward Bucky were related to their long friendship in Bucky's world.
He thought about how he had kissed Steve last night. How natural it had felt.
"What's wrong?" Wanda asked, touching his arm lightly.
"Nothing. So... the only person left to fix up here is you," he said.
She laughed. "I don't know, I'm too shy."
"You? Shy?"
She laughed again. "I know you, that's the only reason I seem so friendly."
"I think we can find someone for you."
"I don't know..."
Wanda was blushing now, so Bucky decided to back off. "You want to take a coffee break?"
They made themselves Frappuccinos topped with caramel and chocolate syrup. It wasn't a true coffee break, since they continued to serve customers and sucked down their drinks behind the wall of espresso machines. It was, however, the first light-hearted moment Bucky could remember having in a long, long time.
When Clint arrived, Wanda and Bucky shared a conspiratorial look, but it was Bucky's favorite customer who arrived first. Bucky was unfortunately cornered in the back with Tony when he arrived.
"I can't believe you would do this to me. You're lucky Sharon managed to clean up your mess from last week." Tony was pacing right in front of the door. "You know, I don't wanna be the bad guy here. But I don't have a margin of error for this kind of thing."
"I'm sorry," Bucky said again.
Wanda peeked her head through the door. "Tony? I'm sorry, we really need Bucky out here."
Tony waved him away.
"Thanks," Bucky said, then saw Steve leaning against the counter. "Oh."
He wasn't sure why he felt a full-body flush coming on. His body immediately wanted to hug him. He still didn't want to think it was anything more than simple conditioning, but he had to admit that it made him happy that Steve was so eager to see him. He also found himself a little grateful that Sharon went home at noon. He wasn't quite ready to yet to try to lose Steve to her. Or Peggy.
"Hi." Steve was smiling. "You free after work?"
"Yes."
"Good."
They stood smiling at each other until Clint wandered over. "So, you gonna stare at each other all day, or you gonna order something?"
"Oh, uh..." Steve fumbled for his wallet. "Venti--"
"You don't have to order anything," Bucky said. "Here, I can make you one on the house."
"I can pay."
"Steve."
While Bucky was making Steve's drink, Clint leaned in. "Uh, you know Tony frowns upon free drinks. For anybody."
"I'll pay for it," Bucky said stubbornly.
"All right," Clint sang. "It's your ass, though."
"What about your ass?" Steve asked when Bucky brought him his coffee.
"Oh, nothing."
"Good. 'Cause I like your ass."
Behind him, Wanda giggled.
"Hey, is your friend Natasha going to stop by soon?" Bucky whispered.
Steve took the opportunity to lean in. "I don't know," he whispered back.
"Because Wanda and I want to move things along with her and Clint."
"So we can double date?"
"Maybe..." Bucky hadn't even thought of that. "What do you want to do after..." He glanced at the clock. "In three minutes?"
"I don't know. We could just walk around. Or we could go back to my place and make out."
Bucky felt his face heat up.
"Or take a nap. The possibilities are endless. What do you want to do?"
He had no other response than to shrug. What had he done with himself, when he had a chance to do anything? He could barely remember those days. As the Winter Soldier, he hadn't been given an opportunity for down time. When he was on the run, he was mostly just struggling to remember anything, and spent a lot of time reading everything he could get his hands on, doing research. During the war, he might have played cards with the guys, or gone out for a drink. And before...
"Have you ever been to Coney Island?"