Orpheo Looks Back
Bucky was the last one to sit at the lunch table, but it was clear the conversation was still focused on Clint’s prank.
“You should have seen the look on your face, Stark!” Clint exclaimed with a mouthful of food, in which Nat swatted him for.
“You just watch your back, Barton.” Tony narrowed his eyes at Clint, who had a sly smiled plastered on his face.
When Bucky finally sat, he first assumed that no one had noticed his late entrance, but then he saw the look Natasha gave him. He sometimes almost felt jealous of her, of how easy she found it to talk to Steve. He wished it was that simple for him. Most of the conversation going on Bucky deemed as background noise, until his name was mentioned.
“Ahh, Buck!” Clint said, leaning forward across the table towards where Bucky was sitting, “The look on your face was priceless! You looked like you were going to piss yourself!” This time Nat didn’t scold her boyfriend, but Bucky could feel her stare on him intensifying.
“That wasn’t fucking cool what you did back there, Clint.” Bucky muttered, expecting no one to listen or even pay attention to what he said. It was silent after he spoke.
“It’s just a prank, bro…” Clint tried to defend himself.
“Well it wasn’t fucking funny.” Bucky spat, standing up from the table.
“Come on, Bucky,” Tony encouraged, “sit down.”
Bucky shoved his chair in as a reply, charging out of the lunch hall.
Winifred Barnes made no attempt to lure Bucky out of his room when she saw the boy hurtle past her when he arrived home from school. It was late evening now, and Bucky’s dinner outside his bedroom door had began to go cold. He had kept his phone on silent, but still checked it every minute or so, stupidly hoping for a message from Steve.
Bucky knew he was being naive. He embarrassed Steve, made his… Friend? feel like shit. Bucky hated being scared, but right now he was terrified. He knew he cared about Steve, but enough to impulsively protect him? He knew he shouldn’t, but he loathed Bruce. When that fog rose and Bucky watched his Steve suffer, he knew that whatever he did Steve would resent him for it, but he couldn’t help it. He couldn’t help caring about him. And Bruce didn’t do a fucking thing, Bucky thought bitterly, he just stood there. But Bucky couldn’t blame him, Bruce didn’t know what to do. Bucky checked his phone again, huffing when he saw Natasha’s caller ID flash up on screen. Reluctantly, he answered the call.
“I believe you have some explaining to do, Barnes.” She said.
“Oh, hello Bucky! Glad you picked up the phone!” Bucky said in a faux girl voice, “Hello Natasha! My most persistent friend! I could never ignore a call from someone so interfering as you!”
“Har. Har. That sounded nought like me. Now, explain.”
“S’nothing to tell.” Bucky lied.
“Okay, if there’s nothing to tell, riddle me this: why did you get so pissed off with Clint? Why did you get so worked up about the prank? Why did I have to hush Tony into secrecy by doing his maths homework–which, by the way, he could very easily do a better job on than I could–?”
“Steve has asthma.” Was Bucky’s answer
“Yes I know.”
“And your boyfriend is an idiot.”
“In other news, water is wet.” Bucky could almost hear Natasha’s eye roll, “Look, okay. Bucky, I get it. You’re not entirely sure why you freaked out over the Lynx bombs.”
Oh, I know why, Nat.
“It’s something to do with Rogers, and definitely something to do with repressed feelings.”
Feelings which shall remain entirely, catastrophically repressed, “I don’t want to talk about this.” Bucky said, hoarsely.
“Tough titties, Barnes. If you hang up on me I’ll climb through your window.”
Much to the redheads joy, Bucky finally gave in and blurted out, “I miss him so much, Natasha. He didn’t deserve any of the shit I put him through. And I’ve–I’ve really fucking lost him. I fucking hurt him and I still care about him, God, I care about him so much it fucking sucks. I can’t even tell him why I fucked him over and I’m a fucking screw up I wasn’t thinking in class and now he hates me even fucking more.”
Stupidly, Natasha didn’t say anything straight away. This gave Bucky a second or two to realise what he had unloaded on her. A muttered, Fuck, ran down the receiver and the dial tone clicked. Bucky had hung up.
Poor git, Natasha thought, opening up twitter so she could procrastinate just a bit longer. It was when she actually started her art homework she decided she had to tell Steve.
It was raining hard. Perfect weather to stay indoors and crack out some painting. Steve was in the groove, oblivious to everything around him. That was until Natasha pulled out his headphone, muttering, “...Talking about you.”
Steve turned to look at her, quirking his eyebrow, “Hmm?”
Nat looked him dead in the eye, “He was talking about you last night, you know?”
You didn’t need to be a rocket scientist to realise whom Nat was talking about. Steve guessed it straight off the bat, “Bucky?”
Nat nodded, “He feels bad.”
For some reason, this made Steve angry. Bucky feels ‘bad’? And yet he gets someone else to tell Steve? “Oh, wow!” Steve snarked, “About what? Humiliating me or being a homophobic prick?”
Nat ignored his remarks, continuing with the script she planned at lunch, “He worries about you, Steven.”
“Sure he does.” Steve scoffed.
“He misses you.”
“Fat fuckin’ chance.”
“You’re insufferable.”
“I’ve been told.”
Steve declined Bruce’s offer to spend that Friday afternoon at his house, and instead walked home alone. He wanted time to think before his mum arrived home from her shift at the hospital. The way he reacted to what Natasha told him wasn’t truthful, but he wasn’t ready for the truth, not yet. He wasn’t ready to start hoping, hoping that his Bucky still cared about him. Steve knew that is was probably naive of him to trust what Nat said was genuine, that she wasn’t just making up lies to make him feel better. She doesn’t seem like that kind of person, he decided. He couldn’t help but feel stupidly happy, but confused and angry at the same time. A vibrant red colour dusted his cheeks when he thought of Bucky saying Steve’s name, thinking about Steve. But then Steve remembered the argument, remembered how Bucky hurt him, betrayed him. He knew it was wrong, but Steve wanted to think it will get better, that himself and Bucky will just drift apart and forget each other. Whether both boys liked it or not, their lives were forever intertwined, neither of them being able to let go. Maybe I should talk to him, he thought, just something small, like a hi, or… Steve knew there was so much more he wanted to say to Bucky, so much that was left unsaid between them. He was too caught up in his thoughts that he didn’t notice the front door opening, or his mum entering the kitchen, where Steve was sat at the table.
“Hi, sweetie!” Sarah smiled brightly, “We discharged the patient that had the cardiac arrest today! He’s making a terrific recovery–” She stopped when she saw how downtrodden her son looked, “Oh, honey. What’s the matter?”
Steve leant against his mother, who had scooted her chair closer to him, “It’s a long story…” And he told her all of it from the beginning.
From his first year at secondary school when he didn’t share any classes with Bucky, so he started hanging around with Tony Stark more often.
From year eight when Steve came out to Bucky–because he had trusted and respected Bucky, and thought he wouldn’t judge him. Steve was wrong. He told his mum how that caused Bucky to become irritated, and annoyed with Steve when Steve would continue to follow Bucky around and try to get on with his friends. Even though Tony was an egotistical, arrogant prick. Even though Clint was insolent and incredibly ignorant. Even though he just had nothing in common with Thor, who seemed to have treated Steve like a novelty item. He told Sarah about how Bucky had completely cut him off that summer, completely ignoring him. Steve had hoped it was only because Bucky was having too much fun, and that Bucky would be his friend when school started up again, but it didn’t.
Steve told his mum how Bucky had continued to ignore him in year nine and how Steve felt utterly alone and miserable. He’d spent half of the year in Bucky’s shadow. His only way out being art. He told his mum about all the journals he’d filled out with sketches of Bucky around school, in his garden and if he ever saw him in public.
He told Sarah about the argument just before christmas the other year, and she said, “That’s why you were so upset…?” Very quietly, her eyes welling up and wanting so badly to hold her only child until his problems were all sorted out.
Steve nodded and continued his story. He told her that not much had happened after that. That he and Bucky just pretended they didn’t know each other, that he became friends with Bruce. That was until yesterday. He told Sarah about the deodorant prank and how Bucky–the guy that wanted nothing to do with Steve–had carried him out of the room, and he told her about what Natasha had said earlier and how it was messing him up. He didn’t want to risk believing her. Bucky had brought him so much happiness, he didn’t want to lose it again.
Sarah took a moment to compose herself, not wanting to upset her son even further, “It seems as though… And you probably won’t want to… But it seems as though the pair of you need to sit down to talk and sort this out. There must be a reason he wanted to help you, sweetie. There must be a reason he told Natasha about it.”
Steve nodded slowly, “Yeah, yeah, you’re right, Mum.”
Sarah smiled sadly, “I love you Steven Grant Rogers.”
“I love you too.”