driftfleet | Naviadna Mingle

Every atom of Steve wants to wrap Bucky up in his arms and assure him that nothing he's going to say means he doesn't love Bucky. He does. He might not have ever said the words yet but he loves Bucky with a power he thought incapable of after Peggy. Every morning waking up next to his friend is like a dream. The playfulness that was so much like their past combined now with the sharp newness of their affection. It was a dream.

And now Steve was going to wake up.

He nods softly and takes Bucky's hand to lead him over to some chairs. He urges him into one but, before sitting himself, leans in to kiss Bucky long and hard. It might be the last one he ever has.

When Steve sits he looks properly miserable. Even with Bucky so close he feels all alone.

"Nat. She...uh. She got some memories of home. Thanos and the like." He's mentioned what he knew of it all, before. Enough that Bucky should know the name and shades of what had happened. He looks down, sighing deep as his hands clench together in his lap.

"She died... Back home, not here. She died to try and save all the people who died..."

So the thing is... Bucky had thought Steve had just wanted to talk to him about something that was bothering him. Something general, maybe about the ship or hell, his friendship with Loki, or... something else. Something that wasn't Bucky. But the problem is... that kiss does more to add weight to that stone already in his stomach than anything, and his expression is somber when Steve sits alongside him and starts to speak.

Steve's told him some about what's going on back home - about what he's heard, what he knows, which has been, admittedly, limited. Bucky realizes his own picture is even more limited than that, but even then, he knows the situation is serious. That it's untenable. Maybe he's known that all along.

"Steve - " he breathes, because those few simple words are a lot. A lot, because Bucky likes Natasha well enough, has gotten to know her a little better here (well, Steve's version, anyway), but Steve is close to her, and she's close to Steve. He knows that. "Steve, I'm sorry." He reaches out for Steve's hand, grasping it for a moment whether Steve's fingers twine with his or not. "But she's still here now?"

Bucky knows, somehow, that this still isn't the crux of the matter. That doesn't make hearing this any easier. Not for them, and not for Natasha, he's betting.

"Yeah..." He holds Bucky's hand back. It doesn't have the callouses that it used to from the dock but it's still the same hand. It holds onto him with the same care and the same love. Bucky's blue eyes look at him with that same fondness he's always had. It breaks something in Steve to know he'll never see it again. Just in old video clips and photos. In memories that sometimes he alone holds. The Bucky in his time is still his best friend and still all the things he'd once been to Steve, but it is different. Just like Steve is different, so is the man waiting at home for him.

Here...here is the Bucky that soothed the raw edges inside him. And here he was going to stay.

Steve swallows hard and looks toward the ground, his eyes burning. His duty has come between things he's wanted before. He left Peggy to die in the snow, after all. But this...it doesn't seem fair. After all these years he finally has something that he wants to hold onto with both hands. And just like before he's going to lose it forever.

"Thing is..." He sniffles a little and doesn't look up. "She died before...things were over." Steve loosens his grip on Bucky knowing that as he figures things out he probably won't want to hold onto him any more.

"All of us...we all had a job to do to make sure what Thanos did was undone. I don't... I don't know if we won.

"Or if we'll still win if...I don't go back..."

Thing is, Steve starts - and there is is, huh. There is is, the part that's actually worse than Natasha dying, the part where Steve does that stupid thing Bucky knows better than to talk him out of - the part where Steve says he's gonna go back. Maybe not in so many words, but Bucky hears it pretty loud and clear, all the same.

That stone in his stomach feels like a two-ton boulder all of a sudden, and he's got to school his face before it gives something away he doesn't want it to give away. Thank God his poker face is better than Steve's - well, not that that's hard to do, but of the two of them, Bucky's always had the ability to keep things off his face a little better than Steve. Steve might shove shit down just as much - they all did, and they still do - but Bucky's the one who's got to keep it off his face, because Steve's the one who needs him to be strong.

Bucky absolutely does not feel very strong right now. He feels cold and angry and empty. He feels like the fucking girl on the side, being told she can't measure up to the real thing. And fuck, he should've known. Loki had pretty much told him, straight up, to his face. He'd known, then. He'd just found it easier to ignore.

It's pretty impossible to ignore it now.

"So you're gonna go back," he says carefully, quietly, just - he doesn't really need confirmation, but maybe he does. Maybe he's selfish, or cruel, needing Steve to say it to his face. Maybe he's a fucking terrible friend, and he can't be here for this Steve any more than he could be for his.

"I don't...." Steve reaches for Bucky and pulls his hand back before making contact. He wants to touch him so badly and it hurts worse than he can say to know that he can't right now. His eyebrows knit high on his forehead, eyes bright and tortured. This is harder to do than he even expected and he'd already been convinced this would be one of the worst days of his life.

"I don't want to, Buck. God, you gotta know how bad I don't want to go back. But it's...the Universe."

It's not fair. It's not fair that this falls on him. Everything always falls on him leaving Steve to drop whatever he loves to carry the new weight. He bends forward, hands covering his face as the ache in his chest gives way to pure misery. He's been cold all day but now it's like being back in the jet. Part of him wishes he was so that he could avoid this conversation. So that things could be over for him.

God. When would it be over?

When he turns his face up there's a trace of a tear against his cheek before Steve ducks it down towards the floor once again. The blank look on Bucky's face should be lethal. It should kill him and it's a travesty that it doesn't even make a cut.

"I would give anything to stay. Anything to bring you with me. If I knew all would be fixed I would make the choice to stay, easy. But it's billions of lives in the balance, here...

"I don't know what to do..."

The fact that Steve pulls away pretty much clinches it for Bucky - as if he needed it any more clinched, really. He watches Steve and it hurts not to touch him, but the more Steve talks, the more Bucky knows, "You're gonna go back," he says, quietly - not quite like an order, because who the hell has he ever been to order Steve around - but it comes out flat like one anyway. Because Steve could give anything, but that anything would be billions of lives, and - "I know what I want. What I would do."

But that's the thing. Bucky's not Steve, but he's been trying to be like Steve, to be as good as Steve, for two years now. And if Loki's right at all, then it hasn't been working, and this is why. This is the difference between them, and - this is the best way to try to make Loki a little less right. "This is what you would do," Bucky says, and he's doing his best to keep his voice steady and even, even though it feels like there's a lump very quickly forming in his throat. He has to look away from Steve's face like a coward, the second Steve looks up at him, so maybe he misses the way Steve isn't looking at him, either. Maybe it's for the best. "And you wouldn't fucking forgive me or you if you didn't."

He might try. But he wouldn't be happy. And Bucky wants Steve to be happy. It's all he's ever wanted for Steve, and for one brief moment, he'd thought maybe his own selfish wish to be happy could've aligned with Steve's. But that moment is definitely over, and he should've seen it coming. He's supposed to be the realist, here.

Maybe he has gotten better at thinking like Steve than he'd thought.

"So go," he says, and he's trying not to make it sound hurt and angry. He thinks - hopes - it's working. "So go, and let me make it easier on you by - not reminding you. I'll move back out. We don't have to do this shit anymore, if it's not gonna last."

Because, the hurt little part of Bucky says, what's the point if it won't last? It's not like some last fling with a dame before he ships out. That was easy. But this matters. And it'll only hurt more if they draw it out. Right?

Bucky's words are sharp bullets that puncture Steve deeper than he thought they could. His eyes go wide as he sits up and stares at his friend confused and hurt.

" 'This shit'?"

Steve's only ever been in love with two people. And now one of them was not even looking him in the eye and saying they didn't 'have to do this shit'. Deep down Steve knows that Bucky is just doing this to cover up his own pain. He knows Bucky didn't mean it like that at all. But suddenly Steve is sixteen again, scrawny and sick. Every date he gets is out of pity and because their parents said the girl 'had to'.

And now Bucky was saying it too.

"You don't... Have to do anything," he says quietly, numbed by his surprise and sudden hurt. "I woulda...liked to spend the time we had left together. But. Yeah.

"You don't have to do anything you don't want, Buck."

"Why?" Bucky asks, sharp and angry. "What good is spending it together gonna do? It's just gonna make you leaving worse, and I have fucking left you too many times to want to go through that again."

His fists are balled up, like he's sixteen now, ready to punch someone over Steve, only the problem is, the person he's fighting now is Steve. And yeah, sure, they've fought before. But not like this. Not like lovers. Not like people really, truly about to leave each other forever. Even when Bucky had shipped out... it hadn't felt like this. He'd been young and dumb, maybe, but it hadn't felt like forever. Not like this.

"I'm not doing anything I don't want to, here. I'm doing this 'cause you said we were gonna stay - you convinced me to stay, for you, and now you're fucking pulling out and fine. Fine, Steve. I know I can't follow you where you're going." Even though, Bucky thinks, he would. He would go with Steve, but he can't.

And - he's got Steve, his Steve, and he doesn't know what he's doing yet. He doesn't know how he feels, what he wants, and - "I got things I have to do, too."

It probably sounds sullen and stubborn. He doesn't care.

This is familiar. Steve can handle this: Bucky's temper flaring up and his mouth running off without his brain. The words still hurt and Steve is unsure as he moves but he at least knows now what he's going to say.

"Because I love you," he finally says, his voice breaking on it. "Because I love you and if I go it will just be another chunk of my heart I'll never get back again. I don't want to lose it any earlier than I need to."

He slides off his chair and kneels at Bucky's feet, looking up at him with red, wet eyes. His hands rest lightly on Bucky's knees so he can be pushed off if need be. He hopes he won't be but he'll understand if he is. He pushes up and reaches to cup Bucky's cheek, if he can.

"I haven't been happy for years. Not like I have been with you, Buck. I want to stay. I want to stay so bad that it might kill me.

"You're...you're home. I don't want to lose it again."

For a second, Bucky feels like he can't breathe. The lump in his throat swells up so big it's blocking all of his air, and all he can do is just fucking stare down at Steve for a long, long, silent moment.

Except - he huffs out an aggravated sound, reaching to pull Steve's hand away - and then pushing himself up out of the stupid chair, and pulls Steve up with him and into a hug that's fierce and unapologetic and still definitely angry, for all that it's desperate, too.

His voice is strangled but firm when he says, "I'm not your home, Steve. I'm not - your Bucky, and we both know it." Maybe that's the real heart of the problem, here. It was never gonna work. Sooner or later, something like this would happen, and Steve would have had to choose between where he really belonged, and this "shade" of Bucky Barnes. All Steve is doing, here, is clinging to a past that doesn't exist, and Bucky's trying to do the same.

"Home is gone," he finally says, because - it is. For both of them. Neither of them can go back to the guys they were. "It was gone seventy years ago, and if you're just trying to make me that. To make this that. Then don't. I won't do that to you anymore. It's a shitty thing to do, and I fuckin' hate being shitty to you, 'cause I fuckin' love you, you punk, and I don't know what the hell you're supposed to do but I won't stand in the way of you doing it if you've gotta."

He'll just - he'll swallow the hurt. That's what he does for Steve. He shoves it down until he's solid and firm so Steve can do what he needs to do with a clear conscience. Right? Whatever that means.

So, "What the fuck are we doing until... you leave?"

Fuck, he knows he just said he'd move out. He probably should. He shouldn't go back on it.

Steve lets out a sob as Bucky pulls him in for that hug. His arms loop around and crush him just as desperately as Bucky's are crushing him. Steve's head buries into Bucky's neck and he just stays there for as long as he can. Breathes in this scent that he knows better than any other and that he'll lose for the rest of his life. Won't even remember he'd ever had it.

When he pulls back he presses their foreheads together and keeps his eyes closed.

"I meant it. You don't have to do anything you don't want to. If you wanna move out then I'm not going to stop you. I know you gotta take care of yourself."

His hand finds Bucky's hip and holds it. It's hard but he somehow manages to use that leverage and push Bucky away. Just enough that they can look at one another and Steve can think more clearly. That was always the problem with them. Neither thought clearly with the other. They used each other to get what they'd lost and now it was too late to fix that. Too late to learn who each other were outside of memories. Too late for everything. And yet...

"Just. Please don't shut me out. I'll take whatever you give me but...don't close me out. If this is my last days with you I wanna make sure I don't waste 'em."

Yeah, Steve's crushing him a little - and Bucky couldn't really care less. He doesn't loosen his grip on Steve until the other starts to push him away a little; for a second, Bucky's stomach drops - but Steve doesn't push him away completely, for better or worse. Bucky wishes it didn't make him feel such a complicated mix of good and bad at the same time, but Steve tends to have that effect on him, no matter what.

He snorts a little, reaching up to punch Steve halfheartedly on the shoulder. "Dumbass, takin' care of you is taking care of me." It always has been. And if Steve didn't know that before - well. Maybe it wasn't the same, for his Bucky. But it's how this one feels, and how he's always felt.

"I just don't wanna make it harder on you. I don't." He's adamant about that, taking a deep breath before he goes. on. "Half of me thinks it'd be easier to make you mad and just storm out. I mean. It would be easier."

In principle. Not really on either of them, in the end, he suspects. But Steve's the one he cares about now, which is why he says, "Whatever you want, pal - and I don't mean it like a brush-off. If that's what you want - " Then that's what Bucky will give him. He's got a whole life here or back home or however it falls out, to regret this - or forget it ever happened. A whole life to nurse the pain, so he can put it off for now. For Steve.

"So are we... breaking up or staying together?" he asks, with a little laugh, but... it's a serious question. Whatever Steve wants. Bucky doesn't have to be in his bed to do his best not to shut Steve out.

Steve doesn't know what to say so he ends up saying nothing at all. He just leans in and kisses Bucky hard, desperate to feel the soaring happiness he once had. And it's there. Just muted underneath the pain of knowing they were now on borrowed time. Or, even if they weren't, there was enough aired out between the two of them that they probably should break up just to try and get a more functional relationship formed out of the ashes. They don't have time for that, though. There's no time to learn this Bucky in his own right and to have Bucky learn him. No time for them to figure out all the similarities and all the differences and use them both to embrace the future instead of the past. All they could do now was soak in the other and make the best of each hour. Pray that some small molecule of it will stick with them on the trip home.

Or pray that something happens and the trip home gets cancelled all together. But that too would just be temporary. Steve knows that he needs to get home. Sooner or later, he will have a job to do there. Bucky can't go with him no matter how long they put it off.

Steve pulls back from the kiss only to lean back in for a second. Desperate and grateful and furious all at the same time. When he breaks off this time he stays back, one hand finding Bucky's to hold it loosely.

"I don't want to break up," he answers honestly. "We might have...possibly the most messed up, unhealthy relationship in the 'Fleet but it's ours and I want it up until the very last second. As long as I'm not hurting you somehow by asking for that, then. Yeah. I want you with me, Buck."

He pushes their foreheads together and Steve can feel the warm skin alive and soft against his own. Real. Real and here. At least for now.

"I love you, jerk."

If nothing else... they're used to not having time. They're both used to war, to world-ending situations, and to luxuries you just don't get. Maybe, honestly, Bucky's just glad Steve is grabbing for this at all, even when he's planning to let it go. Maybe Bucky feels a little better, wanting what he wants, knowing Steve at least wants the same, even if he's going to have to turn and walk away from it. It feels like some little victory - or maybe that's just the way Steve kisses him; it's hard to tell, because that kiss is so desperate and sincere and screams Steve all over, that Bucky both hates himself for giving in, knowing he's going to lose it, and also doesn't give a single solitary fuck about what might happen tomorrow, even knowing the pain it's going to bring.

He laughs a little, when Steve pulls back, because, "Yeah... yeah, I think that's what we've got." It's messed up, and probably unhealthy - and yeah. Story of his fuckin' life. That's how things go with Steve. Maybe Bucky really isn't sorry about it, after all. "But I guess we're keeping it."

He breathes out, slowly, not quite a sigh but definitely a measured breath that gives him time to try to pull himself together. "I think I'm still staying," he says, squeezing Steve's hand a little. "I don't... really think they need me back home, and if my Steve - if Grant - is gonna stay, I'm staying with him. Or if he goes... maybe I'll go."

One more breath, for good measure, before he glances at Steve, their gaze a little too close, with their foreheads pressed together, but he doesn't really care. "I still love you, though, you idiot. You're weirdly lovable."

Steve laughs and settles his head against Bucky's shoulder. He's tired and miserable with too much going on in his head. So much of him wants to lock himself and Bucky in their cabin and never let them out again. Steve wants to just curl up in their too-small mattress and forget the fact that time is ticking away and he'll never have another moment like this ever again. He just wants this. Wants to be happy. But that never seems to be his lot in life.

"I didn't plan on telling you like this," he admits. "I've known for awhile but... I don't know. I wasn't sure how to just spill it out."

He nudges his head back to press a kiss to Bucky's chin and jaw. Each inch he can reach is one he wants to give attention to. Steve wants to memorize every single bump and pore and scar on this body. He might still forget but it won't be from lack of effort to remember.

"I'm gonna talk to people," he promises. "I wanna stay. More than anything I wanna stay with you. If there's a way I'm gonna take it. Understand?"

He pulls back to stare into Bucky's eyes.

"You're weirdly loveable yourself, dumbass. And I don't want to lose you."

Bucky just lets out a soft, fond sound that's definitely a laugh, but, "I get it," he says. He does. Telling someone something like this isn't easy. "D'you think I told you the instant I was drafted?" Well - maybe that'll finally be the difference between their worlds, but without the other Bucky here, they'll probably never know.

Still, "I understand. If you gotta go - Steve. I get it. I do." Bucky sighs, looking back at Steve and thinking the universe has been so fucking unfair to this one man, this one good man, and he deserves a break. He deserves a break more than anybody, and it eats Bucky up to think that he can't give him one. That he can't help him, and he can't help Grant, either. Not the way he wants. Not the way either of them deserve.

"I never wanted to lose you," he says, quietly, reaching up to run fingers through Steve's short, blonde hair. "But I've been tryin' to tell myself I was ready for when it was gonna happen since I was about ten, you know? Never made it any easier, though."

Steve's face is pure agony as he listens to this. All of it hurts. The reminder of the draft opens a wound Steve had cauterized shut so long ago that he nearly forgot how badly he'd been hurt. He'd been devastated, quietly and privately, of course. Spent nights staring at Bucky and wondering if he was ever gonna see him again. And if that wasn't bad enough, Bucky is going ahead and giving him permission to leave. Telling him how he'd planned on it since they were kids and Steve's life expectancy ranged in months.

He leans in and kisses Bucky hard. If he can pour his love into this kiss he'll drain every single drop in his body. Anything to make this better. Anything to not have entire universes separating them from the man they love. Steve cups Bucky's face and holds it tenderly. When he pulls back Steve keeps his eyes closed and his head close.

"I love you so much, Buck. I don't want to hurt you again. We've said goodbye too many times..." He doesn't have an answer though. He doesn't have a way to stop the inevitable. It crushes his heart into powder inside his ribs.

"I'm gonna try. I'm gonna try everything. I...don't want to lose you.

"Just this once, I don't want to lose the person I love."

Bucky lets out a breath - he certainly feels breathless, after a kiss like that. And Steve's not wrong - hell, he's not, they have said goodbye too many fucking times. And it gets harder every single time. At least, it does for Bucky.

"I don't want that for you either," he says, and then laughs a little, because, "and I sure as hell ain't too proud to admit I don't want that for myself. I think you've paid enough, Stevie, and I don't think you owe anybody anything." He loops one arm up, pressing his palm to the back of Steve's neck, just touching, reassuring. "But I also know you wouldn't be you, if you were just... okay, leaving things back home as they were. And I love you because you're you - and all the stupid that comes with it, you know?"

This time, it's Bucky that leans forward for a long, slow, drawn-out kiss. When they'd started this conversation, he'd thought he'd have to walk out and never have this again. Now... he knows he still won't have it, when Steve leaves. But at least for now... at least for a little longer... he can be greedy, and he can kiss Steve as many times as he can manage.

"Maybe the other me's got it right," he finally says, a little hoarsely. "Maybe... if you don't remember this. Maybe it'll be better for you."

He hates saying that. He feels awful the second he does. And yet... he maybe means it, too.

The kisses feel like good-byes. Steve hates them even as he wants to drown inside them. He kisses back with every shred of love he can muster and chases Bucky as he pulls away. He's greedy too. He wants his memories full of Bucky until the very last moment. He doesn't want to let go of the happiness he finally found.

He just wants to stay.

"Don't say that," he almost hisses, stunned by what Bucky's said. "Don't you dare say that forgetting you is better. Are you...are you insane?"

Steve yanks Bucky close, holding him in a hug that might also be a wrestling move, somewhere. Only Bucky could ever withstand the force of it. Steve only does it because he knows it won't hurt him. Steve never wants to hurt Bucky.

"It would not be better, you idiot. Have you any idea what it's been like for me? I've wanted this. I've wanted you so bad. Some nights I wake up and think I hear the train or your breathing next to me.

"God, Buck. Knowing I had this, even if I lost it, would be better than all those years of mourning and wondering 'what if?' "

The grip Steve's got him in is - well. It's tight, and firm, and yeah, Bucky can handle it, but he can also read what it says pretty clearly. He knows it was a shitty thing to say.

He still can't help but wonder if it's not true. Shakespeare said all that shit about loving and losing, yeah. But Bucky never wanted to hurt Steve, either. And he knows this will, because it hurts Bucky, hard and deep, in a way he knows he's going to carry around for the rest of his life.

His arms come up around Steve as best they can, trying to touch him, to rub his back, to be reassuring in a situation where reassurances mean pretty much nothing. "I wanna give you what you want, Steve. God knows you deserve it, and then some. I wish I could go with you." Give Steve the best friend he needs, because... Soldat could be a friend for Steve, over time. But he's not Bucky, and everyone's accepted that by now. And it's - fine, sure. Maybe better for Soldat. But Bucky isn't sure it's better for Steve. "But I don't want you hanging everything on this."

He moves to grip Steve's arms, pulling back a little so he can look Steve in the face. "I don't want you to not move on, because - like I said. You fuckin' deserve it be happy. And I don't want to stand in the way of that, when you get back." He doesn't want Steve to spend the rest of his life mourning this.

Steve decides to shut Bucky up with a kiss. He's heard enough and just pulls back to press their lips together, hard. It's not loving and it's not lustful. It's desperate and grieved as he knows both of them are right in their own way. This is an impossible situation and both solution is both correct and incorrect at the same time. There's no winning this. Just surviving and moving forward.

Steve strokes his hand over Bucky's face all the same, thumb tracing along his hairline.

"I'd rather have this." He says it with finality, not expecting or welcoming debate. "I'd rather know that I had this. Forgetting...it just means you died. You died and all the things I never said died with you. But now?"

He pushes their foreheads together and closes his eyes. Steve's hand goes to Bucky's hip and holds onto it lightly. He barely breathes.

"Now you know I love you. I know you love me. No matter what else comes...there is value in that. I want it. It's mine and I want to keep it."

It's impossible, but what is being Captain America, but making impossible decisions. Losing to win. Winning to lose. Isn't it all the same, after awhile?

Bucky kisses back just as desperately. Because honestly, of all the things Steve could have said... saying he wants to be selfish, that he wants to keep this, means more because Bucky knows just how selfless Steve is. And if this is the thing he wants to keep -

Bucky's fingers ball into fists in the fabric of Steve's shirt, and he chases that kiss with one, two, three of his own. "It's yours," he confirms - promises - softly. "Whatever I can give you, before you go - it's yours, Stevie."

God, this is almost worse than losing him off the side of that cliff. Swift and sudden was easier than staring down the end, knowing it's going to happen. Bucky feels like such a coward, but there it is. Is this how Steve's Peggy felt? Was she the one there, to talk to him until he hit the ice?

"Besides," Bucky adds, with a dumb smile almost hinging on ridiculous. "I hear I'm really fuckin' hard to kill."

Naviadna Mingle

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