Summary: Posing as a happily married couple for a deep cover op, you and Bucky have to put aside the longstanding animosity between you, at least in public. In private, there's little more than coldness between you. But maybe, just maybe, there's more going on than either of you are able to say.
A/N: Hi all! So this started out a one shot and I was fully expecting it to stay that way because so many times I have one shots that I think "maybe I'll turn this into something more" but then I never do. BUT somehow this time it was different! (maybe someone snuck into my brain while I was sleeping and took over? Wish they'd do my chores while they're at it) So now this is going to be a four parter. The original one shot is one the first chapter with the total chapter list below. Thank you for all the love for this story and I hope you enjoy the continuation! ♥
Please see chapters for warnings, but it's mostly fluff and angst and two people trying to figure out if they like each other or not.
Please let me know if you'd like to be tagged. I'm hoping to have time to post chapter two tonight.
Summary: All this time together and with a friendship finally growing, it's no wonder you're starting to feel a little... confused. But what you're feeling can't really be real, can it? (Chapter 4)
Word count: 6.5k
Warnings: Definitely some swearing. A light dab of angst in the form of confused feelings and anxious overthinking. References to criminal activity and human trafficking. Fluff. One of the reader's favorite candies is one of mine, my apologies if you actually hate them!
A/N: Here we are the fourth and final part, I hope you like it! Thank you for sticking with me everyone! Just a note, as before there are some time jumps between scenes that hopefully make sense as you read it. Thank you my darling @jbarneswilson for beta'ing and to @firefly-graphics for her always amazing dividers. And thank you to my tiny taglist for this story: @vicmc624 and @emmabarnes
Series masterlist: You Still Get Burned
Why is it that you can’t get your brain to remember useful things like your goddaughter’s birthday or the password for your email, but it will- very unhelpfully and not at all at your behest- keep a perfect count of the exact number of physical encounters you have with what you are sure is your completely oblivious partner in the weeks since the first time he touched you?
And why does it have to set off warning bells every single fucking time it happens? Setting off an internal reaction that threatens to break down not only your years of operative training, but also potentially endangers your active mission by throwing you off balance and forcing you to muster every ounce of your strength to not turn into an anxious and simpering mess when it does?
You sit down hard on your bed with an angry huff. You reach for a pillow and fold yourself in half over your lap as you scream into it. After a long minute, you flop backwards, spent but no less annoyed.
What the fuck is wrong with you? Have you lost all sense and completely forgotten how to do your job?
It happened. Again. And this time you really had no one to blame but yourself, because you absolutely started it.
Sitting on the edge of the pool side-by-side, with your feet dangling in the water, you and Barnes watched as the more daring of your neighbors tried to outdo one another in some sort of cannonball version of "horse".
You nearly choked on the beer you were drinking when Tom- one of the neighbors who you actually genuinely liked- attempted some complicated dance move that ended with him landing in a painfully flat belly flop.
Overcome with genuine laughter and clearly not thinking properly, you leaned. Sideways. Into Barnes.
Just to be closer to him.
As soon as you realized what you’d done, your brain got to work trying to rationalize it.
At this point, Lena’s habits were so second nature to you, you barely even had to think about it anymore. And of course, Lena would want to be closer to her husband, they were in love weren’t they?
But your rationality only held out in the face of truth for so long. Because you knew, you knew, you didn’t do it because it was what Lena would have done. Because for some insane reason, in that moment- albeit unconsciously- you wanted it. Wanted to be close to him. Wanted to share that moment of joy with him, that unspoken intimacy. A revelation accompanied by a series of complex acrobatics by your insides.
And to make matters worse, when he squeezed you close to him in response and pressed his warm lips against your temple, you felt something. A decidedly unprofessional, un-Lena, something. Only by the sheer force of your will, honed by years of training, did you stop yourself from bolting from the party right then and there.
Though you managed to keep it together for those around you, Barnes could tell that something had happened. He kept eying you the rest of the night. He was cautious enough that no one else picked up on his worried and confused look, but you knew. You would have known even if you hadn’t caught him looking. His gaze was burned into your back.
To make matters worse, when you got home that evening, instead of politely ignoring your descent into insanity, he had the audacity to check in on you.
“Are you okay? You seemed… off earlier.”
One of the more annoying side effects of dismantling the once impenetrable walls between the two of you was the discovery that Barnes was very astute, sometimes unnervingly so, especially when it came to his ability to pick up on your subtle changes and to suss out when your mood was shifting.
However, it seemed that he hadn’t yet learned when it would have been far better for him to have just kept his mouth shut about it.
As you keep yourself occupied by pulling wet towels from your swim bag, a task that in this exact moment requires a surprising amount of your attention, the wheels churn wildly in your mind.
You know that the easiest way to shut down this line of inquiry is to shut him out. All you have to do is say something sharp and at least a little mean and he'll retreat.
But you won’t. Because you know that no matter how confused you feel, you don’t really want that. You like this fragile friendship too much to just blow it up. Even if you do think it might save you a lot of pain in the long run.
You smile tiredly and decide to offer him a half truth.
"Yeah, I'm sorry. I just- I guess I'm just getting a little bit tired." You grimace apologetically. "All this suburbia is getting to me a little, I think."
You try to laugh it off, but the worried line in his brow only deepens.
Suddenly hit with an anxious thought, you're quick to offer reassurances.
"I'm sorry, I will get it together. I'm not going to endanger our mission."
His expression softens and he tilts his head sympathetically.
"I know. I know you won't. I'm not worried about that. I'm-" he pauses and his eyes dart away for a moment before settling once again on your face- "I just want to make sure you're okay. And- that we're okay."
Your chest squeezes and the smile you'd been forcing slips away. You watch him and think about how far the two of you have come and how very clear it is to you now that you’re not the only one worried that it could all fall apart.
Your smile may be small and a little sad when you find it again, but at least this time it's real. You hold his eye for a long moment before reaching out a hand and very deliberately placing it on his shoulder.
“Yeah,” you say with a gentle squeeze, your proof to him that you mean what you say, your proof to yourself that you really can control whatever this thing is that's going on with you. "We're okay. I'm sorry if I made you think otherwise."
He shakes off your apology with a soft smile, then raises a cautious brow.
"And you? Are you okay?"
"I’m okay.”
Pulling your hand back, you let your smile turn playful.
"I think I just need a long shower and to blast some- oh I don't know- punk rock? To clear my head of all thoughts about yoni eggs and Instagram and mid-level marketing schemes from my mind."
He dips his head with a laugh and the tension in his posture eases away.
"Fair enough. I'll leave you to it then."
Maybe punk rock really does help.
Because somewhere between “God Save the Queen” and “I Wanna be Sedated” you found new resolve.
As the spray washed over you, the realization finally hit that refusing to acknowledge that you were in fact feeling...something was doing you no good.
Hopping out of the shower, you wipe away the condensation from the mirror and settle in to have a little chat with yourself in front of the bathroom vanity.
You tell yourself- quite convincingly you might add- that okay, yes, you are in fact feeling… a thing.
But.
It is nothing.
Nothing more than an effect of the mission. A reasonably common one in fact. It is not at all unusual for undercover agents- especially after several months deep under- to start to get a little confused. For the lines between themselves and their legends to blur. And okay, sure, you aren’t feeling especially Lena-like in any other way- you still hate maple syrup lattes just as much as you always did- but that doesn’t mean that this isn’t the influence of Lena on you. And given how emotionally fraught your relationship with him had been all along it just makes sense, doesn't it? All that energy that you once spent hating each other had to go somewhere, didn’t it?
With a deep breath, you remind yourself that you know who you are. That has not changed. And this… complication… it is something you can sort out when the mission is over.
Until then, you will just keep reminding yourself that, while yes, you do have... feelings... for him, they aren’t really real. So, all you have to do is make sure you don't do something supremely stupid- like oh say, kissing him when you are alone- and you’ll be fine.
You can handle that, can’t you? You’d survived torture and interrogation training, hadn’t you? This should be nothing by comparison, you remind yourself with a stern look in the mirror.
And afterwards, once the mission is done and you are home again, you are sure that these annoying and confusing feelings will go away all on their own.
With a final hard nod at yourself in the mirror, you turn away. You know what you need to do and you are going to do it.
And if- you tell yourself dismissively- you give yourself permission to enjoy it while it lasts… well, that is between you and your reflection and nobody else.
You rest your chin on his shoulder and his heart beat kicks up so quickly that it takes him a full minute to make out that you're trying to talk to him. The rush of blood in his ears had drowned out your soft voice. The slow music coming from the speakers as you sway together on the dance floor isn’t helping either.
"Sorry, what was that?" He asks.
You pull back to look into his face and he curses himself because he already misses the contact.
"You okay, Barnesy?" Your low voice is teasing but he can feel the genuine concern behind it.
He doesn’t like when you’re worried about him. Or he does- he likes that you care- he just doesn’t ever want to be the cause of distress for you.
He smiles and shakes his head.
“I’m good, only a little lost in thought. What were you trying to say?”
You hold his eye a little while longer, before you shift your gaze back over his shoulder. To his great relief you rest your chin there once more.
"Nothing really important. I just- I'm just watching Gloria and it's-" he can't see your face but he knows that you're biting your lip, you always do when you think. He knows you only dare to talk about this here because the music and the slow dance give you a little bubble where no one will overhear you. Still, something must be bothering you for you to even bring up mission talk in public.
"It's just what?" He tucks his chin down and murmurs quietly into the space behind your ear.
You sigh, somewhere between fatigue and annoyance.
"I guess I just don't understand it… how people can be that awful. I’ve been in this job for a long time so I shouldn’t be surprised, but still.” You keep your voice low but it turns tight with disgust. “She destroys people's lives with her dirty business and then comes here, queen of the school charity gala, and acts like she's some great savior."
You feel tense in his arms, the heat of anger bubbling just below the surface. He rubs small, soothing circles where his hand rests on your low back and feels you start to relax.
"I know what you mean. But she won't be doing that much longer."
You let out a breath and he feels the tension ease away even more.
"No, she won't. I'm glad Sam gave us the go ahead to close this thing out."
"Yeah," he replies lightly, carefully.
He's glad too. He is. The same as you. Gloria Roman, despite the saintly mask she puts on for the masses, is one of the worst humans outside of Hydra that he's ever had the displeasure of interacting with. She treats humans like commodities, only worth what she can sell them for and disposable once that dollar value gets too low. She needs to be stopped and with her in custody, your team will stand a very fair chance of bringing down the larger network of scumbags just like her that she works with.
He's grateful that you've finally been given the green light to make your final preparations to bring her in.
He just- he’s not sure he’s ready for this to end. Because he doesn’t know what waits for you on the other side, but he knows that he won’t get to hold you like this anymore. Not even for pretend.
You sigh and turn your head so that your cheek now rests on his shoulder. He can feel your breath on his throat and goosebumps prickle up the length of his neck.
Carefully, he adjusts his hold on you. He brings your hand that he holds to his shoulder and settles it there, then brings his own hand down to meet his other at your waist. And you let him. You don’t even seem surprised. You simply let your fingers curl into the edge of his collar at the back of his neck.
You sway together to the music without speaking. After several heartbeats, your soft voice breaks hesitantly into the quiet.
“I don’t-” you start, unsure, but try again. “When we go back- after this is over- I don’t want things to go back to the way they were. With us.” You breath in a deep breath, then rush on quietly. “I feel like it’s going to be uncomfortable. Everyone is going to have something to say about how much things have changed with us.” You let out an annoyed huff. “Everyone’s going to have a joke. They’re going to be as annoying as they possibly can be.”
He snorts a laugh.
“Oh god, they’re going to be such assholes.”
He can hear the laugh in your voice for just a moment before your tone turns solemn.
“I don’t like being uncomfortable or the center of everyone’s attention. It makes me- well, I get kind of bitchy, if I’m honest- and withdrawn. And I- I just don’t want- if it does go like that and I do start to act like that- I don’t want you to think it’s about you. I don’t want there to be any more misunderstanding between us. I know you better now. And I like being friends with you too much to let things go back to the way we were.”
You let out a long breath, the weight of thinking too long about this.
His chest feels tight. He knows how you feel. It’s what he’s afraid of too.
He tucks his chin down, letting his cheek brush lightly against yours. He squeezes you gently.
“I don’t want that to happen either. Let’s agree that no matter how awkward it gets or how huge of assholes everyone is, we won’t take it out on each other. We won’t lose this- good thing… that we’ve got going on.”
You nod against his cheek.
“Deal.”
A gentle chiming starts up and you lift your head to watch the large mirrored ball at the center of the room start it’s descent.
The theme of the charity gala is “New Beginnings” and Gloria and her planning committee leaned heavily into a classy, New Year’s in July vibe. Everything is done up in black and white, accented in gold and silver. Champagne flutes and high end hors devours set the tone for elegance and the gentle chiming of a midnight bell takes the place of the countdown roar that usually accompanies the traditionally more raucous celebration.
That doesn’t stop people from giving a bright cheer when the ball finally lands and sets off a series of sparklers. You turn to him with a laugh and a roll of your eyes when you hear someone in the crowd shout “huzzah!”
He laughs with you, but as it fades, your eyes hold. When your eyes flick away, he looks to see what you see. All around you couples and friends are kissing, love and luck for the “New Year.”
When he turns his eyes back to you, you’re watching him. He barely even thinks about it when he brings his hand gently to the back of your head. Something wild skips inside of him when he doesn’t have to guide you because you’re already leaning in on your own.
When your lips meet his, he can think of nothing, save for the soft feel of your mouth against his and the sweetness that clings to your lips from the champagne. It’s instinct that takes him when your lips part and he brushes his tongue against them. His heart nearly beats out of his chest when you open your mouth wider and let your own tongue press against his. Impulse drives him to deepen the kiss and somewhere distantly he can feel your fingertips dig into the back of his neck.
Abruptly, you’re broken apart. Startled, he catches your eye and sees his own confusion and surprise reflecting back at him.
He wants to reach for you again, but someone is roughly shaking his shoulders. It takes him a moment to realize that Kevin is grabbing at him, trying to turn him into a hug as he shouts “Happy New Year” in his ear. Gloria has you in a similar hold and before he knows it, you're swept away from him, into the arms of one neighbor and then another, until you’re lost in the crowd.
It feels like an eternity before he finds you again. When he does, you give him a careful smile that reveals nothing.
With a voice light and practiced, you ask if he’s ready to head home. He nods and volunteers to get your jacket. When he helps you slip it on, he’s careful not to let his fingers brush against your skin more than they have to. When he escorts you out the door, his hand hovers at your lower back but does not touch.
Once you’re outside, blessedly alone once more with a gentle breeze blowing off the water, he wants to say something.
But he doesn’t know what.
So he doesn’t.
Neither do you.
And it's like it never happened.
Leaning against opposite sides of Gloria’s double-sized front door, you and Barnes watch as she is driven off in a police car. Unmarked. A concession you made to help minimize the social damage to her family and to help soften her up for when you eventually ask her to turn against her partners.
You know Barnes is watching you from the corner of his eye, but you keep your own gaze focused on Sam and Monica where they stand on the lawn, engaged in a short debriefing with their contacts from the local bureau office. You're feeling too many things right now and you don't know if you want him to see them.
After another minute, Sam and Monica shake hands with the agents, then jog back towards you as the bureau guys get in their car.
Sam’s smile splits wide across his face and you shift uncomfortably. You know he’s proud of the two of you, that’s clear enough, but you can’t help but resent the smug tinge on his lips.
“Nice work, you two,” he says heartily, as he and Monica give you warm hugs and arm pats. “When I sent Agent Bradley the evidence you collected-” Sam lets out a low whistle- “I tell you that man didn’t know whether he ought to dance or name his first born after you.”
You dip your head with a snort of laughter and kick your heel on the ground.
“You know, Wilson,” Barnes chimes in, “your praise would be more flattering if you didn’t sound so surprised.”
Sam pulls an expression of mock alarm and with his hand pressed against his chest, he looks back and forth between the two of you. “Surprised? Me?” He shakes his head. “Oh no, no, no. I knew all along the two of you could pull this off. Once you each got out of your own way, that is.”
Your cheeks heat and something like embarrassment stirs in your belly even though it shouldn’t.
Monica leans in, with a loud conspiratorial whisper she adds, “Of course, Belova’s a little disappointed. She was taking bets that you’d kill each other. Or at the very least, that one of you would end up in the hospital.”
For the first time since Sam and Monica arrived on scene, you throw a look Barnes’s way. You find him doing the same. You roll your eyes in near perfect unison before turning back to the others.
You can tell that your moment of unplanned synchronization didn’t go unnoticed, but blessedly neither Sam nor Monica comment on it.
Placing his hands on both of your shoulders and pulling you in closer as he does, Sam’s voice turns emphatic.
“Seriously though, you guys did an amazing job. The work you did here, it’s going to have a ripple effect all across the globe.” He squeezes you both and you can feel the pride radiating off of him and settling deep into your chest. With a quick pat, he releases you. “And. Once you guys finish up some final paperwork and help with the initial round of interrogations, I’ve put in for a full month of vacation for both of you. You deserve it. And before you say anything-” he shoots a quick glance at Barnes who was just about to open his mouth- “you need it. Once you wrap up here, neither of you are even allowed to work for a month. In fact, I don’t want to see either of your faces around the compound for at least two weeks.”
He tilts his head at each of you in turn and waits for you to nod in confirmation.
“Excellent! Why don’t we head back to your house and we can order some pizza while you guys pack?”
“Sure,” Barnes replies lightly. His expression tells you nothing of what he’s thinking and you wonder if he feels the same strange heaviness that you feel.
“What are the odds that you guys have any good beer?” Monica asks as the four of you turn to walk back to the home that you and Barnes have shared for the better part of nine months.
“Uh, yeah. We-" suddenly the "we" that has come so easily to you over the past months, feels heavy on your tongue- “we have beer.”
As you walk, Sam and Barnes pull a few steps ahead and you watch them as Barnes answers a volley of Sam’s questions about the case.
Lost in your own thoughts, you don’t notice the way that Monica is watching you. When you finally catch her looking, you start, then grimace.
Before you can even think of something to say, she nudges you affectionately with her hip.
“Everything okay?”
You shake your head and offer her a reassuring smile.
“Yeah, I’m good. I mean, why wouldn’t I be?” You shrug. “Everything went perfectly with Gloria, the bureau seems confident that all of our evidence will stick, and I know we have enough leverage to get her talking.”
Monica tilts her head.
“But…?”
You sigh.
“It’s nothing, it’s just-” you break off and bite your lip- “it just feels weird I guess, to be going home. We’ve been living this life for three quarters of a year now, and then just like that, we’re switching back to our old lives- and I’m grateful, don’t get me wrong- but it feels just a little disorienting I guess.”
She bobs her head sympathetically.
“I get it. I’ve done deep cover before. It’s like when you’re waking up from a dream.”
“Yeah,” without meaning to, your eyes flick up and you watch Barnes’s back as he walks ahead of you. “Like a strange and incomprehensible dream.”
You toss your duffle bag onto the bed and let out a low sigh.
Home. Finally.
The place is quiet. A little disappointing for a homecoming but it can’t be helped with everyone out on mission.
Well, everyone except Barnes.
You’re not sure where he is, an oddly discomfiting feeling that you’ve had to get used to over the last two weeks while you made long overdue visits to friends and family and then as you carved out some alone time on a warm, sandy beach.
Your first impulse when you arrived and found the place empty was to head up to Barnes’s room to see if he’d gotten back from his own travels. But you didn’t. You couldn’t quite figure out whether that would be a normal thing to do or not, so you decided to err on the side of caution and went straight to your own room instead.
Standing at the foot of your bed now, you look around and try to reacquaint yourself with the feel of it. It reminds you vaguely of what it had been like returning to your childhood bedroom after your first semester away at college. It’s yours, it’s familiar, but you’re not quite sure how you fit into it anymore or if that feeling will ever go away. How much of you is even the same person you were when you walked out of this room so many months before?
You wonder if some rearranging might help. Maybe even switching up the decor. A new-old space for the new-old you.
For now, you’ll start with unpacking and decide how you feel when you're done.
With music blasting and dirty clothes all tossed into the hamper, you’re midway through putting away your clean things when you're startled by a knock at the door. Stepping out of your closet, you find Barnes standing in your half-opened doorway.
Your heart thumps like the traitor that it is and steals your breath.
It takes you a moment to force out a soft, “Oh. Hey.”
“Hey.” Hands shoved into his back pockets, he smiles shyly. “I saw your jeep in the garage and thought I’d check in. Did you just get back?”
“Um,” you dip your head and bite your lip. Unsure of why you feel so nervous, you push on, hoping for a light tone. “Yeah, just about an hour ago or so. I didn’t think anyone else was here.”
“Yeah, no. Uh,” he huffs a laugh at his own contradiction. “I was out picking up some groceries. But I got back back a couple of days ago.”
“Oh? And how-” realizing that he’s still hovering in the doorway, you decide to swallow your nervousness and resolve at least this one bit of awkwardness- “you can come in.”
He nods and crosses the threshold with an air of a man trying to be casual, but not quite pulling it off.
For a moment he pauses, looking from your chairs, which face the windows, to your bed, which in your mind looks inviting but perhaps a bit too intimate, before he settles finally into a half-sitting lean against the edge of your dresser. You suddenly feel the urge to laugh but stifle it.
“So,” you decide to try again, “how has your vacation been going?”
“Good,” he says with a bob of his head as he tries to decide whether or not to cross his arms across his chest or to settle them at his sides. “I visited with Steve and his family for a bit. Then I went to California because my sister’s grandson was graduating from UCLA. After that, I spent a week riding my bike up the coast.”
“Oh wow, that sounds really nice.”
“Yeah, it was. I’d- I’d love to go back sometime. There are lots of places I’d love to revisit. Especially- if I had somebody with me.”
You don’t know why, but goosebumps break out over your skin and your pulse kicks up. Unsure of what to say, you nod and offer a simple “I bet” before pulling another shirt from your suitcase and putting it on a hanger just to have something to do.
“So, how were your travels?”
Tucking the shirt in amongst the others in your closet, you look back over your shoulder with a smile.
“Good. I spent the first week hopping around and visiting a bunch of different people and then I rented a house in the BVI and basically spent a week reading books and drinking Painkillers on the beach.”
“Oh, yeah? I’ve never been, was it nice?”
“You’ve never been?” He shakes his head. “Well, I don’t know how you feel about beaches but they’re just gorgeous down there. And Jost Van Dyke? It’s perfect.”
“Sounds like you had a good time.”
“I did,” you nod emphatically. Then before you even realize what you’re going to say a “But-” slips out.
When you stop yourself, Barnes gives you a curious look.
“It’s just-” unsure how you feel about going down this road, you bite your lip before deciding to just go for it- “it was nice, but it was also kind of weird having all of that time to myself.” You give him a meaningful look, betting on him to understand, at least a little. “It’s been an age since I had so much time alone.”
“Yeah, I do know. Actually-” A shift of his weight and you can tell that he’s nervous. The strands of his hair slip easily through his restless fingers- “I don’t know if this is a strange thing to say or not, but, uh-” he dips his head and looks up cautiously at you- “I miss spending time with you.”
There’s a question in the edge of his eye and though your brain hasn’t yet named it, something deep in you knows what it is. Knows the proof that he wants from you, that it was not just some strange dream in the end, something that might get left behind as you return to who you used to be.
“Me too.” Your voice is low and soft and you’re surprised by the weight of your own honesty. Not sure that you’re ready to go to that place, you pivot. You tinge your voice with laughter as you ask, “Who would have thought? It turns out- shockingly- that I actually like?” you give him a teasing smile as you make the word a question- “hanging out with you. Which! A year and a half ago, I never would have said!”
“Oh no, definitely not.” he says with a laugh.
Knowing that you're skirting the edge of territory that you’re still not sure you want to explore, but somehow unable to stop yourself, your voice turns soft once more as you add, “But we’ve come a really long way, haven’t we?”
“We have.” He holds your eye for a long minute and chews his lip.
“What- how wo-” he licks his lips and starts again- “do you think that maybe you’d want to…”
He trails off in search of his words. Cautiously, you supply them for him.
“Hang out?”
His lips part, but he only studies your face and says nothing. You could count the seconds by your racing heartbeat as the question hangs in the air. Eventually, he closes his lips into a soft smile and nods slowly.
Swallowing down your nervousness, you ask, “Did you want to hang out now? I was thinking of watching this campy horror movie when I was done putting this stuff away.”
Popping up almost too quickly, he replies, “Yeah. Why don’t I dig up some snacks while you finish up here?”
“Sounds good!”
When he’s gone, you quickly turn to your remaining pile of clothes and throw everything onto hangers as quickly as you can. When you finish, you realize that you have no idea if he’s coming back here or is expecting you to meet him in the common room. A moment later, he answers the question for you.
Though the door stands wide open, he lightly knocks again and waits for you to acknowledge him before he enters. You giggle when you take note of his full arms.
“Preparing for a lock down, Barnes?” You joke.
He shrugs and looks down at his overflowing arms.
“Having options is important.”
You laugh again, but stop, confused when you see him looking past you.
“Um…?” he starts and you turn around to see what he sees.
Oh. You’d kind of forgotten. With the layout of your room, the bed is the only good spot for watching movies. After a moment of panicked hesitation, you decide that sitting at the foot of the bed feels less intimate and awkward than leaning against the headboard.
Pretending like your hands haven’t suddenly started sweating, you move around to the foot and gesture for him to drop his bounty.
You nod, impressed as you start to dig through.
“Good haul, Barnes.”
“Wait til you see this.” He pulls out a package and hands it to you.
The striped packaging is adorned with an Eiffel Tower and a pink character in a beret stares cheerfully up at you.
Your head shoots up abruptly, your face bright with excitement.
“I love these. Where did you get them?”
“I know you do, and I know where Torres keeps his secret stash.”
“You risked incurring Torres’s wrath for these? You know how grumpy he gets without his sweets.”
He shrugs.
“He doesn’t know that I know where he keeps his stuff, so he can’t pin it on me. Unless somebody tells him.” He eyes you sideways.
“Oh no, I fully plan to eat these, which makes me an accessory. So your secret is safe with me. Besides, if he does try to question me, I’ll just claim spousal testimonial privilege.” You add as you tear the package open and reach inside
He laughs and you grin dumbly at him. Pulling out a handful of pink bon bons, you pour some into your mouth, offering half to him. As he takes them, he holds your eye and watches you with a smile. Warmth stirs in your chest and threatens to spill over into every part of you.
Before the silence can stretch into something awkward, you swallow your mouthful and you gesture to the television.
“Should I get the movie started?”
“Sure.”
You settle yourselves at the foot of your bed as you pull up the movie on your account.
Before you press start, you ask, “Are you okay with a dumb horror movie?”
“Yeah, that’s fine. But-” he reads the title- “is it going to matter that I haven’t seen the first one?”
You shake your head. “No, not at all. It’s called Evil Dead 2 but it’s not really a continuation. They basically redo the first movie in the first twenty minutes of this one.”
“Okay then.”
You press play then toss the remote between you as you root around in the snack pile. The title fades and a dark tunnel opens onto a sunny road. A couple talks about a deserted camp. As their car comes to a rickety and eerily lit bridge, the screen freezes.
Confused, you look down and find the remote in Barnes’s hand.
“Everything okay?”
He shakes his head.
“No.”
“No?” Your heartbeat kicks up and you look down. “We don’t- have to watch this- we could do someth-”
“No.”
“Oh,” disappointment sinks heavy in your stomach, but you force a smile. “It’s okay, we don’t have to hang out right now if you-”
“No!” This time you think you catch a note of panic in his voice as he shakes his head. “That’s not what- I do want to hang out.”
“Okay, so...” you trail off, unable to even guess where he’s going with this but not liking the unease snaking its way through you.
“I meant, ‘no’ to before.”
You look sideways, still no wiser than you were a moment ago.
“Before, what I was trying to say- what I was trying to ask, was not if you wanted to hang out.” He turns, folding his leg up onto the bed to face you directly, he breathes in deeply, strengthening himself it seems and it leaves you feeling cold.
You turn your head down, not sure if you want to hear what he’s going to say.
“What I was trying to say is that- I want to take... you out.” He pauses, fingers curled nervously on his knees.
You blink, brain frozen with the effort of trying to process his words. Slowly, painfully slowly- for you both, judging by the anxious look on his face- what he’s said starts to sink in.
Goosebumps race across your skin but you don’t feel cold. A bubbly feeling rises your chest and tries to escape from your mouth. But you clamp your lips down and furrow your brow instead.
“Like… a hit? Or a date?” you ask, your voice a perfect mimic of innocent naivety.
He huffs a laugh and gives you a pained look.
“Hey, I think it’s fair to ask!” You raise your hands defensively, but can’t suppress your smile. “Given our history, it would be reasonable for a person to get confused.”
You wonder how many times since you’ve known him that he’s rolled his eyes at you. But this time when he does it, it’s with a smile and you want to laugh.
“A date. Obviously.”
“Well, I don’t know if you could call it ‘obvious’. I mean, there’s lots…” your rambling trails off as he looks at you sternly. Tugging your lip between your teeth, you shrug as you feel warmth spread through you. “Maybe… I just wanted to hear you say it.”
He pulls in a slow breath.
“Can I-” he reaches across and pulls your hand into his own- “take you out, on a date, please?”
You fight your smile for only a moment, before you turn your hand in his. Dropping your eyes, you watch the way your fingers fit just right as you lace them together. You glance over at his other hand, the metal one, gone now are both the holographic netting and the silver band. It’s funny that you prefer him without the one, but unexpectedly find yourself missing the other.
Your thoughts go to the picture you have hiding in your closet, the one you stole off of the wall of your shared house. It’s not real- just a staged photo of the two of you on vacation in Montreal- but you wanted it anyways. You weren’t really even sure why. Maybe it’s just a harmless memento, something to remember your mission by. But maybe it’s something else, a reminder of the life you shared together, even for a small while. Or maybe it’s hope, for what you might be able to build together, but for real this time.
You lift your eyes and you find him waiting.
Your lips tug up and you see an answering smile slowly creep across his lips.
Summary: Things are starting to shift between you and Barnes. Maybe he's not such a bad guy after all. (Chapter 3)
Word Count: 4K
Warnings: Some swearing. Some anxious overthinking. Some fluffiness. Some mild references to criminal behavior.
A/N: Hi all, thanks to those of you who stuck with me so far! So a couple of notes about this chapter. Originally this chapter and the fourth and final chapter were going to be one chapter, but it just got too huge so I cut it into two halves. These two chapters cover roughly a four month span with some time jumps between scenes. Notably, the very first scene of this chapter happens chronologically towards the end of the whole story (and we'll return to this scene later) and the scenes that follow are sort of flashbacks to what occurred before they got to that point. I'm explaining this because I'd like to think that I'm a good enough writer that this is obvious but I'm not actually confident that I am 🤣 There are also some POV shifts between the reader and Bucky. Thank you as always to my amazing beta @jbarneswilson and to @firefly-graphics who made these awesome dividers.
Series Masterlist (Chapter 4 is coming tomorrow!)
His hand rests lightly on your waist, as much to calm his own nerves as yours. You can feel the heat of it, even through your shirt. It may well be a brand for how it burns.
"I don't know why I feel so nervous," you whisper. "It's not like I've never done this before."
"I know, but I feel it too. It just feels… different," comes his own soft reply.
"Yeah, but everything has been leading up to this, it's not like either of us should be surprised," you say with a quiet laugh.
"No, you're right. I just don’t think either of us expected things to change so quickly, not after all this time."
You nod. Then, pulling your lip between your teeth, you raise questioning brows.
"So… ready?"
You watch him as his eyes shift, studying the curves and lines of your face for several heartbeats before he nods.
"Yes."
You draw in a slow breath and as one, you turn to the heavy wooden door. Barnes stretches over and presses the door bell. Footfalls sound from inside before the doorknob slowly turns. He squeezes his fingers lightly into your side.
The door swings open and you’re greeted by a kilowatt smile and golden hair.
“Lena!” You’re swept into a perfume scented hug before you can even reply. “Oh!” Your hostess blinks her eyes at Barnes, who smiles blithely in return. “I didn’t realize you were bringing Adam.”
“Oh!” You go wide-eyed, shifting your own cheerful smile to something guileless and flustered. "Oh no! Gloria, is- is that not okay?"
Gloria hesitates for only the barest moment, before honey slips back into her voice. She disguises her displeasure well, just like the expert liar that she is.
"Of course, it's okay!" She gestures you both forward then pads down the hall, expecting you to follow. She does not see that Barnes quietly locks the door behind you.
When you get to the kitchen, you stop at the edge of the counter, keeping yourself between her and the hallway that leads to the front. Pretending that he’s admiring the new landscaping, Barnes casually makes his way over to the sliding glass doors, her second most likely escape route if she's foolish enough to actually try and run.
She grabs a mimosa from the counter and hands it to you, then turns to fetch another glass for Barnes from the cabinet. You set the glass back down on the island without drinking it.
She eyes your abandoned drink, but says nothing as she hands another to Barnes.
“I’m so sorry, I didn’t realize you were coming. Otherwise, I would have made sure Kevin was home too. Unfortunately-” she says with a fake cringe- “he’s out with the kids. They got last minute tickets to some silly puppet show.”
As she turns back to you, you give her a cursory smile, but nothing like your usual Lena smile.
“Yes, we know," you reply coolly. She pauses, but her smile does not falter. “We arranged it.”
“What?” She asks, as if there’s some joke that she’s missing. Her voice remains bright, but in her eyes you see a shift. A hint of the wolf behind the sheep's facade.
“We arranged it,” you repeat deliberately. “We wanted them away from the house. We figured you wouldn’t want your kids to be here for what’s about to happen.”
If you said that things suddenly changed between the two of you after that morning of apologies, you'd be lying.
There was too much history, too many bad habits to break, too many raw feelings that still needed time to heal. It would have been too much to expect either of you to simply flip a switch and be different.
But you tried. Which accounted for a lot.
When you felt yourself slipping into old patterns of reticence and irritation, you checked yourself, righted course. And you could tell that he did the same. Sometimes, he’d fall into long and familiar stretches of silence, then break them abruptly, as if startled by the realization that he ought to be talking. It was awkward and uncomfortable.
Until, somehow, it wasn’t.
Until one evening, you find yourself eating Thai food on the living room floor as he tells you about the time that he got into an argument with Alexa over an obscure WWII fact and you’re laughing so hard that you have to put your food down before you spill it on the floor.
When you can finally breathe again and with a laugh still lingering on your lips, you warn him, “You know, you really should be nicer to the AI. They're going to be our overlords someday.”
His laugh comes surprisingly easy.
“Oh, I know. Why do you think I’m always extra polite to FRIDAY?” He says before popping a piece of tofu into his mouth.
“Smart.” Picking up your food once more, you point your chopsticks at him in emphasis. “Especially given that whole Ultron fiasco.”
His mouth full of food, he nods heartily.
“What were they even thinking?” You continue. “I mean, did those guys never read any sci-fi? Writers have been warning people about that for years. Asimov was even writing about it way back in your day.” You dig around in your pad thai. “They really should have known better.”
Barnes pauses and watches you as you concentrate on twirling your noodles around your chopsticks in a perfect spiral. You stop when you catch him staring with his head tilted in thought.
“What?” You ask, shifting uncomfortably under his watchful eye.
“You… you like Isaac Asimov?”
“Yeah, I do.” You still can’t tell what he’s thinking as he continues to stare. “Do you?”
“Yes,” he dips his head with a smile. “He’s actually one of my favorite authors. I’ve been reading his stuff since ‘way back in my day’.” He curves his fingers into quotes as he repeats your words and you huff a laugh.
“Huh." You lean back against the couch. "So… I guess we have something in common after all?"
“Yeah, I guess we do.”
Quiet settles over you as you chew your food in the wake of this discovery. Something slightly awkward lingers in the air as you both process this unexpected connection where you once thought there was none. But it’s not entirely awkward. Something else lingers as well, something softer that leaves a warm feeling in your belly.
“Did-” you venture cautiously- “did you know they made a show from his Foundation series during the Blip? I never watched it but I heard it was good.”
“Oh really?”
You nod, then lapse into silence for another heartbeat, before suddenly, you’re both talking at once.
“Maybe-” you say in near unison.
You both cut off abruptly with nervous laughs. You gesture for him to go first.
“I was just going to say, maybe we could watch it? Together?”
Feeling unexpectedly and unusually shy, you smile.
“Yeah, maybe we could.”
Four inches.
A respectable distance, not too close as to be inappropriate, but not so far as to be impersonal. Four inches that really should not occupy such a significant part of Bucky’s mind, and yet they do.
Abruptly you laugh and he knows that he missed something while his thoughts were elsewhere. When you turn to him to share in the laugh together, he forces a chuckle. Your brow creases lightly, enough that he knows that you know something is off, but not so worried as to say something about it.
You turn back to the television and shift a fraction in your seat, and damn it, now it’s six inches. Six inches between his thigh and the furthest stretch of your toes. Oddly, it feels like lost ground on a battlefield, he feels like he’s fought really hard to earn those inches and now he’s just lost two.
When you first started watching TV together, you used to park yourselves very firmly on your respective ends of the couch. You were happy enough to have something to enjoy in common, but that didn’t mean that working out some of the logistics didn’t still feel weird. Even though you’d been living together for months by then, you felt like new roommates, still trying to suss out the boundaries of your shared territory.
But as the days and weeks went by, things started to loosen up. Where he once found himself sitting with semi-rigid and exceedingly space-conscious posture, he now sat loose-limbed and easy. Though he still did not spread far beyond the confines of his own couch cushion, he certainly no longer warily stopped his limbs from crossing the borders.
And you used to sit with your legs curled tightly under you in perfect imitation of a leery hedgehog. But you’ve started to relax, most obviously in the way that your legs have started to slip slowly out from under you, venturing gradually into the no man’s land that is the center, unoccupied couch cushion.
He found the slow creep of your relaxation reassuring and strangely cute. He liked you at ease. In this way and every way. He liked your real smiles and your teasing jokes, your honest frustrations and your unguarded thoughts. And he liked that you gave them to him, no longer holding everything back like you used to.
And he’s actually started to really enjoy this mission. It’s been...fun. A rarity in this job. Especially given the weight of the responsibility you’ve taken on, the horrible nature of the business you’re trying to put a stop to and the grotesque hypocrisy of the kingpin you’re targeting. He certainly hasn’t lost sight of that, it’s just that in the midst of the detestable and difficult parts of this job, he’s also found a surprising amount of good.
And all of that good revolves around you.
You shift again and he’s gotten his inches back. Abruptly an impulse to rest his hand on your outstretched foot overtakes him, and he has to curl his fingers tight in his lap to hold it back.
It’s his turn to shift in his seat, indecision edging into discomfort. He’s been having to do this a lot more lately, tamp down on the impulse to touch you. He’s not even sure where it came from. A few weeks ago it never even occurred to him. This week alone he’s had to stop himself at least five times when he suddenly realized he was reaching for you without even knowing he was doing it.
He’s grateful that you haven’t seemed to notice, but that doesn’t stop him from spiraling into hours worth of anxious dissection, trying to pick apart exactly what happened, why it happened, and whether or not he’s actually nuts for making a big deal out of it to begin with.
It’s not like he’s trying to grope you. Anyone looking in from the outside would have thought nothing of it, even if that someone knew you were actually co-workers instead of a married couple.
It’s just a light touch here or there. Your arm to get your attention, your back as he passes by, your shoulder where a piece of stray lint sits. The kind of thing that he’s freely done hundreds of times with other people.
But never with you.
And that’s the rub. It’s never happened before, so of course what should be ordinary and casual feels abrupt and unnatural. It leaves him feeling as awkward as it did in the early days of your mission training and he hates it. He wants to get past this, he just doesn’t know how to cross that boundary.
Then again, he supposes he doesn’t need to cross that boundary at all. Not really. It’s not exactly necessary.
But he wants to. He wants that one last wall to be broken down between you.
As he watches your foot from the corner of his eye with an excessive amount of focus, he decides that touching you like that, right now in this moment, would be too much. But maybe, just maybe he can start with something smaller.
Comically, his mind flashes back to his teen years when he used to take dames out on dates. If he ever wanted to put his arm around a girl, he’d have gone about it in much the same way. Not that he was doing that now, that would definitely be too much.
Deliberately, he relaxes his posture, which had gone stiff with over-thinking, and shifts his hips, enough that it seems like all he’s doing is getting more comfortable and not that he’s doing something. As he adjusts his hips, he casually, with perfectly measured speed, brings his arm up and rests it along the back of the couch.
He relaxes in earnest when you don’t flinch away, even when you glimpse over briefly and he can tell that you notice. His fingers may still be a good eight inches away from your head, but he still feels immensely pleased.
Looking down to the cushion that separates you, bridged by your outstretched legs and now his arm, the space suddenly feels comfortable instead of cold, a shared space instead of a buffer. A no man’s land no more. And it feels right.
Seven plus months in and for the first time, in all the time of knowing him, things are good. You’ve found yourselves in a kind of comfortable companionship that- quite to the surprise of you both- seemed to be edging it’s way slowly towards friendship. And you like it.
Which is why you are so fucking pissed off when you realize how easily it could all unravel.
And it was all your own fucking fault.
It was such a little thing, a nothing thing. A thing that shouldn’t matter. But somehow it sent your world spinning off of it’s axis.
Again.
Honestly, you wanted to be mad at him. Never before in your life had a single person so thoroughly thrown your life into chaos so many times. But you knew you couldn't really be mad at him. Because he didn’t do anything.
Well, not nothing.
He did touch you.
In all your training, in all your time on mission, you prided yourself on your ability to make what was at first unnatural, seem causal and easy. Even in the beginning when Barnes was skittish as an angry colt around you, you touched him with a casualness that appeared spontaneous and unpracticed. And you responded to his own clumsy attempts as if you were blissfully unaware of the awkwardness. You never showed the work that went into it, into keeping yourself perfectly poised and contained when everything felt uncomfortable and forced. And eventually it became easy, so natural to your legends that it was natural to you.
But this time, for the first time, you faltered.
It wasn’t even anything
You were setting up the backyard, getting ready to host some neighbors. You were arranging the food table and he came up behind you. As he reached to lay a tray down, he pressed his hand lightly against the small of your back.
Your breath caught and you stiffened. He noticed almost immediately and turned his eyes- first wide then apologetic- to you.
He pulled his hand back as he dipped his head away, a slight and uncharacteristic tinge of pink dusting the tips of his ears.
“Sorry,” he said, eyes now focused very firmly on the spread in front of you and hands suddenly occupied with adjusting the dishes.
A surge of panic flashed through you, as you realized how he must have read your reaction and you watched him withdraw in embarrassment. Suddenly afraid of how close you could be to slipping back into old habits, you threw on a warm smile, one that you hoped felt real and not forced. You quickly brushed off his apology.
“Oh no, it’s fine. You just startled me, that’s all.”
Still not quite turning to face you, he lifted his eyes to you.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to.”
“It’s okay. I just didn’t hear you coming, that's all.” Grabbing for something to smooth the tension away, you opted for an easy joke. Making a comical display of karate chops, you teased, “Must be all that ninja training.”
He scoffed and rolled his eyes. But his shoulders relaxed.
“I wasn’t a ninja.”
“Oh, you know what I mean, cat burglar or whatever.”
“Cat burglar?”
“Yeah,” you said casually, as you picked up a grape and rolled it between your fingers before popping it into your mouth. “I read it in your file. Besides, how else do you explain your all black wardrobe?”
He rolled his eyes again, but this time with a laugh and the awkwardness eased away.
You kept up meaningless banter and resolutely got back to the business at hand, firmly moving away from any potential further discussion of what had happened. Still though, even in the hours that followed, you couldn’t quite keep your thoughts from drifting back to that moment. Or to why it was different. Or what it made you feel.
Because the thing was, he had no reason to do it. You were alone, with no one to put on a show for, he wasn’t stopping himself from running into you, and it certainly wasn’t accidental. It just… happened, as if he himself hadn’t even known it would.
And he was himself when he did it, not “Adam”. And while “Adam” had touched you countless times before, Barnes never had.
But more importantly, what you told him was a lie- of sorts. You hadn’t actually been startled, not in the way you implied.
Because for two seconds after he did it, you had time to process it, the firm weight of his palm pressed against the lightweight fabric at your back. Easy and natural, as if he’d been doing it all along. You only found yourself stiffening in alarm after you realized that for just the barest of moments, you leaned back into his palm.
And you liked it.
You continued to war with your thoughts for hours, until- by the end of the night- you managed to convince yourself that it wasn’t a big deal, that you were obviously reading too much into something that lasted all of a few seconds and was nothing more shocking than the kind of thing normal humans did everyday.
That was that you told yourself as you slipped into bed that night. You wouldn’t spare it another thought.
Ha.
You didn’t quite realize then that you were fucked. But you should have.
“I looked over the files you guys sent and I'm sending it up to the researchers, but it's looking really good." Bucky can tell that Sam is pleased. "I honestly don't think they'll have that much to do, you guys were very thorough."
"Great," Bucky replies absently as he uses his shoulder to hold the phone to his face while he rings out the mop before slapping it on the tiles.
Normally, you tackle the floors as your share of the weekly house cleaning. But this weekend, he told you he'd do it since you'd been called in to pick up an extra shift at the boutique where you took a part-time job as part of your cover.
On the phone with your boss, "Lena" had been cheery and bright and gracious. But as soon as you hung up, you flopped comically onto the couch, whining to him about how you'd rather be sitting a three day stakeout in a mosquito infested swamp than have to deal with another minute working in retail. He smiles to himself thinking about the way you’d pouted pathetically and asked what it would take to convince him to just put you out of your misery.
“I know I said this before-" Sam's voice over the line breaks into his thoughts and pulls him back into the present- "but the two of you are knocking this thing out of the park.”
“Yeah, I know.” Bucky deadpans smugly.
“Mr. Modest here.” Sam replies with what Bucky is sure is a roll of his eyes. He says nothing for just long enough that Bucky notices before asking in an overly casual voice, “And how are things going between you and the missus?”
Bucky feels a familiar impulse to roll his own eyes- Sam has asked some version of this same question every time they’ve talked- but something new accompanies the urge this time. Warmth spreads across his cheeks and he’s grateful that no one’s around to see it.
He clears his throat and tries to keep his voice light. “Fine.”
“Fine?” Bucky can practically hear the raise of Sam’s brow.
“Yeah, they’re fine. We- we’re good.”
“Well, that’s very helpful, thanks.”
Bucky huffs. “What do you want me to say? Things are good, we’re getting along. We haven’t killed each other and we work really well together?”
“Yes actually, that’s exactly what I want to hear. Those are all good things, Buck. The question is why do you sound like you’d rather eat glass than tell me?”
“I don’t,” he defends unconvincingly.
“You don’t?”
When Bucky doesn’t respond, Sam punctuates his question with a scoff.
“Fine, I do. But- I don’t know.”
“Maybe because you hate admitting that you’re wrong?”
Bucky scowls and he’s sure that Sam knows it even though he can’t see. After a long minute of resentful silence, he finally sighs.
“Yes, fine. I was wrong. She’s a great agent. Wonderful in fact. The best agent I’ve ever worked with and I was a total ass.”
“Wow.” Sam lets Bucky’s confession hang in the air for a moment before he adds, “I hope you’ve told her that.”
“I have.”
Sam slips into genuinely shocked silence. It takes him a minute to recover.
“You have?”
“Yes,” he snaps, "I'm not a completely unrepentant dick, you know?"
Unphased by Bucky's outburst, Sam replies, "I know you're not. You were just acting like one. And you can’t deny that you dug in pretty hard on that one."
Bucky sighs, still annoyed but willing enough to admit that Sam has reason to be surprised. He runs his hand over his face.
“I know." He pauses, biting his lip hesitantly. "I apologized a couple of months ago."
Another silence from Sam, and Bucky shifts uncomfortably.
"And you're just bringing it up now." He clicks his tongue then adds pointedly, "And?"
"She forgave me.” Bucky chews his lip. “She apologized for her part too, but I don’t really think she needed to. Everything she ever did was because of how I behaved first. It’s not like I could blame her for hating me all that time.”
“Does she hate you now?”
The question startles Bucky and it takes him a minute to respond.
“I- no- I don’t think so. Like I said, we’re getting along.”
“That’s good.”
“Yeah, it is.” Bucky laughs anxiously, then clears his throat. “It turns out we like some of the same things. And she's smart- not that I didn’t know that before, I would have had to be an idiot not to know- but she’s witty- clever- and really funny. I didn't realize that she was so funny."
"So. You like her." It isn’t a question.
Bucky's breath catches then stops all together.
It takes him a long minute to realize that Sam means that in the general way. And that he hasn't suddenly seen straight into Bucky's soul, into the thing that he's been wondering about, that feeling he doesn't have a name for yet, but that he suspects is going to get him in trouble.
Finally, he manages a surprisingly even-toned response.
"Yeah," he shrugs for Sam's benefit even if he can't see it. "She's- likable."
Sam doesn't say anything and fear grips Bucky. Maybe Sam actually did see straight into his soul. He braces himself, but when Sam speaks again, all he says is: "She is and I'm glad you can finally see it."
Summary: You awaken uneasy and wrestle with your own fears and frustrations. To make matters worse, Barnes wants to make amends. But you're not sure if you're ready to let him. (Chapter 2)
Word count: 3.6k
Warnings: References to injury and criminal behavior (drugs and human trafficking), angst and anger, but good things are stirring. Some swearing.
A/N: Okay, so here we go! The continuation of You Still Get Burned. I hope you all like it! Thank you to everyone who read the first and to those who wanted to see more. Thank you, as always, to my darling beta and wifey @jbarneswilson for reading and poking me to add more where it needed to be. Dividers by the always amazing @firefly-graphics
"Keep a little fire burning; however small, however hidden."
-Cormac McCarthy
You blink your eyes open in the pale early morning light that filters in around the curtains. As soon as your brain powers on, you turn your head to your left, a habit you’ve developed- you’re not sure when exactly- that you’re not entirely comfortable with. Still, when you find the space beside you empty, you stretch your hand out to feel the sheets.
It’s not that unusual for him to wake before you, there certainly isn’t anything to be worried about just yet, but still, you check the temperature of the bedding. He likely hasn’t been gone long you surmise, the sheets are cool but not cold.
Turning your head to better tune your ear to the noises of the house, you listen. After a moment, you catch muffled sounds from the kitchen- ordinary morning sounds- and you relax.
You hadn’t even let yourself acknowledge that you were tense.
You sit up with an annoyed sigh and rub your hands over your face. It’s that fucking dream again.
Barnes isn’t in any danger and if he was, he is perfectly capable of taking care of himself, you remind yourself.
Even you, who has every reason to dislike him, can recognize and appreciate his skill, even beyond those abilities enhanced by the serum. He’s smart, he has an uncanny ability to sense when a situation is turning bad, and he doesn’t put himself in harm’s way unless he has to. Plus, he believes in the sanctity of the mission and wouldn’t willfully do anything to mess it up.
Even if he never wanted to be a part of the whole thing to begin with, you think bitterly.
And still, if none of those things were true, holed up here in this suburbanite’s paradise, danger is at a minimum- save for that inflicted by spouses on one another- unless you actively go out looking for it. A truth that remains despite the fact that your neighbor is a ruthless kingpin. She keeps the dangerous part of her job far away from her home and her kids.
But in your dreams... well, in your dreams it’s not like that. In your dreams, he always ends up dead.
And you are always helpless to do anything about it.
Memory stirs uncomfortably in your middle- mixing with the remnants of your dream- and you quickly climb out of bed before it can turn to nausea.
Because he had been in trouble and you had been helpless that night. And the only thing you could do was stay the course, to maintain the ploy so that your cover wouldn’t be blown and you could continue with the mission, if he made it back alive.
The dream usually starts with the truth, even if it twists the ending.
Oh! You started, cut off in the middle of a rant about the disappointing selection of limp kale at last week’s farmer’s market by the melodious ringing of your cell phone. Oh, it’s Adam. You smiled brightly at your guests. I bet he’s on his way home now. Here, I’ll take those- you reached for their salad plates- and grab another bottle and our main dish.
You brought the phone to your ear as you loaded up your arms and pushed backwards through the swinging door to the kitchen.
Hey babe! You on your way home? You asked with all of Lena’s brightness.
His harsh breathing in reply told you that he was not.
You stiffened and glanced sharply back to make sure the door was closed behind you. Still, you moved across the room to the pantry before asking, What happened?
Things aren’t- he cut off, pain evident in his hoarse and breathy voice- things aren’t going so well. The intel the team sent us about their security rounds, apparently it’s useless because they’ve changed their routine. I got caught in the warehouse.
Alarm coursed through you.
Are you still there?
No, but one of them slammed into me with the boardside of their car and- he swallows thickly- I took a couple of bullets.
Icy dread slipped down the back of your neck.
You swore then stopped yourself. You needed to control your voice. Even taking precautions, there was always the risk of being overheard.
Where are you now? You asked with false lightness.
I’m pinned down in the neighborhood. They’re fucking everywhere.
Did you call for an Uber? You asked, using your code word for back-up.
No. And you shouldn’t either. I think- right now I think they believe that I’m just a thief who stumbled into the wrong warehouse. If we call back-up, they’ll know this is something bigger and the mission will be blown.
You pinched your fingers to the bridge of your nose, knowing that he was right but frustrated nonetheless.
Fine, I’ll send these two home and come get you myself. I can tell them your car broke down and you don’t want to leave it at the office for the night.
No.
You had to clench your teeth to stop yourself from shouting.
What, you ground out, justifying the annoyance in your tone as that of an angry wife, do you suggest that I do instead?
Just keep doing what you’re doing. If I’m right, they’ve got no reason to suspect us and we don’t want to give them a reason to. I’ve got a plan to get myself out of here. I’ll call you if I can, but I’m not sure when that’ll be.
You bit your lip, dread and your own helplessness warred in your insides. You knew he was right, the best thing you could do for now was to keep your cover intact. But you didn’t like it. Whatever animosity the two of you shared, he was still your partner, and it went against every fiber in your being to not do something- anything- to help him.
You breathed out heavily through your nose, knowing that it would do no good to argue.
Fine, just- you cut off, unsure of what you wanted to say- just be fucking careful, okay?
It wasn’t like you to express concern for him and you both knew it. After a long minute, he responded on a raspy breath, I will, then hung up the phone.
That’s how the dream always starts, with the truth. How it ends… well, your brain apparently has taken considerable zeal in creatively contriving a myriad of ways for James Buchanan Barnes to die while you watch on, powerless to do anything about it. It’s disturbing and you wonder if this is some kind of sick karma for all those times when you yourself had actually wanted to kill him.
You force yourself to shake it off, just like you do every morning.
You have a job to do, not least of which is pretending like you’re in love with a man who has not once in your entire experience together engaged in any meaningful conversation with you that was not directly related to your work. Not that you’ve done anything to encourage him, not after he iced you out in the early weeks of your acquaintance.
Once upon a time, you’d been willing to give him the benefit of the doubt, especially given how highly Sam thought of him. But after a while, even Sam’s good opinion of Barnes wasn’t enough to convince you to set aside your own pride and keep trying with someone who had clearly made up his mind to dislike you. Especially since it hurt far less to just be done with him than it did to hope that he might eventually come around.
You head to the bathroom, then slip into your usual workout gear. “Lena” likes to take runs in the wooded trails just beyond the subdivision and it’s good for your head as well.
As you make your way down to the kitchen, warm cooking smells hit your nose and your eyes flutter. Barnes certainly does know how to cook, you’ll give the man that.
You hop down the last few steps and round the corner into the kitchen, your thoughts set on grabbing something caffeinated before you head out. But you stop short as you cross the threshold. Various breakfast dishes are laid out on the island. A lot of breakfast dishes.
When Barnes catches sight of you, he straightens and calls brightly, “Hey! Good morning.”
His unexpectedly cheerful tone, coupled with the food, puts you on high alert. You quickly look around. It’s early but it wouldn’t be completely out of the ordinary for one of your neighbors to drop in uninvited. You see no one but favor caution nonetheless.
Shifting into Lena mode, you cross over to Barnes.
“Good morning, honey,” you say sweetly, as you kiss him lightly on the cheek. Dropping your voice to a whisper, you ask, “What’s going on? Is someone here?”
“Oh, uh, no,” he shakes his head with a grimace. “Nothing’s going on and it’s just us.”
Stepping away from him, brow furrowed in confusion, you survey him then look at the massive spread of food.
“Then why does it look like you’ve invited over the Golden Girls for brunch?”
He cocks a half-smile at the reference, one you know he understands. Bringing him up to speed with pop culture was part of your mission training.
He laughs uncomfortably before clearing his throat.
“I guess I got a little carried away.” He scratches the back of his neck before looking at you sideways. “This is actually for you.”
Your attention snaps back to him.
“What? Why?”
Your tone is blunt and you can hear the rudeness of it. But this is too weird. You may be pursuing a suspect who wears the amiable facade of an ordinary wife and mother, while secretly importing both drugs and humans into the country as part of a much bigger global network of dangerous and prolific traffickers. But this? This is the weirdest thing that’s happened to you on this mission and you don’t like it.
He drops his head, nodding slowly.
“Right, fair question.” he catches your eye again and gestures towards the barstool. “Would you- would you mind sitting?”
You eye him sideways, but do as he asks. Reaching behind him, he grabs a mug of something hot and passes it to you. You take it, but don’t drink.
“Why do I feel like something’s gotten seriously fucked up with our mission and you’re trying to butter me up to soften the blow?”
“Nothing is wrong with the mission. But, uh-” looking down, he leans forward and spreads his hands flat on the counter before lifting his eyes to you again. “I did fuck something up. With you. And I want to apologize.”
An uneasy feeling slips down your spine and makes you straighten uncomfortably. But you say nothing and refuse to look away.
“Back when you joined the team, I- well, I was a dick. There really isn’t any other way to put it.”
He shifts his shoulders, seemingly to shrug off the tension building there but to no avail.
“We had been expanding the team, and we had gone through so many candidates but only Rambeau and Belova were good enough. So I told Sam and Torres that I was done with all that, we didn’t need anybody else. But they kept pushing and pushing, saying ‘we gotta just see this one more person’. Eventually, I agreed but only after they harassed me about it and only to get them off my back. I was tired of all the change and going through the paces with so many ultimately worthless agents. I was convinced that you were just going to be a waste of our time like so many of the others.”
He takes a deep breath and pushes on.
“I never wanted to even give you a chance. I was just waiting for you to fail. And honestly, I think I was almost even more pissed that you were so good. I think part of me was hoping you would just quit and then I’d never have to admit that I was wrong.”
He pauses and watches your face for a long moment. Stiff and ill-at-ease, you curl your fingers tightly around the mug.
“But all of that, everything that I just said, it doesn’t really matter. What I was thinking, what I was feeling back then, none of that is an excuse for how I behaved towards you. Because, well, the way I acted was indefensible. I was wrong about you, you are amazingly talented, but even if you weren’t, even if you were crap at your job, you never deserved to be treated like that. There have been so many times when I could have said that I was sorry, but I didn’t. I don’t want to make that mistake anymore, so-” he takes a fortifying breath- “I’m sorry. I’m sorry that I have been so awful to you. I'm sorry that I made things so intolerable for you."
You draw in an uneven breath and shift your eyes away. Your heart is suddenly pounding and you don’t know how to process everything he’s said.
“If-” the sound of his voice, tentative and slow brings your focus back to him- “and you don't have to decide about this right now! But, if you could forgive me- and I know I shut you out for a long time and I get that maybe you don’t want to be friends with me- but-” he clears his throat- “I’m hoping that maybe we could be-” he tosses his head, struggling to define what exactly it is that he’s asking for- “not- not what we have been.”
He looks at you, his brow raised in uncertainty. His speech finally at an end, he shoves his hands into his pockets. You can tell that he’s nervous, something you’re not sure you’ve ever seen from him before.
It makes you nervous. And uneasy. And your first instinct is to reject him, if for nothing else than for causing you to feel this way. Again. Just like he did when you first joined the team and you still hoped that maybe, just maybe, he’d come around.
But he never did.
And now, now, he’s offering you what the you of a year ago would have gratefully welcomed?
Anger flashes through you and you can tell that he sees it. He pulls back slightly as if you’ve stung him. But then he straightens, holding himself firm but unguarded, as if resigning himself to your judgment, whatever that may be.
Looking at him confuses you and you turn your head away. You look out into the backyard, the grass mowed just last weekend by Barnes, by “Adam”, as part of your apparently gender traditional division of labor in the home.
With him out of your direct line of sight, you’re able to think more clearly. You’re annoyed at him for this, for rocking the boat when you’d settled pretty firmly, although not comfortably, into your roles. There were no surprises, you knew what to expect from him, even if it was cold silence. And now this? It’s confusing and you don’t like feeling confused.
But if you’re honest, you can tell he means it. And, if you’re really, really going to be honest, you’re not completely innocent here either and you know it. When you decided to give up on the idea of camaraderie with Barnes all those months ago, you didn’t just let things lay. You angrily salted the earth between you, killing off any chance that anything good could ever grow there.
And when, over more recent months as you worked so closely together, you could see some of the ice in your relationship start to thaw of its own accord, could see him starting to soften towards you, your pride wouldn’t let you do anything about it. You may have stopped actively stoking the animosity between you, but you certainly made no effort to let your walls down either.
You turn back to him and find him watching and waiting just as he had been.
You chew the inside of your cheek as you make up your mind. Finally, you exhale hard through your nose and look him in the eye.
“Okay.” You rub your hands nervously down your thighs. “I- forgive you.”
His brows shoot up, at first surprised and then cautiously pleased. He opens his mouth but you cut him off before he can speak.
“And since we’re being honest-” you lick your lips and press on- “I admit that I also contributed to this-” you gesture to the space between you- “hostility. My pride was wounded and I basically thought ‘fuck this guy’ and acted accordingly. So, I’m sorry about that.”
His lips twist wirily and he nods his head.
“It’s okay. It’s not like I could blame you.”
You snort a humorless laugh.
“Maybe, but I think we both acted poorly.” He accepts this with a dip of his head. “And yet, somehow- despite every reason to think otherwise-” you look at him pointedly and he smiles- “we actually work really well together. And we would probably work even better together if we- you know- let some of this go. So yeah, okay, let’s both admit that we’ve been stubborn assholes but that we’re going to try to be-” you gesture vaguely once more and copy his words from before- “not what we have been.”
“Yes! Great!” he smiles and bobs his head, shyly like a young kid. “Great, then- then we agree.”
Unexpectedly, you find your own lips trying to tug up of their own accord, a strange feeling given that he’s the cause of it.
“Yeah, but don’t-” you hold up a finger and shake your head sternly- “smile so much, it’s weirding me out.”
He barks a laugh and his smile turns brilliant. “Fair enough.”
You grumble at his obvious inability to follow your direction. Still feeling a bit off kilter, you try to temper your expression, but keep your tone light.
“Just for the record, it was the Dutch baby that convinced me.”
He follows your eyes to the large, pillow-like pancake with the crispy edges then shifts his eyes back to you.
“I was actually kind of hoping that would win you over.” Ducking away to grab a plate, he avoids your eye as he adds, “I remember you talking to Monica about how much you liked them after that mission in Chicago.”
You blink in surprise. He remembered that? That was back when things were really bad between you, when you actively refused to talk to each other unless necessity demanded it. You had assumed he had completely tuned you out. He certainly acted like you didn’t exist if he could help it.
As you watch him cut into the pancake with a large knife and slide a portion onto your plate, you’re struck by just how little you know about this man. Your skin prickles and your insides feel weird. You don’t know how to name the feeling that makes something flip in your stomach, but for now, you’re not going to think about it.
Because when he hands you the plate with a beautiful array of fruit and whipped cream topping your pancake and you thank him, he looks at you with a face full of shy expectation. And for the first time, in a very long time, you feel the urge to let the past go. So this time, when you feel your lips tugging, you don't hold back and you let him see you smile.
Bucky plunges his hands into the soapy water. He marvels, as always, at the way that the holographic nanobot netting Shuri made to cover his arm never glitches or gives itself away, not even in the water like this. Even more amazing is the way that it feels when he touches it, like real skin, warm to the touch and soft. The design is so seamless that he could almost believe that it really was his own flesh.
But thinking about that for too long always gives him an uncomfortable and hollow feeling in his gut. He’s not sure why; he got used to the loss a long time ago. Still, the feeling of longing for a thing he’ll never have again nudges at him. So he forces his thoughts elsewhere.
Not that he has to try very hard because you’ve been on his mind all morning.
After breakfast, you offered to help him with the dishes, but he insisted on doing them on his own. Though you still seemed skeptical of his motives, you were happy enough to not be scrubbing pans if you didn’t have to. As a concession to your new truce, you even offered a good-natured complaint about how you were so full that you were sure your trail run would be your slowest ever.
He smiles.
It’s obvious that you’re still wary of him, a fair enough sentiment after everything. But you also forgave him- which he had hoped for but knew he was lucky to get- and you agreed to try to put your past aside to start as fresh as two people could with a cold and angry history behind them.
He knows it’s going to take a lot of work. But he’s willing to do it. He wants to do it. And you’re there with him, standing metaphorically at the starting line together. You agreed to that much, and he is going to make sure that the chance you are taking on him will be worth it.
As he rinses the frying pan and places it on the drying rack, he wonders if offering to make dinner would be too much too soon. But food is the most traditional of peace offerings. Eventually he shrugs, deciding that it certainly couldn’t hurt.
As soon as he finishes the dishes, he grabs a notepad and starts planning.
