Studmuffin
“Okay, so,” Sam begins, reading off of the manual in his hand, “There should be a three-sixteenths bolt that goes in the big gear.”
“Nope,” Bucky replies, completely ignoring his instruction and throwing the guide down on the table in front of them.
“You didn’t even look,” Sam notes incredulously.
“I didn’t have to,” Bucky answers, throwing his hands up cockily.
Sam resents the old man.
They’re at the dock, sitting with pieces of the water pump spread out in front of them. They’ve been at it since early in the morning and have gotten nowhere, but Sam doesn’t want to give up just yet. The boat is his childhood. He’s not ready yet.
“Uh-huh. No. No,” Sarah walks in from behind them, chastising the pair.
He turns to look up at her, and she fixes him with a pointed look of disapproval.
Bucky, though, apparently is incapable of listening to some damn instructions, “Hi, Sarah.” He waves at her with a flirty smile. Sam turns back to him, annoyed. He’s not sure what Bucky’s trying to achieve. The man is usually too busy making heart eyes at a completely different woman. And he knows his sister well enough to know she’s noticed it too.
“I told you specifically that the water pump was not the problem, and yet, here you are,” Sarah rebukes him from behind him.
“Yep, Samuel,” Bucky chimes in.
Why are they friends, again?
“In our defense,” Sam tries while throwing his hand up in defense, “We were supposed to be done long before you woke up.”
She’s not buying anything he’s selling though. “I don’t come up to the sky to tell you how to barrel roll, so don’t come down here and mess around with things you don’t understand,” she retorts.
And damn, that fucking hurt, “Wow. Wow.” He remarks in disbelief.
“Would you mind terribly if I took a look at it?” a voice comes from in front of Sam and all the heads turn to look at Y/n, who’s back into her shirt and trouser combo from yesterday. She’s standing there, with her hair messy, hands in her pocket, and a charming smile aiming at Sarah.
What the hell is up with these two love-sick fools flirting with his damn sister?? He thinks he preferred the awkward sexual tension between the two better, compared to whatever this is.
“Have you ever worked on a boat before?” Sam asks.
Y/n looks at him dead in the eye, shrugging, and says, “Nope!” She turns to Sarah and asks again, “You mind?”
Sarah sighs, her resolve breaking under Y/n’s magnetism. “Fine,” she acquiesces. “Knock yourself out.”
Y/n pulls out her hands from her pockets and claps them together in excitement. “Awesome. Thanks! You won’t regret it.”
Sarah’s annoyance falls away and a smile pops up on her face. He gets it, Y/n’s enthusiasm is a rare sight these days but it’s just as damn infectious as ever.
“Alright, dumb and dumber. Let’s go,” she calls out as she makes her way into the boat.
“Hey! Who you callin’ dumb?” Sam asks, cause this is just plain disrespectful.
“Me, obviously,” Bucky says, following her without question like he always does. “You’re dumber.”
“Watch it, tinman!” Sam shouts, his hands pointing at him.
Y/n chuckles at their interaction.
They all climb down into the cabin, where the engine sits.
“So?” Sam asks impatiently.
She pulls her hands out of the pockets, shaking them gently as she breathes in heavily while closing her eyes. She’s hyping herself up, Sam realizes. She exhales, opening her eyes and they begin flying all over the place. She’s assessing the situation like she assesses a battlefield. Sam can’t help as his lips curve up at the thought.
And all of a sudden, Y/n’s hands are on the engine, she’s pulling out wires, bolting nuts, and moving things around that Sam didn’t even know existed. Her hands are flying everywhere and he’s having a hard time keeping up.
She looks back at Sam, reaching out, and says, “Wrench.” When Sam hands it to her wordlessly, she takes his hand and makes him pull a cluster of wires apart.
“You said you’ve never done this before.” Sam’s confused. She’s moving around with confidence that doesn’t really match that statement.
“I haven’t,” Y/n reiterates. “But I understand the basics of an engine. Tony taught me enough to lend him a hand. And I built my bike; this isn’t the same but it isn’t far off.”
“What do you mean you built—You built your bike?” Sam asks astounded, thinking back to one of the most beautiful motorcycles he’s ever seen.
Y/n shrugs from where she’s leaning and playing with wires like it’s no big deal. Bucky chuckles from in front of them where he’s standing on the opposite side of the engine, while Sam tries to make his brain function again.
“Could you hold that up, sunshine?” Y/n asks, pointing at a heavy piece of metal Sam definitely doesn’t know the name of.
“Sure thing, sweetheart,” Bucky replies, easily picking it up with one hand for Y/n to walk over and pulling more wires out, and ripping them with her teeth.
Goddamn lovesick idiots.
She ties the two naked wires together, and asks, “You know what you gonna do with it?” She’s standing opposite to him now, next to Bucky. “The shield I mean.” Before he can reply she adds, pointing in front of Sam, “Could you unscrew those bolts?”
Sam picks up a screwdriver from behind him and sets upon the task. “I’m thinking about it,” he answers her previous question.
Y/n hums in acknowledgment. She continues working. Without taking her eyes off of whatever she’s doing, she says, “Not that you asked for advice, but I wanna share some anyway. You mind?”
Sam snorts, “Nah. Advice away.”
“After what he went through, it makes sense for him to resent the shield as much as he does,” she says, referring to Isaiah. Sam had told Bucky and her about his conversation with him after they had wrapped up dinner and were cleaning up. “I—I’ve been where he is. It wasn’t as bad for me, obviously. Peggy saved me before it could get to that. But I understand what it feels like to be abandoned by your country… left for dead,” she says, her voice thick with emotion.
Sam scolds himself.
With all the ease she carries herself around, it becomes almost effortless to forget that she too has played the part of a guinea pig for a good chunk of her life. He can tell Bucky’s thinking the same damn thing as him because his face morphs, guilt evident.
“Y/n—” he begins but is promptly cut off.
She waves her hand at him, dismissing the entire thing as if it’s nothing. “Long time ago, I’m over it… mostly.” She moves behind Bucky walking over to the end of the room, tapping on his shoulder once, hinting that he can let go.
Bucky sets the piece down and moves back to lean on the wall behind him.
Y/n picks up some pliers and walks back, passing Bucky. “Not why I brought it up. I just meant I get it.” She sighs exhaustedly. “People like Isaiah and I… we didn’t get to choose for ourselves. We were forced into deep dark pits and had to crawl our way out of there.” Sam steps back having finished his task. His eyes, however, remain fixed on her as she continues working. “It made us bitter,” she notes. “And we are so fucking bitter,” she finally looks up at him as she says it.
“I’d say you’re justified to feel that way,” Sam comments.
She nodded her head to the head in assent, “Not suggesting otherwise.” She motions him to hand over the screwdriver, and he obliges. “I’m saying, you’re not like that,” she states, leaning down to get a better look at whatever she’s doing. “Every time the world has beaten you down; you got mad at it just like us, yes. But then you got right back up and decided to fix it… And I don’t mean like Karli’s trying to. You’ve tried to fix it with the least amount of violence possible. You’ve always opted for civilized conversation over mindless vengeance or blind fury.” She gets back up and looks at him head on, “That’s why Steve gave you the shield,” she says, her voice radiating pride.
Sam remembers meeting her the first time when she along with Steve came knocking on his window. She seemed constantly reluctant in her participation but followed through regardless. He remembers not completely understanding why she kept going on missions and taking on more responsibilities when she seemed like she’d rather be out of the whole Hero gig than ever have stepped into it. But he couldn’t help but admire her regardless. After the thing with Ultron happened, he thought he understood her a little better. He thought she was constantly trying to stay in control of her powers, afraid of blowing up. He supposes he wasn’t really wrong about that. But now he understands, more than anything else it was her trying to be better. Trying not to become what Madripoor and Hydra were intent on making her into, while simultaneously being afraid of becoming just that.
If you’d asked him a couple of days ago he would’ve told you that they were good enough friends but right now he realizes they are more. He realizes she respects him. Not only that, there’s an admiration in her eyes that Sam had never been able to notice before.
Her words hit home for him. Little pieces begin to click in place because she is far from wrong. While Isaiah’s not wrong in feeling the way he does, it doesn’t have to dictate how Sam feels. If Sam wants something to be done about the wrongs committed against Isaiah; he has to get up and do it himself. And that—that he’s always been fairly good at.
“Go check,” she says suddenly, breaking him out of his reverie.
“What?” Sam asks, completely lost at the drastic change of tone.
“Go check if it works,” she replies easily. When Sam remains confused, she adds, “Start the damn boat, Birdman!”
“Come on,” Bucky urges him, walking up the stairs to the cockpit. She does the same and Sam follows behind.
Looking over at Sam, Bucky nods over at the console, so he steps up and turns the keys.
And the engine fucking purrs.
“Holy shit!” Sam exclaims. He can hear Bucky chuckle behind him. “Holy shit!” He turns and pulls Y/n into a tight big hug. She reciprocates immediately. He’s so fucking overjoyed with a considerable amount of disbelief, he picks her off the ground, laughing.
At first, she screams, laughing, and then, “Alright, alright. Calm down, Bossman,” she chides.
He does as instructed. “You’re a goddamn miracle, you know that?” He plants a kiss on her cheek, holding her face.
She throws her head back in laughter. “I’ve been known to have my moments,” she replies.
Bucky, however, doesn’t really appreciate the gesture. He can practically feel the other man boring holes into his back with his glare.
“You think you can look at the toaster—” Sam teases, but is promptly cut off by Y/n shoving him lightly, a smile gracing her face.
He can’t help but laugh.
They begin cleaning up as much of the boat as they can. Both Bucky and Y/n plan to set out in a couple of hours, so they seem intent on helping him out as much as they can before their exit. Sam can’t really express how much that means to him. So he’ll do them one better, instead.
He walks into the cockpit where Y/n is fiddling around with the wires under the console while looking far too intently out the window at a certain Super Soldier working on the deck.
“You like him,” he nudges her shoulder. She moves a bit, but her eyes stay fixed ahead and her hands continue working with the wires, as she leans back. He settles next to her, looking out the window as well.
He can see her smother a smile, intent on not letting herself break just yet. “Like who?” She plays dumb, just to egg him on.
“You know who,” Sam cajoles.
“Your sister?” She asks, turning to him, wiggles her eyebrows, “You bet I do!”
He feels like he’s dealing with children which is hilarious considering both of them are almost the same age Betty White.
“Hey!” Sam warns, wearing his best big brother voice, “Stop flirting with my sister, alright?” He sighs, “And here I thought Bucky’d be the one I’d have to keep an eye on.”
She laughs softly before turning back to look out the window (at Bucky) again.
“Come on,” he nudges her again, “You like him.”
“Who?”
“The old man over there.” He nods in Bucky’s direction.
“I’m literally 100 fucking years old, Sam. Stop using that as an insult.”
“Yeah, yeah,” he concedes. “But you like him.”
“Who told you that?” He knows she’s being stubborn just to screw with him. He doesn’t mind. He grew up with Sarah; this is a goddamn cakewalk for him in comparison.
“Nobody had to tell me jack,“ he answers with certainty.
“Then how do you know?”
“Cause you keep looking at him like that?”
“Like what?” She asks while looking at Bucky.
“Like that.” Sam points at her eyes, “Like he’s all there is.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about, Birdman.” She finally breaks a bit, her lips curving up at the edges.
“I know exactly what I’m talking about. Cause that’s pretty damn similar to the way you used to look Steve.”
She clicks her tongue, “Tsk, tsk.” She looks back at him, eyebrow cocked, “That’s how you wanna play it? Bring my ex into this?” She nods over to Bucky, “Bring his best friend into this? Really? You’re a shit wingman, wingman.”
Yeah. That was a horrible idea, he realizes okay? But he’s not fucking wrong, is he?
Sam let out a small laugh and lifted his hands up in defense, “Okay, okay. That was a bad play, I’ll give you that. But doesn’t make it any less true.”
She takes a breath, “It was different with Steve—I wanted Steve. Him,” she pauses, looking over at Bucky who seems confused by the existence of the things in front of him as if they hold the secrets to the universe, “I just want him to be happy,” she finishes.
There is a silence that falls between them and neither of them seems to want to touch it.
But Sam has to. “Holy shit! You actually like the staring machine,” he exclaims in shock.
He knew she liked him. But he didn’t know she was falling for him head over feet.
“I thought you already knew that,” she replies, calmly.
“I thought you wanted him like, you know, like a—”
“—a rebound?”
Sam nods in response, afraid to offend. That is not his intention. She begins walking out of the cockpit onto the deck. Sam follows behind.
She just smiles back at him as they make it onto the dock, “You already met my rebound, Sam… Well one of them.”
Met him, he has. And look Sam can be honest and admit, with the beard and the accent; Brekker must have been a pretty dang good rebound.
Sam smiles too. “So you like like him.”
“Is this what sleepovers are supposed to be like? Cause I missed out on that part of growing up. Are we going to paint our nails next?” She teases him with a grin.
“Jokes on you, I’d rock the whole black nail paint look and you know it,” he counters with a smug smile.
They’re facing each other, with Bucky only a short distance away from them to his right.
“You could rock anything and everything. Not much I can argue with there, studmuffin,” She remarks as she begins to walk away, passing him by.
He can’t help but laugh because who the fuck still uses the word ‘studmuffin’? Oh yeah, 100-year-old cranky ladies, like Y/n.
“Studmuffin, huh? Means I still got a shot?” He shouts out, loud enough for Bucky to hear. She knows exactly what he’s doing. Their eyes meet and there’s a silent agreement to play into it, “You know, over the competition?”
Alright, that wasn’t the most subtle thing ever but Bucky’s a grouchy old man who wouldn’t be able to read the damn sign without his glasses if it isn’t big and flashy enough.
Y/n chuckles as she climbs out of the boat, passing him. Turning around she says, “When have you ever backed out of a challenge, Wilson?”
He just winks in response. And both of them can see Bucky in their periphery, forgetting how to function as she walks away.