Chapter Text
After the fight over the Potomac, in 2014, Sam was the first to talk to Steve when he woke up. Steve was more beaten than he'd ever seen him, and of course he knew why. Steve told him he wouldn't be able to fight the Winter Soldier, and he wasn't able to. Bucky was the last of Hydra to get away, and Steve was found on the side of the Potomac river.
He wanted to tell him “I told you so”, but Steve beat him to it, said that Bucky had remembered him, and saved his life. He was disappointed when Sam told him that no one had seen Bucky since.
He couldn't resist. “I told you he wouldn't come around so easy.”
“I know. I'm not going to stop trying,” Steve replied, in that righteous voice of his. As if he wasn't bleeding in a hospital bed. Worn down to bits, only to claim the person who put him here had saved his life.
“I know you're not.”
He remembers feeling something akin to anger towards Bucky, for disappearing when things got tough. Isn't that what I did? he thought to himself. It wasn't a total coincidence that he joined the military when he did. He nurtured the anger regardless, kept it to himself as long as he could. Let it slip out in reasonable amounts.
He'd felt more pity than anger after Steve told him about the fight with Tony. How Bucky's arm was torn from his body for a second time. He’s glad Steve was there with him.
If you told Sam on that day in the hospital ten years ago that in 2024, Bucky would be his best friend, he wouldn't believe you.
“Sam!” He heard a shout faintly from below him. He flew downwards, close enough to drop down without injury, stumbling a little.
Bucky caught him by his shoulders, already analyzing how banged up he was.
“You gonna fall over on me?”
“Wouldn't dream of it.”
Hospitals were mouthy—they were meant to be somewhat discreet here—and the nearest one was a long drive anyway, Bucky figured, so he'd be dealing with this himself. They were back at the safe house, still stuck in this foreign country chasing leads that led to nowhere, and Sam had a stab wound ripping across his arm.
“I’ve never done someone else’s stitches before..” he bit the inside of his cheek. “Just my own. So don’t expect this to be any good.”
Sam was sitting in an armchair, Bucky towering over him preparing a needle on the table beside them.
Has anyone ever done yours before? Sam wanted to ask, but his lips stayed shut. He found himself keeping his questions to himself most of the time, with Bucky, he didn’t want to alienate him. Scare him off. Sam let out a whine as the sterilizer doused his blood soaked left forearm.
Bucky’s metal hand held his injured arm in place as he worked. The metal plates whirled in a faint noise. Sam looked away from his arm.
“Talk to me,” he asked, staring at Bucky’s focused expression.
“What?”
“Give me something else to focus on.”
As pararescue, he was trained to never shut up when he was patching someone up. Talking to them, explaining what he was doing, distracting them would help in the absence of painkillers. Clearly Bucky has never been briefed on how to treat an injured person, and why would he have been? He was usually the one doing the injuring.
“What do you wanna talk about?”
“Anything that’s not being stabbed.”
“Yeah? What about we talk about John Walker?”
“Don’t say his name either.”
Bucky sighed. “Once upon a time there was a stubborn injured asshole with a stab wound, leaking all over the place–”
“Hey–”
“--who needed me to patch him up and is now being picky about how I do it. I'm hungry Sam- and I'm tired -”
“It is a wonder how you manage to get along with children,” he mocked, though it really wasn’t. Bucky knew how to treat kids easily, he wasn’t condescending but he knew what information they could handle and what they couldn’t. And Sam knew vaguely that he had a younger sister, but he never asked about her. Maybe he should.
“You're taking it like a champ . Do you want a lollipop-?”
“Alright- Shut up, man.”
“You’re not a child, Sam,” Bucky kept his eyes down, but the stare still hurt.
I hurt like one , he thought. Didn’t they all?
“You never want a little sympathy when you’re hurt?” he said instead.
Bucky didn’t reply, just pulled the needle through Sam’s skin.
Ow.
“I’m trying to think of a story to tell you that’s not about Steve.” Or just… traumatic. Not appropriate to bring up now. Sam had his fair share of those.
“You can tell me one about Steve, if you want.”
“I don’t want to.”
“Okay.” Sam sharply exhaled at the needle puncturing his skin.
“Halfway done, we’ll go home soon. Well, my apartment. If I haven’t been evicted yet.”
“White Panther not paying his rent on time?”
“Psycho-assassin isn’t a very high paying job these days.”
“Yeah, and it used to be? Hydra pay you by the hour? How are you paying rent at all?”
“Disability,” he answered quickly.
“Yeah? What’s your disability, being a complete a-hole?”
“Yeah, actually.”
Bucky tightened his stitches, and Sam could swear he pulled it hard on purpose. “Careful, you might tear the skin.”
“You dug your own grave with the insults, Wilson,” he said, but seemed to remain stitching him more gently. Holding the wound shut, pushing the curved needle through. He winced anyway.
“Do you ever miss the 40s?” Sam tried, desperate to fill the silence. He'd mentioned he liked 40s music, back on Zemos's jet.
Bucky's eyebrows arched, confused by the sudden topic change. “Uh- sometimes. Not the war, not like Steve did.”
“You weren't so eager to fight?”
“No.. I didn't even sign up.” He huffed. “After my dad died, I just wanted to take care of my family. Felt bad because Steve wanted so badly to join, and I didn't even try. Got drafted anyway, though, huh?”
“Why do you keep doing it, if you never wanted to to begin with?” Sam studied his face.
Bucky's eyes didn't leave the stitches. “Cuz I gotta,” he whispered, then continued louder. “Have'to at least try to reverse my wrong, right?”
Their eyes met.
“I'm done,” Bucky spoke softly, Sam looking back at him puzzled before realizing he was done with the stitches.
Bucky straightened his posture, blood stained hands laying idle by his sides. “You okay?”
You don't have to atone for something you had no control over , Sam thought of telling him. If that was the truth, I'd be swimming in sin .
“Yeah,” he replied instead. Bucky nodded before walking off, probably to wash his hands.
Sam watched as the knife hurled at Bucky lodged itself in his shoulder, Bucky’s entire face going pale as a ghost. Sam could vaguely make out him stumbling into a gap between two buildings as he fought the masked person who just threw the knife.
Moments later, he was barreling into the alleyway after him, putting his hands on Bucky’s back as he stood there stunned.
Sam laid him back against the stone wall. “Shh— deep breaths, Buck.”
“I’m fine.” he insisted, his eyes shut, groaning. There was a knife horizontally sticking out his shoulder, so deep only the handle stuck out. “I’m fine- I’m fine.”
“Bucky– I need you to calm down, or you’re gonna pass out.”
“Sam, they’re gonna get away-”
“I don’t care, okay? I really do not give a fuck. Rhodey will go after them. I need to get this knife out of you.”
“Don’t– don’t— it’s got uh– divots in it–”
“I’m gonna pull it out as carefully as I can, I need you to stay calm, Bucky.”
He whined. Sam crouched down in front of him, grabbing the knife handle, slowly pulling on it. Bucky let out an exasperated groan, teetering on a scream. Sam observed the pained expressions, less far-away than they usually were in the heat of the battle—this time he was wincing fully, no suppression this time. Bucky was panting, both of them were, and letting out whines of pain.
When he took the knife out, he let it clatter to the ground—ignoring the blood and tissue it took with it—and quickly replaced it with his hand, putting firm pressure on it.
“Deep breath in, Buck.”
“Sam.”
Sam put his free hand to Bucky’s cheek, getting Bucky's own blood on his face.
“What's got you so shaken?”
Bucky squeezed his eyes shut, heavy breaths falling from his mouth.
“I've seen you take way worse hits and barely flinch.”
“Sam, please be quiet.”
“Hell no, I'm not letting you get lost in that cyborg brain of yours.”
“Go away.”
“Sure thing, man,” Sam pinned his shoulder against the wall, ripping off a piece of gauze from his roll with his teeth.
“Oh- I'm gonna pass out.”
“No you're not.”
“Fucking asshole.”
“Uh-huh.” Sam stretched out the rip in Bucky's clothes further, squeezing his wound shut as he wrapped it tightly around several times under his armpit and over his shoulder in bandages.
“If this doesn't super-soldier-heal quickly, I'm taking you to a hospital. We need to get out of here, though.”
Bucky sank to the floor further, blinking slowly.
“Bucky.”
“If I puked on your shoes would you hold it to me?”
“I'm not answering that.”
Bucky sucked in a mouth of air, letting his head fall back against the dirty brick wall behind him. Sam studied him intently, watching his chest rise and fall with urgency.
“What do you need?”
“To retire?” he coughed out. “Alcohol that can get me drunk?”
“Okay, I didn't mean a list.”
“ Sam.“
Sam crouched down in front of him, their faces not far apart. “Deep breaths, okay?”
Bucky smiled, his lips still parted as he breathed.
“What’s so funny?”
“You’re so close to me,” he huffed. “Kissing distance.”
Sam looked down at him horrified as Bucky let out a delirious giggle. And then he threw up on Sam's shoes. Next to Sam's shoes. Partially on Sam's shoes.
Bucky gathered his senses eventually, and soon enough they were on a jet back to Louisiana. They both knew Bucky planned on catching a flight back to New York after they got there, which Sam planned on interrupting. He wanted him home, didn't know when his home became Bucky's home but it had. After such a long mission, he needed some kind of closure before his friend crawled back in his cave to sulk.
They stared at each other on the ride back, like they used to but with less resentment. Bucky looked tired, his shoulder still bandaged underneath his new clothes, probably mostly healed by now. He wasn't in any shape to get on another plane.
Sam couldn't help but wonder if the kissing distance remark had some flirtation to it, or if it was just leftover banter from his times with Steve. Would Bucky condemn him for even thinking of it? Would he condemn Sam for considering that it wasn't flirting?
He didn't know. He never knew. He knew a little part of him wanted to go sit next to Bucky and lay his head on his shoulder, but he didn't know. They weren’t usually very touchy with one another, mostly just putting a hand on the other’s shoulder or a casual hug here and there. In this state, he’d more expect Bucky to growl at him than respond positively.
—--
Sam remembered a woman back in his support group. Sometimes, looking at Bucky's metal arm glistening in the sun's view, he thought of her. She didn't talk much- unless someone directly asked her a question or she really had something to add into the silence. It started with a J.. Jenny, he thinks.
She'd lost her right leg, and had her own much less Wakandan prosthetic.
One of the only times she spoke in the group, she said something that'd forever nuzzle its way into Sam's brain like a cold shivering dog seeking shelter. Or maybe salt in the wound.
"It feels like you're mourning something you never really appreciated. You take it for granted, and then it’s gone. Almost feels like a punishment for not being grateful before. Not being fully alert when it happened. And it was like an out of body experience.I still- look down at it.. knowing I'll be less of a person for the rest of my life."
That was the most she'd ever spoken in the support group, before quitting before Sam went on the run. Jenny was only in her 40s when she committed suicide 2 months after half the universe fell quiet. After Sam found out, a couple weeks after he was snapped back into existence, he couldn't help but wonder if he had been there- would she still be here too? Did she even remember him?
He thought this now, his gaze on Bucky's own prosthetic faltering.
"You okay?" Bucky set an empty can of paint on the deck, dropping a paintbrush in it with his metallic arm. He squinted his eyes to shield from the beating sun.
"Yeah- I just."
Bucky took a sip from his ice water- courtesy of Sarah- and continued to stare at him.
"Didn't wanna ruin the mood."
"Try me."
Sam took a deep breath, slouching further against the side of the boat. "Do you remember when you lost your arm?"
Now it was Bucky's turn to sigh, immediately averting eye contact, pretending to look for something in the sky. Maybe a way to answer this question.
"A little."
The air surrounding them both - in their bubble - felt so heavy you could swim through it. Slice through it like a piece of meat.
"You know-.." Bucky started, and Sam glanced up expectantly. "Part of it was amputated."
His eyes widened in confusion. "I thought it came off in the fall?"
Bucky coughed. "So did Steve. I'm not sure why they did it." He uncurled his fist, studying it. "Not like I could ask. It was before the serum too- the real one. Maybe it was easier for them to replace my whole arm than just my lower one, or it got too infected to keep."
"That's- that's horrible ."
Bucky raised his eyebrows. "I guess it is. It's possible I remember it wrong- not like that hasn't happened with everything already. I blocked it all out for so long , Sam."
“You were brainwashed.”
“No, even after that. Years after that, after Wakanda, even. Raynor said sometimes people forget traumatic things, but I guess it’s also possible the brain damage had something to do with it. Either way, there's still a million gaps in my memory.”
Sam stared back at him solemnly. “Why’d that knife freak you out so much?”
Bucky sighed opening his mouth to speak before-
“Sam! Dinners almost ready, get your ass out here and help me,” Sarah shouted from the dock.
Bucky attempted a reassuring smile, one that Sam just glared back at.
“Be there in a second!” Sam shouted, glancing back to see if Bucky was going to take the cop out or answer his question. Bucky pursed his lips, collecting a paint bucket before stepping off the boat and down onto the dock.