fossilised | It's AU time

It's AU time

Building 64 down in the East end of Brooklyn was not a fashionable place to live. The apartments were small, barely more than studio size, and the rent was pretty cheap. Not many people lived there permanently, most people only came and stayed a year or two to get enough money together to move onto somewhere better. But there were two residents who had been there a while.

Steven Grant Rogers, early twenties, who earned his rent doing tattoo designs part time to fund his college course, and occasionally dipped his toe into online art commissions. He'd moved in there when his mother had died four years previously, leaving him enough money to get by, but not enough that he could stop working. And right across the hall was Natalia Romanova, an aspiring ballerina from Russia. She was tough as hell, she had worked herself right through high school, paid her own way to America when she didn't even speak the language, and kept going through tenacity alone.

Somehow a friendship had struck up between them when Steve had been the first person not to look at her like she was an idiot or disgusting for not speaking the language. He'd helped her learn, and they'd been firm friends for the last three years. Everyone else was transient, coming and going, not really making an impact. Natalia had friends and a boyfriend outside of the apartment, but she sometimes worried that Steve never seemed to do anything but work and study.

Which was probably why he would be in his apartment when a loud crash sounded on the stairs outside. Said crash had come from a box of (now very broken) plates and bowls being dropped by the man just moving in to the apartment directly above Steve's, judging by the amount of cardboard boxes that were littering the hallway. He was tall, muscled, dressed in faded jeans and a hoodie with long slightly scruffy hair, leather gloves, and deep blue eyes.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"I'm not sure, I lost count, but it has to be over twenty. But don't worry, Steve, you're my best guy. That means you're king of the harem and get to wear a crown. And it means all of our dates take precedence over any others."

He felt like kind of an idiot walking down the street arm in arm like something from an old black and white movie, but it also felt right. Like he and Steve were meant to be together, in goofy ways and serious ways and all the other ways in between. Bucky also kind of liked the term 'best guy', it seemed to suit Steve more than boyfriend. Something more, but not so much more as to be crazy.

"Is this the part where I'm meant to tip my hat at you and lay my coat on the ground so you don't have to walk on all the snow? Because I like you, but this is my only coat and the streets are gross."

King of the harem was not a title that Steve wanted to wear, even in jest, and so he skipped over any further comments to get right at the much more amusing thought of Bucky brandishing off his coat to protect his shoes from the snow. “I think we can safely pass on the coat. Not because I care so much about it being your only coat, but because I really don’t want to have to hold onto your arm after if it’s muddy and covered in hepatitis.”

They rounded the last corner of old brownstones with their four floor fire escapes cascading down the side, passed the alley between the Chinese take out place and the Deli and their own apartment and headed up the stairs to the front door and then to Steve’s second floor apartment.

“Well this is me,” he said, thumbing the door behind him. He couldn’t help but bite on his lower lip again. Waiting. Expectant. Crazily falling in love with someone that really needed to sort themselves out before they could commit. Steve didn’t seem to care.

Bucky snorted very quietly when Steve needed to say this was him, like Bucky didn't live right upstairs and hadn't slept on his couch to help him through pneumonia. It was cute, though, and that lip bite set his blood aflame. He could just eat Steve with a spoon, but he would take this at his pace.

So he just bent down to capture Steve's lips with his own, pouring passion and want and affection into the kiss. Steve deserved to feel wanted and desired, he knew that the poor guy was self conscious over his size and stature, and he shouldn't be because he was goddamn gorgeous. But more than that, there was an underlying current of tenderness too, of thanks for how he had been with Bucky at the mall that day.

When he eventually pulled back, slightly short of breath, he gave Steve the cockiest smile that he had while speaking super politely.

"Good evening, Mr. Rogers, it was real swell."

It had been real swell, Steve decided, the flush to his cheeks a bit of a double entandre. Something was obviously swelling. He had dropped his bag in the process to feel the broad expanse of shoulders beneath his fingers and lightly thumbed along the edge of Bucky’s hairline and neck before he pulled back.

“Feel like coming in for a night cap, Mister. Barnes?” Steve wished he knew what rank Bucky was. That thought was exciting to him. He knew was was terrible. It claimed some of Bucky’s sanity and his own father’s life but the military was an important institution and the men and women that served in it happened to hold the majority of Steve’s respect.

Steve had no idea what a night cap actually was, if it was supposed to be a drink or not, but he had a very good idea of what he would like it to be.

If Bucky just wanted some coffee with a shot of Baileys, though, that was fine too.

Bucky knew exactly what a nightcap was, this was hardly his first rodeo. He might have shipped out when he was just out of school, but he used to be a real charmer and he had enjoyed more than a few dates both in high school and while he was on leave. His eyes darkened a little in interest, unable to hide how attractive he found Steve, but all he did was nod.

He would come in, and if Steve actually meant a drink then that's what he'd have and not pressure him for more. It was weird that he wasn't more nervous. He didn't think he had been shirtless in front of Steve other than the time he had pulled his prosthetic off in a fit of pique, and he was usually self conscious about his scarring. Weirdly he wasn't, like it didn't occur to him that Steve might not still find him attractive.

Bucky stepped past Steve into the apartment and pulled off his wet coat a bit awkwardly, tossing it over the back of a chair before surging forwards and tugging Steve in for another heated kiss. God, he could do this for the rest of his life and never get bored.

Steve was a virgin. He couldn't bother denying it, and Bucky was so experienced. No one wanted to sleep with virgins. It might be sweet in the movies but in actuality, people preferred to sleep with partners that weren't new to this whole thing. Getting your rocks off should not have a learning curve, not when you were supposed to have learned how sex worked in high school. Steve was only five years out of high school but he'd never gone passed second base and he was worried that it would show.

The thing was, crazy as it might sound, Steve didn't feel like a virgin.

He gripped Bucky as his back was more or less used to shut the door. He swiftly maneuvered himself to get a knee between Bucky's legs and worked to pull off his belt. It was a bold move. They should probably have a chat about it. Deceiving Bucky was the last thing he wanted.

And so he broke the kiss to pant; "Buck, I'm a virgin. I haven't-- you know what a virgin is, I'm sure. But I want.... I want this. It's crazy. I know. But I really want this."

"Jesus, I want it too."

Bucky was barely coherent by this point, and Steve saying he wanted it was the final nail in the coffin. He was hard as a rock in his pants, only his belt undone, and he needed to be touching Steve all over in the next thirty seconds or he might just explode. He didn't care that Steve was a virgin, though it did make him determined to make sure this first time was good. No hurting, proper preparation, or maybe he'd just have Steve take him, he enjoyed being a switch and just because a guy was skinny didn't mean he had to be a bottom all the time.

He wished he had two hands so bad right now, because he had to choose between cupping Steve's ass or sliding a hand under his shirt instead of being able to do both. He settled on tugging at the button and fly of his pants instead, wanting to get him naked.

"Fuck, Steve, you're so gorgeous."

"Yeah?" He didn't know why he needed the confirmation but he wanted to hear it again. The growl was enough for him though and while it was probably going to be throwing mixed signals at Bucky, Steve worked his arms up between them and pushed his soon to be lover away from him. "I just-- one minute. Don't get dressed."

Touseled and needy, lips bright red and cheeks a stunning pink, Steve slipped out of the apartment and ran towards Natalia's door. He basically threw himself at it and the redhead answered with a sort of half drunk smile. She and Thor were celebrating Christmas Eve by wrapping gifts and getting drunk. It was pretty much how they spent a lot of their time but they had stressful careers and it was nice to not have to feel the stress together. "Steven? Are you ill? I will get my coat. Thor--"

"No. No no I'm-- I need... Uh. Condoms. Lube--? It's a little late but..."

He rubbed a hand down his other arm, which had Natalia in stitches. "Are you making slippery water balloons, Steven?"

"No--! Nat--"

A box came flying at him from over Natalia's shoulder and Steve barely managed to catch it, and he even was forced to take a step back from it.

"Have a good time, Steve. Nat, come back inside. Let's have a good time too."

Bucky had no idea where Steve was going when he pulled back looking positively sinful with his lips so pink and swollen, and his pale face so flushed. But he told Bucky not to get dressed, so he wasn't too worried that he had done something wrong or come on too strong... definitely not worried when he heard the frantic knocking on the door across the hall and the brief conversation that followed.

He was half laughing and half aroused as hell when Steve returned with the needed items, banging the door shut and literally lifting Steve off his feet to press him against the wall and grind against him, his knee pushing apart Steve's legs so that he could use his thigh to tease his best guy.

"Good thinking," he murmured against Steve's lips, breathy and aroused as hell. "Condoms. Plural. Excellent thinking. Trust me, we're gonna want to do this more than once."

He wanted Steve to know how amazing it felt from both sides, to know he was respected as an equal partner and not just seen as some twink to be taken. To that end, he bent his head and nibbled on Steve's ear, voice a low growl.

"Jesus, I want you to fuck me."

It was a good thing that Steve didn't need to reciprocate the wording. He wasn't even sure his mouth could form that particular word. Instead, he found himself turned on by the strength Bucky had to lift him and let his head fall back against the wall. They could take their time, Steve was planning on it at least, and he was thankful that Bucky would sort of give him the reigns. When he put him back down on his feet.

Steve wasn't too sure how he felt being on the bottom, society making him out to be the sort that should be there, and so he jumped at the chance to have Bucky this way first. It would be less of a fuss to. Hopefully.

For a long while, because Steve had been raised in a culture of foreplay and not just jumping right into sex, they touched and rubbed and kissed one another laying side by side, mostly naked, in Steve's turned down bed. Steve wasn't waiting for a signal to proceed so much as trying to experience everything fully and romantically.

Because of course he was a romantic.

He traced Bucky's twitching cock with his fingers and then his lips, the older man stretched out for him, beautiful in the dimmed light from the hallway and the street below. He had never actually given anyone head before. But it didn't feel that way. Muscle memory kicked in from a time that had never happened.

Steve wasn't Bucky's usual type, he would be lying if he said that he had ever looked for men that looked like Steve before, but right now he couldn't imagine literally anyone in the world looking sexier than Steve did with his lips wrapped around his cock. It didn't matter that he was inexperienced, he still seemed to know how and where to trigger the most pleasure out of Bucky, to turn him into a writhing and sweaty mess.

It was an embarrassingly short time later that his fingers fisted in Steve's hair, not painfully but still with urgency, to try and push him back from what he was doing before he ended all of this prematurely.

"Stop-- stop, god, you're too much."

He kept mumbling alternate curses and benedictions as he kissed his own way down Steve's body to return the favour, first sucking on his cock and then down to lick at his ass. Not to prepare him, he meant what he said when he wanted Steve inside him, but just to feel good.

If anyone needed to stop, it was Bucky. Steve was suddenly very aware of his tenuous hold on himself and only a few scant minutes of Bucky proving what a decade of participation in bedroom events could lead to. He was again pushing st Bucky, small hand on a broad shoulder, toes curled, and almost begging. "Please... Just let me... Inside you--"

Luckily, Bucky was smart and got the picture fairly quickly.

Steve lasted longer than he thought possible, likely because he was worried he was hurting Bucky most of the time, no real knowledge of what those faces he was giving him meant. Soft blond hair the color of cornsilk plastered to his forehead after several long moments of swinging back and forth with each thrust. He took his time, leaning in to kiss Bucky soundly as he put his hands against his thighs.

He enjoyed himself. Too much, maybe, for someone getting over pneumonia, but Bucky was hot. There was no need to fear a relapse there.

Bucky practically lost his mind, the faces he made were definitely ones of pleasure, and he found his release only a few moments after Steve by taking hold of himself in a few desperate and sweaty strokes. God, but he could do that all day and every day, he had no idea why it already felt like something they did all the time, something they were meant to do, but he loved it.

He pulled Steve up and into his arms, not caring about the sweat or the sticky mess all over the place, just reaching down to take off the condom and toss it into the trash.

"How can you never have done that before? You were amazing. I never want to leave this bed again, this bed is my new home."

Steve never felt more masculine than he did now. He laid on a bunch of half mashed up pillows with his arm bent behind his head and his free hand lightly stroking the hair from the back of Bucky’s neck. It was pretty remarkable, how different he felt and how completely the same he felt at the same time. His eyes were half closed as he grinned at nothing in particular and in his mind, a tail that he might have had if he was a dog wagged as at being praised for something he never thought would please him before.

“if you wanted to, I’d let you,” Steve said sincerely. First date to sex to moving in? It sounded a little like the off colored lesbian jokes he’d heard before. If it was strange for him to literally and sincerely offer Bucky to stay, oh well. Why bother keeping up pretense that they might not belong together?

Everything had been magical. Or ordained by God. Or-- Steve didn’t know or care what the proper turn of phrase was right now because he was too filled with the need to gloat over his accomplishment.

It was a good thing that his phone was in his pocket in his pants across the room. Nat might be getting a little too much TMI right now otherwise.

Bucky knew better than to believe anything offered in the afterglow, or especially in the run up to sex, hormones were all over the place and it was the tale of too many people that they offered love and commitment and all sorts, only to regret it when the mood had ebbed and they were back in their right mind again. But it still made him smile and wind his arm tighter around Steve, the prosthetic tossed somewhere on the floor in the heat of the moment.

"I'd settle for just making a burrito out of the blankets and not moving until tomorrow morning. And then hopefully Santa will have brought me some more lube for Christmas so I can properly enjoy the festive season."

He grinned wickedly, spoiled a bit when he yawned. God, he was so relaxed, like a puddle of himself, reduced that way by Steve Rogers and his talent in bed. He was one lucky bastard.

"I mean... it's not Christmas unless you're naked all the time, right? I don't think I noticed how much I hate clothes until like an hour ago."

“Never had a Christmas like this so I’ll just follow your lead,” Steve said before erupting into a giant yawn that traveled down his body in a full fledge, cat-like stretch. He lightly traced some doodles on Bucky’s shoulder but for the most part, he was letting himself sink right into sleep where he belonged. Morning was not too far away and since Steve was never one to sleep in and he’d left the curtains open, the sunlight woke him up with a groan.

This was, by far, the best Christmas he had had to date, with a warm body pressed against his back, and he carefully slipped out of Bucky’s arms to make some breakfast and some coffee. He had on his robe since he wasn’t prepared to get another sickness, and the fluffy blue terrycloth was pulled up high to his ears.

He ended up balling up the pancakes and the bacon, keeping them in place with little toothpicks, and even if it was childish and silly, he couldn’t help but be amused by his own ingenuity.

Hopefully Bucky wouldn’t mind being woken by the smell of delicious food and coffee because Steve was going to need some help cooking for that afternoon.

Bucky woke up when Steve slipped out of bed, but he didn't move. He just luxuriated in the feeling of real sheets that were clean (relatively so, after last night) and the heat of where Steve had been in the bed. He wanted to stay there all day, but he knew this was Christmas and that Natalia and Thor were invited to take part too.

Oh shit. Christmas.

He didn't have anything for Steve, and he surely had very little time before presents would be exchanged to figure something out. That got him up pretty effectively, appearing out into the kitchen to see the magnificent ball breakfast, which just had him laughing hard enough that he nearly fell over.

"That-- you're a goddamn culinary genius, Steve."

He plucked up one of the pancake balls and popped it in his mouth, before leaning over to kiss him deeply and enthusiastically.

"I've gotta go upstairs for a bit, take a shower, get changed. But I'll be back down to help cook soon, okay?"

"This sounds to me like you're running out for your walk of shame," Steve said before making an O shape with his mouth so that Bucky would mimic him and he could push another ball of pancake between his lips. It made his cheeks puff up. He had to laugh, and then kiss the pouting lips he was left with. "Fine. Go. After breakfast. I need to actually do some wrapping too, so knock when you come back."

Steve enjoyed his little moments with Bucky, especially because the other man seemed perfectly content sitting in only his boxers in the kitchen with him, prosthetic discarded, scars visible. Their knees touched under the table as they had done the night before at that little hole in the wall bistro. And maybe Steve kept running his fingers on a bare thigh from time to time. It was all right if his fingers were sticky from syrup.

Bucky was just going to shower anyway.

It was so strange to be this comfortable, he still wasn't even always comfortable looking at himself in a mirror, so to be able to lounge around eating breakfast so exposed with Steve was amazing. He wouldn't be able to do it with anyone else, these relaxed moments where the humour and the kindness of the man he used to be shone through were for Steve and Steve alone.

Breakfast finished, and only just managing to keep from diving right back into the bedroom with Steve, he finished dressing and disappeared back upstairs to shower, get his prosthetic on properly, pick out some nice clothes from the few he owned and... scour his stuff for something to give to Steve.

It took about an hour for him to come back down and knock, during which time Steve would get a text from Natasha.

TO: Steve
FROM: Natabatadingong

Thor and I will be coming over in two hours for food and presents. If you have drawn me a picture then I will have to hurt you. Happy Christmas. xx

Steve could do two hours. Two hours was plenty of time to get dressed after a shower and still wrap presents. Natalia was going to have to hurt him because he always drew on the wrapping paper, but at least he had a real gift for her. The woman was capable of taking care f herself but she was always broke somehow. Or maybe she was wisely investing while mooching off of the rest of them.

His little tree was set up on the windowsill by the painting and he even managed to do some decorating after he showered and dressed in the eagle sweater Bucky had gotten him not too long before. It was soft and he jazzed it up with a little Santa hat pin he had in his box of decorations. What was more American holiday than an eagle with a Christmas hat on? Nothing.

He combed his hair neatly to the side and was just putting the oven on when Bucky decided it was time to show his face again.

Forty minutes to go...not enough time to get the pie together and have sex. Damn it.

Bucky looked pretty good. He didn't have many fancy clothes, but he had a suit from when he just got discharged in the hope he would be going to lots of job interviews, so he had dug that out and put it on with a deep blue shirt open at the neck. If it had just been Steve then he would have pinned the sleeve up and been comfortable, but because he knew other people would be there then he had the prosthetic on.

He had a box under one arm, not wrapped, and a slightly sheepish expression.

"Hey-- so... I want to do your gift before the others arrive, okay? I'm sorry, I don't have any wrapping paper, but could you sit down a moment?"

He was kind of nervous, this was probably going to be too big and too dumb a gesture for a guy that he had been on one official date with.

One official date, several very unofficial dates, two making out sessions and one bout of passionate sex, but who was counting?

Steve grinned up at Bucky, saying the things you're supposed to say about Bucky really not needing to do this, but he sat down as requested by the Charlie Brown Christmas tree and took the box with bright and curious eyes. Had Bucky just wrapped something of his? Or boxed it at least? That was something Steve used to do when he was younger and didn't have any money. It was oddly touching and he reverently opened the lid and peeked inside.

The look on his face was a little worrying.

"I can't," he whispered, seeing the dog tags there. He had his father's framed with his medals but those were passed on after he had died. These were...incredible. They'd been with Buck through a whole lot. Steve felt his throat close. "These are too precious, you can't..." That didn't mean he was going to let them go.

It choked him up a little to see this, more for Steve's reaction than giving the tags themselves away. It was a wrench, but he was sure that if anyone would wear them and care for them as they were meant to be cared for, it would be Steve Rogers. And at least he knew that Bucky had been a Sergeant now, not the lowliest of soldiers, but hardly one of the top brass either.

"They're just-- I didn't have time to get you anything, and I know they're just something of mine, but I'd like you to have them. Something of mine for my best guy to carry around with him."

He leaned over to press a kiss to Steve's lips, kind of wanting to see him wearing the dog tags and nothing but the dog tags now.

"It was this or my medals, and you'd look pretty dumb wandering down the street with a bunch of medals pinned to that sweater. Which, by the way, santa hat is an excellent addition to the eagle."

It was sort of unfair how perfect Bucky was. Sure, his boyfriend had some issues to surmount, but he was still perfect to Steve. Putting the beat up metal on caused him to chew the inside of his lip, but he held the tags in one hand against his chest before he wrapped his arms around Bucky's neck. "My gift is pretty stupid now," Steve muttered, not letting Bucky go just yet to fetch it.

He needed another five minutes of hugging Bucky and looking at the tags off and on.

When he was doing emotionally well enough to actually get Bucky's gift from beneath the little tree, he did so half tripping over himself because he couldn't stop trying to look at the dog tags against his sweater. Whoops. At least the little tree didn't crash to the ground. And no one had to pull burst Christmas balls from Steve's palms or shins.

Handing Bucky the box with the fuzzy socks in them, wrapping paper hand drawn, Steve waited for his boyfriend to see the scene he'd drawn. It was from his second favorite movie about that superhero. Steve drew the bounty hunter and the space deputy monkey holding hands with words scrawled over their heads in comic sans: Til The End Of The Line, Pal.'

It was kind of embarrassing how much he liked those movies, he just felt some weird connection with the characters, though especially Captain America and his best friend Buddy. It was sweet of Steve to notice that, and even sweeter of him to spend the time and effort to draw him his own comic.

He took a long time just reading over the paper with a soft smile on his face, very carefully unwrapping it so as not to rip it. This was going on his fridge next to the picture of himself as the bounty hunter. The socks themselves were secondary, though he did grin at how ridiculously furry they were.

"Are you trying to say my feet are too cold in bed, Steve? It's okay, I can take a hint."

The socks were pulled on right away, toes wiggling teasingly in Steve's direction to cover how touched he was that Steve kept looking down at those dog tags like they were precious.

"So, do I get to be your helper today? Assistant Chef Barnes, I could be in charge of something low-stress like... sprouts."

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