Archive of Our Own ^beta

There were definitely a lot of ways Sam could have announced his presence in New York that were not literally swooping down to meet his very startled partner at the old World's Fair grounds in Flushing almost two hours before he'd claimed he would be landing at JFK. Virtually all of them were much less dramatic than the route he'd chosen.

On the other hand, he was there because of a text exchange that had finally fucking established that yes, they had feelings for each other, and yes, they wanted to do something about it, and the whole thing had been so fucking long in coming that Sam felt like being a little dramatic.

Of course, showing up with his wings had meant several minutes of selfies with a few people who happened to be walking around the grounds, too, but in some ways, the incredulous look on Bucky's face actually helped to settle his nerves.

A little.

So did teasing him all the way back to the apartment.

"I hate you," Bucky said once they'd gotten to the living room. The smile on his face as he watched Sam tuck his wings in the corner made it very difficult to take his feigned indignation about being teased seriously. "And you don't have to be so careful with that, it's fucking vibranium. If you don't trust months of using them, trust me. Sam, can I please just fucking kiss you now?"

Bucky said that at the exact moment that Sam realized his partner was actually wearing the Captain America socks Sam had gotten him as a joke a month or two ago. The combination was a lot. "No - I do have some actual things to say that I wasn't going to just put in a text. That's your thing, not mine."

Bucky groaned and slumped down a little further as Sam joined him on the couch. He'd tossed his jacket in the vague direction of a chair when they'd first gotten in, and while Bucky in a leather jacket right after a conversation about their having feelings for each other hadn't been doing wonders for Sam's sanity or self-control, he hadn't really been thinking about how Bucky in a short-sleeved shirt was very capable of being maddening all on its own, especially once you knew he wasn't going to be wearing it for much longer. 

This man and his fucking biceps.

"I mean, that's fair, but goddamnit, Sam, why didn't you just fly all the way up here with your wings? You'd have gotten here a lot quicker."

Sam felt his face start to get hot. Dramatics aside, the main reason he'd flown most of the way on a plane was that he was feeling too nervous and anxious about the entire thing to be able to focus on wings-flying for that long. He'd seen this coming months ago - their progress toward it had been both very obvious and absolutely glacial - but there was a significant difference between 'this is definitely where this is going' and 'we're suddenly fucking here,' and he'd spent the past few hours overthinking what he wanted to say now that it wasn't just the in-the-future conversation he'd run through in his brain at least half a dozen times.

Flying from from Delacroix to Brooklyn in that state of mind just wasn't happening.

He probably could have dodged the question - Bucky didn't seem to be sure what to focus on right now, which was making his eye contact uncharacteristically subpar - but Sam decided to just answer instead. "I couldn't focus on flying."

Now Bucky did meet his eyes. "Oh," he said. "Yeah. I get that - I did just spent the entire fucking weekend freaking out about a conversation that turned out to basically be 'hey, Bucky, you realize you're not the only one who wants us sleeping together to turn into a euphemism, right?'"

"So you're saying my nerves are turning me into you? Thanks, Buck, now I feel much better."

"Hey, I can't help being me. You're the one who's choosing to be here, too." Bucky hesitated for a moment, and then he took a deep breath. "Sam - you're allowed to be nervous, you know. I fucking was."

Of course Bucky had picked up on the nerves behind the teasing. It was still a little disconcerting to feel so fucking transparent after a lifetime of almost no one consistently picking up when his jokes were doubling as deflections.

"It's not because I don't want it," Sam said. "Really. I don't even know why I'm nervous. It's not like this was a surprise - waiting for it has been driving me up the fucking wall."

"Sam, you've been teasing me since you got here and you were about two inches away from giving me a handjob in a fucking cab. I'm really not worried about whether you want to."

Relief washed over him - at least that was clear. "Be less fun to tease, if you don't want me to do it."

"I can't." Bucky edged a little closer to him. "You always smile at me and touch me when you tease me - I couldn't help it before, and I definitely can't help it now."

Sam closed the rest of the gap and reached out to thread his fingers through Bucky's hair and pull him closer. "Buck, is 'stop smiling at me and touching me' really what you're going with? Right now?"

Bucky's right arm snaked around Sam's waist. It was a familiar action, but the added context made his heart start to speed up. "Okay, that's fair," Bucky said. "No."

"And what'd you mean, you were nervous? What changed?"

He felt rather than heard Bucky's laugh. "You dropped out of the sky two hours before I was supposed to meet you at the airport, whispered in my ear that you've always wanted to tell me how fucking hot I look in leather - which you have, by the way, and you know you have - and then immediately spent ten minutes letting fans take selfies with you before teasing me all the way back here. My cyborg circuits overloaded - there's no room left for nerves." He twisted around to meet Sam's eyes. "I can help overload yours too, if you want." There was a slight lift to his eyebrows, a little extra crinkle in his forehead, and his eyes were just slightly wider than they usual.

Sam knew that expression. That was always the way Bucky looked when he both knew something that Sam didn't and knew it was going to get a big reaction out of Sam once he figured it out.

Like the time Sam had left Brooklyn to go home the day before his birthday and Bucky had said goodbye with that exact fucking expression when he knew that he was going to show up in Delacroix at 5:30am the following day, park way down the road so Sam wouldn't hear the rental car, use his fucking winter soldier training to sneak into Sam's room to hang his jacket on the door, and then slip back downstairs to have coffee with Sarah until Sam walked into the kitchen just before 8 asking if she knew how the fuck Bucky's jacket had gotten there.

On one hand, Sam absolutely needed to know what that expression meant in this context. On the other hand, he genuinely did have some things he wanted to say before they really got started, because he knew that once he'd started taking Bucky's clothes off, he wasn't going to have any fucking interest in stopping.

"Fuck yes, but I really do have some things to say, so -"

"Don't kiss you? Got it." Bucky nudged Sam's legs further apart to make room for his knee and then leaned in to blow lightly on Sam's neck. "Does this count as kissing?"

The correct answer was probably yes, but the correct answer was also probably that this wasn't crossing any lines that they hadn't already crossed on the way back. More importantly, Sam just didn't fucking care. "No," he said, letting his head fall back to rest against the back of the couch. Then he felt Bucky's lips on his neck, and his mind went very foggy very, very quickly.

Bucky's knee was resting well down Sam's thighs, and his hands were staying put, at least for the moment - no matter how much Sam's hips had started to move, this probably wasn't in any immediate danger of escalating. 

The intensity was still hitting him like a fucking truck.

"Fuck - Bucky -"

Bucky's hand drifted up from Sam's chest, and after a moment, Sam felt his partner's fingers lightly tracing along his collarbone before settling on the other side of his neck. The warm metal of Bucky's left hand was something Sam had long since gotten accustomed to in general, but right now, the sensation was invading Sam's senses in the same way that the smell of Bucky's shampoo was, both hammering home that this thing with his partner really was finally fucking happening.

And also that it was going to feel even better than he'd thought it would.

His body was really starting to burn now, but just as he was about to slide forward, he felt Bucky's other hand slide around to rest firmly on Sam's stomach, keeping him in place.

On one hand, that was probably a good call. On the other, having Bucky hold him in place like that wasn't doing anything to diminish the sheer fucking need that was starting to overwhelm him.

"Fuck talking," he managed to say. "Bucky, seriously, fuck talking, just -"

"How are your nerves?" Bucky whispered in his ear.

Sam took a deep, shuddering breath. "Fuck my nerves, I don't care. Wait, Buck, don't fucking stop -"

He dragged his head up just as his partner moved backward on the couch, leaving a little distance between them. "You said you wanted to talk before that, and I was getting too turned on to remind you." He sounded almost as breathless as Sam, who very pointedly did not look down. "And don't say you changed your mind, you didn't actually."

Sam was not actually sure he had a mind that was capable of changing one way or the other right now. "Fuck." After a moment of trying to catch his breath, he looked over at Bucky. "Okay, I think you did too good a job - my nerves are better, but now I can't fucking think at all."

"Is 'make it feel less good when you kiss me' really what you're going with right now?"

Sam groaned and ran a hand over his face. "No, but - Bucky, where the fuck did that come from?"

"I think that's a compliment?"

"Yeah." Sam took a deep breath. "No, it's definitely a compliment. Fuck, I really can't think right now."

Then he felt warm, reassuring, and very familiar fingers lace through his. "Come on - yes, you can. For fuck's sake, Sam, it's just me."

Somehow, that characterization was what got the gears in his brain moving again, albeit very sluggishly. "I know it's you - that's why I was nervous in the first place. It's you, and you fucking know me, and that's not - look, there's knowing me and caring about me, and there's doing shit like going to the fucking library to read up on sleep paralysis after I mentioned that I get it once in awhile and then always staying up until I'm really asleep so you can wake me up if I get it. That's a lot, Buck."

Bucky immediately looked down, and Sam could see his cheeks flushing. "It's not a big deal - I just wanted to help."

"You have. You do." Sam still didn't really understand how Bucky had actually been able to tell it was happening at all, but there wasn't anything that was going to make Bucky staying up an extra fifteen or twenty minutes most nights that they were together in case Sam had a nightmare on his way to actual sleep any less sweet, no matter how much he'd tried to change the subject once Sam had realized what he was doing. "And it's a big deal to me."

"Okay," Bucky said after a moment. He managed to meet Sam's eyes, though his cheeks were still red. "Yeah. I get that."

"And so is noticing when I'm nervous or anxious like you did tonight. People don't notice that, Bucky - I don't let them. Fuck, sometimes I don't even notice it. And don't say that's not a big deal, either. It is to me."

"Okay." He heard Bucky swallow hard and then take a deep breath. "Sam, you know I'm not going anywhere, right?"

The question could have sounded judgmental. It could have sounded defensive. They'd definitely had it out over Bucky's disappearing act after several months of them talking fairly regularly after the blip. It wasn't that Sam didn't get it, or even that he blamed Bucky for being in a really dark place - it was just that getting it didn't change the fact that it had hurt more than he'd been ready to acknowledge at the time.

It didn't sound judgmental or defensive, though. It just sounded real. And in the context of Sam's nerves, it wasn't a bad question.

"Yeah." Bucky didn't look away, and fuck, Sam had no idea when those bright blue fucking eyes started to be able to see right through him for shit like this, especially since Bucky could still sometimes be maddeningly dense in other ways. "No, I really do. It's just - it's a lot. We're a lot. You know?"

"I know." Bucky's hand squeezed his. "Can I hug you? Not in a - "

"Yeah." As soon as Bucky's arms had closed around him, though, Sam realized that the 'not in a' way probably wasn't possible when they were going to be touching each other 'in a' way in the very near future.  A hug was more than enough to make Sam's mind to go there, no matter where their hands were.

Bucky sighed. "Sam, I really was just trying to process everything this weekend. I wasn't going to ghost you."

"Okay," Sam said softly. He could barely hear himself, but Bucky had better hearing than him. "And I get that. But I don't like spending that much energy on misunderstandings that could have been cleared up with a five minute conversation. Buck, I'm not going anywhere, either, okay?"

Bucky's hold on him tightened a little. "Yeah. Okay." After a moment, he said, "Uh - do you feel better?"

"Yeah, why?"

"Because if you do and you still have things to say, I think I need to not be touching you this much."

Well, at least it wasn't just Sam's mind that couldn't stop going there.

Bucky did move away from him, but not far enough that he couldn't take Sam's hand to hold it again. Sam took a deep breath to steady himself and try to re-gather his thoughts. "Right. I - look, I also just wanted to say that I'm really proud of how much work you've put into dealing with your shit. I know it hasn't been easy, and you've come a long way. And I'm really, really glad you're my partner."

"Even though I suck at interviews?"

Only Bucky would manage to be snarky while Captain America was talking to him about why he wanted them to be together.

(Of course, Bucky was also the only person Captain America actually wanted to be with, and those two things were probably not unrelated. It was also not necessarily a bad thing to lighten the mood a little from the very strong 'please can we just fuck now' undertone.)

"I don't need you to give good interviews, Buck - I just need you to be you. You make my worst fucking days feel a little less awful, and you can always make me smile."

This man and his fucking smile. For fuck's sake.

"And anyway, your interviews aren't that bad. You're good at the talking me up part, anyway."

"Well, you make that part easy - I don't deserve any credit for it."

Only Bucky would manage to say something that fucking smooth without even meaning to. Sam closed his eyes again to try to steady himself, and he felt Bucky pull on the hand he was holding. He opened his eyes just in time to see his partner bend down to kiss his knuckles. 

Okay, maybe it was intentional. The little smirk on Bucky's lips definitely implied that it was. "Okay, seriously, Buck, when the fuck did you start being smooth?"

The smirk got a little wider - it had definitely been intentional. "Well, I used to be smooth. Now I'm something like 10% smooth and 90% intense staring. I guess you're getting some of the 10% tonight. Don't get used to it, you'll end up disappointed."

That response somehow left Sam with an even stronger urge to kiss him than he'd had a few minutes ago. "You're not going to disappoint me," he said, and Bucky's eyes met his again. 

"Thanks." Bucky's voice was soft, but his joke about intense staring wasn't actually that far off the mark. If Sam hadn't realized how fucking hopeless they were before now, this definitely would have done it.

He had, though.

Tossing 'I love you' into this conversation was definitely more than even Sam's placated nerves could cope with just then, no matter how often he'd said it in a theoretically-platonic way, but he was definitely thinking it. Instead of saying it, though, he leaned in to brush his lips against Bucky's. It was light, and he didn't linger, but it was even more difficult than he'd anticipated to pull back and say, "I'm almost done. I promise."

Bucky's breath was definitely coming faster now, and his grip on Sam's hand had tightened a little. "You're killing me here, Sam."

"Because of what I'm saying, or because you want to tear my clothes off?"

"Both."

"I'm almost done," Sam said again, as much to himself as Bucky. Fuck, he wanted this. "I'm pretty sure I know the answer to this, but just to make sure we're on the same page - this is us becoming an us, right? Not a friends-with-"

He stopped talking - the expression on Bucky's face was answer enough. "No!" Bucky said. "I mean - no to second thing, I don't do that, and even if I did, I'd know better than to pretend that I could be casual about that shit with you. Yes to the first one. Obviously."

Sam let out a breath he didn't realize he was holding. "Okay. Good. I'm done, then. No, really, you -"

Sam wasn't sure whether he'd blinked or whether Bucky had just moved very, very quickly, but one moment he was watching his partner, and the next he found himself being pushed backward on the couch, left hand still clasped in Bucky's right one. This time, Bucky's other hand was sliding up his shirt - he was clearly not interested in taking things slow.

That was something they could definitely agree on. This was a kiss Sam had been thinking about for a long time, and he wasn't sure that there was any possible way it could have disappointed him, but the giddy jolt of electricity running through him was even more intense than he'd thought it would be.

He raised his arms over his head and Bucky pulled back just long enough for them to rip off their shirts; when he leaned back down, he was back at Sam's neck. This time, Sam felt a hint of teeth. "Buck," he gasped, and the hand Bucky had slid down to Sam's hip when he leaned back in tightened.

The more bare skin he felt against his chest and under his hands, the better it was, and Sam slid his hands around from Bucky's back to trace along his belt buckle. Bucky groaned and managed to choke out a "Fuck, Sam - yes, fuck, yes -" before crashing their lips together again.

This fucking man.

Why the fuck hadn't they started doing this months ago?