Bucky
Bucky’s phone rings as he reaches the third floor of the apartment building. He checks it to see Natasha calling: “Hey. Is anyone letting you use their apartment to watch the alley?” She was watching the entrance of the building while he needed a vantage point from within the building to the alley next to the building. Bucky knew Natasha didn’t like knocking on doors for a stakeout, so he ended up doing it every time.
“I’ve had three no’s, two doors slammed in my face, and a place with so many birds it looked like an animal shelter on steroids.” He knows he sounds a little pouty, and can tell Natasha finds this amusing.
“Well, at least it’s not spiders.”
“Really? You had to mention spiders?” Once he had yelled (squealed actually) when he saw a spider in his coffee cup on his desk, and now everyone at the station kept scaring him with them. He does give the corridor he’s walking through a quick look over; you can never be safe y’know. He can see another door at the end of this corridor. “I’m not done yet.”, saying that he cuts the call with Natasha and knocks on the door.
He hears footsteps and the door is opened by a short blond guy wearing a black tank top and plaid pajamas. He’s wearing glasses, but you could see those blue eyes from Mars (probably, Bucky doesn’t know). He forgets what he’s doing, or why he knocked in the first place. The blond looks at him with confusion, and Bucky has to shake himself into speech.
“Uh, uh, Detective Bucky Barnes, NYPD.”, he says while he pats around for his badge, which he finds in the inner pocket of his jacket. He flips it open for the blond, who now looks more confused with his eyebrows furrowed. Cute. The blonde looks over the badge fleetingly only to reply “I didn’t do anything wrong.”
“I didn’t say you did. In fact, I bet you never do anything wrong.” Bucky is already cringing as he’s saying the words. He tries to pass it off as a smile, but looking at the blond’s raised eyebrows, he can tell it didn’t work.
“Real smooth. That work for you with other people?”, the blond asks as he leans on the door with his arms crossed in front of him. “No. I don’t know why I said that. I’m not that guy.” What is he doing? He wishes he could keep his mouth shut in front of the cute guy, clearly, he is failing.
“So, who are you?” Is that flirting? That sounds flirty. Right, yes. His job.
“Just a cop that really needs some help.”, he said earnestly. This time Bucky knows what he’s doing. The bird lady would have kept him if he hadn’t actually run away from her house. Never say Bucky can’t charm his way through things. “Hmm.” Steve nods and waves his hand inside the apartment to let Bucky in.
Murmuring his thanks, Bucky heads in. As he removes his jacket, he looks over at the apartment. It has all kinds of knick-knacks scattered around. There’s a cozy chair right next to a big window, which Bucky thinks would overlook the alley. He makes his way to the window, while also peeking in through the other window in the living room. The blond had gone to the kitchen, presumably to give Bucky space. As Bucky finishes checking for where he can sit, Steve comes from the kitchen.
“So, Bucky, what’s going on? What are you looking for?”
“Well, all I can really tell you is that I have to watch that alleyway.” He points out to the alley, as the blond starts clearing out the space around him. Taking away his mug of brushes and a packet of sheets, the blonde only nods in response.
“Listen, if there’s anything you need to do, just pretend like I’m not here.”
“Why would I want to do that?” the blond says with a very sunny smile, Bucky melts a little. He sighs out loud, “Well, I just don’t want to get in your way.”
The blond has been pottering around for stuff, so Bucky keeps turning around to talk to the blond. The blond only then walks in front of Bucky, with a reassuring smile, “You’re not.”
He keeps whatever he has in his hands on the dining table, and pulls a smaller chair in front of Bucky. “So, you can’t talk about your case. Can you talk about yourself?” He has a big sketchbook in his hand. Huh, artist then. Now with the blond is sitting down, and looking up at Bucky with half a smirk, Bucky feels himself get pulled towards the guy. Usually, stakeouts are hours of staring at a door front or waiting for something to happen. He returns a smirk, draping his jacket around the chair sofa before sitting down.
Bucky had talked about himself before asking the blond what he does. His name was Steve, born in Brooklyn but moved to Manhattan after his mother passed away when he was 15 years old. His aunt took care of him until he went to college. He was an artist, but just selling his paintings didn’t pay the rent so he worked at an orphanage a few blocks away. After almost two hours of chatting, the two fell into a comfortable silence. Bucky kept his head turned towards the alley so he wouldn’t miss anything.
It was about fifteen minutes after nobody had said anything, Bucky noticed Steve working on his sketchbook with a pencil. He would sneak a look at Bucky from beneath his eyelashes, and then go back to sketching. It felt a little weird, so Bucky had to ask, “Alright, what are you doing there?”
Steve didn’t even look up to answer, “Just sketching you”. He did however look up to give a shy smile before going back to whatever he was doing.
“Really? Can I see it?”
“No” Steve answers immediately, while hiding the book in his chest, “It’s not done yet.”
Bucky chuckles at that, going back to looking at the alley. Nothing much was happening there, just a few passersby, not the suspect he and Nat were looking for.
Steve interrupts him again after a while, not looking up from his sketching, “Anyone ever tell you that you look like Gene Kelly?”
At that, Bucky looks at Steve, “No. Who’s Gene Kelly?”
“A movie star from the 50’s. Ya know, Singing in the Rain?” Steve looks a little surprised by his answer.
Bucky looks quickly at the alley before replying “I don’t really watch old movies.”
Steve sits up in his chair and sighs, “I love old movies. And I love Gene Kelly, he was so handsome.”
Bucky clears his throat and tucks his hands under his thighs, looking away from Steve in an attempt to hide the red flush that is for sure showing on his cheeks. This is definitely flirting, jesus almighty.
He hears a rustling of papers from Steve's direction before Steve speaks again “What do you like to do for fun?” Steve looks a little flustered, so he allows the topic change.
“I love the Mets.”
Steve goes back to sketching, sounding a little sheepish, “I don’t know much about baseball.”
Bucky doesn’t realize he has gasped out loud until Steve looks up from his sketchbook, now rotated almost diagonally. “You can’t live in this city and not love the Mets.”
Steve relaxes back into his chair, the grip on his sketchbook loosening. Laughing, he says “So tell me about them.”
Bucky couldn’t gauge if Steve seriously wanted to know or was just being polite, “Yeah?”
Steve drops his pencil beside him on the chair and pulls his legs up so he sits cross-legged on the chair, with the sketchbook on his lap. He has a big smile on his face as he nods. Bucky angles himself towards Steve so that he doesn’t have to move his neck a lot, before he nods to himself, “Okay, the story begins during The Glory Days from 1947 to 1957…”
Around seven-thirty, Bucky snaps out of his thoughts to get up from the chair. He stretches out his kinks, after having sat for long. He shoots a quick text to Natasha that he’s leaving, the victim’s aunt hadn’t been spotted moving so he should get going. He and Steve had talked about baseball and its history for almost two hours, before Steve got up to get them both coffees. He was currently napping on the couch behind Bucky.
Bucky takes a moment to look at Steve sleeping, half his blond hair fanning the couch pillow and the rest on his face. Steve slept with his mouth slightly open, but other than a sigh here and there, he was a quiet sleeper. He had his left arm under the pillow, while his right arm clutched the pillow right in front of his face. God this is too cute.
Bucky looks around to find a blanket draped over the handle of the couch near Steve’s feet. He takes it and covers him with it. He finds the sketch Steve was working on the coffee table underneath his glasses. Steve was a very talented artist, not just with paints, but even with pencils. He would have to look up Gene Kelly later.
He puts the sketch back on the table, and after a last glance at Steve, Bucky takes his jacket from his chair and takes his leave.