He wonders when everything became so fucking tragic. He knows he never used to wonder this. Even though he doesn’t remember a lot, he remembers that. The things he does remember, though, the things he’s scribbled down in his notebook with rushed writing because he was always scared that the memories would leave him as quickly as they came. It was like a game. They’d come, they’d go, and he’d hurry to write them down or tell someone that could remind him later, but whether he forgot or remembered, he always seemed to lose. Sometimes he tells Steve, whispers in the dead of night, mumbles in the shower against wet necks, shaky voices over breakfast. Sometimes he doesn’t tell anyone. He thinks of Steve’s heartbreaking smile every time he hears a new memory that he’s lived in his own head a hundred times before, and Bucky hates himself for making him relive it again. He knows it should be a good thing, but he also knows they’ve lived enough to be dead, and maybe those memories should stay dead, too. At the start, everyday was a bad day. It got better, though, and so did he. And through it all, there was Steve. He was the only thing that hadn’t changed, not to Bucky anyway. He was still the same kid from Brooklyn, one who’d die for the people he loved. One who’d live for the people he loved. Bucky knew how hard it was for Steve after he had seen him for the first time all those years ago, to find a way to keep going despite it all. Steve was able to tell him now that back then, the only reason he’d gotten out of bed and fought was because of Bucky, because the thought that he’d had to do that for years without choosing made him hurt worse than he could ever say. At the start, Steve couldn’t stop blaming himself, he’d never tell Bucky, but he’d seen it in his eyes, every time he looked at him.
I let you go. I’m sorry.
Bucky didn’t know how to tell him it wasn’t his fault. Sometimes, his words weren’t enough. So he didn’t tell him. He’d leant in and kissed him on the mouth one cold night when he’d seen Steve’s guilt flash in his eyes particularly badly. Steve had been blaming himself that all of this had happened to them, that if he hadn’t let Bucky go, he wouldn’t have died, and then maybe Steve wouldn’t have had an excuse to put that plane and himself in the water. And he might’ve been right, but what he didn’t realize was it was his fault that they’d had a second chance at all. They’d both had their pain. They’d had their time to be sad and angry but now was their time to grow back. Grow back themselves, grow back better. Grow back together.
Somewhere along the way, the rest of the Avengers decided silently that they’re better together than alone and had all done small things to show them just that. They’d force the two of them to be paired up on missions, like they’d ever go separately. They’d ask one about dating just to make the other squirm with silent jealousy. They’d pay them surprise visits in the mornings just to catch them sleeping together. And they’d had a bet running for years about who would catch them together first. It was the only way to make it bearable to look at these two people who had suffered enough for all of them put together. They’d smile at the end, but it was important for them to smile right now. So Steve and Bucky went along with it. It was Bucky who’d had the idea. They’d been debating who to tell first when he had just wondered why they didn’t tell them all at once. So, one day in a meeting, Bucky had grabbed Steve and they’d kissed so fiercely they’d been lightheaded by the time they’d broken apart. After the deafening silence of disappointment, Tony had yelled that he’d seen it first and it had been anarchy after that. And Steve and Bucky had laughed through it and they’d forgotten for a bit how tragic it all was.
The fact that they could be together in public now was something they didn’t ever take for granted. They still had memories of dark back alleys behind diners where they’d kiss until the street lights turned on or someone stumbled past and they’d have to pretend like their lips weren’t burning when they were apart. And their apartment, walls seeing what the world wouldn’t, didn’t have to be their safe place anymore. The hadn’t realized before, but their safe place had always been with them. Their safe place was each other.
Bucky’s memories weren’t all back, and maybe they would never be. He remembered the smaller moments more than the bigger ones, which is why it was so hard to piece together his life before. The colour of the walls of their apartment, but not the number on the door. The secret grin they’d share over breakfast, but not why. The sound of Steve’s voice, but not what he was saying. And even though the smaller moments happened everyday, they somehow seemed as important as the big ones. Those were the little moments that made up the whole, the nuances in between the realization that he was falling headfirst for his best friend. He couldn’t tell if big moments stopped happening now, or if they were always happening. There wasn’t anything that stood out particularly until there was, and he knew it wasn’t just a big moment. It was the moment all the other moments had been leading up to. It shouldn’t have been as big a deal as it was, except they’d never said it to each other before. They’d known, in different ways, what they were feeling. It’s me. It’s Steve. Jerk. Punk. You’re my friend. You’ve known me your whole life. I’m with you ‘till the end of the line.
And then I love you had come along, and it fell like a question from Bucky’s lips and Steve tried to keep his voice steady, his heart pounding against his ribs, as he answered, I love you. It wasn’t always as good as this, but when it was, nothing else mattered. When it was, it was worth it all.
Steve had realized as he gazed at Bucky one night, the city lights dull compared to the glowing moon, that to be the first of something was rare, but to be the last of something was even rarer. And he was so lucky that the first person he loved, loved him back. He thought there was something even about that, like no matter how uneven everything else got, the knowledge that Bucky was always, the one constant, the one person he’d never stop loving, the one person that he never wanted to live without, was what had kept Steve Steve.
And they got it all. They’d made it. Twice. Two lifetimes with each other, and it still wasn’t enough. They knew they wouldn’t have forever, so they’d have to settle for right now. And Bucky knew, looking at Steve’s sleeping figure as moonlight spilled through their bedroom window onto glowing skin, that it had had to be enough. So they made it enough.