A Lifetime
A long time later found Bucky sitting on the sofa with Steve pressed tight from knee to hip. Across from them on the second sofa sat a still somewhat shaky Becca and her very confused husband.
“God, Bucky, it’s been years. A lifetime.” Silent tears still leaked from Becca’s eyes, but she tried her best to pat them away.
“Yeah, well,” Bucky shrugged and offered a weak version of his usual grin, “Story is that Stevie and I got stuck in some ice after we hit the water.”
“Ice?” Becca laughed, though it sounded less humoured than it did slightly hysterical. Her face was pinched in a look of near disbelief, “It sounds like science fiction!” She clutched tight to her husband’s hand and shook her head. “I just can’t believe you’re both back. And you look so young.”
“Andhandsome, right? Don’t forget handsome, Becca.” The teasing words fell from his lips with very little thought. He relaxed back against the couch cushions to the sound of Becca’s laugh and Steve’s snort of amusement.
“How long have you boys been back?” Becca’s husband, Timothy Proctor, asked. Timothy – call me Tim – hadn’t stopped grinning since he realised exactly what kind of reunion was happening in his living room. His eyes had shone but he’d managed to sniff back any tears as he had greeted his brother-in-law for the first time.
“Couple hours,” Steve shrugged. “We woke up in some SHIELD base earlier today.”
“SHIELD?” Becca asked curiously.
Bucky gave a shrug of one shoulder. “It’s what the SSR turned into after the war. Somethin’ Steve’s girl, Peggy, set up.”
“She wasn’t my girl!” Steve immediately protested, turning to face Bucky with cheeks already blossoming red.
An answering grin curled Bucky’s lip at the sight of his friend’s embarrassment. “You sayin’ you didn’t want her to be?”
“No,” Steve spluttered, “‘m saying she wasn’t my girl. Come on, Buck. She had to be at least seven years older than us.”
“So? You like older women. Nothin’ wrong with that, Rogers.”
“I don’t like older women!”
Bucky nudged Steve’s calf with the point of his shined shoes. “So Peggy was an exception?’
“Peggy wasn’t my girl,” Steve said firmly, giving Bucky’s shoulder a shove.
Bucky retaliated by sitting forward enough to drive his elbow into Steve’s ribs. “But you sure did fancy her, didn’t ya champ?”
“I swear ta god, Barnes.” Steve surged forward trying to get him in a headlock that Bucky only managed to avoid by slinking down in his seat. Surging forward, Bucky managed to catch Steve around the midriff. He tried and failed to shift Steve’s stupid serum enhanced weight. Meanwhile, Steve used the temporary advantage to lock his arm around Bucky’s neck as best he could and start trying to rough his knuckles across his best friend’s scalp; prevented only by Bucky shoving his head in the questionable sanctuary of Steve’s armpit.
Steve jammed a finger into exposed ribs and Bucky gave an indignant squawk in response before throwing himself sideways. His momentum pulled them both off balance and sent them crashing together onto the floor in a sprawl of limbs and short shrieks of panic.
It was a miracle they managed to avoid the very nice coffee table sat in front of the couch.
They lay tangled up and very still on the carpet for a single beat before they both lunged for one another. It was an unco-ordinated scramble of limbs and elbows that only ended with Steve successfully pinning Bucky in a head lock.
“Say uncle!” Steve shouted as a last warning.
“You’ll never break me!” Bucky cried dramatically, kicking his legs in futile effort for escape. His heroics lasted right up until Steve brought bony knuckles to rough up his poor scalp. “Ow! Ow- dammit Steve! Uncle! ‘m cryin’ Uncle, for god sake.”
Steve released him, beaming bright and wide at the foul look Bucky shot him.
Bucky pointed a finger at his stupid grinning face. “Don’t you think this is over, Rogers. This is just a tactical retreat. You won’t win next time, ya hear?”
“Whatever you say, Buck.” Steve all but preened.
Bucky threw him one last foul look, just for principles sake, before turning to face his sister and her husband. The both of them were pressing their hands to their mouths, trying to muffle the laughter that shook their shoulders.
Pulling himself from the floor, Bucky sat very primly down on the sofa. Sulkily, he pulled his uniform straight and set about trying to pat down his horrendously mussed hair.
Steve threw himself back into the seat beside him, grinning over at Becca and Tim.
“God, you two haven’t changed at all, have you?” Becca gasped.
“’S not my fault that Steve’s still a punk.” Bucky argued to very little effect. Both Becca and Tim continued giggling with one another. They didn’t settle down until Bucky had patted his hair back into some semblance of order.
“I just can’t believe you’re here,” Becca’s smile remained bright even as her eyes threatened to fill again. “Both of you.”
“You and me both. We weren’t exactly expectin’ to wake up again.” Steve admitted. His smug grin slid off his face as something sadder took its place. “But you shoulda seen this guy, Becca,” Steve jutted a thumb in Bucky’s direction. “There was the Director of Shield - the agency weowe our livesto,no less-, trying to give us a briefing on all the things we missed. An’ Bucky here wanted none of it. Second he found out you were here he was out of his seat and demanding to see you right then.”
Bucky grinned sheepish at the sweet fond smiles Becca and Tim both pinned on him. “What do I care what’s happenin’ with politics and what not, anyhow? Never cared for it much back then neither.”
“That’s because you’re an animal.” Steve announced solemnly.
“Hey!”
Steve shook his head as though disappointed. The whole act might have worked if it wasn’t for the grin he couldn’t wipe from his lips. “It’s true. You never cared for current events.”
“Yeah? Well how did keeping up with current events help you, huh? We’re seventy years in the future. Nothin’ you know is current anymore.” Bucky’s teasing words took on a life of their own. They sat heavy between the pair as they were hit once again with the overwhelming realisation that everything they’d known was changed.
The world had aged, and they were still the same.
Bucky swallowed and offered Steve an apologetic look. It was received with a nod and a short commiserating grimace.
“You said you’d only been back a few hours?” Tim’s voice was thoughtful as his eyes flickered between them. “Did you mean back in the states or, well, back?”
Bucky and Steve flashed twin looks of discomfort.
“Oh my,” Becca shook her head. She looked like she wanted to cry again but forced the tears back.
“So, uh,” Steve smiled, though it was a tight painful looking thing, “Fury said you had two children, Becca?” As far as topic changes went it was far from subtle. But no one in the room was eager to bring it up. They fell on the excuse with the hunger of the starving.
Becca and Tim delighted in telling Bucky that not only was he an uncle five times over (two from Becca and Tim, and three from Bobby and his wife), but he was also a great-uncle nine times over! Bucky had gaped at the pair before very quickly stammering a request to see pictures. It was surreal to look at photos of babies that had grown to teens, that grew to adults and then were on to having their own children – all the while knowing they were his family that he’d never had the chance to know them.
In another life he might have held these babies in his arms. Greeted them into the world as their uncle. Taught them how to throw a punch and how to smooth talk. He’d have told them every drop of hard-earned wisdom he’d learned in his short nineteen years.
He should have been there.
The realisation put weight on Bucky’s shoulders and made his smiles turn sadder as he flipped through the albums of photos.
Eventually, Steve made their excuses and they stood to leave.
Becca enveloped them both in tight hugs and extracted promises from them both that they would stay in contact.
“I’ll get on the phone to everyone. We’ll have a proper welcome home bash for you both. Don’t you worry!” Becca’s eyes were knowing as she pressed a kiss to Bucky’s cheek. “It’s a little late, but you can meet them all now.” She promised him quietly.
Bucky tried to offer her a smile but knew it came out weak. “We’ll come back and visit you real soon,” He promised instead.
Becca examined him for a silent second before tugging him in for one last hug. “I’m so glad you’re home, Bucky. I love you.” She murmured into his chest.
Bucky pressed a kiss to her temple. “I love you too.”
In the two weeks that followed, Bucky and Steve were set up in a very nice Manhattan two-bedroom apartment. At first, they had argued on where they wanted to live but Bucky had succinctly argued the point by saying; ‘We can’t leave New York, it home. But we can’t live in Brooklyn with all it’s memories. We’ve never lived in Manhattan’.
It hadn’t taken Steve long to agree.
SHIELD had taken care of all of it. They had helped quietly revive them from the dead, setting them up with new papers and their own licenses. The real shocker had come when they’d been given access to their army wages only to learn that it had sat accumulating interest over the years they’d been gone. They were two nineteen-year-old kids and they’d never have to work another day in their lives if they didn’t want to. Bucky and Steve had wasted very little time in taking a small chunk from each account and buying two very nice Harley motor bikes.
SHIELD had also provided re-occurring appointments for them to attend each week aimed at introducing them to the 21st Century. While Bucky had thrived at learning new technologies and had enjoyed the science (though he didn’t always understand it all), Steve had hated it. On the opposite hand, Steve had enjoyed catching up on important world events and current political economics; Bucky meanwhile had wanted to scratch his own eyes out and beg for their assigned agent to stoptalking. They helped balance each other out – though neither of them was all too ready to try and delve into the new social norms of the time.
They were nineteen and they were living life almost like hermits. They attended their numerous SHIELD appointments, and made effort to visit Becca each weekend, but other than that they mostly haunted their apartment. The only reoccurring outing outside of these two things was to the local gym they’d found.
It wasn’t anything fancy like so many of the gyms that had popped up around Manhattan. It was a quiet hole in the wall sort of place where the owner didn’t mind letting them in after hours if they slipped him an extra fifty dollars each week. When they couldn’t sleep, they went to the gym. When the frustration of the modern world got too much, they went to the gym. When their thoughts lingered on all they had lost, they went to the gym.
All in all, for being two weeks into a brand-new world, Bucky thought he and Steve were doing pretty alright.
And then the aliens came.