Setting Him Up

Steve had been waiting outside the restaurant for ten minutes before realising he knew nothing about the girl he was waiting for. He wouldn't be able to identify her without asking everyone who went past whether they were who he was waiting for. He figured that he may as well just go to the table and wait for them to show up. It was taking a fair while, with him still sitting by himself half an hour later. He ordered a wine, for the first time resentful that he couldn't get drunk, because at least that would distract him from having had his date not show. He was taking out his phone to text Natasha to complain (two out of three of his dates had gone really badly) when he saw someone walking up to him in the corner of his eye. ‘Your table, sir. I'll return soon for your order.’ He looked up, confused. The tables next to him were full, but the waiter had said sir, it made no sense. He looked at the man the waiter had brought over, who looked as confused as Steve felt.

'Bucky?’ He was slightly more confused, Natasha was setting him up on a date, wasn't she? So why hadn't the girl showed up but Bucky had? 'What’re you doing here?’

'Could ask the same of you pal. Tony set me up on a date, they must have just taken me to the wrong table.’ At that moment he remembered that Tony had thought there might be something between the two of them, and this seemed to be the sort of thing he would do. This wasn't an accident, and it was going to be a nightmare. He could feel his cheeks turning red, and hoped Steve either wouldn't notice or would misunderstand.

'Huh. Nat set me up, odd coincidence.’ He saw Bucky blush, and was about to ask why when he saw how he was looking at him, eyebrows raised as if he was waiting for him to figure something out, but he didn't know what Bucky expected him to know. He watched as he sat down in front of him, taking up the menu, half concentrating on picking a meal, half watching him with his eyebrows still raised. Steve sat there for a while, head tilted slightly to one side, waiting for Bucky to give in and explain.

'Nat and Tony spent a lot of time together yesterday didn't they? Before Nat organised this for you?’ He said pointedly.

'Finally,' Steve muttered under his breath. This had happened a few times growing up, but it had only ever taken a minute for Bucky to give in, and yet this time it had taken almost five. ‘Yeah, they did actually. Kinda surprised about that.’ He sat in silence a moment longer, before his eyes widened, mouth forming a perfect 'O’.

'Took ya long enough.’

'Wait, did you know?’

Bucky's face blanched, realising he had started digging a pit for himself. 'No, I didn't. Of course I didn't! I just realised as I sat down, and I may not know him as well as you do, but this does seem like the sort of thing Tony'd do.’

'It is. But I don't get why Natasha agreed to this, surely she'd realise how awkward it'd be.’

'Er, yeah, I dunno.’ Him mentioning awkwardness almost seemed to be the reason they sat in silence until the waiter came around for their orders, as if it had made them focus on the fact that this was a date. 'I'll have your strongest wine and the special please.’

‘Strongest? Thought you weren't fussed on the taste?’ Bucky had only ever drunk beer in the war, saying that he couldn't stand wine, and wasn't too much of a fan of alcohol in any form.

'I need the alcohol.’ He paused for a second. 'My version of the serum doesn't completely stop its effects, it just takes a lot more.' He added before Steve could say anything. Steve ordered quickly, the slightest amount of concern showing on his face, imperceptible to anyone who didn't know him.

‘Surely you don't need it, you never have before, and you've been through some tough times. Why should this be any harder?’ He realised how ridiculous that question would seem, and added, 'I’m sorry, you don't have to answer that. Don't answer that.’ He couldn't shake the hope inside him that he couldn't place, something about what he might have answered, but he also dreaded hearing his response. ‘Let’s just forget that we've been set up, pretend we're just hanging out. Like it's the 40s again, our dates haven't shown, and we're just at the local bar eating some cheap food that would make us throw up the next day. Except that this place is ridiculously pricey.’ Even as he said that though, he was thinking about how useful it would be to be able to get even the slightest bit tipsy. Because for some unknown reason he couldn't quite get the fact that he was on a date with Bucky out of his mind.

'Trust me, I need it.’ The same thing was going on in his mind, except he knew why.

A fair few drinks later and he was only just starting to get tipsy. 'You sure you want to keep ordering more Buck? You're going to end up spending a few hundred dollars on wine at this rate. And you look like you're going to be sick after every sip.’

'I’m fine. It's disgusting, but I need it.’ His voice was slightly slurred, but that seemed to be the only effect the wine had had so far.

'Buck. You don't. There's no reason you would.’

‘No, there is, I just can't say.’ For a second he thought he saw a flash of something on Steve's face, hope, maybe? But he denied it to himself the next second, not wanted his own hopes to go up.

'Well, can you at least stop before you get too drunk to stand up? I prefer you sober.’

‘Fine, just let me have one more bottle.’ He couldn't stand the concern on Steve's face, looking at him like he thought something was really wrong, like he needed to be protected. ‘But it's not your job to protect me or whatever you're trying to do.’

‘You mean care? It is Buck, I don't like seeing you like this, I never have.’ He could feel the heat in his eyes, but didn't want to let Bucky see the tear that was close to falling.

‘You mean there have been other times?’ His memories were not all back, but he had thought he would remember something like this, it was the painful memories that had resurfaced fastest.

'Once. There was this girl, you really liked her, you'd been dating a couple of months before she left you for some guy who joined the army as soon as he could. I could never understand why she left you. You took it real bad, spent the night drinking, and I couldn't do anything. You could barely stand the next day, I broke a rib trying to help you home.’

'Steve, I'm…’

'No, don't try to apologize.’

'But…’ He looked at Steve's face, and saw the tears that he was trying so desperately to hide. He knew that trying to say something would make it worse, and set down the glass that had been in his hand. He pushed it over to Steve. ‘Here. I'll stop.’ They sat for a minute, silent. ‘You got any better stories of our old life? Something to lift the mood?’

'Well, somehow life in the Depression wasn't all laughter. But there were plenty of good times. We went to Rockaway Beach once, had to get a ride in a truck because we spent all our money on hotdogs. They were great hotdogs though. Probably made us sick the next day, I can't remember.’ He paused, looking at Bucky, watching his face, wide-eyed as he remembered.

'I was trying to win something for a girl, wasn't I?’

'Yeah, you were.’ He smiled, 'The amount of times you'd spend our cash on girls was ridiculous. I'd buy some food, and you'd buy something for a girl, and maybe a roller coaster ride for the two of us. It annoyed me so much, but looking back I wouldn't have it another way.’ He laughed at Bucky's protests, trying to tell him that he should have said something, not yet remembering that he had. ‘Oh, and we watched the first Walt Disney flick together, had to save up for a month to go. It took a few of them for you to like them, but I was in love immediately. I still remember you throwing a pillow at my head when I started singing one of the songs from Snow White, and then you joined in even louder a minute later. I think it was watching those cartoons that made me start drawing.’

Bucky was smiling, but he looked confused at the same time. 'I can't remember that. I remember all sorts of things, but not singing songs from cartoons. We do that often, or just the once?’

‘A few times. We sang a bit over the campfire with the Commandos, there was this one time when I tried to make us all sing instead of howl because you had a headache. That only made them howl louder.’

'How nice of them.’

‘They didn't like me trying to stop them.’ He smiled at Bucky, and their eyes caught for a minute, neither looking away. He noticed suddenly that his head had slowly been turning to maintain eye contact, and saw that Bucky had been slowly moving his chair around to be closer to him. He nudged his chair closer, and they were almost sitting next to each other instead of opposite. Bucky was slowly leaning in closer, closer, until all Steve could see was his face. Then, in a flash, Bucky's mouth was on his. Steve sat still in shock for a few seconds before he could react, realising that this was what he wanted, what he had always wanted. He went to kiss him back, but Bucky was pulling away, bright red.

'I’m sorry, I'm so sorry,’ he said, 'I shouldn't have done that.’ Steve whispered a protest, leaning back in, but Bucky stood up, not seeing Steve's reaction, thinking he'd just made a huge mistake. 'I guess I'd better go.'

'No, Bucky, wait.' He stopped for a second, but didn't turn, and left the restaurant in a hurry, certain that he had messed up, had ruined the one true friendship he had. Steve watched him go, desperate to chase after him, but he knew that would only make him leave faster. He just wished he hadn't taken so long to realise what he really felt, that he'd kissed him back when he had the chance.