The man was progressing well. He couldn’t wear the arm twenty-four hours a day. But he could wear the Incogneat Arm for up to ten hours. It had full complete nerves. It felt just like his real hand — in both senses. It had the exact same sensation recognition, and it felt the same to the touch. When he was in the garden with Stevie, he wiped his arm across his face, and he realized that even the sweat that fell into his mouth tasted the same. The freckles were right; the arm hair was right. It was beautiful. He loved touching Steve with it.
He asked Steve to set up a visit with Becca, and Steve called her for a coffee visit. Before he called, Steve said she always acted like she wanted to get him out of the way so she would agree to host him that day. Sure enough, she told him to come over in a few hours.
After hanging up, Steve said, “I don’t know if she just wants to get my visits over or if she hopes I’ll not be able to come.”
“Maybe she’s eager to see you, Stevie.”
Steve chuckled, “Oh, Buck, wish that were true.”
***
Steve reminded him that she wasn’t a little kid. He showed him current photos. Steve didn’t want the man to get a blow.
They got a car over to her house. She lived in a nice little place in Brooklyn, had bought it back when she was first married when a working-class family could buy a house in Brooklyn. It was pretty; she had done well for herself and had a happy, normal life. They had the window between them and the driver, closed for privacy.
“I’m going to have him park. Just wait and I’ll come get you.”
The man gave him one of those tiny, sweet kisses. They felt so nice, so gentle, unlike anything he had had for decades, “I love you; thank you, Steve.”
“It’s gonna be okay, Buck.”
He left the cocoon of the back seat, had a quick conversation with the driver, squared his shoulders and went to the door. He had a bunch of flowers.
The man saw an old woman open the door and give Steve a tight smile before ushering him inside.
***
Steve headed back to the car far sooner than the man expected. Steve walked with anger in his step, and the man watched him try to shake it off as he approached. He had a fake smile on his face as he opened the door, “Hey, she wants to see you.”
“You okay?”
“She’s very angry at me; but she wants to see you, so it’s okay,” Steve’s face went soft as he looked at the man. “I love you. It’s all going to be okay, Buck. No matter what happens with Becca: we have a dream house in the works. You and me, ‘til the end of the line.”
“‘Til the end of the line,” the man promised as he slid out of the car. He was dressed in slacks and a new Henley. He had done his hair neatly in the style he’d adopted. His stubble was at the length that looked normal now. He had left Edwin Tower feeling put together. Now he felt unsure. He took a step toward the house, and Steve didn’t follow. He looked at Steve questioningly.
“I’m sorry: she doesn’t want me in there. You’ll have to go alone. I’m sorry, Buck. It’ll be okay.”
He walked to the house with his palms sweating; he had expected Steve to be at his side. Both his palms sweat. That was comforting at least — his stress displayed itself through the arm. The door opened before he got there. Becca was smiling wetly. He could see the little girl in her face. “Jimmy,” she said, studying him.
“Hey, Becca, you grew up.”
“You didn’t,” she replied.
“No,” he agreed.
“Come in,” she said.
“Not Steve?”
“I want to talk to you,” she said vehemently.
“Okay,” he nodded and followed her into the house.
It was nice. There were a lot of pictures on the walls of faces with features he recognized. There was furniture he knew. There was the scent of coffee being brewed. It felt like a warm house.
“You were alive? This whole time? You were alive.”
“Did Steve explain?”
“He said you were brainwashed.”
He nodded, “Sometimes I was cryogenically frozen. Mostly I was awake. Did you read any of the HYDRA files from the internet?” She shook her head. It would have been so much easier if they had a base to build off. He wished Steve was with him. But he could do this. He had been through harder things. “Oh, um, yeah. I was… I was their best weapon, the Winter Soldier, the brainwashed empty assassin. But I’m out. Tony Stark saved me. He, Bruce and JARVIS, they stripped the brainwashing. I’m good; I’m great. I get to have a life for the first time in seventy years. It’s wonderful. I didn’t know who I was, and now I’m here with my own mind.”
“Jesus, Jimmy,” she replied.
Their mother would have washed her mouth out for that back when he’d last seen her. “You look amazing,” he said. “Stevie was telling me about your kids, grandkids, great grandkids. Amazing.”
“You tell me you’re brainwashed and want to talk about my grandkids?”
“There’s not much to talk about with the brainwashing. At least, not anything you can’t read about without searching for ‘Winter Soldier’ or ‘Soldat.’ Not much fun. Rather hear about you.”
“When did you get away? How?” she replied, not talking about her family.
“Sometimes their programming slipped. I was… on a mission and I just got out. Then I started taking them out. And the Avengers reached out and asked me to let them help me. I didn’t know who I was. I looked at Steve and looked right through him. They helped, fixed my head; gave me a better prosthetic. I’m good; ready to get back to the fight.”
“You’re going back?”
“I have to see this through.”
“Because Steve is doing it,” she snarled. “Right? Because Steve is fighting.”
“Becca,” he said slowly, “HYDRA used me for years. I need to see this through.”
“And he has nothing to do with it,” she said sarcastically.
“You have always hated Steve.”
“Jimmy, he was always taking you away and then he got you killed,” she replied.
“Taking me away? You resented me being with him instead of you when you were a little kid. But you’re an adult, think about it realistically. I am almost nineteen years older than you. I didn’t live with you; we had an apartment together. I read you bedtime stories, but I didn’t want to play. I wanted to go out dancing and drinking. He wasn’t taking me away. And I signed up for the war because there was a war. That wasn’t Steve. I was captured before Steve was overseas.”
“And you joined a frontline specialist group because him. And you died,” she said.
He exhaled slowly. “I don’t know what to say. What if it were Michael?” he asked. He didn’t want to do this in the foyer, but he didn’t know how else to do it. They hadn’t moved into the house, and it seemed they were stuck there. “What would you do if it were your man?”
“That’s entirely different.”
“Because you didn’t meet him on the first day of second grade? Because Michael wasn’t sickly? Because it wasn’t illegal for you?” he replied. “I spent my whole life knowing I would bury him young and then he was healthy and strong and all we had to do was get through the war and I could have him forever. And no, I couldn’t marry him, but we could maybe have houses next to each other and kids who played together. We could grow old next to each other, and it would have been enough. Of course I followed him; I watched his back and protected him from second grade onward. All we had to do was survive the war and I wouldn’t have to outlive him. And here we are, building a beautiful farm so that, when HYDRA’s gone, we can have the goats and chickens we dreamed of back the ‘30s. And I’m not afraid of cops raiding the nightclubs I go to and Stevie’s not afraid of Catholicism and we’re gonna have a perfect life. We designed the house with a perfect bedroom suite for you. But if you don’t want to come,” he shrugged, “I haven’t known you since you were seven. I want to know you. I want to like you. But he’s all I’ve wanted since I was eight years old. Yes, I joined the Howling Commandos for Steve, of course I did. And now we are building a perfect house with goats and chickens and the cat I bought him who sleeps in our bed.”
She said nothing for a long time, and he waited to be told to leave. Instead, she said, “I have my real hips. Most of my friends have had a knee or a hip replaced.”
“That’s good,” he said, not understanding what it meant or knowing why she was changing the topic.
“I like dancing at weddings and I’m not getting younger.”
He laughed, “Becca, we just found each other again. The last time I saw him neither of us admitted it was there.”
“You’ve been in love with him since the ‘20s, planning goats since the ‘30s, you’re building a farm but you think it’s too soon for a little ceremony and dancing?”
“We haven’t… we kiss, cuddle and share a bed, but… after decades with HYDRA. I just.”
“If you have to be having sex to be married, Michael and I haven’t been married for close to a decade.” He laughed. “I love my husband, but I’m old and very tired.” She finally said, “Come through to the kitchen.” He followed her.
The kitchen was nice, lived in.
As she poured coffee, he said, “I was awake, most of the time, brainwashed, in pain, but awake. I’m old and tired too, Becca, I just don’t look it. But Stevie looks at me and he smiles and… I feel like I’m seventeen again. And we wake up in the morning and I’m back in our apartment but instead of being in our own twin beds I’m curled around him with our cat sleeping on my head. I want to be better for him. But he’s not pushing anything. We dance. We never usda dance. Well, we’d dance to fast stuff on the radio but now we dance to all the pretty ballads. Back then… he was so sure he was going to hell just for thoughts. But me? I was just afraid of the cops arresting me and Mom finding out.” He took a sip of the coffee he was handed.
“Lizzy thought you were gay. She said so, years later, after you were gone,” said Becca, and he choked on the coffee. “I never paid her any mind. But she said you had three girlfriends a month, they never cried when you ditched them, and none of them ever got in trouble. It just didn’t add up for her.”
“Lizzy knew?” he said, and he wiped his face. “Did she tell Mom and Dad?”
“No,” she gestured to the table, and they sat down, “just me and Emily. Emily thought she was maybe right. I thought they were just imagining things. But I was only seven when you went away, so I suppose they knew best. I thought you were just dapper.”
“No, I’m very gay and I’ve been in love with Steve Rogers since I was eight.”
She laughed, “I’ve been so awful to him. Practically my brother-in-law and I’ve been awful.”
“Oh, don’t worry, you took against him at the age of two: he’s used to it.” She laughed again. “He’s okay. The Avengers are a lovely family. Really, so kind. They immediately welcomed me in. Gave me so much medical attention. I murdered Tony Stark’s parents and he said, ‘HYDRA, man, ouch.’ Then he made me a new arm and gave me back my memories. I couldn’t even remember my name when I met them.”
“A new arm?”
He pointed to his prosthetic, “That’s not real. But it’s warm, has a pulse, sweats, nails grow, has all my old freckles. I have nerves, feel everything. It bleeds. Everything about it is real except for the fact that I strapped it to my body when I woke up this morning.”
“What happened to your old arm?”
“I fell off a train in the Alps and had a very, very painful prosthetic for about seventy years. But now I have multiple nice prosthetics, a great apartment, friends who invite me to do stuff and I’ve gone to the VA a few times. They keep telling me to go to a therapist, but… I don’t know about that yet. I wanted to see you first. And I wanted to be able to wear a prosthetic, so you didn’t see how mangled up it is without it. Stevie says it isn’t, and I’m perfect, but… you haven’t seen me since you were seven; didn’t want to be too much of a blow when you opened the door. It’s a real good fake. It took some getting used to.”
“Does it hurt?”
“Nerves get a little tender in the evening but only because they’re healing from the old one. It doesn’t hurt. It’s good; it’s nice. I like it a lot. And don’t worry: all the Avengers check in and make sure I’m comfortable. Tony’s son Win is fascinated. I have another prosthetic you can draw on and erase and he loves it. He eyes it like a lion with a gazelle. But, when I offer to let him draw on it, he always very politely says I own my body and he doesn’t want to draw on me unless I want him to. Then he draws things like lobsters on the playground. He’s a cute kid.”
“I’ve never met any of them. They’re Steve’s friends and well,” she shrugged.
Laughing, he said, “They’re nice people, kind. Sam Wilson taught me how to use a supermarket. Never been in one before. He spent hours explaining modern brands, the layout of markets and the etiquette. No one pushes, I… it was so long since I heard my own name that I don’t feel like Bucky anymore. Everyone calls me friend without blinking and it’s very kind of them to act like that’s normal.”
“Does Steve?”
“Steve always called me Buck, only person who did. And with Steve it’s different. Like I said: I feel like me when I’m with him. So he still calls me Buck.”
“Do you feel like Jimmy?”
“No, but I’ll get used to it. You can call me Jimmy. You’re my sister; you can call me Jimmy. I’ll relearn it. Just give me time. Please, tell me about your family. I want to hear about your life. Mine has been bad while we’ve been apart. Tell me about your husband and kids. I want it all.”
She finally relented and gave him so much family news. He asked about old friends, and she knew some of their stories — how their lives had ended up. He talked about how weird it was to see his things in the Smithsonian but that Phil was going to get it all back. He admitted it was creepy to know their apartment was on display to the public, and she laughed.
“That upset your friends so much. They said, ‘No, no, the public can have Captain America and Sargent Barnes; they can’t have Steve and Bucky.’ So, they volunteered to make sure it was ‘accurate.’ Not a single piece of furniture was in the right place. Nothing in there belonged to you, none of it would be recognizable. Yes, it’s your address, but it’s not your apartment. And there’s a little plaque that says, ‘Decorated lovingly by friends of Steven Grant Rogers and James Buchanan Barnes in exactly the way they would want it to be seen.’ Not even the hat stand is in the right place.”
He laughed, “Oh, that’s so comforting. Thank God for the gang. Any idea what happened to that city bench we had?”
“The park bench? Where did you get that? Lonnie’s son has it. But no one ever knew where you bought it.”
He laughed, “Lonnie knew. We got it from the park and we got it for free. All we needed was some Dutch courage, screwdrivers and stupidity. Poor Steve, ninety pounds soaking wet, not a muscle to be seen, totally whiffled and carrying a bench. But it was his idea. Couldn’t afford a couch. I thought he was gonna die by the time we got it back to the building. Had to call Lonnie at one in the morning to help me get it up the stairs so Steve didn’t keel over.” He dissolved into laughter, and she just stared at him.
“I thought butter wouldn’t melt in your mouth,” she said.
“Young, dumb and broke. Steve came up with a way to get a couch and I always went along with his schemes ‘cause always seemed fun. And that one got us a great bit of furniture. Although I did think Steve might die, asthma was no laughing matter back then.”
“I have Mark’s number. He lives in Brooklyn. I’m sure he’d be pleased to offload his stolen furniture back to the thieves.”
He could protest, but instead, he said, “Thank you.” He wanted the pieces of his life back. He glanced at the wall clock and said, “Oh, wow, Steve has been out there with the driver for four hours.”
“He waited?”
“Of course, we’re never leaving each other ever again.”
“Oh God, first I was mean to him, now I made him sit in the car.”
“Hey, hey, Becca, you can never be angrier at Steve for the fact that I fell from the train than Steve is at himself. And you had more years to grieve me, but you never had it cut as deep as he did. The fact that you don’t like him is water off a duck’s back. You’ve never liked him. He’s always liked you. It’s really okay.”
“Where’s this dream house of yours?”
“Greece but we have an incredible, fast, extremely comfortable plane that can make the trip so quickly you and Michael can come for weekends. And we’ll be in the city two days a week. I just… I can’t be here anymore. It’s too different and too much. I said run and he said where. It’s the first time he’s following me instead of the other way around. But I promise, with how fast the plane is, it’s closer than me living upstate.”
She nodded, “Okay… at some point I have to apologize to him.”
“I put a lot on you today. You should probably digest it. Let me give you my number.” He wrote it down on a notepad she gave him. “Until my arm is at one hundred percent, I’m out of the fight. All I’m doing is the VA. But there is going to be a press conference about me. I told Phil to wait until I saw you. I wanted you to know and hear it from me: I’m alive, I’m not a prisoner anymore and I’m doing well.”
She nodded, “I missed you.”
“You don’t have to anymore. You could come over to Edwin Tower. We could have dinner.”
“Yes,” she agreed but didn’t suggest a time, and he didn’t push.
“It’s wonderful to see you as a grown-up, Becca. I’m so pleased you have had such a happy life.”
“I’m happy you’re building one,” she replied.
She walked him to the door, and there they hugged for several long moments. “Call me,” he urged.
He went to the car and waited by the driver’s door, and a man rolled down the window. He awkwardly said, “Just wanted to apologize for making you sit here.”
“Oh,” the guy looked surprised. “I have crossword puzzles and a novel. Don’t worry about it, man.”
The man nodded, “We’re going back to the Tower, please.” He went to the back door. He opened it, and Steve looked up from his phone, looking nervous and hopeful, “Hey. How did it go?”
“Well, I think it went well. We got in a fight over you. But that’s, what did you say it was now ‘on-brand’? It’s on-brand for us.”
“Shit, sorry Buck.”
“No, it’s okay, she wants a wedding.”
“What?” asked Steve.
“She said I shouldn’t have joined the Howlies and I said what would she have done if was Michael. And when she realized what I meant and wants a wedding.”
Steve raised an eyebrow, “I’m with you ‘til the end of the line. If you want to get married, let me get you a ring and propose. But, I only want to do that if you do. If you don’t want to, we’ll blame me. She’s hated me her whole life, I don’t mind taking the heat for this. We shouldn’t have a wedding for anyone but us.”
“I’d like to meet your friends. I’d like to know some people, if we’re gonna… I went to two weddings, y’know, back then.” Steve looked confused. They’d been to weddings together. Plenty of people got married. “In people’s apartments. Two nice girls I knew from the clubs, Shirly and Lucy. And a couple of fellas, Dan and Matthew. They made promises. There was cake, bad champagne, dancing. It wasn’t real — wasn’t legal — might as well have been kids playing at throwing a wedding. But it felt like something, it was something. The idea of having a real marriage… I’d like to know the people at the wedding.”
“So we’ll wait; we’ll get married for us, yeah?”
“Yeah,” he agreed.