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Sam gives a low whistle, eyeing the car up and down. “We’re not fitting in that thing.”
“Good,” Bucky says. Steve blinks. Bucky frowns. “They won’t be looking for it,” he explains, shrugging.
Sam nods in agreement. “All right,” he says, “but I’m driving.” Steve opens his mouth to protest, but Sam holds up a hand. “I’m not squishing up next to either of y’all.”
Steve sighs. “Let’s just go.”
Bucky glares at Sam, but there’s something behind his eyes that isn’t quite malice. He and Steve somehow manage to squish into the back of the car, elbows pressing up against one another. Bucky’s legs fold up, knees pressing uncomfortably up against the back of Sam’s seat. Sam decides against mentioning it.
An hour away from the bolthole, Sam breaks the silence.
“So, are you two gonna talk, or?” he says, looking in the rearview mirror. Steve is staring out the window, looking for all the world like he belongs in a soft, acoustic music video. Bucky is glaring directly at Sam.
“Okay,” Sam says, “okay, not talking is fine. Do you want the radio on, or something? You listen to that kinda stuff, right? Radio?”
“Anything but country,” Bucky growls.
“See,” Steve says, “I told you we could trust him.”
Bucky gives a smile- the same smile he’d given when the word newspapers had tumbled out of his mouth. Sam tears his eyes off the rearview mirror, because that smile is not for him, and quickly flicks the radio on. He flips through a few channels before landing on the classical music station, and he hears Steve shift in the seat behind him.
Huh. Hundred-year-old man, likes classical music. Some of the stereotypes are true.
But it’s Bucky, not Steve, who starts humming along to the song.
Sam doesn’t have the faintest idea what it is- some piano song, or something- but Bucky seems to know it by heart. A glance in the rearview mirror, and he can see Steve staring at Bucky like he’s just pronounced the cure for cancer.
“Mozart?” Steve asks.
Bucky shakes his head. “Clementi,” he says.
“All sounds the same to me,” Steve says, and shrugs.
“Clementi’s happy,” Bucky says. “You can tell.”
“Oh,” Steve says, and that’s the last any of them talk for another half hour.
Steve insists they’re going to need fuel sooner or later, and that this might be their only chance to get it. A fifteen-minute argument results, ending with the mutual compromise of Starbucks.
“Okay,” Sam says, squinting at the sign through the car window. “So you wanted- what?”
“Grande, iced, sugar free, vanilla latte,” Steve rattles off. “With soy milk?” he says, almost a question. Bucky nods. “With soy milk,” he says again.
“Jesus,” Sam mutters. “You?”
Steve studies the menu. “Triple Venti, half sweet, nonfat caramel Macchiato.”
“How,” Sam says, “do you not know the difference between Star Wars and Star Trek, but you know what a Macchiato is?”
“Hurry up,” Bucky says, kicking the back of Sam’s seat.
“You’re gonna need to write those down,” Sam says, “because there’s no way in hell I’m rememberin’ all of that crap.”
“Grande,” Bucky growls. “Iced. Sugar free. Vanilla. Latte.”
Sam inches the car up to the ordering station and rolls down the window.
“Hey,” he says, and the speaker shoots out static that he thinks translates into Welcome to Starbucks, can I take your order?
He flicks his eyes up to the rearview mirror.
“Yeah,” he says, “I’ll have two black coffees, Tall. And a croissant.”
The foot on the back of his chair presses so hard that his stomach brushes the edge of the steering wheel.
“You know what,” he says, “better make those Short.”
They’re less than five minutes away from the rendezvous point Sharon had set up, when Steve grabs the back of the passenger side seat and looks intently at Sam through the rearview mirror.
“Wait,” he says.
Sam looks in the sideview mirror, but there’s no sign of a physics-defying metal suit blazing up towards them. Relieved that they’re not about to die, he looks in the rearview mirror and raises an eyebrow at Steve.
“What?”
“We should swap,” Steve says.
“What?”
Sam merges into the exit lane. Steve says nothing.
“Why?” he elaborates, sparing a glance from the road to gape at Steve again.
“I just think,” Steve says, sitting back down and shrugging. “You know, maybe- if we’re meeting the rest of the team later, maybe-”
“You want to get out of the driver’s seat,” Sam realizes. “You- oh my god.”
“Just,” Bucky says, as Steve opens his mouth. “Just let him have this.” Sam raises his other eyebrow in the mirror at Bucky, who rolls his eyes. “He likes being dramatic,” Bucky says.
“I am not dramatic,” Steve says.
“Stevie.”
Steve elbows Bucky. “Don’t Stevie me.”
Sam snorts. “Right,” he says, narrowing his eyes at Steve. “Dramatic, right. I forgot.”
“Hard to believe you could work with him regularly and forget that,” Bucky grumbles.
“I work with him on occasion, as an honorary Avenger-”
“So you’re like an intern?”
“I’m not an intern, I’m an-”
“Will you just pull over?” Steve barks, and Sam swerves the tiny car over to the side of the road.
Steve squeezes out of the car and clambers into the driver’s seat. Bucky looks at the empty seat beside him, and then back up at Sam. His eyes darken.
“Nuh uh,” Sam says, “I’m not sitting next to Red Scare.” And he slides into the passenger seat, beside Steve. He thinks he hears a barely muffled snort behind him, but ignores it. Steve rolls his shoulders, still hunched over, and pulls the car back onto the road.
“That was,” Sharon says.
“Late?” he offers, and it’s the wrong adjective. He barely knows what he says after that, and then Sharon’s heading back into her car and he can do nothing but look back at the car. Sam is smiling smugly. Behind him, Bucky is just… staring.
It’s not quite a blank stare, though, so he decides not to worry about it. He heaves their supplies and uniforms into the trunk of the tiny car, and has to squish his own suit under the front seat to make everything fit, but somehow it all does fit. Sam and Bucky watch him grunt as he shoves what he can into the trunk, neither offering to help.
Steve steps back into the car and closes the door, lips still tingling.
“You don’t like blondes,” Bucky says.
Sam chokes.
“I,” Steve splutters. “I- I don’t- I- what?”
“Don’t hurt yourself,” Bucky says, snorting. “S’just an observation.”
“What,” Steve says defensively, “just because I liked Peggy doesn’t mean I can’t like- other- types of people-”
“Peggy, sure.” Bucky shrugs. “Peggy, and Howard, and Wilson, and Stark-”
Steve swerves the car into the next lane violently.
“Hold up,” Sam says, and it’s his turn to grab the back of the driver’s seat and look increduously at Steve. Steve, whose face is rapidly beginning to resemble the inside of a freshly juiced grapefruit. “What was that about me?”
“He’s got a type, s’all I’m sayin’,” Barnes says, shrugging.
“I do not have a type.”
“You do,” Bucky argues, “tall, annoying, dark hair.”
Sam twists his neck and narrows his eyes at Bucky. “Kinda sounds like someone I know.”
Bucky’s eyes look dangerous enough to throw knives. Considering the kind of training he’s been through, Sam honestly wouldn’t be surprised if they could.
“The point is,” Bucky says, “you don’t like blondes.”
“I can like people if I want to,” Steve splutters.
“Uh huh,” Bucky says, and Sam begins to get the feeling that this conversation is becoming very, very entertaining for him. “And if you don’t want to?”
“I just-” Steve swears loudly as a truck merges beside him, nearly clipping off the sideview mirrors.
“Language,” Bucky says, before Sam can process the fact that Captain America is apparently well-versed in four letter words.
“Suck a cock,” Steve spits, and cuts the truck off. He gives a triumphant smirk and raises his foot. The speedometer falls fifteen notches. The truck honks behind them.
“Not to be a buzzkill,” Sam says, “but aren’t we sort of on a time limit, here?”
The truck honks again, and Steve loses another five miles an hour.
“Brainwashed super soldiers,” Sam says. “Armed and dangerous. Ready to kill, like. Everyone.”
The lane in front of Steve is nearly empty, now. The truck is tailing them closely, not leaving even a foot between their bumper and its front wheels. Steve grits his teeth, tightening his hands around the wheel, and Sam has a second to realize exactly what’s about to happen before Steve slams his foot on the gas.
The car shoots forward into the empty lane until it reaches the regular scramble of cars, then swerves left and right around them, barely dodging one, two, three possible firery car crash deaths along the way. Sam braces himself, one hand against the window, the other hand clamped so tightly around Steve’s seatback that he’s surprised his nails don’t break through the upholstery.
Steve takes their exit and swerves down the ramp.
“Told you,” Bucky says, kicking his feet up on the back of Sam’s seat. “Dramatic.”
“So,” Sam says, uncurling his fingers one at a time from the seat. “So what was that about me-”
“No, what was that about ‘I just’?” Bucky interjects.
“Nuh-uh,” Sam says, turning back and pointing threateningly at Bucky. Bucky eyes his finger as if he’s imagining all the ways he could break it. Or all the places it would fit nicely. Or both. “Nuh-uh,” Sam repeats. “No way, you said Wilson, what the hell did you mean by-”
“No,” Bucky says, shrugging. “No, he was sayin’ somethin’, you’re interrupting- and besides, I ain’t saying anything about you and-”
“No, you’re implying,” Sam says, shaking his finger in the air. “Implying’s worse.”
“Implying,” Bucky agrees, rolling his eyes. “You bring a thesaurus with you everywhere you go?”
“You ever heard of reading?”
“Didn’t have much time for it, when I was learning how to kill you twenty six different ways with my bare hands.”
“That’s a shame; I think a little Jane Austin woulda mellowed you out.”
Steve skids to a stop at the light, and spins around so fast in his seat that the seatbelt feeder breaks off the wall. “I will turn this car around!” he shouts, slamming his hands down on the wheel. It creaks dangerously, and Steve wrenches his hands back.
Sam bites his tongue- literally has to bite down on his tongue to keep from saying anything else. Bucky doesn’t seem to be capable of the same show of self control.
“I mean,” he says, and Steve’s thumbs begin pressing dents into the wheel. “You never said I was wrong.”
“I don’t,” Steve growls, “have a type.”
“You kinda do,” Bucky says. “And that ain’t what I mean.”
“Then what do you mean?”
“I mean you don’t like blondes.”
“That’s the same thing as saying I have a type!”
“Not really, no.”
“I’m going to give you a choice, Barnes.”
“Barnes-”
“You can shut your goddamn mouth for five minutes, or you can walk.”
“Uh,” Sam says, looking between Bucky and Steve. Steve looks at him with an anger Sam has never, ever seen before. “The, uh,” he says, pointing at the windshield. “The light’s green.”
Steve swivels his eyes at Bucky, who stares him back down. After a moment of silence, Steve’s foot presses down on the gas and the car begins to turn. He doesn’t take his eyes off Bucky’s.
“Turn signal,” Bucky says.
Sam presses his face into his hands and prays.
By the grace of God, Bucky and Steve somehow manage to scrape out of the airport alive. And with a fully intact jet, no less.
Bucky sees the second Iron Man fall from the sky, sees the first Iron Man and Sam soar down to catch him. Sees the dent in the ground the second Iron Man makes, and knows that it’s his fault.
If Steve sees it too, he doesn’t say anything.
They waste an hour in the air before there’s any sound in the plane besides the wind against the windows. Bucky, half tempted to curl up on the floor and fall asleep for five goddamn minutes, sits up a little. He’s gotten by with less sleep and less fuel than this before, and the adrenaline of finally catching this asshole is enough to keep him up and running for as long as he needs to.
“Your friends,” he says, remembering them. “What will happen to them?”
“Whatever it is,” Steve says, and takes a moment to find the right words. “They’ll… deal with it.”
Bucky chews his lip. He remembers the archer, how he’d agreed to sacrifice his freedom in place of theirs. He doesn’t even know the archer’s name.
Barton, Clint, something in his mind supplies. He tries to ignore it.
“Maybe,” he says, “maybe I’m not worth all this, Steve.”
“Buck,” Steve says. “Buck, everything that happened… it wasn’t your fault. It wasn’t you. HYDRA made you do it.”
“I know.” Bucky nods to himself. “But I still did it.”
The silence comes back again, and the jacket feels tight over Bucky’s chest. The plane feels smaller, somehow.
Jets like these, Bucky realizes, must not get turbulance. It’s advanced, more advanced than the helicopter he now remembers trying to steal. He doesn’t remember where he’d intended to go with it. This plane stays smooth through the air, as they soar over clouds and cities. He barely hears the rain splatter against the reinforced glass as they pass through a low hanging cloud.
“So,” Steve says, “blondes?”
It takes a moment for Bucky to understand what Steve means. When he does, he snorts.
“Come on,” Steve says, “you had me interested.”
“I just wanted to get Wilson’s nerves down,” Bucky says, shrugging.
“Uh huh, sure.”
“He’s better at hiding in plain sight than you are,” Bucky points out. Steve opens his mouth to say hey, but Bucky runs him over. “Still sticks out like a sore thumb, though.”
“So your solution was to get him angry?”
“My solution was to get him comfortable.” Bucky shrugs. “And that meant arguing, clearly-”
“You were lying in that hotel room,” Steve says, flicking on the autopilot. “And you’re lying now.”
“Please.” Bucky slides his gaze to the window and watches the raindrops scream.
“You are,” Steve insists. He unlocks the bottom of the pilot’s seat and swivels the chair around to face Bucky.
“Why would I even need to lie to you?” Bucky points out, something like a smile behind his lips.
“You tell me.” Steve smiles easily, crossing his legs. For all they’ve lost today, they still have this. “You seemed pretty up in arms about it. And for the record.” He pins his elbow on his knee and rests his head on his fist, “I think you were right about me having a type.”
Bucky looks up. “Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
A moment passes.
“Was I right about anything else?” Bucky asks.
“You were right about a lot of things,” Steve says.
“Like what?”
“Like not wanting to like people.”
Bucky lets out a sharp breath through his nose. “I was always right about that.”
“Always?”
“You know how much I wanted to hate Carter?”
Steve frowns.
“The other one,” Bucky elaborates.
“Peggy?” Steve’s frown turns sad. “You didn’t like Peggy?”
“I loved Peggy,” Bucky insists. “But you don’t know how much I-” He grits his teeth and his metal fingers recalibrate themselves. He takes a breath. “You loved her.”
“I did.” Steve nods. “I did.”
“And I always thought,” Bucky said. “If anyone. If anyone deserved you, if anyone got to have you, she’d… she’d be all right.”
“The Bucky Barnes seal of approval,” Steve muses. “That’s pretty high praise.”
“Shaddup.” Bucky leans back against the window.
“I’m glad you liked her,” Steve says. His hand balls into a fist as he keeps it from grabbing onto Bucky’s shoulder.
“I didn’t want to,” Bucky says, slowly. “But I did.”
“Okay.” Clearly not understanding, Steve nods. “Okay.”
“And I don’t,” Bucky continues, “I don’t want to hate Carter.”
“This Carter?”
“This Carter.”
Steve tips his head to the side, questioningly.
“I don’t want to hate Carter,” Bucky repeats.
“But you do,” Steve finishes.
“But I do,” Bucky agrees. “Not because she kicked me in the face.”
Steve winces.
“I’ve been kicked in the face before,” Bucky adds. Steve’s wince doubles.
“You don’t want to hate her?” Steve prompts, carefully.
“You like her,” Bucky says, and shrugs. His metal arm scrapes against the window.
“I- respect her,” Steve says.
“You like her,” Bucky repeats.
“She spied on me for months in my own home,” Steve points out.
“You like her.”
“I don’t- I just-”
“You just?” Bucky tears his eyes off the rain and looks into Steve’s. “You said that before. You just.”
“I just wanted to give her what she wanted,” Steve says, helplessly. “She’s- she’s Peggy’s neice, she’s helped me so much, she didn’t have to, and she wanted- she wanted-”
“You,” Bucky supplies.
Steve sighs. “I shouldn’t have done it.”
“It’s not really the most pressing issue at hand.”
“Doesn’t make it right. Small mistakes matter just as much as big ones.”
“All right, Mr. Inspirational Quotes.” Bucky sits up. “My point stands. You don’t like blondes.”
Steve huffs. “No,” he says, “I really, really don’t.”
“I knew it.”
The stubble on Bucky’s face, Steve realizes, is almost a moustache. Bucky, he thinks, would look hideous with a moustache. The rest of the stubble suits him, though.
“Sorry, am I boring you?” Bucky says, and Steve realizes he’s been staring.
“No,” he says, leaning back. “No, no, not- no.”
“So your type,” Bucky prompts, amused. “Your type, the type that I was apparently right about.”
“Oh my god,” Steve groans. “You’re never letting that go, are you?”
“Never,” Bucky hums. “So, tell me.”
“Tell you?” Steve frowns. “About what? There’s nothing to tell.”
“About your type.”
“You- you said my type already, I don’t need to spell it back out for you.”
“Maybe I just want to hear you say it.”
“Why? To torment me?”
“I missed tormenting you.”
And that’s what does it, really. Steve sighs, sinking an inch or so into the chair. It’s a welcome distraction from the reality of what they’re doing, anyway.
“There are other things we could be talking about,” he points out.
“I want to talk about this.”
“Ugh.” Steve rubs a hand over his face. “Fine. What about my type?”
“There’s a pattern. I’d say Tall, Dark, and Handsome, but Stark doesn’t really fit the bill for the Tall part.”
“Stark’s not my type,” Steve grumbles.
“Fine, an anomaly.” Bucky shrugs. “So, Tall, Dark, and Handsome still stands.”
“Sure.”
“Wilson?”
“Why is my sex life so important to every Russian spy I ever work with?”
“One, I’m not Russian, and two, who said anything about your sex life?”
“You said type-”
“I didn’t say sex.”
“Bucky, you can’t just say-”
“No one’s here to hear it.”
“That doesn’t make it any less-”
“Was that your first kiss since 1945?”
Steve’s tongue grinds to a halt halfway through a word, and he gapes at Bucky. Bucky shrugs.
“Just sayin’.”
“Saying what?”
“She’s not your type.”
“Will you get off that already?”
“Maybe. Maybe not. I like winding you up.”
“I’ve been wound up for a while, now, feel free to let go.”
“This is more fun.”
“For you, maybe.”
“For me, definitely. This is the most fun I’ve had in years.”
“Yeah, yeah.” Steve rolls his eyes. “Rebuild your memory from scratch, remember me, and the first thing you do is rile me up about my inability to get girls. Figures.”
“Just like old times.”
“You’re unbelievable.”
“And you’re still as dumb as you always were.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means you’ve got a type.”
“Bucky, are you seriously going to-”
“Tall.”
Bucky stands up.
“Dark.”
Bucky tucks a lock of hair behind his ear.
“And handsome.”
Steve swallows back whatever words his brain was halfway through processing.
“Oh,” is all he manages.
“Told you so,” Bucky says.
Steve squares his shoulders and stands, too. “I seem to remember that being something more like Tall, Annoying, Dark Hair.”
“Eh, close enough,” Bucky says, and kisses him.
A few seconds, or perhaps minutes later, Steve realizes that they’re standing up in a plane. He grabs Bucky around the waist and braces one hand against the ceiling.
“Moving a little fast,” Bucky says, “aren’t we?”
“Shut up,” Steve mutters, and tightens his hold around Bucky’s waist as the plane shudders.
“How long until we land?” Bucky asks, nodding over Steve’s shoulder. The trees below them have been turning steadily icier for the last half hour.
“Uh.” Steve looks over his shoulder at the panal. “Few more hours,” he says, turning back. “Four at the most.”
“Good,” Bucky says. “Then we’ve got time.”
And soon, they’ll be loading their weapons and standing at the edge of the doors. They’ll head down that ramp and into the base and fight whoever comes out. Soon, they’ll have to face the music.
But right now, they’ve got time.