hydratrashmeme | Dumpster #3: The Great Pacific Garbage Patch

Dumpster #3: The Great Pacific Garbage Patch

Holy shitballs, look at us go. Welcome to Captain America fandom's resident wretched hive of scum and villainy: ROUND THREE. AKA Bad Guys Do Dirtybadwrong Things To Your Faves, AKA the Hydra Trash Party kinkmeme. As usual, BLANKET NON-CON AND NSFW WARNINGS apply: just assume going in that everything in this landfill is unfit for human consumption.

Rules in brief: don't be a jerk except to fictional characters, warnings for particularly fucked-up garbage are nice but not required, thou shalt not judge the trashiness of thy neighbor's kinks unless thy neighbor is trying to pass off their rotting banana peels and half-eaten pizza crusts as a healthy romantic dinner for two, off-topic comments may be chucked out of the dumpster at management's discretion, management's discretion decrees that omegaverse, soulbond AUs, D/s-verse, non-superpowered AUs, and dark!good guys AUs are off-topic.

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Round 3 is closed; comments and fills in existing threads are still welcome, but all new prompts go to Round 4.

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thank you so much!! :)

They lie still, Bucky sprawled on his front, head turned to the side, an ankle crossed over Steve’s and his hair starting to itch at Steve’s shoulder. The rest of his day—before arriving home, at least—was even less eventful than his morning, so his story’s over before long. But he ends with as much enthusiasm as he brimmed with the whole time, saying, “Did you know there’s a public trash can right down the block? I never noticed it! That puts an end to my littering career.”

Steve says, “Yeah, I know. It’s painted?”

“It is. You could do that. Paint trash cans, if you wanted.”

It’s a few minutes before Steve realizes that he hasn’t answered. “Oh, yeah. I mean. I guess? But I think they’re all already painted.”

Out of the corner of his eye, he can see Bucky studying him. Structure returning to his soft, sleepy face. Out of the rest of his eyes, he can see a wide spread of water damage staining the ceiling.

Bucky says, “You didn’t cut my hair how I thought you would.”

“No? I do it wrong?”

“Not wrong. I just figured you do it choppier, y’know? Less delicate.”

“What, and fuck it up?” Steve looks at him head-on. “You love your hair.”

He’s always loved his hair. First thing, when upset, he’s always touched his hair. Used it to ground himself. And he’s always loved being looked at like he’s something wonderfully made.

“I don’t know. I just—if you’d wanted to fuck it up, make it uneven and awful? I’d’ve let you.”

“You love your hair, Buck. Anyway, I liked how I did it. I like to—It’s nice, not overdoing it. Little things. Scratch you a little. Take a little of your hair.” And he likes that Bucky hadn't disappeared yet.

“Oh, yeah? Steve Rogers: King of Subtlety?”

“King of being delicate with you.”

“That’s dumb.”

“No, it’s not.”

“No. It’s not.” Soft and needy as an animal, he pushes himself into Steve’s arms.

“Hold up.” Steve rearranges to better accommodate him, slouching against the headboard, tipping a bit to one side. He ends up with his arm slung across Bucky’s back, Bucky’s head on his chest and one leg flung across both of Steve’s.

Bucky sighs, then goes heavy and still. Warm and real. Half-dried sweat clings to the curve of his neck, smelling of sweet milk and aluminum. Steve slides a hand under the wild mass of his loose hair, and flexes his fingers to comb through. He repeats the motion, hoping to soothe. He knows his heart must be fast and loud under Bucky’s body, so perceptible. Never permitting him to be a good liar.

On top of him, Bucky is making happy noises, small hums and sighs. His heartbeat is hard too, but he was aroused. That’s normal. Steve, on the other hand, was just having a body. A body that surged with blood even as his best friend was blinking in and out of existence under his hands. He wants to choke on something.

No, that’s stupid.

He wants to understand what’s going on. He’s never been content with not understanding things. Not when he knows that if you bang your head against a wall long enough, a crack’s gotta form somewhere. And he didn't lock Bucky in, or smack him in the face. He moved slowly. He was good.

“Hey, there, honey,” he says, and runs his thumb lightly up Bucky’s jaw. It must tickle, because he draws in his shoulders and smiles at the same time. Against all odds, he looks so small.

“Hey there, wildflower.”

Steve cough-laughs. “Can I—”

“No. It’s illegal.”

“Ask you a question?”

“All questions’ve been outlawed. You want me to pass the pasta sauce? Too fucking bad. That's sauceless pasta for you.” Steve doesn’t respond, watching the casual, sleepy droop of Bucky’s lips. Bucky lifts his head and bangs it back down on Steve’s sternum. “Ask me your question, Steve.”

“Thought it was illegal.”

“And here I forgot you were such a law-abiding goody two-shoes.”

“Shut up.” He sticks his fingers in Bucky’s hair again. It’s impossible to tell if Bucky has any idea that something is wrong. With either of them. “I wanted to know how the experiment was going.” He tries to say it how he’d ask how class went, or if they should order in tonight.

“You mean being raped or being a student?”

“The first one.”

“Oh, that one. I seem like I’m enjoying it, right?” He sneaks up and kisses Steve at the line where his skull joins the vulnerable flesh of his throat. Steve exhales a slow stream.

“Well. You are pursuing it with a certain amount of. Uh.”

Bucky scoots down to where he was before. “Yeah, of what? Glee? Delight? Entertainment?” He puts on a voice like he’s narrating a film trailer: “Stalin has the conductor raped. The train doesn’t move. Khrushchev tells the conductor it was rape. The train still doesn’t move.”

He cracks up at the unfinished joke. The sound is beautiful and makes Steve nauseous with the weight and warmth of Bucky on top of him, rolling back and forth with glee, delight, entertainment. He waits. When the sound and motion cut off, it’s abrupt. Like a hurricane downing a power line inside him.

Low-voiced, Bucky says, “I hate it, actually. It makes me feel sick. You said you don’t get anything out of it. But do you feel sick?”

“Yeah, I do.”

“Not thinking about it. Saying it. Does saying the word make you feel sicker than thinking about it?”

“No. I guess not.” There’s always a moment, when he hears himself say it, when he wants to cringe, to stuff the word back in his mouth, too hard and flat and blunt to be allowed out into the world. But that’s called feeling responsible, not feeling sick.

“It didn’t feel like rape when it was happening. I don’t know why it should have to feel that way now. I’m sick of how many things I’m supposed to feel now, Steve.” And he does look sick, pale and starved. He climbs off of Steve, getting to his knees on the other side of the bed. He looks like the world’s deadliest prairie dog.

“Being the Winter Soldier or. Whatever you want to call that. It felt bad. I knew that it felt bad. Other stuff—Everyone has to find something to like, right? I liked having sex. I don’t care if you think I shouldn’t have.”

“Okay.”

“Okay.”

“Except—”

“Oh my fucking god.”

“I don’t want to tell you how to feel. But do you think maybe—”

“Also tired of having to think so many things—”

“You do feel bad? I think you do feel like it wasn’t. Good. Buck. On some level.”

Bucky sits back on his heels, spreading his legs as he does. His dick still hangs limply out of his pants, and his left hand tremors. “You don’t want to tell me how to feel. You just want to tell me how I already feel like I’m too stupid to know. Thanks. It's much appreciated.”

“Not stupid, just, maybe. When we have sex—Your face is wrong. Sometimes.”

“That’s not a real phrase. You were eavesdropping on me and Sam.”

“Can’t help it. You know you knew I could hear you.”

“I know. I knew.” He buries his face in the crook of his metal elbow, then slides it back up and out. His lower lip catches on a plate, but he doesn’t make a noise. A thin cut appears. That’s all. Gone soon. “Wrong in the same way yours is? Was.”

“I don’t know. How was mine? I don’t spend all day staring in the mirror, you know.”

“You better not. It’s my job to stare at you.”

Steve warms with distracting affection, but soldiers on. “I wouldn’t dream of competing. How was my face wrong?”

“It was brittle, I suppose. You looked too, uh. I don’t know. Awake. Dangerously awake.”

“Then no. Not the same way as me.” Bucky flicks his head to the right, then back, in a little prompting gesture, like if he took any longer to ask Steve to go on, he’d change his mind and stalk away instead. “You disappear. It was like you shrank in to yourself and then you were gone.”

Bucky’s shoulders drop. He’s smiling. A thin smile with a thin cut on one lip. “Yeah? That’s how sex works, babe. That’s how it’s always been. Means it’s good, right? So you get overwhelmed.”

“Yeah, you—No. You always got overwhelmed. You never did that.”

“Of course I did. What the hell are you talking about?”

“No, Buck. What the hell are you—” He makes himself breathe, to think about his lungs filling up, but he’s supposed to focus on the exhalation too and honestly, who has the time? So he goes right into, “Yes, you’d get overwhelmed. But it looked different. You’d get exhausted, or weepy.” He hates that, because he’s only ever called Bucky “weepy” in a sweetly mocking way, and now it’s tainted. “Or you’d cling to me and babble some bullshit. But you were always you.”

The moments before Bucky responds drag out, harsh as grinding teeth.

And then, “I’m still always me. You’ve told me I’m always me. You’ve told me that a fucking thousand times, Steve!” His speech takes a turn for the imitative, high and cruel. “You’re Bucky. You’re Bucky. Hi, Bucky. I love you, Bucky.” He spits his own name like the shell of a sunflower seed. It clatters to the floor. Wet and discarded.

And Steve shouldn't be hurt, not when Bucky's clearly hurt, but he feels, in an instant like lightning, like he has the flat of a knife at his back. “That’s not what I mean, fuckhead.”

“Fuckface. Get it? Because I just exist for you to fuck my fucking face while I’m not Bucky and not here.”

“What?” He can’t remember the last time he fucked Bucky’s face.

“Get off me.” Bucky uses his soft hand to stuff his soft dick back in his jeans.

“I’m not touching you.”

“Yeah? Well. I don’t want you to anyway.” He practically throws himself off the bed. “I have homework.”

“Which class?”

“Creative Nonfiction.”

“Have fun.”

“More fun than this.”

He’s out the door and in the hallway when he pauses, puts his metal hand on the doorway light as a moth and turns so Steve can see his face. Now he does look the way he described: brittle and dangerously awake. Teeth held visibly open between his slack, open lips; eyes wide, and the muscles around them making little leaps, little indications that he would pull his eyes even farther back into his head if he could.

Steve says, “Buck. Stay.”

“Sorry. No.” Bucky shakes his head and swallows. He told Steve, a while ago, about string theory; he said the vibrations of the strings are too subtle for people to consciously be aware of, and that’s how Steve thinks Bucky is right now: vibrating powerfully enough to change the whole world, even if he appears perfectly still.

“Bucky. You don't look good."

“I’m sorry. I really. I don’t want to upset you, but I shouldn’t stay here. I need away for a second.”

“A second?”

“An hour. Two hours. Outside. Text me if you need me. I don’t want you to—I don’t want to run off on you. I did that before, I guess. I’ll see you later.”

“Yeah. Just, uh, if you’re going outside—” He forces a breathy laugh as he tugs on the front of his own t-shirt.

“Oh. Yeah.” A grin appears on Bucky’s tight face, looking carved there, like on a jack-o-lantern. He steps into the room. “Wouldn’t want to be indecent.” And he opens the closet and grabs a tee and a flannel in a flash, pulling both on as he stands there.

There’s nothing Steve can do but watch his back. There’s a pink line flicked across his skin, high up on his hips, where Steve must have gotten him with the knife in his sudden surprise. It’s most of the way healed, but Steve’s got good eyes. Hasn’t he?

“Yeah,” Steve says mechanically, “this isn’t a firemen’s calendar. It’s a modest and respectable neighborhood.”

“Not really.”

Dressed, the flannel not pulled all the way up his metal arm but held there by its girth anyway, Bucky comes and stands less than a foot away, diagonal to Steve’s right. “Look.” He comes closer, holding his pale right hand out, then changes his mind, slipping it in his back pocket. When he’s almost pressed up against Steve’s still, patient body, he leans in like for a kiss.

But he doesn’t kiss Steve’s mouth. He presses his forehead to Steve’s shoulder, close to where it meets his neck. His inhalation is deep, but shaky. He moves to press his lips there instead, and leaves a couple of gentle kisses. Then his mouth jumps almost imperceptibly, and he makes an abbreviated, high noise. Holding in a sob.

He stands up. He says, “See ya, honey,” without looking at Steve’s face. And he leaves. Brisk and businesslike. Leaves Steve sitting on the edge of the bed, unable to escape the sensation that the room is very far away, and on the other side of bulletproof glass, and he’s just waiting to be allowed back in.

Oh god these boys, I cannot even.

*wraps them both up in blankets made of sodden newspapers and used coffee filters*

This is a really good chapter.

Oh jeez. I'm glad that Bucky's leaving and not LEAVING. But man, both of them have things to process, and I was wondering when the dissociation=arousal bit of the prompt was going to surface. <333

This is so beautiful, both in writing a characterization, and it's as though I could feel Bucky being trapped in himself...bravo :)

This interaction is amazing. All the messy, complex feelings - and you write it in a way that is so palpable. I love this.

Thank you so much for this amazing story!! I found it via a rec and I've been rereading it almost everyday. It's an incredible story and you write so beautifully.

So this turned out to be less imaginary friend Brock and more fucked up vivid hallucination of Brock. I hope you still enjoy it!

On hands and knees, Bucky draws a panting breath as Steve presses two excessively slick fingers into him. A part of Bucky is annoyed because Steve’s favorite silicone-based lube is hell to clean out of his sheets. His cock twitches uselessly in the metal sheath that contains it as Steve presses against his prostate. Balls aching and heavy, Bucky fights against the urge to pull away and press his spread thighs together because he hates this, how spread open and exposed he is.

Bucky must have made a sound because Steve asks, “You alright, Bucky?”

Tell him you love it, Brock whispers in his ear as his hand trails over the curve of his back.

“I love it,” Bucky moans, fighting against the growing knot in the bit of his stomach. He’s grateful when Brock crawls beneath him and forces his thighs wider, removing any chance he’d have of closing them. Instead he drops down onto his forearms, his back arching in a way that many seem to find appealing, and lets his head fall forward to hang between his arm, his hair brushing against the sheets.

Such a pretty little slut, Brock says as he tugs at Bucky’s bound cock and balls, wrenching a full body shudder from Bucky as Steve scrapes his fingernails against his prostate.

Roll your hips. Show him how much you appreciate him taking care of you like this.

Doing as he’s told, Bucky thrusts back on Steve’s fingers, fucking himself on first three and then four fingers, breathing hard as he swallows against the rising bile at the back of his throat from the stretch and burn of it.

“God, Buck, you look amazing like this, spread open and so needy for me. Can you take more?” Steve asked. “The thought of you stretched around my wrist…”

No, Bucky wants to say, but he bites the word back.

Hand fisting in Bucky’s hair and yanking his head back, Brock forces him to meet his eyes as he asks, You don’t want to disappoint Steve, do you? After everything he’s done for you?

No, Bucky doesn’t want that. “Please, Steve,” Bucky makes himself beg. “Anything you want.”

“Shit, Bucky. You can’t say that to a man and expect him to last.”

As Steve pulls his fingers out, Bucky feels relief, but it’s short lived when they return newly slick, Steve’s thumb pressed against his palm as he presses himself knuckles deep and then deeper still.

Sobbing at the stretch, Steve pauses, and Bucky shakes his head wildly. “Don’t stop.”

Such a drama queen, Brock tuts as he squeezes Bucky’s balls hard enough to draw another sob from him. This is hardly the biggest thing you’ve had in your ass. Push back. Let him in.

Fighting against his body’s instinctive reaction to fight the unwelcome intrusion, Bucky forces himself to relax, to push back, and as he does so, the thickest part of Steve’s hand slips inside. Bucky’s breath hisses between his teeth when Steve’s fingers curl into a fist, his knuckles pressing against Bucky’s prostate.

Bucky can’t help the shout that escapes him, the way his cock suddenly spurts and dribbles down on Brock and the sheets, not just the white of the cum being milked from his balls, but the piss he couldn’t seem to hold back.

“Jesus, Buck,” Steve says with a moan as the potent scent hits him, and he looks down at Bucky’s leaking cock. “You’re perfect, so perfect for me.”

When Steve presses again, Bucky’s cock releases another stream of fluid.

He wants you to beg for it, wants you to feel it for days, but he’s too kind to admit it. Tell him what you need, Brock says as he reaches back to press against Bucky’s stretched rim.

“Please, Steve. I need you to fuck me with your fist. Punch fuck me. I want to feel it for days.”

Bucky thinks maybe he’s done it wrong when he hears Steve shift and feels the way that Steve tenses inside him, but that is just the prelude to what is to come. Bucky’s whole body jerks with the force of Steve’s thrust, and Bucky tries his best to brace himself, every breath a sob as his cock spurts with each movement.

Bucky can feel his insides rearranging themselves with the force and depth of Steve’s fist, each thrust sinking deeper yet until his cock dribbles continuously.

Never could control yourself. Just let it all out now. Show him what a slut you are.

With that Bucky stops fighting it and just lets himself go, kneeling in the growing puddle of piss and cum and lube beneath him.

Yeah, pet, just like that. You’re such a good boy for me. You want to be a good boy for Steve too. Show him how good you can be.

Yes, Bucky wants to be good for Steve. Maybe if he is good, Steve won’t share him. Steve never hurts him, not really, not in any way he doesn’t ask for.

Bucky can’t help but flinch when Steve finally pulls out of his abused hole, his body so used to the intrusion that it doesn’t want to let it go. And when the seemingly endless length of Steve’s arm leaves his body he can feel himself gaping open, feels the splash of Steve’s cum against the widespread lips of his ass as Steve jacks off at the sight of his ruined hole. He flinches again when Steve presses his fingers into the mess, when Brock’s slide in alongside Steve’s, slipping into the swollen flesh again with no effort.

Such a pretty, ruined hole. Such a good boy.

“Such a good boy for me, Bucky,” Steve says, his words echoing Brock’s.

“Yeah, Steve. Your good boy,” Bucky promises as he collapses again Brock’s chest. Bucky is good at doing what he has to do. Steve takes care of him. And if this is what he has to do to stay in Steve’s good graces, he’ll continue to do it.

Also on AO3 http://archiveofourown.org/works/8074507

This is so fucked up. I love it.

BEAUTIFUL

Ouch. This is so painful and so good.

Now edited and on Ao3! In the Hydra Trash Meme anon fills collection (works/8002999)

Ahhh!!! This was so good!!! Everything from Steve's hopeful research, to him thinking about what he'll do once they get out (cutting hair, toothbrush, etc), and poor Bucky!

Thanks, A!A, this was great!!

Thanks!

Thanks so much!

Oh crap this is KILLING ME. Might be my favourite chapter so far. But. My chest is tight and I just want them to both to *understand* and *I* want to understand and I want them to be safe and happy and and...so many feelings. God DAMN this is some good fic

At breakfast, Bucky puts his head down on the table. One moment, he’s stuffing a blueberry Eggo in his mouth, syrup smeared across his chin. The next, his head slumps onto the wood with a thud, and he stretches his arms out in front of him. Syrup transfers from his chin to the checkered tablecloth, and Steve winces, knowing Bucky will be mad at himself about it later.

Then it occurs to him that something might be wrong. Bucky looks all hollowed out. No bones, no muscles, no jokes.

So he jokes, “You should chew and swallow before taking a nap.”

Bucky grunts and raises his head a couple inches in the air. He glares. Blurry through the Eggo, he says, “Naps are a scam. You wake up still dead inside.”

“I can’t argue with that.” Steve shuts his eyes tight to take a long sip of juice. Country music drifts in from the living room radio. Bucky listens to a lot of country music these days, and a lot of it is angry.

“What’s up, Buck?”

“I don’t know, Doc. What’s up with you?”

“Oh. Well. You know how it is. Enjoying some Cheerios. Supporting the weight of my own head instead of going to sleep at the table. Not much.”

Bucky makes a show of chewing and swallowing now, treating Steve to the sight of his jaw snapping open and shut, full of mashed-up food. He washes it all down with scalding coffee that makes his nose scrunch.

“I’m not asleep. I’m concerned.”

“Tell me.”

“Concerned about you.”

Steve pushes his Cheerios away. “So tell me. I can take it.”

Bucky grabs the bowl and steals a metal handful of Cheerios. He inspects them as he asks, “Are you still afraid?” Nimbly, he places two Cheerios on his tongue.

“I’m Captain America. I’m not afraid of anything.”

“You’re thinking of Sam. Sam Wilson. And he’s afraid of crawling bugs and, huh, the Loch Ness Monster, he said. Are you still afraid? And don’t fucking try to get out of it. I promise I know about getting out of things.”

“Yes, Bucky. I’m afraid. I’m afraid when you say that sex is supposed to involve looking like a ghost of yourself. That doesn’t fill me with confidence.”

“About me not leaving you if I need.” He stuffs the rest of the handful in his mouth; it’s not enough to make his cheeks bulge, but he bulges them anyway. For comic effect? He looks sweet that way.

“Yeah, well, I guess.” It doesn’t fit. Not quite right. But Steve hasn’t put a lot of thought into being afraid of anything else. It’s the same thing he’s always been afraid of in different ways. Trapping Bucky.

But when he thought Bucky wouldn’t dare leave him because he was small and sick and would maybe die alone, well. As much as people talked about him like he was still-twitching roadkill, he was actually plenty resilient and fine alone. But if he would die left to his own devices, that wasn’t something he could control at all. There’s so much more that he can control these days.

Not that being powerless has ever made him feel any less guilty. He tears a piece off of Bucky’s waffle and puts it on his own tongue. His fingers are covered in syrup now too.

Bucky looks at him for a long time. His chin is lifted as if in challenge, but his eyes are soft. Without looking anywhere else, he reaches up and pushes a bobby pin more securely into the mass of curls on his head. Then he puckers his mouth tight before smoothing it into a smile and asking, “Am I your whole life?”

“Excuse me?”

“Okay, so maybe that’s what you’re afraid of. And that’s your problem to fix, not mine.”

This would be easier if he looked smug. But he looks so tired. He looks like he means all of it and wishes he didn’t.

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“You afraid of me not leaving you, or of you not leaving me, huh, Steve?”

“Why the fuck would I need to leave you? I wouldn’t do that.”

“And why the hell would I need to leave you! Fuck. You think I have to have a contingency plan, but nothing could ever hurt you. So you let me be your whole life. Because how the hell could that go wrong?” He pokes at the tablecloth. “And does syrup stain?”

“I think things can hurt me.” He makes himself smile. “I could get stained by syrup.”

“Not funny.” He pokes the syrup again, then rubs his thumb and forefinger together, growling at the sensation. “I’ll wash it anyway.”

“It’s a little funny.”

Bucky flings a Cheerio at his forehead. It stings, and Steve rubs the spot it hit, frowning. He pulls the bowl back and hunkers down, holding it close to his chest. He wants to say something else funny, but he can’t. Bucky’s afraid, and that’s what he’s been trying to avoid.

He says, “Buck, please,” which is completely useless.

Bucky, always a more useful person, says, “Sorry, but please, sweetheart. Please just try to—Make a friend. Make more art. Talk to the people on the internet who like the fucking goat minerals.” He pauses and pokes his tongue into his cheek, looking like he wants to make a joke about goat-fucking but knows it isn’t appropriate.

Knock-knock. Who’s there? Baa, baa. Baa, baa who? Baa, baa, fuck-goat, give my dick a pull. Yes, sir, yes sir—

Slowly, like a mollusk, he slips his tongue down back where it belongs, flicking it out of his mouth for a second. “Hell, go play Ultimate Frisbee.” He breaks out into the most real smile Steve’s seen on him in ages, squinty and irrepressible. Then it’s gone. “I don’t understand what you do all day. And that’s terrifying.”

“Excuse me, I work. I have a job. And I eat. And I do draw things. Sometimes I go for walks. I go see Sam.” He imagines himself listing things forever, trying to make himself sound more and more legitimate. I inhale oxygen. I go to sleep most nights. I wear shoes.

Bucky stretches his mouth out to one side and squints. “You draw? You doodle, yeah. But you don’t get invested in any shit.”

“I’m invested in—” He stops, because it’s obvious how that sentence ends.

“Me. Yeah. No shit. I love you, and no shit.”

“I could paint a trash can.”

“You said they’re all painted.”

“So I’ll paint over one. Who’s gonna stop me?” No one would stop Steve Rogers, but possibly someone will stop Stewart Roberts. That’s okay. Getting fined for defacing public property would count as doing something with his life.

“I won’t. I don’t want to stop you. You want me to.”

“I want you to?”

“Yeah, you want me to, and I don’t want to. I want you to do things you’ll love. I love you.” For no clear reason, he picks up the waffle remaining on his plate and wipes it on his face, leaving a huge patch of syrup. He says, “Fuck.”

“I love you.” Steve wants to lick the syrup off Bucky’s face. Bucky probably wants him to lick the syrup off his face.

He doesn’t lick any syrup off of anything. Not even the tablecloth. Not even his own fingers (Bucky tries to do it for him, but Steve tenses up and kisses him stickily on the forehead and goes to wash his hands).

Is it crazy to lie awake until the middle of the night, then get up, gather some art supplies, and sneak out of the house? Yes. Is he crazy? Probably. His head always hurts with the weight and density of everything stuffed in there and buzzing around. Maybe Natasha’s right, and he should lie down on a couch and let himself get hypnotized. He can talk about sex, and terror, and his head, and how he has no life.

There’s a moment, as Steve’s exchanging his pajama bottoms for sweatpants with deep pockets, when Bucky seems to wake. He snuffles like a toddler getting a cold and rolls onto his side, and slits open his eyes. He says, “What’s it?”

And Steve jumps a couple inches off the ground and pulls the sweatpants all the way up. He whispers, “Hey, it’s okay,” and wipes his palms on his thighs only to learn that they aren’t sweating. “We’re okay. I’ll be back.”

“We’re okay?” Bucky frowns. His eyes are closing again. “It’s all good.” And he face-plants, stretching his arms in front of him in a sleep-heavy impression of Superman.

“Buck?”

“Shhh. Sleepin’.”

“Yeah, yeah.” He waits until the bedroom door clicks shut behind him to add, “Sleep tight,” like a prayer.

As he’s in his office, transferring unopened paints and brushes to a canvas shopping tote, he contemplates going out the window instead of the front door. Solely to complete the ridiculous sensation of being a teenager sneaking out to meet his bad influence boyfriend. It’s something he never got to do, Bucky being the one with the bad influence boyfriend, and the one whose parents were always home at night.

But he’s only a certain amount stupid, and using a window as a point of egress is horrible for security. Bucky, if he found out, would pale and start hiding knives up his sleeves again for reasons having nothing to do with sex. So he steps out the front door, beneath a full moon bundled in clouds.

It never gets less disconcerting, the surplus of greenery in this town. Hedges delineate their property from the sidewalk, and the whole way up the street, he’s accompanied by overhanging trees. Rich shadows, the sounds of bugs, one hand death-gripping the handle of the tote over his shoulder, the other rubbing at his beard. Scratching, until he notices what he’s doing and makes himself stop.

He’s sneaking out to set his good influence boyfriend’s mind at ease. Bucky will call if he wakes up again and finds Steve gone. Maybe. Maybe he’ll just panic. Something rustles next to Steve and he puts his shoulders back, almost gets his fists up, but realizes in a second that it must be an animal of some kind. Only an animal. He stops to text Bucky, stepped out for fresh air, and hopes the sound on his phone is turned off.

The street lamp overhanging the trash can has a burned-out bulb. But between the moonlight’s effort and his night vision, it’s no problem at all.

The past few days, it’s been gnawing at him, the idea of painting over another artist’s work. And for selfish reasons, too. But not really selfish—after all, he hates how exposed he feels standing here. He’s doing it for Bucky, regardless of how crazy that might be.

And it isn’t a masterpiece, exactly, that he’s about to deface. Only swathes of green and purple, and some punctuation smiley faces here and there. He’s seen cans around town with intricate murals of landscapes and giraffes.

Should the difference matter? He thinks of Rothko, then snorts and says, too loud in the night, “Jesus. Way to minimize a genius, you enormous fuck-up.”

And he crouches down, and gets his materials out, and swallows his guilt, and starts working.

Later in the morning, Bucky rolls over and checks his phone. “‘Stepped out for fresh air,’” he reads aloud. “Oh yeah? Must be in two places at once then, ‘cause I see you in my bed, buddy.”

“My bed.” Steve’s feeling dried-out and flattened. Like he just got back inside, though he knows it must have been hours of fitful sleep. He attempts to bury himself beneath his pillow.

“Oh, really? Arm wrestle for it.”

“No, I’ll pass. Take the bed. Take the kingdom.”

Bucky snuggles up to his side, jabbing his face into Steve’s shoulder and sighing and overlapping their legs. He says, “You doing okay?”

“Of course.”

“Steppin’ out for fresh air help?”

“Well, of course. It does wonders for my asthma.”

At first, he stands blocking the front door, arms straight out to his sides like he’s being made to hold up two stacks of Bibles. The doorknob prods at his ass and the wood is hard behind his head.

Bucky swaggers toward him. He’s smiling with one eye half-lidded. A pin-prick sensation marches its way up Steve’s neck, and he stops leering in an affectionate kind of way and drops his arms and steps smoothly to the side.

The door’s unguarded; they can both leave whenever they want.

But Bucky catches him around the waist, right arm pressing into what little soft flesh he has left and dragging him closer, so that their bodies are perpendicular, and bits of each of them knock up into the door. He puts his face against Steve’s neck. He says, “A tenth of a penny for your thoughts?”

“Not even a ha’penny?”

“Bargain with me, sure. You’ll get a piece of pocket lint for your thoughts and that’s the end of that story.”

“You drive a hard bargain there.”

“I drive a hard a lot of stuff.” His teeth graze Steve’s throat. He pokes at Steve’s clavicle with his tongue. Little, quick gestures, and Steve can’t help but put his arms around him and squeeze. He lowers the right, but leaves the left, sliding up and down Bucky’s ribs.

“Sure,” he says. “Uh, Hey. I want to tell you what route to take to class.”

Bucky licks at his clavicle more obnoxiously, and Steve smushes the heel of his hand into his face, though not hard enough to budge him. “Is this a sex thing?”

“Why would it be a sex thing?”

“I don’t know. I think it would make a good sex thing. Why else do you wanna do it?”

“Because I’m a control freak with zero sex appeal. Come on. Humor me a little.”

Bucky lets him go. He leans back against the door now, lounges there, an arm curving across the top of his head, the veins at his wrist green and pronounced. He says, “I’m always humoring you, honey. I’m a humorous man.”

“Knock-knock,” Steve says in a high voice. “Who’s there? Oh, it’s me! Captain America!”

Bucky bursts out laughing. “See? It’s a great joke.”

Steve kicks at his shin. “I want to tell you where to walk, and I want you to walk there. And I want you to send me a picture.”

“Of me walking?”

“No. You’ll know what. But I do want you in the picture too. If you want.”

“Nothing about this has zero sex appeal.”

“I don’t get you.” He puts his fingertips to Bucky’s jaw, to the dense curl of his beard. Watches as his eyelids flutter and his lips jerk apart.

“Of course you do. You get me. I get you. You get pocket lint. I get your thoughts.” He laughs. “Tell me, okay? But don’t make me late, I swear to god.”

Ten minutes after they kiss goodbye, Bucky texts him, what the fuck is this. Then, ???

Steve resumes the push-ups he’s been doing on the living room floor, working through the warmth gushing through his chest. Then he pauses, wishing he was out of breath. Can I help you?

He’s expecting a selfie, with the kind of careful angling that Bucky’s perfected. What he gets appears to have been taken by a stranger, a landscape shot with all of Bucky’s goofy, half-smiling face and his pressed-and-ironed body crouching, right hand making a V sign by his head. And beside him: the trash can, featuring a painting of two air conditioners getting united in holy matrimony. Both wearing the upper halves of tuxedos, a suggestion of stained glass in the background, and hovering between them, two golden rings.

It’s not his best work. It is more than a doodle.

Bucky texts him, What’s wrong with you? I love you. I do.

Steve texts back, I stepped out for some fresh air.

A printed version of the photo ends up on the refrigerator, held by a magnet from the farmers’ market.

A couple times, Bucky tries using it as fuel for them to fuck. Not with any real effort, but stretching his head into Steve’s lap on the couch as they watch a nature documentary and saying, in a voice like he’s joking, “You be the air conditioner repairman and I’ll be the broken air conditioner and you bang on me and check out my insides until I’m good and operational again.”

Or, when he comes in the door after class and Steve greets him like a househusband, looping his arms around his neck and muttering, “One day, an air conditioner comes to life, and it’s really horny, but only for other air conditioners, and it sees me, an air conditioner who isn’t alive, just sitting around out there. Unprotected. Hmm?”

Both times, Steve chuckles and ruffles his hair, and Bucky looks affronted, and Steve freezes, and then they touch less. And they talk about killer whales or meteors.

They talk; they don’t fuck; they don’t talk about anything important; Steve sketches more designs to paint on trash cans, but doesn’t take his paints out of the canvas tote.

They both wake up late. It’s a Saturday, and rain shushes heavy outside, obscuring any light that might come through their bedroom blinds. They wake up both tangled in the blankets, both agreeing that their mouths taste like death, and untangling the blankets a little.

An hour passes, and they're still in bed. Steve stares at his book on the Comics Code without processing anything, while Bucky scrawls something in a notebook, curled into a protective ball around it. He writes with his left hand, and the snatch of handwriting Steve glimpses when Bucky stretches to yawn is smooth and delicate.

His heart feels like it’s made of clay. His mouth still tastes like death, and is still dry even after drinking the glass of water left on the nightstand. He looks at Bucky, and he says, “I don’t feel like I can talk to you.”

Bucky looks up. He dog-ears his page in the notebook and closes it, then hides it beneath the sure muscle of his thigh. He looks soft, unguarded, his hair a rat’s nest. “So talk. I’ll talk to you. With you.”

“I want to be clear.”

“So be clear. Steve.” He grins.

“To be clear, I mean that I want to you talk about things that matter. I want to talk with you about important things.”

“You gonna read The Jungle to me again? I didn’t like it when I was sixteen and I don’t—”

“No. Bucky. Can we talk like friends? Like you do with your friends?”

“Talk, Steve. Go for it.” He takes the notebook out from under his thigh so he can use it like a pillow. “I’m listening.”

“Um.” Now that he’s planning to ask, he feels ridiculous, over-sized, an intrusion. He tries anyway. “What happened on the cliff?”

“The cliff.”

“With Dorsey. You and Katarina were laughing about it. Can you—Are you willing to tell me?”

“Why do you do that?” He sounds half-asleep and resigned, and shuts his eyes and breathes in deep.

“What? Do what, Buck?”

“Try to make me hurt you! Fucking cut it out. Please.” He opens his eyes.

“Oh, I try to make you hurt—” his voice get smaller as he thinks about what he’s saying—“me?”

He means really hurt him, re-traumatize him, pull him out of himself, but Bucky doesn’t think there’s trauma to relive, so of course that’s not what he’ll hear. Steve’s never in his life tried to make Bucky feel broken about liking when Steve hurts him, but now here they are. He doesn’t even want Bucky to feel broken about it, but here they are.

But Bucky takes it mostly in stride. “Yeah, a real hardship for you, having me squirming under you begging to get roughed up. I’m sure that’s been real hard for you all these years.”

“In a sense.”

“Yeah, in a sense. Dumbass.”

“So you’re not going to tell me.”

“No. I’m not.” He shrugs. “It’s okay that you asked. Do you want to wake up now?”

“Next to you?” He sets his hand down between them, close enough that Bucky can take it if he wants. “Always.”

Bucky doesn’t take his hand, but he does smile and says, “Jesus. I don’t know what to do with you. I can make breakfast. I can make breakfast sandwiches. Don’t ask me about Dorsey again.”

“But can I read you The Jungle?”

For all his smiling and offers of breakfast, as he stands, Bucky seems drawn in on himself and drawn tight. His hair falls in front of his eyes and he doesn't brush it back. He says, “You read me that book, I’m doing my own muckraking. Steve Rogers: pervert by night, pervert by day, and can’t make a Bloody Mary to save his life. It's gonna be a bestseller.”

After bacon and egg sandwiches, Steve opens the window in his office and sticks his head out into the downpour. He mutters to himself, “Stop asking shit,” and gets rain in his mouth.

He asks Bucky, “What do you want for your birthday?” because they both learned years ago that Steve has no idea how to guess.

“Your dick,” Bucky says, eyes glazed over, clutching his coffee mug with “Metropolitan Museum of Art” stamped across in cursive.

“No, you don’t. What do you want?”

“No, I don’t really,” and the honesty of that makes Steve wish he would accidentally drop his own coffee on the floor. There’s no other way to externalize anything. He settles for getting up from the table and staring in the fridge like he didn’t finish eating ten minutes ago.

Bucky says, “I don’t know.”

They both woke up late again, Steve’s throat foggy and tight, Bucky refusing to open his eyes in a hammed-up display of orneriness toward no one in particular. And pulled themselves into proper clothes while moaning and grunting. It felt familiar, like waking up hungover on the couch together with their suspenders still half-on and somebody outside yelling.

It’s conceivable that Bucky is hungover; Steve’s just tired down to his blood cells. He takes a jar of peanut butter out of the fridge. He puts it on the counter and stares.

Bucky clears his throat, and Steve returns to the table, aware that the peanut butter is now in his hand. When he’s settled, Bucky says, “I want you to know shit.”

“Yeah? What shit?”

“What happened with the cliff. Nicer things. Everything. You don’t get it. I keep trying to tell you and you don’t get it, and I need you to get it already. I love your thick skull, man, but it’s causing us an issue.” He slurps at his coffee. He grimaces, because their beans are stale and they’re out of cream, and because grimacing is a thing that people do to fill dead air.

Bucky’s always made the stupidest faces when they’re not-quite-fighting.

Steve settles the peanut butter in his lap. Resists the urge to pat its lid. “Isn’t that a gift for me?”

“No. It’s definitely not. And, huh. Buy me flowers. Nice flowers. And a cake.”

“What kind?”

Bucky glares at him. “You know what kind.”

“Yellow.”

“Fucking obviously. Chocolate icing or I’m locking all the doors and windows.”

“So I’ll come down the chimney.”

“I’ll light a fire. Try and cross me.” He sticks a fragile finger in the untouched bowl of oatmeal in front of him, scooping up a dollop. He leans across the table and smears it on the bulb of Steve’s nose. Steve jerks back at the wetness, but he’s startled into laughter, and Bucky’s laughing too, and says, “Mazel tov, douchebag.”

Steve swats at his hand without making contact.

Bucky's laughter cuts off. He says, "You know, though. You, uh. Don't have to get my name on the cake. It's okay with no decorations."

"I don't have to or you don't want me to?"

Bucky says, "Eh," and see-saws his hand in the air. "Do what feels good, okay? You don't have to." He puts more oatmeal on his finger.

*sets up camp among the moldy newspapers and rusted tin cans*

Steve shaming yasssssssssss

Every time this updates, I am more and more impressed with the breadth of this fic.

Seconded. I am also surprised at the visceral emotional reaction it drags out of me every time; sometimes I can't even pinpoint what exactly I'm feeling or why, just that my chest feels tight after reading. Great update, as always.

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