Chapter Text
“Stop. Flirting. With my sister.”
“Sam, she’s a grown woman!”
Sam growled. He actually growled, what the fuck. “She’s still my sister.”
Bucky snorted. “Alright, fine, Christ. Sorry.” He raised his hands in a surrendering gesture. “We’re cool now, right? Didn’t mean anything by it.”
Sam eyed him for a few moments, then nodded. His shoulders drooped, like they had lost all the pent-up tension, and he reached out to clap Bucky on the back, hesitating for just a second before going for it. “Yeah, we’re… yeah, we’re cool.” His jaw flexed and he looked away for a split second, like he had more to say, but he didn’t; he just walked off, giving Bucky another pat before ducking into the boat.
Bucky stared after him, sucking the inside of his cheek thoughtfully.
Sam was weird.
Sam pissed him off. From the moment he’d refused to move his seat up in the car, he’d burned right through Bucky’s patience like a hot flame and gotten right on his nerves. Had toasted them to crumbs, in fact. He’d yapped on about that shit about Gandalf and the big three—as if Bucky wouldn’t have read the goddamn Hobbit! And now he was here, being all domestic about his boat, and Bucky was willingly helping him.
Sam was so fucking weird.
But… he still liked him.
He was… they were… it was complicated.
“Hi, Sarah.” Bucky smiled and waved, hearing the waves slosh behind him—nice, he liked that; reminded him of when he and Stevie would go on walks by the bay—and she smiled, waving back. Bucky grinned, and she ducked into the house. She was real pretty. She was. He liked her.
Sarah was Steve’s ma’s name. That was kind of weird, he had to admit. But Bucky found that a lot of things were weird now. Like the internet. Mytube—no, youtube. Social media. Cellphones.
No wonder Steve had written things to discover in the book. It was there in his pocket now, too. It was small and old, but it felt like his whole damn world, because it had been Steve’s. All he had left of Steve were bits and pieces of objects that he could put together to find some sort of remembrance of him, so every part counted. A machine couldn’t run when it was missing a screw.
“So. Why did my sister just tell me you could stay the night again?” Sam plopped down next to him, and despite his words, Bucky could only see amusement on his face. “Oh, hold on, let me correct myself—why did my sister just say my handsome friend can stay the night?”
Bucky’s lips twitched before he could stop himself, and he had to cover his laugh with a cough at the mildly outraged look on his face. He shrugged. “What can I say? I’m a charmer.”
“No.” Sam gave him a look, and Bucky tossed him an affronted one right back.
“That was rude.”
“No, I mean—” Sam huffed. “You are a charmer, okay? Whatever.”
Why did that make Bucky’s chest feel warm? Sam was so fucking weird.
“Doesn’t mean you have to be charming my sister.” Sam frowned at him.
Bucky gave him a mockingly sympathetic look. “Can’t help it. Charmers don’t choose who they charm.” He gave Sam a lopsided grin. “Just happens.”
“Okayyy. And now your ego is pissing me off.” Sam rolled his eyes.
“I don’t have an ego,” Bucky said defensively.
“Oh, baby, you do.” Sam let out a bark of laughter. “Please. Charmers always have an ego.” He gave Bucky a pat on the shoulder, a bit harder than necessary, Bucky thought, and strode off to break up the playful tussle his nephews had started with the shield.
Baby.
Sam called him baby.
Bucky let his left hand drift up to his shoulder, touching the spot Sam had clapped, just hard enough for him to really feel the ache. Shit, Sam was strong.
And weird.
Really, really fucking weird.
Baby.
Bucky shivered.
See, Bucky’d thought it was a joke, had thought that Sam was joking when he’d said stop flirting with my sister. And that was why he’d kept doing it, because it was funny to rile Sam up, and that was what they did with each other, that was what Sam did to him.
So he didn’t quite understand why Sam was refusing to say a single word to him while they fiddled with the water pipes of the boat.
Or, well, he did understand, but he just— look, the situation was weird and complicated.
All he knew was that Bucky had flirted again with Sarah; she was a nice woman, her smile made him smile, and Sam was upset because he had spent the last couple of days telling Bucky not to. But the truth was, Bucky had thought it was a joke, even more so because he and Sarah had established—just by exchanging a very long look with each other, how strange was that?—that it wasn’t serious, that it was just them exchanging sweet manners, and he’d thought Sam was joking when he said stop.
Bucky had thought it was a joke, and now that he realized that it wasn’t, there was a familiar little ache in his heart, one that he didn’t like to discuss or delve into, one that he knew well because he constantly carried it around with him.
Guilt.
And the fact that Sam was giving him the cold shoulder was making it worse by the second.
“C’mon, Sam.” Bucky scowled to hide his hurt. “C’mon, jesus fuck. If I’d known you were gonna throw such a tantrum I wouldn’t have done it.”
No response, except for another flex of Sam’s jaw muscles.
“Christ,” Bucky muttered under his breath, chest tightening with frustration and anger and resentment and fear because shit, he didn’t have anyone else besides Sam now, he didn’t— he needed Sam, he wanted Sam, he— no.
No. That wasn’t the path he was going to go down. He’d done it with Stevie, he’d done it with— with a billion of others, and he didn’t need to be focusing on whatever this was right now, he needed to be making amends and saving the world—with Sam.
Sam.
It always circled back to Sam fucking Wilson, right there in the corner of his brain, never leaving him alone, always lingering, always reminding him that he was always— always— alone.
He wasn’t… Sam wasn’t his.
And he needed to stop hoping for something that he would never fucking get. Wasn’t this proof enough? Sam refusing to look at him, not speaking to him, turning his head away just when Bucky tried to make eye contact so he could show that he was sorry, because his words were never enough? Wasn’t it proof enough that he was reaching for something he would never be able to grasp in his hand?
Sam didn’t need him. Not the way Bucky needed him. Sam wouldn’t understand, so he would— he would need to leave him alone. Let him be. It’d be fine. He’d just go to his apartment again, he’d be fine on the floor, with the dog tags clinking as he woke up from yet another nightmare, the TV flashing bright enough to make him twitch in his sleep, the bare, cold room, cold like ice, cold like the soldier, cold like loneliness.
It was always cold without Sam, he realized.
That created a lump in his throat that he couldn’t swallow, his spit felt like acid, burning a hole into his tongue, and he couldn’t— this wasn’t—
“Okay,” he said, and his voice came out more hoarsely than he’d wanted it to. He cleared his throat, forcing the lump down, feeling it move down to his stomach, and he tried again. “Okay. I’ll just—I’ll let you be.”
Sam twitched, reaching for the wrench to fix the pipe, but… silence.
Bucky took a step back, and still… nothing. He was shocked by how hollow he felt inside.
And when Sam pulled out his phone, like he wasn’t even fucking there, the hollowness in his chest filled, filled with anger, with frustration, with— with—
“Okay,” he repeated, muscles tensing enough to hurt. “Okay, I’m gonna go to Sarah and see if she needs a hand in the kitchen.” He turned, grimacing at the jab—no, bait—he’d thrown, knowing it was fucking stupid, and jesus, Steve definitely hadn’t taken all the stupid with him because here he was, and before he knew what was happening, there was a whirl of movement in the corner of his eye as Sam shot up from his seat and slammed him into the side of the boat.
It rocked precariously; it had been strong enough to rock the whole boat, Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, and it went straight to Bucky’s dick, even more so when he realized that Sam hadn’t just shoved him, he was holding him there, with his arm across Bucky’s chest, hard enough to make him wheeze like the 106 year old man he was, and— and Bucky—
Bucky moaned.
Sam held him there, looking taken aback not only by the noise that had left Bucky’s mouth but by the entire situation, and his eyes dropped to the tent in Bucky’s pants. “You—” He broke off, staring.
Bucky’s face flushed hotly at the dumbfounded expression on his face. Shit. This— shit, he should’ve— he’d miscalculated, he shouldn’t have—
“You like this,” Sam breathed, and Bucky couldn’t bear to look him in the eye.
“Sam—”
“No, no.” Sam pushed a finger onto his lips, making his heart skip a beat. “You like this. You like— you like me. You do. I can see it on your face, Buck.”
Bucky twitched and gritted out, “Don’t call me that.”
“I’ll call you whatever I want to,” Sam snapped, and Bucky’s mouth went dry. “Jesus fuck, Bucky. Look me in the eye and tell me you like this. You like it when I hold you down? When I make you tell me how much you like it?”
“I— no, that’s not—”
“Don’t lie to me.” Sam’s eyes flashed, stopping Bucky right in his tracks. “Don’t lie. You’ve done enough lying.” He stared at Bucky, eyes boring into his, and Bucky wet his lips nervously with his tongue, not missing the way Sam’s eyes flickered over the movement. “I… oh, I get it now.” Sam tilted his head, perceptive as ever, goddammit. “All this flirting with my sister, that was just to get my attention, wasn’t it? I know it was. Say it.”
“That wasn’t—” Bucky croaked, but Sam wasn’t having it.
He huffed a low laugh, and bulldozed right through Bucky’s feeble pretense. “You like it when I pin you against the wall? Take away all that power you have, that strength that your arm gives you? Make you feel small, maybe?”
Bucky stared back, breath hitching in his chest.
Sam tightened his hold. “Say it.”
Bucky groaned, his cock twitching. He couldn’t. He— that wasn’t— he was— Sam didn’t—
Sam… Sam wasn’t weird. He was hot.
He liked Sam.
The full extent of that realization hit him like a truck and he choked on his next breath. “Yes,” he gasped out, trembling, and Sam released him. He fell to the floor, breath still raspy and hitched in his chest.
Sam let him catch his breath, face expressionless, and then said, “That wasn’t so hard, was it?”
In any other scenario, Bucky would’ve laughed at the potential that pun had, because holy fuck, his dick had never been so hard before. But right now, he was a cock-hungry tornado for one Mr. Sam Wilson, and Sam was going to fuck him into a new dimension, he already knew it.
“I—shit, Sam,” Bucky said intelligently, staring up at the man. Sam extended a hand and Bucky took it cautiously, letting him help him to his feet. “You still mad at me?”
Sam huffed and turned his head to the side, making Bucky’s heart sink a bit. There was a small pause between them, not necessarily awkward, just… there, and Bucky was ready to say something inevitably stupid when Sam beat him to it. “Nah. Nah, I’m not… I wasn’t mad.”
“Yeah, you were.” Bucky felt his lips twist into a bitter grimace, angry at himself. “Shouldn’ta done it. ‘s my fault.”
“Yeah, well.” Sam finally dragged his eyes back to him. “Not your fault you’re, well, you know.” He broke off awkwardly.
There was another silence between them and Bucky’s mind was beginning to go white with panic, because this wasn’t exactly how he’d planned this shit to go down, ever, and he stammered, “Um.”
“Um?” Sam stared back at him.
Bucky licked his lips again, and again, Sam’s gaze moved down to follow the movement. “Maybe we should—‘s too quiet. Maybe—”
“Maybe I like it quiet.”
“I—oh.” Bucky broke off, biting his lip.
Sam just stared, then broke into a wide grin that had Bucky both relaxing and tensing for whatever would come next. Then, just when Bucky was beginning to sweat through his shirt, Sam stepped closer, close enough to press him against the wall of the boat, and tilted his head when Bucky chewed at his lip nervously again. “Don’t do that,” he breathed, and Bucky obeyed instantly because Sam told him not to, “that’s mine to bite.”
That was the only warning he got before Sam pressed his lips to Bucky’s, kissing him soft and tender before Bucky let out a small moan. Almost as though the noise had jump-started something inside him, Sam growled, and the kiss quickly turned hard and wet and sloppy.
When they broke apart, Bucky’s chest was heaving, and he found himself following Sam without even realizing, only stopping when Sam laughed and pushed his hand against his chest, forcing his back to the wall again.
“You stay like that,” Sam told him, and Bucky was pleased to hear him sound a bit winded from the kiss. Good. He wasn’t the only one. “You stay where I put you.”
Bucky nodded eagerly, hard enough to give himself whiplash. “Yeah. Yeah, I’ll stay,” he breathed.
“You stay,” Sam repeated, then pulled back from Bucky after one last lingering look to disappear, heading for the exit of the boat.
Bucky’s heart skipped a beat and for a millisecond, he wondered if Sam was leaving, if he’d seriously misread this situation, but there was no way that was the case, right? Sam had kissed him.
Bucky could still taste him.
Sam Wilson tasted like fucking candy.
He heard some rustling, and then a clink and a grunt, and he realized that Sam was locking the door down to the area of the boat they were in, and he swore under his breath.
Sam was serious, then.
Wetting his dry lips nervously, he let a hand fall down to the bulge in his pants, pressing the heel of his hand against his cock, letting out a deep, shaky breath that he hadn’t realized he’d been holding in.
His eyes fluttered shut and he bit his lip before releasing it, remembering that it wasn’t his to bite, it was Sam’s, and fuck, just the thought of that was so fucking heady that it made him dizzy.
“There.” Sam appeared, making Bucky jump. There was a glint in his eyes as he drew closer, then pulled Bucky’s hand away to pin it above his head without a moment of hesitation, the sheer demonstration of his strength going straight to Bucky’s cock, and he caged Bucky in his arms by planting his hands on the wall until everything, Bucky’s entire goddamn world, was full of one Sam goddamn Wilson. “Now we can get started.”