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As far as Sam can tell, Bucky’s two favorite hobbies are scowling and prowling.
“That’s not fair,” Steve says when Sam points this out to him.
They’re on the way home from their morning run. Sam spent most of the run mulling over the precise way to classify how Bucky spends his time, which is the excuse he’s using to explain why he ran slower than usual. Definitely not bringing up the nagging headache he woke up with to Mr. I-Haven’t-Been-Sick-Since-1943.
“He’s not scowling. He just looks like that. He’s got a—what do you call it—a resting bitch face?”
“Who the hell taught America’s Favorite Grandpa what a resting bitch face is?” Sam asks incredulously.
“I’m up to date on all the slang, you know that,” Steve says, bumping against Sam, the electrifying moment of contact threatening to turn Sam’s running shorts several sizes too small. “How else would I be able to connect with the youth, help keep them on the right path?”
Sam rolls his eyes, but doesn’t let Steve change the subject back to the various educational videos that he considers among his greatest accomplishment this century.
“It’s not a resting bitch face. It’s an active bitch face. Mailman drops off mail? He scowls. He finishes loading the dishwasher? He scowls. I ask him to make Alpine stop howling outside the bathroom when I’m trying to take a shower? You’re never gonna believe what he does. I’m telling you, it’s fun for him.”
“The last one’s not his fault. Alpine might like him best, but she still doesn’t listen to him.”
Sweat makes Steve’s light gray shirt cling even tighter than usual to his stupid sculpted chest. His face is flushed light pink, the way it gets after vigorous activities such as running or, presumably, sex.
Not that Sam would fucking know.
“Don’t change the subject. I’m telling you, man. Some people have jigsaw puzzles. He’s got scowling. And prowling.”
“You think he’d like jigsaw puzzles?” Steve asks as they turn down the rapidly-gentrifying Brooklyn street where his place is—well, Sam’s place too, as Steve always reminds him, but even after nearly two months of living there full-time, it’s still hard to think of it as home, sometimes. “Now that we’re back on call, I’m worried he’ll get bored if we’ve both gotta go on a mission.”
“No, he’s not gonna get bored. Because he’ll be scowling and prowling. That’s my whole point.”
“He does prowl,” Steve admits. And Sam has to let the conversation drop because they’re approaching the front door, but he takes the small victory where he can.
For all that Bucky had said he wanted to keep hunting down HYDRA when he’d agreed to come home with them, he seems content to stick around Brooklyn for now. The house makes up Bucky’s main prowling grounds. He stalks between rooms on silent feet. More than once, Sam has rounded a corner and nearly had a heart attack to find that the hallway he’d reasonably assumed was empty was instead being prowled in by Bucky, who always just shrugged as Sam grasped at his pounding heart and asked him what the fuck he was doing.
Not to mention the times when Sam has peacefully been sitting on the couch, watching a movie—sometimes with Steve also on the couch, sometimes only inches away from Sam’s elbow seductively brushing against him—when all of a sudden a metal hand has reached down from the heavens to snag a fistful of popcorn from the bowl he’s holding.
In all fairness, on those occasions Bucky did swap the scowling for an expression of contriteness as he went to get the vacuum cleaner. He’d once even remade the popcorn without being asked to, though of course he didn’t add anywhere near the proper ratio of butter and salt to it.
He’s not… unfriendly, exactly. But he’s certainly not talkative. He’s an observer, not a conversationalist. When he talks to Sam, it’s mostly about Alpine or his opinions on the movie night selection. Current events. He’s not at all inclined to talk about his past, at least not to Sam.
He also prowls outside, sometimes. His existence is bound up in a legal gray area where the government isn’t issuing a full pardon yet, but they’re also not prioritizing hunting him down. Steve has made it very clear that any hypothetical actions taken against the hypothetical ex-Winter Soldier hypothetically lurking about his house will result in him hypothetically melting the shield to scrap metal. And with the revelation of HYDRA’s infiltration at all levels of the government still being so raw, having Captain America around to unite the populace is high on the fed’s priority list.
But even without the threat of being imprisoned once again, Bucky isn’t exactly eager to join their jogs, or sunbathe on the rooftop, or volunteer to do the goddamn grocery shopping, no matter how much he eats. He seems to view reintegrating into society with a profound amount of suspicion—which okay, Sam gets it; it’s been just under a year since he fled from HYDRA, and that’s not a whole lot of time when it comes to adjusting to being out of a war zone.
Still. Trained as he is in recognizing PTSD, he privately thinks that maybe slipping out a window to go prowling, sending Steve into a frenzy until Sam pointed out that he probably wouldn’t have left without the goddamn cat, is less a mental health symptom and more a symptom of the fact that Bucky is just very, very strange.
Where Bucky goes on his outdoor prowls is still a mystery, at least to Sam. He never elaborates on his whereabouts when he stalks back inside. Just shrugs and says he was “Out for a walk,” which would be a totally normal thing to say, except for the fact that no one would ever describe his loping gait and constantly searching gaze as belonging to someone who was merely “out for a walk.”
Alpine is sitting inside the bay window as he and Steve make their way to the front door. She meows at them, a flash of pink tongue and tiny sharp teeth, then pushes her way under the curtain and jumps down.
Predictably, she keeps her distance once they’re inside. She typically ignores Sam, unless he’s behind a closed door. Then it becomes imperative that she be in the same room as him, a fact she makes vocally clear. She also somehow manages to get her tiny white fur all over his dark jeans, which just doesn’t seem fair when she almost never snuggles with him.
Bucky prowls into the hallway. His face remains neutral: definitely not smiling; he almost never does, but also not scowling. It must be too early to engage in both of his hobbies at once.
“I made breakfast,” he informs them.
Alpine trots over to Bucky and squeaks, putting her two little paws on his legs. He leans down and scoops her up, setting her on his shoulder. Sam currently doesn’t count “Hanging out with Alpine” on his taxonomy of Bucky’s hobbies. Much like staring at people, that’s more of a lifestyle than a pastime.
“Thanks, Buck.” Steve flashes his stupid luminous smile as he unties his sneakers and drops them on the mat that Sam had insisted they buy.
“Is it cornflakes,” Sam says.
Bucky’s expression remains the same. “Only yours.”
Joking is not one of Bucky’s hobbies, though Sam really wishes it was. His breakfast is, indeed, a normal amount of cornflakes, plus a single massive mango. The fruit varies: yesterday it was half a dozen kiwis, which was particularly concerning because Sam knows for a fact that neither he nor Steve bought kiwis on their last grocery run. But the main meal is always cornflakes, except for a couple of mornings when Bucky spiced things up and made unbuttered toast. At least they aren’t soggy: Bucky stopped adding milk after the time that Sam came back from his run and caught Alpine siting on the table, drinking from his bowl.
Steve, on the other hand, has his usual breakfast cereal salad, mixed up in the same large bowl they use for popcorn on their movie nights. Today, Sam can make out Froot Loops, Raisin Bran, Lucky Charms, and Honey Bunches of Oats. The sight makes his stomach turn even more than usual.
He’s yet to determine if Bucky is, like, actively fucking with Steve, or if he actually thinks that he’s putting together an appetizing and nutritious meal. Probably he isn’t going to find out, not as long as Steve keeps eating it all.
Cooking isn’t one of Bucky’s hobbies, not as far as Sam can tell. He will sometimes make dinner unprompted, though usually that means heating a frozen pizza or, once, boiling every vegetable they had in the house. Mostly he’s content to eat what Sam or Steve make or order.
No, his tertiary hobby is hiding weapons around the house. Possibly that’s a subset of prowling—Sam has yet to actually catch him in the act to confirm in the two are related. He just knows that there’s an unloaded Glock hiding in the stuffing of one couch cushion, a clip of bullets in the other. Another gun waits wrapped in a plastic bag in a half-full oatmeal container in the pantry, as Sam discovered the last time he felt like making cookies.
Most sinister is the large knife Velcroed to the underside of the shelf in his bedroom closet. He’d asked Steve if that was a threat, and he’d just shrugged and said he got a closet knife too, so probably it was nothing to worry about.
The truth is, the weapons-stashing isn’t the most concerning of Bucky’s hobbies, even if it does basically guarantee that Sam will never have his nephews over for a visit. The scowling is of least concern. The prowling is mildly concerning, given that they have no idea where Bucky goes when he leaves, but the neighborhood hasn’t seen an uptick of unexplained deaths in the past few weeks, so probably that’s not a huge deal either.
Bucky’s most worrying pastime is sleeping with Steve.
Sam doesn’t know when it began. He doesn’t know if it’s every night, or just occasionally. He’s fairly sure he’s not supposed to know about it at all: Steve has never mentioned it, and obviously Bucky isn’t about to come to Sam to tell him all about the wild, hot sex he’s having.
It was Alpine’s fault he knew about it in the first place. Two weeks ago, he’d woken up to her mournfully yowling out in the hallway.
Upon finding her standing in front of Steve’s bedroom, he’d informed her in a whisper, “You’re at the wrong door. Bucky’s down the hallway. Go on—”
But before he could gently shoo her in the direction of her preferred person, the door to Steve’s room had swung open. His eyes shot from Alpine to the figure standing there, heart spiking at the thought of getting to see Steve wearing nothing but the boxers he’d slept in back when they were sharing motel rooms. His hair would be mussed. His sleep-drowsy gaze would meet Sam’s, and maybe he’d raise his eyebrows, maybe he’d tilt his head and beckon Sam to come inside—
Only it hadn’t been Steve at all. It had been Bucky.
Sam had frozen. He and Bucky stared at each other, Bucky’s expression as unreadable in the dark as it was during the day. He’d been wearing nothing but a pair of loose-fitting pants.
Alpine meowed reproachfully and trotted inside. Never breaking eye contact with Sam, Bucky slowly shut the door.
No one mentioned anything the next morning, and Sam tried to write it off. Maybe he’d been dreaming. Maybe Bucky standing in Steve’s bedroom was, like, the non-paralyzed version of a sleep paralysis demon, a nightmarish hallucination. Or maybe it was Steve who’d had a nightmare, and Bucky had gone to sit with him. Maybe the two of them had been up late swapping WWII stories, and Bucky had been too tired to go back to his own bedroom. Really, there were lots of reasonable explanations.
But a few days after that initial incident, it had been Sam who’d woken up from a nightmare, the sort that left him feeling too raw to want to risk falling back asleep. Instead, he’d gone to lie on the couch, turning on the captions and watching an old monster movie on mute.
An hour into the movie, he realized he’d left his cellphone in his room. He went to get it, and as he was walking down the hallway, head a door creak open. He glanced over, and—
Bucky, skulking back to his own bedroom. He hadn’t acknowledged Sam.
So.
Steve is sleeping with Bucky.
Steve hasn’t mentioned to Sam that he and Bucky are sleeping together, even though Sam is supposed to be his best friend. Even though they go running together almost every morning and Steve always slings his sweaty arms over Sam’s shoulders when they’re done and he’s making fun of how slow Sam was. Even though they sit next to each other on the couch and watch movies together, despite there being numerous other pieces of furniture upon which one of them could sit. Even though Sam knows, he knows he didn’t imagine the electric tension that was building between the two of them in the days before Bucky showed up in their motel room. He certainly didn’t imagine how Steve’s gaze had lingered appreciatively on his shirtless chest when they were in the locker room at the Tower last week. And even though he was up in the air at the time, he’s, like, 87% sure Steve was staring at his ass when he’d taken the new wings out for a spin.
It’s possible that Bucky just… thinks Steve needs extra security, and so insists on sleeping at the foot of his bed like a guard dog. That seems like the sort of weird shit he’d do. Or it could be that he’s got nightmares himself that are made easier by sleeping near Steve, and he doesn’t want Sam to know because he thinks it’s embarrassing.
…but probably the two of them are just having incredible sex. Sex that Sam could’ve been having if he’d shot his shot, but instead Steve failed to pick up on what Sam thought were pretty obvious hints. And Bucky had been bolder than him. And now he gets to do whatever he and Steve do in the haven of Steve’s bedroom, and Sam gets to depressedly jerk off at night, then go running and eat cornflakes and pretend that everything is fine in the morning.
He knows, logically, he should move out. But the stipend that’s been periodically showing up in his bank account ever since he joined the Avengers, while way more than he made working for the VA, still isn’t enough for him to afford a place anywhere near as nice as this. And maybe he could just move into the Tower, but he likes it here. He likes the big bay windows and the comfortable couch and being around Steve, even with constant reminder that he can’t have what he so desperately wants, even if he doesn’t know how long this can last.
He has Steve Rogers as a best friend. That’s enough. That’s more than enough. He just needs his heart and his dick to get onboard with what his head already knows.
Anyway, at least the walls are thick enough that he’s yet to overhear what Steve and Bucky get up to. He’s grateful for that. He thinks.
Neither the cornflakes nor the cold shower does anything to abate the headache Sam had woken up with. Luckily, he didn’t have any plans for today besides helping Steve install new faucets in the bathrooms.
Truthfully, he hadn’t had much to do since Bucky appeared in the hotel room. He’s finally cleared for action with the Avengers, and he knows that one day he’ll look back on this period of downtime and wish he’d appreciated it more. But lately the lack of a clear purpose has been driving him almost as insane as Alpine’s routine 2:23 AM yodeling sessions.
Today, he’s able to recognize the emptiness of his schedule for the blessing that it is. The bright lights of the hardware store leave spots dancing in his vision as he and Steve debate over which faucets would go best in which sink. His fingers feel thick and clumsy as he helps Steve with the installation. And when a slight mishaps results in water spraying all over Steve, making his white shirt cling tight to his Greek statue abs, lightheadedness overcomes Sam with such power that he has to actually sit down hard on the tiled floor.
“Sam? You okay?” Steve crouches down next to him, frowning. Water seems to drip off him in slow motion.
Sam blinks. He shakes his head to try and dislodge some of the brain fog, but that just makes his ears ring worse, makes his vision even floatier.
“Think I might be coming down with something,” he admits, propping himself up against the cabinet.
Steve frowns. Without warning, he rests the back of his large hand against Sam’s forehead, and if Sam hadn’t been feeling lightheaded before, that certainly would do the trick.
“Seems like you have a fever,” Steve says a moment later, withdrawing those knuckles that Sam has contemplated licking more than once. “You feel hot.”
You think I’m hot? Sam almost says, but luckily he’s not quite that far gone.
Instead, he clings to his last bit of self-control and replies, “Yeah, I wouldn’t be surprised. There’s a thermometer in the first aid kit.”
There are first aid kits in all the bathrooms and bedrooms, and one in the kitchen for good measure. Sam had insisted on it. It is, he supposes, his version of Bucky and his weapon-hiding compulsion.
Steve stands, his soaked shirt straining against his abs as he reaches for the medicine cabinet. Sam forces himself to stare at the opposite wall. His ears ring, and realizes how sensitive his skin feels. Maybe he’s worse off than he thought.
“Here,” and suddenly Steve is kneeling down next to him, his large hand cupping Sam’s cheek as he slips the thermometer beneath Sam’s tongue. Unfortunately, he lets go of the plastic before he can also slide his fingers in with it.
He also withdraws his touch. This is the sort of tactically-sound decision that Sam ought to expect from Captain America: had he kept his palm cradling Sam’s face, Sam’s temperature surely would’ve risen so high, it would be impossible to tell if he actually had a fever.
It’s still disappointing, though. However uncomfortably hot Sam might feel, he’d still welcome the heavy warmth of Steve’s touch any time.
He’s also not sure if he imagined that Steve’s hand had lingered as it withdrew. That the palms of his fingers had paused for a moment on Sam’s jaw, that there had been the slightest hitch of Steve’s breath…
…it was probably the fever. The concern in Steve’s eyes is unwavering as he stays by Sam’s side, but there’s no reason to think it’s anything but platonic. He has to remember that.
The thermometer beeps. Steve plucks it from Sam’s mouth.
“100 exactly,” he announces. “All right. Bed or couch?”
There’s no way he can even pretend to be normal about Steve bringing him to bed. Not in his weakened state. “Couch.”
“Sounds like a plan.”
Steve slips behind him, his elbows basically under Sam’s armpits as he tugs him to his feet. He keeps his left arm wrapped around Sam’s ribs as he steers the two of them towards the door. His chest, still damp from the earlier faucet leak, presses flush with Sam’s skin. It turns out that the fever is good for something: if Steve senses how Sam just became about ten degrees hotter, he can reasonably blame it on the illness.
Steve manhandles him gently to the doorway, taking on more of Sam’s weight than he really needs to. And Sam lets him. He lets him because it’s nice to be held, to have Steve hold him. To lean against Steve as they traverse the short distance to the bathroom door and into the hallway, where—
“What’s wrong with him?”
—where Bucky is, evidently, prowling. He eyes Sam suspiciously, not quite scowling, but pretty damn close.
“He’s not feeling well,” Steve says. His thumb rubs back and forth against Sam’s rib cage, and it’s so nice that Sam decides not to be too annoyed at Bucky’s inability to phrase things in a nicer way.
That resolve lasts about two seconds, at which point Bucky says, “People these days still get sick?”
“Sick of your face,” Sam mutters. He must really be unwell, because for half a second, he thinks he actually sees Bucky smile at that.
“We can’t all be supersoldiers,” Steve says sagely. Bucky steps out of the way to let them pass, then trails after them as they make their way down the hall and into the living room.
“What else can I get you?” Steve asks after he’s deposited Sam on the couch. He gathers up a bunch of throw pillows, sticking three of them between Sam’s back and the couch’s arm. “Advil? Gatorade? Toast?”
“Just some water for now,” Sam says, and then, considering, “Actually, maybe bring me the bottle of cold and flu syrup that’s under the sink. And some saltines. I don’t know if you can take that on an empty stomach.”
“You got it, pal.” Steve squeezes his shoulder before he lopes off to do Sam’s bidding, and the lingering warmth of his strong fingers almost makes up for the sting of the pal.
Sam closes his eyes, snuggling back into the pillows. His head throbs. There’s a faint discomfort in his stomach that could eventually become nausea, but it’s not too bad for now. He just needs to rest; he might even fall asleep before Steve comes back—
A shrill mewl stabs straight through his eardrums and into his brain. He opens his eyes and glares down at the white hellion.
“You’re taking up the whole couch,” Bucky informs him, padding into the living room and standing by Alpine. “She doesn’t like that.”
“What? She never jumps on the couch.”
Alpine rubs her head against Bucky’s shin, arching her back. “She might want to.”
Steve reappears. He kneels down next to the couch, dumping the supplies that Sam had requested on the coffee table before arranging them in a neat row.
“Water, cold and flu syrup, crackers. Anything else?”
“Nah. Thanks. I think I’m just going to try and take a nap.”
“We won’t be too loud,” Steve promises. He reaches over and squeezes Sam’s ankle before he stands. “You think of anything, just yell. I’m not going anywhere—”
And that’s when his and Sam’s phones start ringing in unison with the “Avengers—Activate!” sound that Tony got made special by some big-name composer.
Alpine charges off, her claws skittering against the hardwood floors. Sam also kind of wants to flee from the onslaught of sound, but that would require getting off of the couch, and also the problem is coming from inside his pocket. He fishes out his phone and jabs at the “silence” button, trying not to look at the bright screen.
“‘Giant sentient vines taking over parts of Fairfax County,’” Steve reads aloud. “‘Three distinct incident areas reported so far. All hands on deck.’ Says Natasha will be by ASAP to take us to the Tower, unless you want to fly. I’ll just let them know we’re not coming—”
“What? You should still go. You don’t need to skip it just because I’m sick.”
“You’re more important,” Steve says firmly. “Besides, depending on where in Fairfax County we’re talking, the giant sentient vines might be an improvement.”
He’s not wrong, but still. “Thor isn’t around, it’ll take Clint way longer to get to Virginia, and if they’re anywhere near the CIA headquarters, it’ll be a whole thing if we let the Hulk loose. Tony and Nat can’t deal with it on their own.”
He can tell that Steve knows he’s right, but doesn’t want to admit it. “You sure you don’t want me to stay? I know Buck can look after you, but…”
“It’s just a cold,” Sam says. Bucky, he realizes, has made himself scarce. Possibly to go comfort Alpine, though it’s equally likely that it was the mention of Natasha coming that drove him off. “Go. I just wish I could come with.”
“I know. I wish you could too.” Steve squeezes his shoulder. “But Bucky’s the best person in the world to stay with you when you’re sick. He’s the only reason I’m still around. We used to joke that it was a shame he hadn’t been born a dame, ‘cause he missed his calling as a nurse—don’t look at me like that; it was a compliment, and I think it’s swell that men can be nurses now. Anyway, Bucky’s great with colds. And the flu, and stomach bugs, and he’s actually pretty good with rheumatic fever too. Not so much with pneumonia, but you can’t really hold that against him.”
Sam decides not to ask. “I don’t think I have pneumonia.”
By the time Natasha shows up, Steve has just finished changing into his uniform and double-checking his go-bag. Bucky still hasn’t reappeared, though Sam is pretty sure he’s hiding out in Steve’s room, since he’d heard low voices talking while Steve had been getting ready. Sam is sitting upright on the couch, munching on a saltine when she walks in.
“Heard you’re not doing so hot,” she says, perching on the armrest opposite to Sam. “How are you feeling?”
“Too hot; that’s the whole problem. And I’m upset I’m missing out on the vine action.”
“Don’t be. Tony says it might be some sort of sex thing? Like, they’re aliens and part of their mating ritual is taking over Virginia. That might just be wishful thinking, though.” She studies him with her ever-inscrutable expression. “Why don’t you come along and stay at the Tower? You can have one of Tony’s robots wait on you.”
It’s a tempting thought, but, “That would mean getting off the couch. And it’s really not that bad. I don’t need JARVIS keeping track of my temp.”
“No, I know. I figured Steve wouldn’t be coming along if it was serious.” Steve makes an affirmative noise as he shoulders the shield bag. “I just meant, I wasn’t sure if you’d want to stay here by yourself, without Steve. You know. With Alpine.”
Oh.
Officially, no one but he and Steve knows that Bucky lives here.
Officially, knowing things that no one else knows is Natasha’s entire job.
She has yet to come straight out and say that she’s aware of Bucky’s current whereabouts. But there have been hints. Casual mentions of how nice it is that they finally settled down, after months of relentless searching. The way she stares directly into Steve’s eyes when she asks how his quest to find Bucky is going. How the first time she met Alpine, she had commented on how she was “white as the winter snow,” and, “a real soldier of a cat,” and, “pounces like a trained killer.” All of which were true statements, but still felt somewhat pointed.
“Why would Alpine be a problem?” Steve asks, his tone as bland as Natasha’s. He refuses to come straight out and confront Natasha. Sam hasn’t figured out if it’s some sort of weird game they’re playing, or if they’re each just trying to outstubborn the other.
“I’m not saying she’ll be a problem. Just, it’s fine if Sam doesn’t want to be left alone with her. She’s not his responsibility, and I don’t think she’ll run off if she’s left by herself for a few days.”
“She’s an indoor cat,” says Steve. “How would she run off? And I know we have the automatic feeder, but she likes company.”
“No one’s going to judge you if you’d be more comfortable at the Tower,” Natasha continues, directing her words at Sam and ignoring what Steve had said. “I mean, she has tried to kill you. Multiple times. With her sharp little claws.”
“It’s been ages since Alpine tried to kill anyone, and you know that wasn’t her fault,” Steve says, glaring. “She and Sam get along great.”
“It’s fine,” Sam says to Natasha. “Thanks for checking, but I’ll be okay. She mostly just leaves me alone these days.”
Natasha hmms and stands up from the couch. “Okay, then. If you’re sure. You can always call the Tower and have a driver come get you if anything changes. Hopefully we won’t be gone long.”
Steve comes over and squeezes his shoulder. “I’ll keep you posted. Rest up and feel better. You’re in good hands. With Alpine.”
As soon as they’re gone, Sam gives up on nibbling the bland-ass saltines. He pours out a dosage of the cold and flu syrup and forces it down, chasing it with water that doesn’t quite wash away the gross, vaguely minty taste it leaves behind.
Sam snuggles back into the pillows and closes his eyes. Neither Bucky nor Alpine have reappeared, but like Natasha said, that’s not really his problem. Probably they’re off prowling somewhere, though hopefully not hiding anymore weapons in unexpected places.
Sam wakes with a sneeze. And another sneeze. And then three more for good measure.
The trained medic part of his brain knows that this is good, that it means the illness is starting to pass through, and his body is working to get rid of all the gross stuff it needs to expel. The majority of his brain cares more about the fact that there are parts of him dripping that definitely shouldn’t be, and he’s going to have to use his sleeve—
A wad of tissues drops into his lap. Sam snatches them up and shoves them under his nose.
He manages a muffled, “Thanks,” to Bucky in between the blowing. Bucky gives a single, sharp nod, placing the box of Kleenex onto the coffee table and then vanishing again.
By the time Sam has mostly gotten out what he needs to, Bucky has reappeared with one of the small trash cans from the bathroom. He sets it down on the floor next to Sam’s head, so Sam can dump the nasty wad of used tissues into it.
“I appreciate it, man,” Sam says.
He rubs at his forehead, taking stock of the situation. Nose: stuffed. Ears: blocked. Throat: scratchy. Head: aching. Joints: also aching.
Judging by the light, it must be early evening. He’s slept the day away, and he’s still tired. He should just go to bed.
Sam reaches out for the water, which is probably tepid at this point, but might still help his throat.
“No,” says Bucky, snatching the glass before Sam can get to it and moving it out of his reach.
“You have to take your temperature first,” he continues before Sam can actually voice his objections, which mainly boil down to, What the fuck? “Then water.”
He hands Sam the thermometer. Sam is too tired to argue with what is, admittedly, a sensible idea.
“I used to buy these for Steve sometimes,” Bucky says as Sam sticks the thermometer beneath his tongue. Sam follows his eyes to the box of Kleenex on the table. “They were new. He couldn’t really afford them.”
“Hmm,” Sam says, trying to convey polite interest without opening his lips.
“Not that I had a lot of money either. But. If we didn’t have tissues, then I would always have to be boiling his handkerchiefs and waiting for them to dry. And he didn’t have that many handkerchiefs to begin with.”
“Mmhmm,” Sam replies, nodding his head in a way that hopefully indicates that he too does not own many handkerchiefs. The conversation feels vaguely like a fever dream, but he’s pretty sure he’s awake, and not actually sick enough for that.
The thermometer mercifully beeps. Bucky snatches it out of his mouth before he can check it.
“99.8,” he announces.
“About the same as before. Think I’m just gonna head to bed.”
Bucky frowns. “You should eat something first. Toast?”
Sam thinks briefly of the dry-ass toast Bucky occasionally makes for breakfast. “I don’t know. My throat’s pretty scratchy.”
Bucky’s frown deepens, eyes narrowing like he’s just been given orders to carry out a particularly complex assassination. “Oatmeal or a smoothie. Or both.”
He doesn’t think his head can handle the blender going off. “Oatmeal?”
Bucky nods, looking approving, and stalks off in the direction of the kitchen.
Sam retrieves his water and checks his phone while he waits to see what Bucky will come up with. Steve left a voicemail about half an hour ago, saying that they were attempting to negotiate between three different factions of alien vine things while also fighting off the most violent of them, and it wasn’t not a sex thing, so probably Sam should be glad he missed it. He figures they’ll be down there at least another day.
“Rest up and feel better, okay? I hope Alpine is taking care of you. No, I know she is. See you guys soon.”
Alpine—the actual Alpine—trots into the room just as the message finishes. She sits in front of the couch, tail flicking.
“I’m getting up soon,” Sam informs her. “You better not start howling while I’m trying to sleep tonight. I’m sick. I need my rest.”
Her ears twitch back like he offended her somehow. She chirps at him, then stands on two legs to inspect the contents of the tissue trash can that Bucky brought over. Gross.
“Here.”
Bucky hands him a bowl of steaming oatmeal, and also puts a fresh glass of water down on the table. It looks… remarkably good, given what Sam has seen of Bucky’s previous cooking endeavors.
“It’s got peanut butter to keep your strength up,” Bucky informs him. “And honey. For your throat. And a bit of cinnamon. To help you sweat out the fever.”
Sam isn’t sure it actually works like that, but he can appreciate the intention. “Thanks. It looks good.”
And it is. Bucky sits in the chair and watches him closely as he eats, like he wants to make sure Sam fully appreciates his efforts. If Sam was feeling 100%, he would point out how creepy that is. As things stand, he figures it’s not worth the energy. He just focuses on swallowing down the sweet, soft oats.
When he’s done, Bucky nods approvingly and takes the empty bowl before he can set it on the table, disappearing into the kitchen without another word. It belatedly occurs to Sam to wonder if the oatmeal came from the same oatmeal container where Bucky’s kitchen gun hides. He’s not sure if he wants to know the answer.
Sam checks his phone one last time—nothing new—and then stands up, gripping the back of the couch when a wave of lightheadedness makes his brain feel too tight as the room spins around him.
“I’m heading to bed,” he calls as he halfheartedly straightens out the blankets and the pillows on the couch. He doesn’t hear a response over the sound of Bucky washing his dishes, though he knows Bucky must’ve been able to hear him even over all the splashing water and clattering glass.
He figures that Bucky will probably head out for an evening prowl. It’s around the time he usually vanishes, and Sam is pretty sure he hasn’t been out for a few nights, and with Steve not here and Sam laid up sick, it’s not like there’s a movie night or something for him to creep in on.
So it’s kind of a surprise when, after brushing his teeth and washing up, Sam makes his way into the bedroom and finds Bucky standing next to his bed, fluffing up several pillows that definitely aren’t Sam’s.
Under normal circumstances, Sam would probably be pressing a hand to his chest and saying something along the lines of Jesus Christ, or What the fuck, or even just, If you’re gonna creep around my bedroom, do me a favor and make some goddamn noise so I can hear you from the bathroom.
As it is, he really just wants to go the fuck to sleep. “There something I can help you with, Buck?”
“You have to sleep with your chest elevated.” He gives the pillows one last squeeze and then steps back, apparently satisfied with his work. “Otherwise, you’ll get pneumonia. And there’s not much I can do about pneumonia.”
“I have a cold; I’m not—” He’s not having this argument. “Thanks.”
Bucky gives his short, sharp nod and slips out, closing the door mostly, but not entirely, shut behind him. Sam prefers to sleep with it closed, much as that upsets Alpine (she never even comes inside to snuggle; she just takes deep personal offense to being excluded from any part of the house).
But he’s too fucking tired to care tonight. He flops down on his mattress, realizes that a chill is starting to sink into his bones, and crawls beneath the covers before he can start shaking.
He overheats in about twelve seconds. God damn it.
He throws the covers back, exposing himself to the open air. The chills start around two minutes later. He shivers and it isn’t even fair; he has a fucking fever; his body is objectively hot, not cold.
Sam ends up falling asleep with one leg under his quilt, one leg on top. Every time he wakes up, which is often, he’s more tangled in the sheets, and also too tired and too busy coughing or blowing his nose to do anything about it.
In the brain fog of the previous night, he apparently forgot to turn off his alarm. It goes off at its usual bright and early hour. Sam fumbles to silence it, blinking through crusty eyes as he jabs at the screen, but the damage is done.
He lies on his mound of pillows, staring at the ceiling and the shadows cast by the barely-risen sun. His head hurts. His throat does too, possibly as a result of post-nasal drip from all the gross stuff currently clogging up his nose. His joints and sinuses and lymph nodes seem to have all swelled up overnight. His entire body is simultaneously too hot and covered in a cold sweat.
However tired Sam is, he knows he won’t easily fall back asleep like this. He ends up dragging himself into a shower with the water set as hot as possible. The steam clears him up enough that he can, miracle of miracles, breathe out of his nose.
That lasts until he steps out of the bathroom. The second he leaves his homemade sauna, his nasal cavity congeals right up.
He also almost trips over Alpine, who had apparently decided to sit in complete silence with her tiny body pressed against the door. Maybe he should be grateful she didn’t add to his headache with her usual caterwauling, but it’s hard to feel appreciative when she’s shoving between his feet to get inside, and he’s grabbing for the door frame to avoid falling on his face.
“I’m sick,” he reminds her, the words somehow coming out both scratchy and nasally. “You should be nice to me.”
Alpine stands up on her hind legs and peers inside the bathtub. She doesn’t even spare him a glance.
Sam blearily makes his way into the bedroom, then stops. His sheets, previously twisted and rumpled from his restless sleep, have been straightened and tucked in with military precision.
He stares for a moment at the perfectly-made bed.
“Did you do this?” he asks Alpine as she trots past him, the tub apparently having been found wanting.
Predictably, she ignores him. Sam sighs, which triggers an unpleasant coughing fit that has him running back to the bathroom to spit some phlegm down the sink. He should maybe be glad that things are starting to loosen up, but it’s hard to feel grateful at the moment.
His ears are blocked up as bad as the rest of his head, but the kettle’s whistling had pierced through a few minutes ago. Sam heads for the kitchen, hoping that he’s not being burglarized by a bunch of bandits desperate for their breakfast tea.
Luckily, it’s just Bucky. His back turned to Sam, he says, “Sit down. The oatmeal’s ready. This is almost done steeping.”
The oatmeal is, indeed, ready. It looks the same as last time, except now there are banana slices on top, arranged in the shape of a star, or possibly a flower. The bottle of cold and flu syrup stands next to it.
“I know you’re still congested. I listened to you breathing while you were asleep.”
Sam, who had been on the verge of thanking Bucky for doing something that was admittedly kind by making the oatmeal and the tea, closes his eyes and counts to ten. “That’s creepy.”
“You were snoring.” Bucky squeezes a sizable dollop of honey into the teacup. “It wasn’t hard to hear you.”
“‘I could hear you snoring’ and ‘I listened to you breathe while you were sleeping’ are two completely different sentences. I know you know that.”
“They mean the same thing.” Bucky turns to face him, not quite scowling, but definitely frowning. “The banana has vitamins and potassium. You have to keep your strength up. And the tea is for your throat. You were coughing last night.”
“I’m aware.” Sam swallows down a dose of the medicine, then shoves in a spoonful of oatmeal to chase away the awful taste. “Did you make my bed?”
“You shouldn’t be exerting yourself. I can change the sheets if you want, but I thought you might want to wait until you’re better. Besides, if you’ve got scarlet fever, we can’t just wash them. We’ll have to burn them.”
“I don’t have—” Fuck, it’s not worth it. “Look, I appreciate it, but maybe don’t go creeping around my room? Ask first.”
Bucky actually does scowl at that, glaring even as he hands over the tea. “You were in the shower. You would’ve gotten mad if I’d come in and asked. And I wasn’t ‘creeping.’”
“You creep all the time,” Sam points out, because even though it hurts to talk, apparently they’re having this conversation now. “You hid a knife in my bedroom.”
“Knives.”
Sam pauses, cup of tea so close to his face that he can feel the steam opening up his pores. “What.”
“Knives. Plural. If there’s an intruder and you can’t get to your main weapon, you need to have a backup.” Bucky’s frown somehow deepens. “You only found one?”
It turns out that they’re actually not having this conversation, because he can’t deal with this shit right now. Sam finishes his breakfast in pure, blissful silence. Bucky accepts this arrangement without argument, though he watches Sam with the same sort of intensity that he probably once trained on all his marks. As soon as Sam has scraped the last of the oatmeal from the bowl, he whisks it away and begins to wash it. Probably doesn’t want the scarlet fever germs festering.
Sam isn’t complaining. Vitamins and potassium aside, he feels about as lousy as he had when he’d first woken up. He doesn’t have the energy for much besides breathing through his mouth and hoping that the medicine kicks in soon. He probably should have taken his temperature before the cough syrup, but he doesn’t much see the point. The way his insides keep alternating between freezing and overheating, the way the kitchen lights feel too bright, the way his brain won’t stop pulsating… he has a fucking fever.
So he just sits there, hands wrapped around the teacup that he’s still nursing as Bucky finishes washing the dishes.
“Have you heard from Steve?”
“He called while you were in the shower. He thinks he’ll be back tonight. He said to tell you he hopes you feel better, and you should only text him if you’re feeling well enough to.”
Bucky’s voice makes it clear that he does not, in fact, think that Sam is up for the arduous task of sending a quick still alive message to Steve. He might be right about that. The thought of forcing his stiff joints to type on the tiny, too-bright screen holds little appeal.
Actually, there isn’t much that sounds appealing right now. He doesn’t get sick that often. On the rare occasion he’s laid up like this, his usual preference is to watch daytime television until his body becomes so desperate to see something that’s not either a soap opera or a reality court show, that his immune system kicks into overdrive and finally sets him free.
But staring at the TV holds about as much appeal as looking at his cellphone. He’s not sure his head can handle it.
“Think I’ll go lie on the couch,” he says to Bucky when he’s done with the tea.
Bucky snatches up the teacup and takes it to the sink. “It’s all ready for you,” he says in a tone that Sam wouldn’t exactly describe as non-threatening.
He finds out what Bucky means a moment later. A large pile of pillows rests against one arm of the couch. There are now two boxes of Kleenex on the table, along with a bag of cough drops, a little thing of hand sanitizer, and a travel mug that, when Sam picks it up and sucks suspiciously at the straw, turns out to contain ice water. The trash can has been completely emptied of the previous night’s dirty tissues. Across the couch cushions lie two blankets, one thick, one thin, both folded neatly in half. Alpine lies atop the blankets.
“Come on,” Sam says to her. “You don’t even like the couch.”
She flicks her ear but makes no movement. Sam heaves a sigh that turns into a coughing fit, that results in him sitting down hard and grasping for the tissues as he hacks up something slimy.
The disturbance is too much for Alpine to bear: she leaps up and bounds off the couch, so upset that even through his watering eyes, Sam can still see how her tail is poofed out and bristling. He tosses the used tissue into the trash and stretches out across the now-empty couch. Given the option, he would’ve rather shared it without his lungs feeling like they were two degrees away from spontaneous combustion, but he’s not going to look a gift horse in the mouth.
Once breathing gets a bit easier, thanks in part to the cough drops, Sam spreads out the thicker of the two blankets and settles down on top of it. He rests the thinner one over his legs. His head pounds in the wake of the coughing fit, and he’s once again stuck in that state of being too hot and breaking out in a cold sweat. The coughing and/or the cold medicine have loosened up his nose enough that he can sort of breathe through it, but it’s not a very pleasant experience.
He leans back against the stack of pillows, closing his eyes. Rest is the best cure for something like this. He knows that well.
So why the fuck can’t he fall asleep?
He tries lying on his back, then his side. He squeezes his eyes shut, and tosses an arm over them for good measure. He kicks away the thin blanket, curling up against the ensuing chill.
Nothing works. His body remains, stubbornly, awake.
“Son of a bitch,” he says to the empty room, after what feels like an hour or so of tossing and turning.
“Do you need something?”
He didn’t hear Bucky approach, but he’s too exhausted to be startled at his sudden appearance.
“Sleeping pills would be nice. Some melatonin, maybe.”
Bucky frowns. “I don’t know if you can mix the cough syrup with those.”
Sam sighs, then coughs. “I didn’t mean it. I’m too tired to do anything, but I can’t fall asleep.”
Bucky’s frown deepens. He leans against the door frame. “I could make you some more tea.”
“Sure,” Sam says wearily.
He doesn’t especially care either way, but when Bucky comes back fifteen or twenty minutes later and presses a warm cup into his hands, he has to admit that it’s nice. The honey soothes his scratchy throat, and the heat does something that seems to settle his cough.
“Thanks,” he says to Bucky, who’s hovering at the other end of the cough, watching him with a critical eye. “This is good. Really.”
Bucky accepts the thanks with a curt nod. “Can I get you anything else?”
“I don’t think so. Not unless HYDRA told you all about how they found a magic cure for the flu.”
“HYDRA didn’t do things that would actually help people. Or if they did, they didn’t tell me about it.”
Even through his fevered brain, it still occurs to Sam that this is one of the first times he’s heard Bucky talk about HYDRA. Weird.
“Noted,” Sam says, not wanting to make a big deal of of something that… well, it probably isn’t a big deal. It’s fully possible that Bucky and Steve discuss HYDRA all the time when they’re shut away in the sanctity of Steve’s bedroom. It probably isn’t significant at all, that Bucky was willing to so casually reference his past with Sam.
Still. Bucky doesn’t leave. He stays there staring at Sam while he sips at his tea. Probably as soon as Sam is done, he’ll snatch the cup from his hands and whisk it away to the sink before a stray germ can even think of contaminating the rest of the household.
He’s going to be waiting awhile. This cup of tea is the only thing Sam currently has to occupy himself with, and he intends to make it last. Or at least stretch it out as long as he can without it turning all lukewarm and nasty, which… probably isn’t all that long.
“What did you and Steve do, back when he was sick? To keep busy. The man hates being stuck lying around all day, and I’m guessing that didn’t start after he got the serum.”
The only reason Sam knows Steve is an absolute pain in the ass about being on bed rest is because of how he’d been after Bucky had shot him multiple times on the helicarriers. He chooses to omit that detail as he asks the question.
“No. He’s always been like that.” Bucky actually does scowl at that, though it feels like a somehow more thoughtful scowl than usual. “Pain in my ass. He always wanted to be going for a walk when he could barely stand, saying he was fine when he was coughing his lungs out every other breath. I saved for months to buy a radio, and that helped, once he could listen to ball games or his shows. Too bad no one has radios anymore. They’re just in cars.”
It occurs to Sam to wonder if anyone has told Bucky about streaming services or, god forbid, podcasts. He definitely isn’t up for that conversation right now. “Yeah, not a lot of people have them.”
“We listened to records sometimes. I could lug out Steve’s record player, if you want. Or we’d play cards, or charades. We could do that.”
The former Winter Soldier, who tried to kill him on multiple occasions, offering to play charades with him. Sam has officially reached the “fever dream” portion of his illness.
“I think I’m too tired, but thanks.”
“Or I could read to you,” says Bucky. “We’d do that sometimes. When his head was hurting too bad for him to read on his own. I stole so many books from the library.”
“I’m pretty sure they let you borrow them for free these days,” Sam says, the words ending in a cough.
He sips at his tea. Bucky’s suggestion is… not a bad idea. He’s still trapped in the state of being too sick to do anything that requires effort, but not quite exhausted enough to go back to sleep. And he definitely doesn’t have the energy to keep up the conversation with Bucky.
“Sure,” he says. “Why not. My mom used to read to me when I was sick too, when I was real little. Right before she’d make me her famous chicken noodle soup.”
Bucky’s eyebrows knit together, but whatever he’s thinking, he doesn’t share it. “What do you want me to read?”
Sam is between books right now, so, “Surprise me.”
Bucky gives a short, sharp nod and vanishes down the hall. He reemerges after not too long, holding a thick volume. Sam squints at the cover. Best American Short Stories 2000.
“It’s Steve’s. He’s catching up on what he missed.”
Bucky settles into the nearby armchair—though “settles” might be the wrong word; he sits straight and alert, like a soldier on a mission. He flips through the book, picks a story, and begins reading.
He’s… remarkably good at it. He reads with a steady cadence, enough emotion behind the words that he doesn’t just drone on. Honed, Sam supposes, through years of practice reading to Steve. He probably would’ve complained if Bucky slacked off on doing the character voices or something.
Sam focuses on the story as he finishes the tea. Once he’s set the cup on the table, though, it becomes harder to pay attention. Soothing, he decides. That’s how he’d describe Bucky’s voice. Incredibly, remarkably soothing. It’s by far the most that Sam has heard him speak at once.
Sam wakes with a start, sitting up with flailing limbs, the usual disorientation that comes with emerging from a daytime nap compounded by the fact that he just got his breath knocked out of him for unknown reasons.
Which pretty quickly turn into known reasons: Alpine, sitting on his chest, lets out a mrowl of distress at all the motion and leaps off of him.
“Was there a point to that?” he calls to her retreating form. The words come out hoarse, ending with a cough. He reaches for his water, spots the thermometer, and realizes he should probably take his temp first.
Bucky comes in while he’s got the thermometer hanging from his mouth.
“You’ve been sleeping for about two and a half hours,” he informs Sam. “You’re lucky Alpine woke you up. You need to hydrate.”
It really isn’t fair that Sam can’t tell Bucky exactly what he thinks about that luck. He makes the most disapproving hum he can muster around the thermometer. Bucky ignores him.
“You should eat something. I thought you might be getting sick of oatmeal, so I put in toast. But if you don’t want that, I can do something else.”
The thermometer beeps. Sam pulls it out. 99.6. Still high, but he feels more alert than he did this morning. He reaches for his tumbler of water and sucks down several mouthfuls. When it doesn’t hurt his throat too badly, he says to Bucky, “Toast is fine. Thanks. Maybe butter it?”
Bucky considers this. “Peanut butter and honey would be better for you.”
“Close enough,” Sam says.
He lies back against the pillows and scrolls through his phone as he waits. The bright screen hurts his eyes, but he feels like the boredom would hurt him even more. He sends a quick text to Steve letting him know that he’s still alive, and gets an almost immediate response.
Hope you’re feeling better!
I know “Alpine” is taking good care of you, and I know you’re there for “Alpine” too. I’m glad you guys have each other.
I should be back late tonight. Miss you.
The words make him feel warm for reasons that have nothing to do with the fever. Fuck, he’s down bad.
He’s still looking at his phone when Bucky comes back in with the toast, two slices cut into perfectly-even triangles, with peanut butter spread on top and a drizzle of honey.
“Do you need anything else?”
Sam considers. He’s still got a decent amount of water, plenty of tissues, and a solid pile of cough drops. “I don’t think so. Thanks.”
Bucky hovers near the couch. “Do you want me to read some more?”
“That’s okay. I just want to eat. Maybe watch some TV.”
Bucky nods. He pauses there for a moment, then turns away.
“You can stay here,” Sam says. “If you want.”
Bucky doesn’t speak, but he pivots and makes his way back to the chair. This time, he really does settle into it, leaning back and resting his elbows on the wide arms.
He also stares at Sam. Not scowling. Just watching. It’s weird as fuck, but also well within the bounds of Bucky’s normal behavior, and Sam doesn’t want to waste his limited energy commenting on it.
He eats his toast in silence under Bucky’s careful gaze. As is becoming typical, as soon as he’s done, Bucky grabs the plate.
“Do you want anything from the kitchen? More tea?”
His throat actually feels pretty okay after the peanut butter and honey. He’s also warm, warm enough that he’s kicked off the lighter blanket and is lying uncovered on the couch. “Nah, I’m good.”
Bucky disappears into the kitchen. Sam picks up the remote and flips through the channels, eventually settling on an episode of Judge Judy, which is exactly the level of intellectual stimulation that he feels capable of handling right now.
He doesn’t comment on it when Bucky comes back in and resumes his place in the armchair. He turns his focus onto the television, though Sam can feel that Bucky is still observing him from the corner of his eye. He’s back to scowling, though Sam feels comfortable saying that every single person who comes into Judge Judy’s courtroom has fully earned the former Winter Soldier’s scowl.
Sam’s eyelids start feeling heavy towards the end of the second episode. He forces himself to get off the couch when it’s all done. Bucky tracks him closely, but thankfully doesn’t ask if Sam needs help going to the bathroom.
Inside, he splashes cool water on his face. It doesn’t do much to make him feel more awake. He grips the counter, staring at himself in the mirror.
He shouldn’t be here. He should be in Virginia with Steve and the other Avengers. Fighting evil vines, or possibly helping to negotiate their relationship drama. He’d be good at that; he knows he would be.
But instead his stupid immune system chose to fail him at the worst time. Instead, he’s stuck here, getting babysat by the Winter Soldier. Drinking tea and eating toast, and okay, it’s nice that Bucky has stepped up instead of taking advantage of Steve’s absence to murder him and claim he ran away, not that Sam thinks he would actually do that. Probably. He’s grateful, is the point.
But. It should be Steve here. Or it should be him with Steve, pushing through the cold or flu or whatever to take on the vines. They should have each other’s backs.
Sam thought he was putting together the jigsaw puzzle of his life, and it was revealing a perfect portrait of him and Steve. Except now there’s a giant Bucky-shaped piece in the middle, and Sam has no idea how anything is supposed to fit together. And he’s starting to think in metaphors that barely make sense, which means that his fever might be spiking and probably he should get from the bathroom back to the couch before he faints.
When he returns, Bucky is right where he left him, still watching him. Sam swallows down another dosage of the cold and flu syrup, then says, “I’m gonna try and get some more rest.”
“You want me to read to you?”
Sam curls up on the couch, back to Bucky. “If you want.”
He hears the creak of the armchair as Bucky leans towards the coffee table, reaching for the book. A moment later, he begins to read. Sam has no idea what’s going on—he seems to be in the middle of a story, probably picking up from where Sam had fallen asleep before, except Sam hadn’t exactly been following along that well in the first place—but the steady rise and fall of his voice still makes for a nice white noise. Sam falls asleep before he finds out how the story ends.
His waking is once again Alpine’s fault, though at least she doesn’t jump on him this time. No, it’s just her shrieking, loud enough to rival his alarm clock. Sam blinks, taking in the shadows cast by a sun nearly set. This, he figures, is Alpine’s usual dinnertime trilling, which typically starts at least 45 minutes before she actually gets fed. He’s been asleep for hours.
Sam sits upright, rubbing at his eyes. Dried sweat stickies his skin. He takes a long drink of water, noting how his throat, though still sore, doesn’t hurt quite as much when he swallows.
His head isn’t hurting as badly either, just the sort of dull ache that comes with either too much or too little sleep. He’s still congested; it takes four tissues before he can somewhat breathe through his nose. But on the whole, he feels… well, “better” might be pushing it, but definitely on the mend. He doesn’t have to take his temperature to know that his fever has broken.
“Here.”
It turns out that he’s still too tired to leap off the couch at someone appearing out of fucking nowhere, with no footsteps or any sort of normal warning signs to announce their arrival. Luckily, it’s just Bucky.
He rounds the couch to stand in front of Sam and thrusts out the contents of his hands. “It’s hot.”
It’s… soup. A bowl of steaming hot soup with a spoon carefully laid across the top. There’s a dishtowel wrapped around it.
“So you don’t burn your hands,” Bucky says. “You know. Since both your hands are sensitive to heat.”
“Nobody’s perfect,” Sam replies, taking the bowl and stirring around the spoon.
Chicken noodle. And it doesn’t look like Cambell’s. The noodles are too thick, the chunks of chicken too large, the vegetables too fresh.
“Did you make this?”
“Yes. Not the broth,” Bucky amends, scowling, like the broth has offended him by being store-bought instead of boiled from the carcass of a chicken he personally slaughtered. “I went out while you slept.”
“…you went out,” Sam echoes, watching the steam twist up. Chunks of bright orange carrots rest within the yellowy broth.
“To the grocery store. I set all the security alarms, plus you know where the guns are in the sofa. And I haven’t found any threats in the neighborhood, anyway. Leaving you alone was a low-risk, high-reward scenario.”
Sam decides not to comment on the mention of guns, plural, in the sofa. He’s only found the one so far. “I’m a big boy. I’m not gonna start playing with matches if I’m home alone. I was just surprised you went grocery shopping. You never want to go with me and Steve.”
Bucky shrugs, glancing away. “I go at night, sometimes. Less conspicuous if I’m alone. There’s more of a chance someone will recognize me if I’m standing next to Steve. They got so much stuff they hadn’t invented when we were younger. Frozen pizzas. Cinnamon Toast Crunch. Kumquats. Lychee.” He frowns. “A lot of new fruit.”
“Sure,” Sam says distantly, also deciding not to have a conversation about how maybe the Brooklyn enclaves in which Steve and Bucky had spent their youth might not have offered a full spectrum of the produce available in the wider world.
There’s logic to what Bucky is saying, he supposes. No one expects to see the assassin who shot up the streets of DC in a New York Trader Joe’s. And Sam also gets recognized way more when he’s alongside Steve than when he’s alone.
“So that’s where you go when you go out at night? To the grocery store to buy fruit?”
“Sometimes. Sometimes I’m patrolling the neighborhood. Sometimes I’m talking with the Widow. Are you going to eat your soup? It’s going to get cold.”
He had, in fact, been about to take a spoonful of soup. Broth splashes back down as his wrist freezes an inch above the bowl.
“Sometimes you’re what?”
“Patrolling the neighborhood.” He scowls. “You and Steve don’t do it. Someone has to.”
“Okay, so first off, Steve and I are always keeping an eye on things. Second, you know that’s not what I was asking about. How long have you and Natasha been meeting up? And why the hell haven’t you mentioned it before?”
“Since the first week I came here. And no one asked if she and I had met. The Widow says Steve needs to learn how to use his words.” He pauses, apparently distracted by Alpine wandering into the room. She rubs against the armchair, arching her back, and then sniffs the air, eyeing Sam’s bowl of soup. “Also, I think she thinks it’s funny.”
She probably does. Sam can feel his headache threatening to worsen. In an attempt to stave it off, he finally takes a sip of soup.
It’s… good. Tender chicken and soft noodles that go down easily on his throat. Whatever herbs Bucky used, it tastes remarkably similar to what his mother used to make him and Sarah whenever they were sick.
“Okay,” Sam says, once he feels a bit more fortified, “one, you to have to tell Steve soon. I don’t want to be keeping your secrets from him. Second, I’m asking now: are you doing any other clandestine shit that you haven’t told us about?”
“No,” Bucky says. Alpine starts to make for Sam, eyes still locked on his soup. Bucky scoops her up with one hand and holds her against his chest, ignoring her screeched objections. “Well. I stole your phone while you slept and texted your sister pretending to be you so that I could get your mother’s chicken soup recipe. But that’s it.”
Sam doesn’t choke on the soup he’s swallowing down, but it’s a close call. “What the fuck.”
Bucky scowls. “What was I supposed to do? Go online and find a stranger’s soup recipe?”
“Why wouldn’t you do that?”
He reaches for his phone and opens up his messages with Sarah. Jesus, Bucky even sounds like him. He somehow chose the exact same words that Sam would have used to ask Sarah for a forgotten recipe—if he forgot recipes in the first place, which he doesn’t. A fact which Sarah is never going to believe now. Before she tells him to feel better, she makes fun of him for not remembering. Great.
“You said your mother used to make you soup. Steve told me to take care of you, and if that’s my mission, I’m going to do it right. That means getting the real recipe. Besides, food holds memories. If this soup holds good memories, it might make you feel better.”
Alpine wriggles out of his grasp and leaps down to the floor. She sits in front of the chair and starts licking herself. Bucky watches her, not actually scowling as he speaks. He looks more… contemplative than anything. It’s not an expression Sam has seen on him before.
“I don’t have any of my family’s recipes. I mostly just remember how to boil vegetables. Maybe they’ll come back, but I doubt it. It’s good that you have yours.”
There’s a shit-ton to unpack there, and Sam isn’t sure he’d be up for it even if he was at full health. Bucky doesn’t seem to expect an answer. He just watches Alpine as Sam eats his soup and tries to think of what to say.
“You know I’m not your mission,” is where he finally starts.
“It’s not a bad thing,” Bucky replies. “Steve gave it to me. I chose to accept it. If I didn’t want to be doing this, I wouldn’t. I’d just be doing nothing, and you’d still be sick. Would you prefer that?”
“No,” Sam says. “Look, I’m grateful for all this—except the cellphone stealing; don’t do that shit again—I just don’t want to be your mission. I’d rather be your…”
He pauses. Friend would be too sincere. Guy who’s got feelings for the guy you’re sleeping with is a bit too much. Roommate, maybe? But that feels almost too impersonal. Forget him and Steve; how exactly are the puzzle pieces of him and Bucky supposed to fit together?
“A couple of guys with a mutual friend,” Bucky offers.
Sam can’t tell if he’s joking or not. It occurs to him that in spite of the circumstances, this might be the most normal conversation he’s had with Bucky.
“That,” Sam agrees. “Much better than a mission. And for what it’s worth, I’m sorry you don’t have your family’s recipes. Not that it makes it okay for you to steal my identity, but… that must suck.”
Bucky shrugs and dips his head in a brief nod of acknowledgment. His face does… something. An expression that definitely isn’t a scowl. Something almost sad, that Sam hasn’t seen on him before.
Steve was definitely wrong about him having a resting bitch face. The scowls are intentional, and Sam has no doubt that Bucky very often means them. But maybe, at least on some occasions, they’re also a mask put on over the things he doesn’t want to show.
“Yeah,” Bucky says. “But I get to try new things. And make you guys try them. So that’s good.”
Which explains the rotation of breakfast fruits. But also, “You give me cornflakes every day.”
“You like the cornflakes,” Bucky says, his expression now unreadable to the point where Sam genuinely, gun-to-his-head could not say if he’s fucking with him or not. “You always finish them.”
“I’m not going to waste them. But some variety would be nice. But not as much variety as you’re giving Steve,” he quickly adds, trying not to picture the disgusting assortment of breakfast cereals that Steve somehow consumes every morning. He doesn’t need to add nausea to his list of ailments.
“He just keeps eating it,” Bucky says. “I keep thinking he’ll say something. The Widow’s right. He needs to learn to use his words. His ma raised him to be too polite to people, at least when he actually likes them.”
Maybe that’s why he hasn’t said anything to Sam about the fact that Bucky shares his bed. Too polite. Doesn’t want to air Bucky’s business, and doesn’t want to make Sam and his barely-disguised crush feel bad. It makes sense, unfortunately.
“I can take that,” Bucky says, standing up and nodding at Sam’s now-empty bowl. “You want more?”
Sam considers it, but decides, “No. Thanks. I’m pretty sure my fever broke, but I’m still beat. Think I’ll just go to bed.”
Bucky takes the bowl. “Let me know if you need anything.”
Sam sits on the couch for a few more minutes. Mostly he’s gathering the energy to move. He’s also trying to sort out the insane swirl of thoughts in his brain over everything that he and Bucky just talked about: the fact that Bucky likes having missions; he will cross insane boundaries to complete those missions; he and Natasha have been hanging out for weeks; he’s holding in a lot of baggage about all the memories he’s lost, and when he’s legally allowed to do things, he should maybe probably see a professional to help unpack some of that.
It’s way too much for him to process in his current state. He measures out one more dosage of cold and flu syrup and swallows it down, then forces himself to get up and go to bed.
It actually isn’t Alpine who wakes him up this time. Sam blinks groggily in the still-dark room. The only sliver of light comes from where he’d left his door cracked, so that he wouldn’t be awakened by Bucky opening it up to listen to him snoring/breathing.
It’s because he didn’t close it all the way that he can hear the soft murmur of voices. Voices, plural. Which, given Bucky’s limited social circle, means that either Alpine has somehow acquired the powers of human speech, or—
Footsteps pad down the hallway and stop in front of his door. The fact that Sam could actually hear the footsteps coming means that it’s probably…
“Steve?”
The door opens as a head pokes through and yeah, definitely Steve. Sam can’t really make out any details, backlit as he is by the dim light, but he certainly seems to be in one piece.
“Hey,” Steve whispers. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you up.”
“It was probably Bucky’s big mouth that did it, not you. You can come in.”
Sam sits all the way up, more or less, propping his elbows on his pillow stack as Steve lumbers over to his bedside. It’s still dark, but he can’t see any obvious signs of injury.
“How are you feeling?” Steve asks.
“Better. Not 100%, but I think the fever’s mostly gone.” His throat hurts, he’s stuffy as all hell, and he’s got a bit of a headache, but it’s still better than he felt the previous morning. “How’d the mission go?”
“No one died and we convinced the vines to get back into a portal to their home planet. There’s definitely some rebuilding to be done, but honestly, Tysons Corner looked way better with all the vines taking over the Capitol One Tower.” Steve rests his hands on the edge of the mattress, so close to Sam but not touching him. “How were things here? Bucky take good care of you?”
“He stole my phone and pretended to be me to get my mom’s chicken noodle soup recipe from my sister.”
“Oh. That’s… I’ll talk to him about that,” Steve says. Sam thinks he’s wincing a little. “Other than the identity theft, how’d things go?”
“Good,” Sam admits. “I can see how he kept your ass alive for so long. He watched me like a hawk. And made me tea and oatmeal, and read to me. Offered to play charades too, though I didn’t take him up on that.”
“Oh, you should’ve. He’s great at charades. Great at reading, too. Did he do all different voices for the characters? I used to make him do the different voices. Kind of a wonder he didn’t just kill me himself.”
“He was good at it. Honestly, it was kinda nice. Not the ‘being sick’ part. But I feel like I got to know him better.”
He doesn’t mention Bucky and Natasha’s meetings; Bucky needs to be the one to tell Steve about that. But he still means what he says. Maybe he doesn’t know how everything fits together, but he feels like… well, maybe not that he understands Bucky. He doesn’t know if he’ll ever get to that point. But he thinks he has a clearer picture of who he is, beyond all the prowling and the scowling.
“Really? I’m glad. Honestly, this is all I wanted all those months we were looking for him. My two best guys under one roof.” Steve reaches over and squeezes Sam’s shoulder. “I’ll let you go back to sleep. In the morning, it’s my turn to take care of you.”
There are so many ways Sam wants Steve to take care of him. Making him toast and emptying his used-tissue trash can has never been a particular fantasy, but… he’s not going to complain.
“I’m holding you to that,” Sam says. “Night, Steve.”
“Sleep tight.”
When he’s gone, Sam reaches over to the box of Kleenex on his nightstand and blows his nose, and blows his nose again, and again. He doesn’t like back onto his pillows until he can mostly breathe out of it.
Huh. He’d been too stuffed-up to realize it before, but…
Sam turns his head and buries his face into one of the pillows, breathing in as deep as his congestion will allow. The pillow smells like Steve, the faint scent of his sweat and the sea salt styling spray he uses in his hair. Bucky must have stolen it from his bed.
It also smells faintly of something, or someone, else. Sam knows Steve’s scent from all the time they’ve spent in cars, motel rooms, and locker rooms. This isn’t him. This is…
Well, it’s probably Bucky. Sam hasn’t exactly been close enough to him to know what he smells like. Like Steve, he probably mostly uses unscented products so as to not bother his super senses. But Sam’s pretty sure that’s not just Steve he’s smelling, and there’s only one other person he knows of who routinely shares Steve’s bed.
He sighs, closes his eyes, and goes back to breathing in through his mouth. It’s fine. He wishes that other circumstances had led to him sharing Steve’s pillow, but it’s still fine. He’s so lucky to have a friend like Steve, period. And maybe, eventually, a friend like Bucky.
Sam snuggles into the pillows. Somewhere nearby, Alpine trills.
Maybe he just needs to treat his attraction to Steve like his illness. Focus on taking care of himself, keeping busy, nourishing his soul.
And then, like his fever, his feelings will eventually break and go away, and everything will be fine.