Chapter 6
2003
Schmidt had put the gun in Sara's hands, raised it to her skull, and pulled the trigger himself. The gunshot residue had even gotten on both his hands. Steph wasted no time mourning her mother. She knew she was dead the moment Schmidt snorted coke off his butterfly knife. She turned and ran.
She knew better than to go to the creek, where the police would find her and turn her in to Schmidt. He was her legal guardian, after all. And the police never believed children. Whatever lie Schmidt told them, she was certain they'd eat up. She couldn't go to Jimmy's house, either. Even if it made him hate her, she wouldn't be safe there. She wouldn't be safe anywhere until Schmidt was dead.
The moment the gun went off, she turned and ran. She didn't take a single thing with her. She'd been crouched on the floor next to Jimmy while the whole thing went down. He'd been hit pretty good, but his breathing was even. She had to trust he'd be okay. She had to take care of herself.
She ran and ran and didn't stop, even when she had an asthmatic attack and her lungs felt like they were on fire and her knees felt like they were going to collapse. She ran to the train station, hopped on, and hid in a storage compartment until they were done checking tickets. If anyone questioned her, she said her mom was nursing her baby brother in the bathroom and had the tickets with her. It took her three hours to reach New York City. She stole a bottle of black hairdye from the first drug store she found, cut her hair with nail clippers and passed herself off as a boy. She walked up to a police officer and told him she was homeless and her mom was an illegal immigrant. He took her to social services, and they entered her into the system with a falsified name. She spent the night at the office and by the next day she was being sent to a foster home in Ohio.
They found out she wasn't a boy immediately, but it didn't matter. She purposefully acted out to try and get the foster parents to give her up, and from the Ohio social services office she was taken in by a family in Illinois.
She went further and further west, as far as she could go to get away from Schmidt and her life in New York. She had Jimmy's parent's home phone number memorized, but she never called it. Not even once. She thought of him every single night and wished they could have run away like she wanted. It never would have worked, she knew. If they'd travelled together, if people had known to look for them, they would've been caught. But alone, she was safe. It was better for Jimmy if he forgot her.
2009
On July 4th, 2009, Steve submitted the paperwork to change his name, from his falsified name Samantha Wilson to Steven Grant. No middle name. He'd chosen the name Sam because of its gender neutrality, before he'd even learned what it meant to be transgender. He thought of Jimmy. He was 23 now. He wondered if he'd gone to medical school, like his dad wanted. She didn't look him up online.
2013
Johann Schmidt, deceased 5/26/13, age 63. Johann passed away from a long battle with lung cancer…
Steve didn't need to read the rest of the article. He was in Arizona, now, and had been doing sex work for five years. He had enough money saved to buy a plane ticket to New York. He visited his old hometown to discover that the neighborhood and creek where he'd grown up had been dozed over and replaced by factories. When he rang the doorbell to the Barnes' household, some stranger answered the door and told her they'd moved out seven years ago.
He looked James Barnes up on FaceBook, but without a birthday, there was no finding him. Jimmy had clearly moved on.
It was just one summer, he told himself. No use being sentimental about it.
So he bought an apartment in Albany and moved on. Jimmy probably hated him, anyway. He'd disappeared without a word, a trace, or a sign, without even waiting to make sure Jimmy woke up. It was just one summer romance- built on deception, Steve reminded himself- and that person didn't even exist anymore. It was never meant to be.
2023
"Jimmy?" Steve gasped, staring at Bucky.
"Uh, yeah?" Bucky answered, not caught up yet. "Or James. But I prefer Bucky. Did you see that on my mail, or something?"
He couldn't believe he didn't recognize him. But it was New York City- he didn't expect to see Jimmy here. And he didn't expect him to be a hundred pounds heavier. The beard didn't help things, either, but under the extra fat and the facial hair, the boy Steve knew was still there. The eyes and the nose were the same. The voice was the same, just deeper. The mannerisms, his laugh, his hands, everything was still the same. Steve had been trying to identify some feeling he had in the back of his mind, and now he knew what it was. Familiarity. He'd been living next to him for a year and he didn't even know.
He didn't blame Bucky for not recognizing him. Firstly, there was being in a different city. Secondly, he'd transitioned. He was even wearing makeup that changed his face a little. It had been twenty years, and they'd only met four times, to be fair. In dark lighting, while they were both a little drunk. If Jimmy was still there inside Bucky, Steph was a person who had really died years ago, and Steve was just the man who inherited her body and memories.
He didn't even know how to explain it to Bucky. He thought for a moment about not telling him, about waiting for Bucky to figure it out, but he'd been honest so far. "Bucky, it's me. It's Stephanie Rogers. I'm the one who's with you in the picture." He pointed.
Bucky's eyes snapped back and forth between Steve's face and the picture in his hands. Steve knew he heard the words, but he wasn't comprehending their meaning. Steve began to fear he'd tell him to get the hell out of his apartment, or tell him he hated him.
After almost a full minute, tears welled up in Bucky's eyes. "…Steph?" he squeaked out, like he almost couldn't believe it.
"Yeah, Bucky. Steven. I changed my name, obviously. I got away from Schmidt. I was put in the system and I moved as far away as possible. I'm sorry I never tried to find you. I figured you must have hated me, but I-"
Bucky stepped over to Steve and pulled him up by his shoulders, pulling him into a hug. Steve wrapped his arms around Bucky, feeling his full tummy press into his abs, his soft sides, the rolls wrapping around his back. His face was at the perfect height to nestle into Bucky's moobs.
"I thought you were dead," Bucky sobbed, holding Steve tight like he was never going to let him go. "I thought he killed you. I thought it was my fault."
"No, Jesus, Buck. Have you blamed yourself all these years? It wasn't your fault. There was no way that situation ended well. I'm lucky to be alive. You were just a kid. There's nothing you could have done."
"Wait." Bucky held Steve's shoulders away and peered down into his eyes. "You told me you were fourteen."
Steve shrugged. "I lied. Sorry."
Bucky scowled. "Christ, Steve. You had me sixteen and trying to fuck a twelve year old."
Steve laughed through the tears. "Don't worry. I wouldn't have let you."
"I was gonna marry you," Bucky whispered.
You still can, Steve wanted to answer. But it was too new. It had been twenty years. Even if they knew each other back then, they still needed to get to know each other now.
"You owe me a sleepover," Bucky told him.
Steve laughed and took a sip of water. "Well, yeah. I'm way too drunk to drive home now."
Steve told Bucky every detail of his life since escaping New York. Bucky scowled and shook his head disapprovingly throughout the story, his old protectiveness coming back to the surface like riding a bike. But Steve knew he'd made the best decisions he could have at the time. After all, all his decisions had brought him here, back to Bucky's apartment.
"I can't believe you went through all that," Bucky exclaimed. "I was an asshole. I should've told my parents what was going on with you. We should've called the police, we should've--"
Steve cut him off with a wave. "Don't worry yourself thinking about what we could have done differently. We were children. We didn't do anything wrong. It was the grown ups that fucked it all up. Speaking of, how are your parents?"
Bucky rolled his eyes. "We haven't talked in years. They don't approve of me being bisexual. And a college dropout. And a burnout. And fat. I'm much happier now that I don't have them in my life."
"How long have you known you were bisexual?"
"Since forever. I always liked guys and girls. You know, I knew you were a girl, but I saw you as a guy, even back then. I liked you the same way I would've liked a boy, if I'd had a crush on one then."
Steve smiled. "I know. You never treated me like a girl. But you always treated me like your girlfriend." He pulled out his phone, and angled it sideways to recreate the picture they'd taken almost twenty years ago, and sent it to Bucky's number.
(Art by me)
Bucky looked down at the picture on his phone. "Jesus, I look fat," he complained. "You wanna be with me even though I'm a hundred pounds fatter than in that picture?"
Steve smiled down at the skinny, sickly little girl he'd been. Well, he was still sickly at least. "Don't worry about it. I'm almost eighty pounds heavier, too."
Bucky rolled his eyes. "That doesn't count. You were so skinny then, and you're such a muscular Adonis now."
Steve chuckled. "Yeah, but I'm still only 5'6". You're what, 6'2"?"
Bucky straightened his back, pushing his belly into Steve more. "6'3" on a good day." His tummy rumbled. "You're not gonna believe this, but I could eat some more."
Steve gestured at the remaining 7 slices of Hawaiian on the coffee table. "Well, we technically are still playing truth or dare. And I did dare you to eat as much as you could."
Bucky shrugged and sat back on the sofa, pulling the box towards him and lifting his 10th pizza of the night up to his lips. "This game is gonna be so much more fun now. It's like I'm playing it with two people."
Steve was so glad that everything had lead them here. They couldn't have really worked out 20 years ago. Steve could see that now, no matter how much he might have wanted it to work back then. Even if he could go back in time and change what had happened… he might change some details about his mom or his time in the system, sure. But the people they were always going to be had met again, by fate or god or the universe or crazy coincidence. And Steve was not going to pass up the opportunity.
It was well past 3 am when Steve started to get hungry again. "I'll make you something," Bucky promised, walking over to the kitchen. He had a hand on the side of his tummy like he was trying to move around all the food in there. He had to be full, but he kept eating anyway. Just because of the dare? Or because he was used to it? "Remind me of all your millions of allergies again?"
Steve listed them off.
"How about good old PB&J?" Bucky asked, and Steve agreed. Bucky made him one sandwich, and two for himself. Steve eyed the plate, but didn't say anything. "You did say everything I could eat, not just pizza," Bucky joked.
"Hey, I'm not judging. This is your home. Make yourself comfortable." Steve looked around at the bare bones surroundings. "Why haven't you… decorated?" he asked, trying to be tactful.
Bucky snorted. "I didn't plan on staying here long enough to make it look lived in. We're going on year 4 of 'I won't be here next year'."
"Wow, if you had left even a year earlier, or I'd moved in a year later, we could've missed each other."
"I don't really believe that," Bucky intoned softly. "Maybe we would have missed each other this time. But somewhere down the line, we would have run into each other again."
They played more truth or dare, although they kept getting off track and just having conversation, which was nice. Steve had come back down to sober, and he was drinking water to make sure he didn't wake up hungover the next day. He wasn't about to get drunk again because he knew from experience that was a one-way ticket to pukesville.
Bucky was still a little buzzed, though. He even pulled out some joints around 5 am. Steve couldn't because of his asthma, but they took their night out to the balcony. Bucky brought the pizza with him (four slices left), and the thought crossed Steve's mind that maybe he was using the munchies to be able to finish it. Steve put his shirt back on to be warm enough in the chill summer night air.
But the temperature suited Bucky perfectly. He set his ankle across one knee, spreading out and getting comfortable as the crossfade set in. A sliver of belly poked out under his shirt, and instead of tugging his shirt down, he rolled the side of his beer bottle on the skin, condensation from the bottle turning the shirt wet. Steve spotted a few stretch marks and swallowed hard.
When he looked up, Bucky was meeting his eyes curiously. Steve looked away nervously. A few hours ago, before he'd known, he'd been willing to push his luck with the whole stuffing thing. But now that he knew what he did, it all seemed more delicate. If he ruined this, he wasn't just missing out on something good. He was missing out on Bucky, and everything they'd had.
"Truth or dare?" Bucky asked him, the first time in a while.
"Dare," Steve whispered, scared of what Bucky would ask if he picked truth.
Bucky groaned and threw his head back, closing his eyes. "Ugh, I dare you to give me a belly rub. I'm gonna need some relief if I'm gonna finish this pizza."
"You really don't have to," Steve strained out, feeling like he was having an out of body experience. But he knelt on the balcony floor in front of Bucky's chair, and lifted his shirt.
He was so full. His belly was round and heavy, sitting on his thighs. Jesus. It lapped his waistband by a couple of inches. Red stretchmarks decorated it the whole way up. Steve kept peeling his shirt higher, over his pecs, up to his shoulders. Bucky set down the joint and the beer bottle on the pizza box and lifted his arms, letting Steve take the shirt off. There were stretch marks on his hairy chest, too, and his shoulders, and his arms. Everywhere. Most of them looked faint, just indentations in his tan skin, but the ones on his belly were freshest.
He was thick all over. Under the beard, Steve could see Bucky's double chin. His shoulders were so padded his collarbones weren't visible. Bucky clasped his hands behind his head, letting Steve look his fill. His armpits' scent wafted over to Steve's nose, old spice with a touch of body odor that made Steve want to moan. His pecs were soft, resting on top of his belly, nipples hard in the chilly night air. His tummy made an audible grumble, and Steve remembered what his original mission was.
He laid his palm across the top of Bucky's belly, where it was tightest. God. It was packed so full there was almost no give to it at all. As Steve massaged, Bucky's lower stomach jiggled, where the fat pooled under his belly button. Steve wanted to bite it, but he resisted the urge for now.
He massaged in counter-clockwise motions, working air through Bucky's pipes. He let out a few burps and didn't even excuse himself. Steve wanted to pinch himself to make sure he wasn't dreaming.
"God, you're full…" he mumbled.
"I know it," Bucky bitched. "Ate so fucking much, honey. 11 slices of pizza and two PB&J sandwiches. And like, 8 beers."
Steve did moan then, jostling Bucky's tummy lightly with his other hand. He watched the ripple move through it like water. "Why?" he asked genuinely.
"I don't know," Bucky answered. "I just like the feeling. I do this a lot, even when I'm not dared to. It's fucking weird, I know."
Steve didn't move his eyes or his hands, transfixed by Bucky's fat tummy. "I think it's even weirder to like it."
"You wanna keep rubbing my belly, or do you want to feed me more pizza and I'll rub it myself?"
Steve groaned again, and felt his pussy soak his shorts a little more. He'd gone commando, and soon the stain was going to be visible through the denim. He rocked forward a little, letting his tdick rub against the seam of the shorts. It was sharp, but pleasant. He hissed. "I wanna feed you," he growled, voice dark.
Bucky put on hand on his belly and kept rubbing. With the other, he picked up the joint and took a long drag.
"If you're too full, you really don't have to," Steve told him.
Bucky shook his head. "I can do it. C'mon, only four slices left."
Steve held up a folded slice with shaky hands, and a drip of grease fell onto Bucky's belly. Without thinking, Steve leaned forward and licked it off. Bucky groaned and grabbed his hair, shoving his face into the soft fat. He ground his hard dick into Steve's chest, thrusting up to get friction on himself.
Steve grabbed Bucky's moob with one hand, burying his face into his tummy as far as it would go.
"Fuck, you're so soft," Steve whined, voice muffled by Bucky.
Bucky chuckled and Steve felt the vibrations through his gut. "Not getting any softer if you don't feed me."
Steve wanted to talk about it. But there was time for that later.
He shoved the pizza into Bucky's mouth, further than Bucky wanted to bite down. Bucky spluttered a little, but accepted the mouthful and chewed. He'd fit almost a third of the pizza into his mouth all at once. When he opened up again, Steve shoved more in, trying to get him to eat as much as quickly as possible, before how full he was caught up to him.
"C'mon, you can do it, that's right," Steve praise, tossing the crust back into the box and picking up another slice. Bucky hadn't eaten the rest of the slices anyway. That had to be enough for like, one whole slice of pizza.
Bucky groaned as Steve shoved the next slice down his throat, humping up uselessly into the air. After he finished that slice, he gasped out, "Wait. I need a drink." He finished off the beer and moaned, rubbing the cold bottle over his overtaxed skin. He was sweating and panting like he'd run a mile. "Get me another one, baby boy," he told Steve, the endearment rolling easily off his tongue.
Bucky dashed into the apartment and pulled another six pack out of the fridge. Bucky was taking a long drag on his joint, and rubbing his poor belly with his other hand. He sat up more in the chair, then hissed and slumped down further, trying to get comfortable. "It's itchy," he complained, looking up at Steve with big grey eyes.
"You're growing new stretch marks for me," Steve confirmed, giving his gut a consoling pat. "You're doing such a good job. Halfway there."
"So fucking full, baby," Bucky whined. "Never been this full in my goddamn life."
"I know, you're doing so good." Steve picked up the next slice and fed it to him, this time fitting half the whole thing in his mouth. Bucky chewed with his mouth wide open, huffing in short bursts around his stuffed tummy.
"Your lungs are being squashed by your gut," Steve told him. "That's why it's hard to breathe."
Bucky humped up into the air again, his dick so hard Steve could see the slit of the head through the fabric. "God," he griped.
"Finish this last slice, and I'm gonna give you the best head of your life," Steve vowed.
Bucky swallowed with a gulp and opened up again. "C'mon," he coaxed.
Steve fed him the last slice, letting him take as many bites as he needed to. Once he finished, Bucky belched, and Steve handed him another beer.
"God fucking damn," Bucky panted. "Two whole pizzas in eight hours. I'm so fucking full. Hurts so much."
"Too much?" Steve asked, worried.
Bucky shook his head. "But you can take my mind off of it." He grabbed Steve's hair again and pushed his face down to his dick. Steve mouthed at it through the fabric of the shorts and Bucky swore.
"Out here?"
"I don't give a fuck," Bucky told him. "Think I'm too full to get up. Jesus."
That did it. Steve pulled down on his abused waistband. Bucky lifted up his hips just enough to let Steve pull the garment down to his knees, and the deck chair creaked.
Bucky's cock bobbed free. The head was flushed dark red with want, precome already beading at the tip. It was the perfect shape, thick and cut with a pointy head. Bucky shifted forward on the chair more, allowing more space under his gut. Steve lifted his overhand with one hand, revealing the base of Bucky's cock nestled in his fat pad. It was about five and a half inches long, the perfect size in Steve's opinion. He'd fucked plenty of 7+ inch dildos- even a 10 inch, for the right amount of money, but the 3-5 range was what he preferred. He was slinging about an inch himself, so size didn't matter. Well, not that kind of size, at least.
Steve swallowed up the whole thing in one motion, trying to show off. Bucky cried out, and Steve grinned around his dick. He had the best blowjobs in the world, he knew. He'd been told by exes and collaborators alike. He wasn't going for endurance; some other time he'd edge Bucky and have him begging for mercy. This time, he wanted to reward him for eating so much pizza.
He worked his tongue down the vein of Bucky's dick, wetting the length of it, tasting him. He had an excellent flavor, earthy and strong and tangy. Steve retreated up to the tip, brushing his forehead against Bucky's belly with every motion. He swallowed him back down all the way to the base, feeling Bucky grow even larger in his throat. The head passed Steve's uvula, sliding down into his trachea. He buried his nose into Bucky's fatpad, breathing in his scent. He rubbed Bucky's dick in his throat from the outside, pulling all the dirtiest moves in the book.
Steve withdrew again, swirling his tongue around the tip and letting his jaw go slack, moving his head up and down the shaft while his lips made a filthy sound. At the same time, he tongued the underside for extra stimulation. He continued sliding his mouth up and down, and Bucky started lifting his hips and fucking Steve's face. Steve moved his lips all over the length of it, pulling off and sucking on Bucky's balls, one at a time, before returning to his cock. He sucked on the spongey head, feeling more bleed surge into the already engorged member. The girth was increasing, so much that Steve had to stretch his mouth to fit all of him. He swallowed him back down to the base again, slowly, keeping rhythm but letting Bucky feel every moment of his wet hot mouth suctioning. Bucky's thighs started to tremble in warning that he was getting close. Steve picked up speed and intensity, wanting to swallow down all of his seed.
Bucky started babbling, one hand fisted into Steve's hair, the other hand clutching his full gut. "God, that feels so, so good, baby boy… You give the best goddamn head, Jesus… like you were born for it… your filthy little mouth was born for me to fuck. Oh, god, I'm getting close… 'M gonna come, baby."
Steve encouraged him with his mouth, suctioning harder, laving his tongue faster, pushing Bucky's dick further back into his throat.
Then Bucky was coming in hot gushes, the salty taste exploding into Steve's mouth. He swallowed it all down, gulping every drop Bucky had to offer.
Bucky softened and Steve licked the last of the nut from his cockslit, making Bucky jump at the overstimulation.
The brunet's eyes were squeezed shut. "Jesus fucking christ. Who taught you to give blowjobs like that? That was the best orgasm I've had in my life."
Steve couldn't help himself from grinning smugly. He wiped the drool off his chin and stood, crouching to give Bucky a kiss. Their first kiss, he realized, slipping a little tongue and letting Bucky taste himself in Steve's mouth.
"C'mere baby boy, sit on my face. Let me eat you out," Bucky told him with a grin. "I haven't had dessert yet."