You´re the only place that feels like home

Living with Bucky…was not what Tony had expected.

Not that he had much to compare it to. The only other person he'd ever shared a living space with for an extended period of time had been Clint – back when they were both 14, barely presented and sent off to a boarding school for Omegas. Clint by a well-meaning CPS agent after an incident with a knife and Clint's foster father. And Tony by his father, who had hoped for an Alpha heir to continue the family business and didn't know what to do with the useless Omega he had gotten instead.
Tony and Clint became friends almost instantly, drawn together by the shared knowledge of what it was like to not be wanted by the rest of the world.

Aside from those 3 years – before Howard had taken Tony out of school so he could marry him off as part of a business deal - and the 5 weeks before he'd met Bucky, Tony had always stayed in places too big for the small amount of people that lived in them, mansions that you could get lost in but that still never had enough rooms for Tony to truly hide.

Not that there was any need for Tony to hide from Bucky. The Alpha kept to himself, staying in his room most of the time. He checked with Tony before running a load of washing or using the vacuum to make sure Peter wasn't taking a nap. He kept to his shelves of the fridge and put his used dishes in the dishwasher right away.

The only thing that bugged Tony about Bucky was that he didn't know the Alpha's schedule. True to his word, Bucky had started working for SHIELD, a private security company, about a week after they'd moved in together. And in the two weeks since then he had had several seminars and training sessions and had been shadowing several coworkers during their shifts. Which meant that sometimes he came back from work around six, just as Tony started cooking. Other times he was home all day, sleeping off a night shift and Tony dreaded every noise above a whisper was gonna be the thing to make the Alpha finally snap.

"No, I totally understand..." Tony walked from his bedroom into the living room, expertly collecting a teddy and a small sock from the floor, as he continued his call with Clint. "I'll figure something out, no need to worry." He ended the call and nearly jumped out of his skin when Bucky asked, "Everything okay?"

The Alpha was in the kitchen, apparently making a sandwich and listening in on Tony's side of the conversation. The Omega's first instinct was to get defensive and snappy but that wouldn´t be fair. Bucky hadn't been sneaking around to see who he was talking to and trying to catch him in a lie afterwards. He had just happened to be standing right there.

So instead Tony took a deep breath and sat down at the bar that separated the kitchen from the living room. "It's nothing...I just have a doctor's appointment and Clint can't take Peter because Kate was up all night with a fever..." He ran a hand through his hair, causing it to stick up even more. "I'm just gonna call and reschedule - "

"I could watch him..." Tony was already halfway out of his chair when the Alpha spoke, so quietly that he couldn't be sure he'd heard him correctly and immediately backpedaling when he saw the surprise on Tony's face at his offer "No, forget it...that was a stupid idea."

And it would be so easy for Tony to agree with him. Nobody would blame him for not letting a strange Alpha look after his pup, because Alphas did not look after children. But that wasn't true. Sam looked after Kate a lot and had even watched Peter as well a couple of times. And even though everything he'd seen and experienced first-hand in his life up to the point he'd found himself in front of Clint's door, was telling him otherwise, Tony just knew that there were more Alphas like this. Alphas who didn't see their own children as nothing but a nuisance that was best looked after by nannies and tutors. Or he very much wanted to believe that at least.

So, when Bucky picked up his plate, no doubt to hide in his room, Tony shook his head: "No...it's not. That would really help me out actually...unless you don't want to..."

For a second the Alpha stared at him as if he'd gone crazy. "You...really? I don't mind. At all. I grew up with 4 younger sisters and a whole bunch of cousins, feels like I spent most of my teenage years babysitting..."

And now it was Tony who couldn't help but stare. Gone was his ghost of a roommate, the Alpha who's facial expressions could at best be describes as stoic - though "resting murder face" usually seemed more apt - was suddenly replaced by a young man with a teasing smile and an actual twinkle in his eyes, all because he'd started talking about his family and looking after his younger cousins.

And that did it for Tony, right there and then he decided that leaving Peter with Bucky for the afternoon would not be the worst thing. In fact, at this point it would almost be cruel to the Alpha to refuse his offer.

Before the tiny voice in the back of his head that was still doubting that this was a good idea could talk him out of it, Tony slid out of his seat. "Great. I'll go wake Peter from his nap, tell him about the change of plans." He headed towards the master bedroom. "And you just try to keep my kid alive for a couple of hours." When he looked over his shoulder, Bucky was smiling at him and Tony couldn't help but smile back.

Tony was still in the waiting room, filling out forms, when Bucky sent him the first picture. In it, Peter was sitting on the floor, in front of the coffee table, what looks like his entire box of crayons spread out in front of him and working hard on some rather abstract painting. The caption read "working on a Masterpiece for Papa". Tony quickly saved it to his phone.

The second one came through while Tony was in the chair, he could hear the faint sound of the notification from where he left his phone under his clothes.
He checked it as soon as he'd left the doctor's office and couldn't help but grin at the absolutely disgusted face Peter was making in the picture, looking down at a piece of fruit in his hand. "Your child is weird" Bucky had added to this one. "Who doesn't like plums?".

Just as Tony saved this one, another one came through. Once again Peter was sitting in his booster seat at the dining table, a small green plate in front of him. He was grinning into the camera this time, reaching out a small fist stuffed with a greyish-purple mess. "But Cheerios and Blueberries are apparently tasty...:rolling_eyes:".

"Petey knows what's good. Blueberries are the best!" Tony quickly replied and just before he ducked down into the subway another message came through. A shaky video of Peter laughing in absolute delight as he feeds the sticky mess in his hand to Bucky who is pulling an exaggerated 'eew' face as he chews. "You are both weird" the Alpha says with a smile and the video ends.

Tony spent the entire subway ride home re-watching it.

Tony had come back home to find Bucky and Peter stretched out on the floor with Peter's dinosaur toys all around them and the domesticity of the scene had almost brought tears to his eyes - stupid pregnancy hormones! And stupid Bucky, because of course the Alpha had noticed right away and had gotten up from the floor and with a concerned look had asked how the appointment had gone.

Luckily, Tony did have just about enough time to ensure him that everything was fine before Peter had managed to scramble up as well to present his Papa with his newest drawing. By the time the toddler was done explaining what exactly each of the shapes were supposed to be, Bucky had left the room.

And now, a couple of hours later - with Peter freshly bathed and put to bed - Tony stood in front of Bucky's room, nervously waiting for a reaction to his knock. He was wondering if he should try again when the Alpha opened the door.

"Everything okay?" he immediately asked, looking Tony over as if he was checking for any serious injuries. His hair was a tangled mess and there was a pillow crease on his face and Tony felt horrible.

"Yeah, everything's...sorry for waking you. It's just..." the Omega took a deep breath to steal himself. This was okay, he was being nice, Bucky saying 'no' would not be the end of the world. "I cooked, Baked Ziti, old family recipe and whenever I make anything involving Pasta my great-grandmother's spirit possess me and she was used to cooking for like a family of 20 people so...Are you hungry?"

Bucky stepped out of the room and for a second the two of them were standing way to close – Tony's brain quickly reminded him that the last time he had been this close to the Alpha was the day they'd met, when Tony had greeted Bucky with a kiss to sell them being a couple - but then Bucky simply walked around Tony towards the bathroom. "Thank you, it smells amazing. I'll just quickly wash up, okay?"

Tony just nodded and then pointed towards the dining table. "Great, I'll set everything up. See you in a bit."

Tony was determined to not let dinner be awkward. So, after Bucky had complimented his cooking, the Omega went straight to the real reason for his invitation: "Thank you for watching Pete today. It really helped me out and he seemed to have a lot of fun as well. Sorry if he was a bit too..." Tony let the sentence hang, not sure really how he wanted to end it.

"Not a problem at all. He's a great kid." Bucky said, finishing his plate and eying the serving dish. "But honestly, was everything okay at the doctors? I'm sorry I asked in front of Peter...I should have realized…"

Tony pushed the dish towards the other man before replying. "Nah, don't worry. Everything's fine, I'm healthy, baby's healthy." Tony took a sip from his water. "Got a sonogram picture...you wanna see?" Tony didn't know why he'd asked that, except that Bucky seemed interested, in him, in Peter, so maybe he'd be interested in this as well and not just brush it aside with an "I don't have time for this Omega nonsense right now."

Bucky almost choked on a bite of pasta in his eagerness to ensure Tony that he absolutely wanted to see it. "I always thought they looked kinda creepy...cool but creepy" he added as Tony got up to get the picture from his bag.

"My child does not look creepy, thank you very much." Tony said as he handed the picture over though there was no real heat behind it.

"Oh, wow." Bucky looked at the picture, mesmerized. "This looks like an actual human being."

Tony snatched the picture back and shook his head. "Of course he does. What did you think he was gonna look like? Godzilla?"

Bucky shook his head, a smile on his face. "I just remember when my older cousin got the first sonogram of my niece, she kept crying coz she could never find her on the picture, she was just a... vaguely bean-shaped blob."

"Yeah" Tony said. "I had some of those...from Peter as well." They were back in Malibu, left behind when he'd grabbed only the essentials - mostly Peter's things, a couple of clothes and documents. Or maybe Ty had already thrown them out along with all the rest of Tony's stuff.

"So, another boy then." Bucky's comment brought Tony out of his musings.

"Yeah, though this one's gonna be an Alpha." Tony put a protective hand over his baby bump and when he looked back up, he met Bucky's confused look.

"Do they know that? Or is it one of those ‘You´re carrying low, you're gonna have a boy’ type things?"

Tony couldn't help but grin at the mention of the old wife's tale. "Science has come a long way in the last couple of years. They can test for that now. Pretty early on, actually." And just like that, the smile disappeared from Tony's face as he remembered an argument from over 3 years ago, with tears and shouts and broken furniture. An argument that Tony had luckily won. He thought of the precious little boy sleeping in the room next door as he added almost silently. "Makes it easier to get rid of unwanted Omega babies. "

"What the hell…why would anyone…" The Alpha's obvious disgust at this revelation made Tony feel strangely vindicated but he still felt like he had managed to ruin the evening.

"I have to go check on Peter." Without waiting for a reply, the Omega headed to his room.

The first thing Tony noticed when he finally stumbled out into the living area the next morning, was that Bucky had cleared away the dishes from the night before.

The second thing he noticed was that the Alpha had put a few things up on the fridge – the picture Peter had drawn, the sonogram and a handwritten note with his work schedule for the next couple of days and "Just in case you need a babysitter again".