and 22 for sambucky, perhaps?? 🍯
22. don't say yes
It is, technically speaking, Sam’s fault that he ends up where he does. Usually, there’s a little more nuance, but this time around, it’s completely on him.
His mother had been fond of saying that eavesdroppers were bound to hear things they didn’t like, and little Sam had only had to test this theory a few times before deciding that she was right. The lesson had worn off at some point, though, as high school and college came and went, and as keeping your ear to the ground made all the difference as a soldier and later as a superhero.
But Sam doesn’t mean to eavesdrop on Bucky. Not really, anyway.
He pulls up to Bucky’s newly-purchased cottage and goes around back to drop off Sarah’s spare wheelbarrow. All afternoon at the docks yesterday, Bucky had been making noises about working on the garden at the new place, setting up a vegetable patch and hauling around some of the bricks left behind by the last owners to make up a little retaining wall.
When Sam had asked just how much experience Bucky had with growing vegetables, he’d mentioned that his Ma had kept a victory garden during the war, and then gone quiet until the boys burst in and demanded his attention. Bucky had gone back home not long after, and Sam had figured that the wheelbarrow and the extra gardening tools he’d pulled from the shed might be some kind of peace offering.
He sets the trowels and gardening gloves on the back porch and leaves the wheelbarrow nearby. It’s more habit than anything else that has him stopping to examine the boards and the porch railing, checking for rot or cracks. Sam doesn’t even realize that Bucky’s bedroom window is open, not until his voice carries out of it and into the yard.
“I promise I’ll be back soon,” he’s saying. “It’s just a quick errand.”
Sam furrows his eyebrows. He’d maybe expected Bucky to be on the phone, but it sounds like he’s talking to someone who’s there with him.
“The hardware store is close,” says Bucky, and the warmth in his voice is unmistakeable, “and the nursery’s not that far, either. I’ll be an hour, tops.”
He tries not to, but Sam can’t help but strain his hearing, trying to catch the reply from whoever is up there with Bucky. He can’t make out any words, but that doesn’t make him feel better. It’s 8 AM on a Saturday; whoever it is could easily just be tired.
It’s far too easy a leap from that particular conclusion to just why someone might be at Bucky’s house in the morning and too tired to really speak. Sam feels queasy all of a sudden.
Bucky had turned down an invitation to have dinner with them last night, and he’d left the docks in the late afternoon instead of hanging out like he usually did. Sam had assumed that he was going back to work on the house while it was still light out, but maybe that wasn’t it. Maybe Bucky had gone into town, or to a bar somewhere. Maybe Bucky had brought someone home with him, and that someone had stayed the night.
Sam is just trying to convince himself that there’s a perfectly platonic, rational explanation to all this when he hears Bucky’s voice again.
“Baby,” Bucky says, somewhere between affectionate and chiding. “Sam’s gonna be here any second; you know I can’t just leave him hanging.”
That’s not how you talk to a one night stand, Sam realizes, with a sinking feeling. That’s how you talk to someone who’s been around for a little while, and who plans to stay that way.
Had he missed the signs somewhere? Had he misread all those conversations that he’d thought were moments with Bucky, even when they’d been on their own separate world-saving missions? All the text messages and the scraps of time they’d caught together in New York or DC or here in Delacroix?
Bucky shyly admitting that he’d put an offer in on a house in town had seemed like a confirmation of something, like establishing solid ground for them to take those first steps together. Now, though–now Sam can’t help but wonder if that solid ground isn’t his to tread, if Delacroix was the choice not because it’s Sam’s home but because it’s someone else’s.
“You’ve got to give me my shirt back, Sweets; I can’t go out without it,” comes Bucky’s voice again, and this time, Sam makes himself step back, intent on hustling back to the truck and booking it out of here before Bucky realizes he was there at all.
He’s already drawing up an excuse in his head, trying to strike the right balance of a reasonable last second cancelation and nothing that’ll worry Bucky too much, but the extra distraction proves to be the last thing he needs. Sam runs right into the wheelbarrow, which falls against the nearby stack of bricks with an extra-loud clang, reverberating outwards like a bell.
“Fuck,” Sam murmurs, and has just enough time to right the wheelbarrow before Bucky is calling out the window.
“Sam, is that you?” Sam doesn’t say yes at first, still trying to salvage his escape plan, and Bucky calls out again. “Sam? Are you there?”
It’s only latent self-preservation instincts that remind him it’s probably a bad idea to make the former Winter Soldier think that there’s someone skulking around his property uninvited, and he finally makes himself answer.
“Yeah,” Sam calls back. “It’s me, sorry.”
There’s no response for a moment, and then the door to the back porch opens. Bucky is smoothing down his t-shirt like he just pulled it on, and Sam’s stomach lurches just a little.
“Hey,” Bucky is saying, “sorry I’m late; I just got caught up with- wait, what’s that?”
It takes Sam a beat to realize where he’s pointing, distracted as he is by Bucky’s ruffled hair and the pillowmarks on his face. Even as part of him grapples with what he’s just learned, he can’t help but feel happy that Bucky seems to have slept through the night.
“It’s a wheelbarrow,” he finally manages to say, like it’s not the most obvious thing in the world. Sam clears his throat, but it does nothing to ease the sudden tightness he feels there. “Thought you might need one, for your garden and all. Plus, uh- we had some spare trowels and stuff at the house. No sense in buying new ones if you don’t need them.”
Bucky looks as surprised as he always does when he’s on the receiving end of a gesture like this, but he thanks Sam warmly. “If I supply coffee and snacks, d’you think Captain America might throw in his help along with the wheelbarrow?” he asks, grinning.
Sam smiles in spite of himself. “Maybe, but it better be some fancy coffee.”
“I think I can make that happen,” says Bucky, nodding. “You about ready to head out? Is there anything we need to take with us to the hardware store?”
“About that,” says Sam, trying to keep his breathing even, “I was thinking maybe it would be better if we rescheduled? I, uh- I know weekends can be busy, and maybe there’s stuff that needs your attention, so we can-”
“Sam, this is the stuff that needs my attention,” Bucky says. His eyebrows furrow after a second, and realization crosses his face. “Oh, wait, do you have something you need to do? Is the motor still giving you guys trouble on the boat? Because we can just head over there instead; the hardware store can wait, but Sarah can’t miss that afternoon charter.”
It would make for a good excuse, but the boat is just fine, and if Sam said otherwise, Bucky would insist on coming along to help. “It’s not that,” Sam says. “Sarah’s all set for the charter. I just didn’t want to take you away from anything important, or pressing, or, I don’t know, more enjoyable than a trip to the hardware store and the nursery. You know Hank and Lottie are going to want ten minutes of gossip for every ten minutes of shopping.”
“I’m counting on it,” Bucky says, giving Sam a slightly odd look. “I want to hear what the deal is with that new couple who just bought the flower shop.”
Sam shrugs. “Just want you to remember that it might take a while, that’s all.”
Bucky waves a hand. “I have time,” he says. “Might even be able to squeeze in a trip to the coffee place so I can put a down payment on your help with the garden.”
That, weirdly, is the final straw for Sam. He may be quietly jealous of this unknown person who’s loath to let Bucky out of bed in the mornings, but they deserve some consideration, at least. If Sam’s partner was going to spend the day gallivanting around after promising to be home as soon as possible, he’d want to know.
Just as Sam opens his mouth to finally address the elephant in the room, Bucky is continuing on, as oblivious as ever. “Let me just grab my shoes,” he’s saying. “And then we can head out.”
He turns and opens the backdoor again, but just before Bucky can step inside, they’re met with the loudest, most plaintive meow that Sam has ever heard. It’s followed by a few more: short, sharp mews of complaint, very clearly addressed at the person deemed responsible.
For a second, Sam’s brain processes ‘there is a cat in Bucky’s house and it’s mad at him’ to mean that a stray cat got in through an open window and found that it couldn’t get out. Then he looks back at Bucky and finds him sitting in the doorway, now cradling a tiny white kitten in his left arm.
The cat is mewling loudly at him, with more force than such a small animal should have, and Bucky…Bucky is nodding along to the complaints, murmuring comforting nonsense back.
“I know, I know, you told me not to go,” he says, gently petting the cat. “Sorry, baby. I should’ve taken you with me, huh?”
There’s one last meow in response, softer than the others, before the cat curls up in Bucky’s arms.
Sam, still astonished, glances from the upstairs bedroom window to Bucky and the cat and back again.
Sorry, baby, Bucky had said. You told me not to go.
“Wait, you were talking to your cat?” asks Sam.
Bucky frowns, looking confused. “That’s what this animal is called, yes. And I’m currently talking to her, so…yes to that, too?”
“No, I mean earlier,” says Sam, before he can stop himself. He feels his eyes go a little wide.
“Earlier when?”
“Uh, nothing. Never mind. Are you gonna introduce me to your cat, or what?”
But Bucky’s persistence is one of his best and most annoying qualities. “Earlier when, Sam?”
With the same consideration that he gives to a particularly risky throw of the shield, Sam makes himself answer. “Just when I got here. A few minutes ago, that’s all.”
“You heard me talking?”
“Yeah,” says Sam. “Your window was open and I was bringing the wheelbarrow around. I heard you saying you’d be home soon, and calling someone pet names, and I made an assumption. I guessed wrong, that’s all.”
Bucky arches an eyebrow. “So you were eavesdropping, then?”
“I was doing a favor for my friend and bringing him a wheelbarrow that’s almost as ancient as he is,” says Sam, his voice dry. “Not my fault you project like you’re on Broadway and aiming for the cheap seats.”
That gets a snort of amusement, at least. Sam steps onto the porch and takes a seat beside Bucky, holding out his hand for the cat to sniff.
“Sam, this is Alpine,” Bucky says. “Alpine, this is Sam.”
Alpine seems to deem Sam trustworthy enough, because she settles back down in Bucky’s arms and doesn’t tense when Sam runs a gentle finger along her back.
“How long have you had her?” asks Sam. “How’d I miss this cat hair on your extensively black wardrobe?”
“Two weeks,” says Bucky, “and I now own about a dozen lint rollers.”
“That’ll do it, I guess.” Sam laughs quietly. “You know the boys are going to want to meet her as soon as possible, right?”
“Sarah asked me to pick them up from school on Monday; I thought I might bring them by to see her then.”
Sam hums in acknowledgment and wonders if he’ll ever get used to the way Bucky has neatly folded himself into their lives.
He doesn’t get a chance to ponder it for very long, though, because then he feels eyes on him, a vibranium shoulder pressed into his own.
He has about two seconds to brace himself before Bucky asks, “So if you heard me talking to Alpine and didn’t realize I was talking to a cat, who did you think I was talking to?”
It’s been a long time since Sam acted or felt like a teenager, and he’s not proud to say that he defaults to a classic 16 year old response: shrugs a shoulder and says, “I don’t know,” as nonchalantly as he can,
It does not work.
“Sam,” says Bucky. “Seriously, it’s Saturday morning. Who would be at my house at 8 AM on a Saturday?”
Sam shrugs again, but this time he makes himself answer, even if he can’t take his eyes off his lap. “Someone who fell asleep here, maybe.”
“Fell asleep here? What does that even-”
“Buck, I know the aw-shucks routine was a real hit in the forties, but you don’t need to go around pretending not to know what sex is now.” Sam means for it to sound light, but the words feel sharp as he says them.
“That’s not what I was trying to do,” says Bucky, and Sam might be imagining it, but there’s something careful in his voice now. “I just didn’t think of it.”
“Right,” says Sam, flat. “Of course not.”
Because only someone with a definitely-more-than-a-crush on their friend and superhero partner would hear three sentences through an open window and immediately assume that they had a romantic rival. Normal people with normal feelings about their friend and superhero partner wouldn’t be fazed.
Part of Sam is searching for an exit strategy again, trying to figure out the best way to wriggle out of this so he can contend with the embarrassment in peace for a while before things go back to normal. He would break out an excuse to get going, except that Bucky is still talking.
“I’m not saying it wouldn’t have come to mind before,” he’s saying, and Sam wants very badly for this conversation to end so he can be swallowed by the earth. “I just, um- I haven’t thought about entertaining people that way in a while, because there’s someone I’m interested in.”
It’s a medical miracle, Sam thinks, that he can feel like someone has punched him in the stomach and yet his curiosity still manages to seize control of his mouth and ask questions. “You sure you don’t have that backwards? It feels like the sort of thing that would be on your mind more, not less.”
He feels Bucky shrug beside him. “We’re taking it slow, I think.”
“Oh?” asks Sam, suddenly beset by chaste visions of Bucky sharing a milkshake with someone at the retro themed diner in Chalmette.
“Yeah,” says Bucky. “Not even any real dates or anything yet.”
Blessedly, the diner and the milkshake disappear. “No dates at all?” asks Sam, because apparently he likes pressing on bruises.
“No dates,” echoes Bucky. “But errands, sometimes.”
Sam furrows his eyebrows, finally turning to look at Bucky. “Errands?”
Bucky nods. “Yeah, errands. Like, grocery store runs, or gardening,” he says, and it seems like the corners of his mouth are turning up. “Or even trips down to the hardware store and the nursery.”
Sam blinks. “Wait, what?”
There’s clearly a grin on Bucky’s face now. “I mean, I’m assuming that the hardware store doesn’t count as a date, because if it were a real date, I’d be getting flowers instead of a wheelbarrow.”
There’s a rushing in Sam’s ears as he processes Bucky’s words. For a moment, he can’t seem to make his mouth work. When he finally does, his voice is embarrassingly creaky, like he hasn’t spoken in days. “Next time,” he croaks. “Next time, it’s flowers, I promise.”
“Okay,” Bucky says, his smile widening. “Next time, then.”
“Okay,” echoes Sam. “It’s a date.”
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