Title: we have found each other thirsty
Pairings: Steve/Bucky
Rating: M
Warnings: internalized homophobia
Spoilers: through CA:TWS
Wordcount: 5013
Summary: It takes years for Steve and Bucky to get it right.

There's a difference between wanting and having; Steve Rogers is no stranger to that. He's spent long afternoons wracked with coughs pushing what little air he had out of his body, desperately willing his ribcage to expand, for his lungs to open up and do the job they were meant to. He's spent years watching boys around him shoot up, their shoulders getting broader and muscles hardening up, while his own body stayed as it was, too skinny and frail to do anything useful.

Steve's wanted many things, but he's resigned himself to not having.

—

The first time he realizes he wants Bucky, he's watching Bucky kiss a girl. They've just come out of the movies, and Bucky puts his hand around his date's waist, dipping her backwards and pressing his mouth to hers.

Steve had heard Bucky talking about kissing girls, but he'd never seen it; and now that it's in front of him he can't look away, the way Bucky's hand curls into the fabric of her dress, the light slanting across Bucky's face.

"Come on, Alice," his own date — Jane — says from beside him. "We've gotta go."

After Alice and Jane have gone, Bucky looks at him, an easy grin on his face. "C'mon," he says, like nothing's happened, while Steve looks down at Bucky's hands and feels the sudden urge to grab them in his own.

He puts his hands in his pockets instead. "You have fun?" he asks dryly, and hopes his voice isn't shaking.

—

The thing is, Steve's never wanted something that was wrong before.

—

Bucky's near dressed for church when he notices that his shirt's got a rip down its side. "Aw," he says, starting to button himself out of it. "This is my best shirt."

"You want me to fix it?" Steve offers. He wants something to concentrate on other than the expanse of Bucky's skin stretched over his torso.

"Naw, I can do it," Bucky says, shrugging his shirt off. "It'll be quick, just gimme a minute."

Bucky licks at the end of the thread before bringing it to the needle. He's sitting at the kitchen table, shirt spread neatly on top of his thighs, and as he bends down to start stitching Steve can't help looking at the curve of his neck, the knob at the top of his spine. And it's not that Steve's never seen Bucky shirtless — out swimming in the harbor, Bucky just coming out of a bath — but it's the first time Steve's wanted to put his mouth to that skin, wanted to touch with careful hands and smooth them down Bucky's back.

He draws a quiet breath and looks away, but he keeps stealing sideways glances: at the sure and steady way Bucky's holding the needle, the strand of thread held between his teeth. Bucky's fingers move deftly over the rip, and Steve can imagine them on his own torso, can nearly feel them with the force of his want.

He presses his own hand into the flesh of his thigh, trying to gain some control.

"Done," Bucky says, satisfied. He raises his head and then frowns. "You all right?"

"Yeah," Steve says. He clears his throat. "C'mon, put your shirt back on. We're gonna be late."

—

When it happens, Bucky is the one who kisses Steve, first. In some ways, that's not even a surprise — hadn't Bucky always been braver than him?

They're both a little drunk: Bucky half on alcohol and half on the whirl of dancing, Steve on beer he'd downed at the bar so he wouldn't keep looking at Bucky. The girls have all gone, and it's just Bucky and him, out on the fire escape in the cooling evening air.

He's laughing about something he doesn't remember anymore, and swaying a little. Bucky puts a hand out to catch his shoulder — he presses his thumb into the hollow beneath Steve's collarbone and looks at him, his own mouth in a grin.

Bucky looks good in the waning light — sharper, more focused somehow — and Steve's looking at the shadows playing across Bucky's face as he dips closer and brushes his lips against the corner of Steve's mouth.

It's just a light touch, gone as soon as it's begun, but it makes Steve stop breathing for a moment. He licks his lips and wonders if he can taste Bucky on his skin.

Bucky's not grinning anymore, just looking carefully at Steve. His hands are back by his side. "You gonna say anything?" he says, clears his throat.

All his words are coming out dream-like. "We should go inside," Steve says. "And you should—" He licks his lips again. "I—"

"I can go," Bucky says quietly. "If you don't want—"

"No, don't," Steve says. He feels like he's burning up. He catches hold of one of Bucky's wrists and climbs into the apartment, dragging Bucky behind.

As soon as they're inside Steve leans up against Bucky. "Can you—" he can't quite say it. Instead he presses a hand to the back of Bucky's head, and Bucky doesn't say a word, just bends down to meet Steve's mouth.

—

They don't talk about it. In the morning, Steve's head hurts and he doesn't, can't look at Bucky.

Steve doesn't know what this means. If Bucky looks at him and feels the same want hooking into the softest part of his belly; if Bucky doesn't care that Steve needs him in this terrible way.

Or maybe it doesn't mean anything. Bucky had been drunk, after all, and he's not a stranger to kissing. Steve had been a convenient body.

It doesn't have to mean anything. It shouldn't.

—

Steve's never realized how often Bucky touches him; he trails light fingers at Steve's elbows, casually steers him by the shoulders. And it wouldn't, shouldn't be a big deal, except for the strain of wrongness that runs in Steve's body that makes him crave more than what Bucky can give him — more than what he should want, from anyone.

And Bucky, who is good and brave and doesn't deserve this — Bucky still looks at him and throws his arms around Steve's shoulders like nothing is wrong.

It takes him longer than he should to talk to Bucky, because he's scared of losing the only friend he's had; he's afraid that finally, Bucky will see him for what he is and leave.

"Look," he says, a quiet evening when Bucky's lying on the floor, perfect for drawing. Steve could pull out paper and pencil and capture the shape of Bucky's smile, the sprawl of his limbs — he's done it many times before.

But this time, he wraps his arms around his knees and confesses, slowly, "There's something wrong with me, Buck."

"Are you sick?" Bucky's up and next to him in a moment, a hand on Steve's forehead. "What's wrong?"

"Not like that," and Steve guiltily shakes off Bucky's touch. "Before, when we—" He blinks, and he can remember too clearly how Bucky's lips had felt under his own. "I want you," he says at last, one choked word at a time. "I can't help it, Bucky, I do."

But Bucky's not jerking away from him, not looking at him in disgust — he's drawing even closer, his hand cupping Steve's jaw, and then he's kissing him once again, his mouth on Steve's mouth. "There ain't nothing wrong with you," he says in between kisses. "Something this good can't be wrong."

Steve closes his eyes and tries to believe that.

—

"I want to be inside you," Steve murmurs one day, through a haze, and two days later Bucky comes to him wordlessly with a tin of slick. His head is tilted up, cockly, but Steve can see his pulse leaping in his throat.

Bucky takes off his clothes slowly, grinning at Steve like he's giving a show, and Steve can see Bucky's cock hard and red against his thigh. More than anything that sight's what makes Steve nod, and unscrew the tin to dip two of his fingers into it. He walks toward Bucky with a nervous lick of his lips, and when he slips a finger into Bucky's body the way he clenches hot and tight around Steve makes his eyes go wide.

Bucky's making small soft noises, saying, "Another, Steve, please." Steve gives it to him, watches with wonder as Bucky stretches around him. When he slides his fingers out Bucky remains open, a little, and that takes Steve's breath away, so much that he has to steady himself with a hand on Bucky's hip.

He looks at the shining marks his slick fingers have left on Bucky's skin, and suddenly something inside of him is choking him. He steps back, takes his hands off Bucky completely.

"What," Bucky says. "Why're you stopping?"

"You don't have to do this." Steve swallows. "Just 'cause I want—"

"Steve." Bucky looks shocked. He sits up and tries to kiss him. When Steve rocks back, he reaches out to put a hand on Steve's face. "Have you been thinking — I want this, I do. I've wanted it for—" he laughs, lightly. "It's been a long time."

This time, when Bucky leans in to kiss him, Steve lets him.

"Now get on with it, will ya?" Bucky says. He sets himself down on the bed, looks over his shoulder. "Since you've done all that work, and everything."

Steve laughs, a little shakily. He's still hard — he slicks himself up and puts a hand on Bucky's hip, and slowly thrusts forward.

Bucky makes a sound, and Steve stops.

"Keep going," Bucky urges, but his voice is tight. "It's okay."

"If you're not—"

"Steve Rogers, I swear to God—"

He can feel Bucky's sides moving as he breathes, the twitches in his flank. He takes a breath and keeps going, into the tight slick heat of Bucky's body. A sound makes its way out of Steve's throat.

"Good?"

"Bucky—" Steve chokes out. His hands feel shaky, though they're steady on Bucky's hips. "You—"

He blindly moves his hands forward, around Bucky's hips until he's got his hands on Bucky's cock. It's softened a little, but Steve keeps stroking at it while he's moving inside Bucky. The sounds Bucky makes are better than anything Steve could've imagined — they're being wrung out of him true and raw, and Steve commits them to memory, and puts his mouth against the curve of Bucky's shoulder blade, biting down a little as he comes.

"Steve," Bucky says muzzily as Steve slips out of him. "Steve."

"Yeah, Buck," Steve says. He climbs up onto the bed and curls into Bucky's side, the heat of his body.

"That was — you were—" he lets out a quiet laugh. "Yeah."

—

Steve is certain that he shouldn't want Bucky like he does.

Bucky's quick touches on his skin have turned into something more, raising fire along his skin and making him feel like he's burning up. Sometimes Bucky just looks at him with a dark heat in his eyes, and it makes Steve feel like his chest is crushing in on itself, toward one single, heavy point and that point is aimed straight at Bucky.

He's known all his life what it's light to fight to breathe, but sometimes when Bucky comes into the room it feels like he doesn't have enough air and it has nothing to do with his defective lungs, but the desire he has rising thick in his throat. He looks at Bucky, the curve of his smile and the lines of his hands, and wants to touch, to memorize the shape of Bucky in every possible position, at every possible moment.

He'd do anything for Bucky, if he asked.

And that's not right — he knows what he feels for Bucky he should only feel for God, because no human being can carry that kind of weight on his shoulders. He wants — he wants Bucky, wants to consume and be consumed completely, and that kind of fire is dangerous.

—

It's a Wednesday, and the pews are empty, but it's still a shock when Bucky kisses him. Steve pulls back instinctively, looking around with his heart pounding.

"Nobody's here," Bucky says, and kisses him again. "Relax, Steve."

"We're in church," Steve hisses, his voice rising up at the end. "Bucky!"

"Don't tell me you don't want this," Bucky says, eyes shining, as he drags Steve into a confessional booth. He presses on Steve's shoulders, settles him down on the bench, and then drops to the ground between Steve's thighs.

Steve can't lie — the sight of Bucky in front of him makes the desire in his chest stir, thick and fast. Even as he says Bucky's name he's aware that it sounds too soft and affectionate, that his legs are falling open as Bucky fumbles at his belt.

Bucky puts a finger to his lips and winks before bending his head down to mouth at Steve's cock. Steve presses a hand to his mouth, bites into the flesh between thumb and forefinger so he won't make a sound, but Bucky's tongue is warm and wet and Bucky is swallowing him down like he wants this — like he can't imagine anything better than this, on his knees with Steve's cock in his mouth.

Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned, Steve thinks, absurdly. With Bucky's fingers curling hard into Steve's flesh, it nearly feels like Bucky is — like he's worshipping him, with little licks of his tongue and hitches in his breath, wringing pleasure from every part of Steve.

Steve comes with one hand in Bucky's hair and the other between his teeth, blood on his tongue. When he looks down Bucky is staring back at him, his cheek laid on Steve's thigh and his gaze warm and soft. Steve closes his eyes because he doesn't deserve this, any of it, and he can't bear that Bucky wants to give it to him.

—

They're lying on Steve's bed, and Bucky's kissing him; but when Bucky presses his mouth to Steve's throat it feels too much, too intimate. Steve pulls away — just a small motion, but it's enough to make Bucky stop and sit up.

"Steve," Bucky says. "Did I do something wrong?"

He sounds crushed, and Steve hurriedly raises a hand to wipe away Bucky's frown. It's not that," he says, pressing his thumb to the corner of Bucky's mouth. "I just—"

"What is it, then?"

Bucky takes Steve's hand away from his face to tangle their fingers together. Steve looks down, at the way their hands interlock, and sighs. "Do you really think this is okay?" he asks, very quiet. "This — us."

"It's not wrong," Bucky says hotly. "We're not hurting anybody, are we?"

Steve wants to believe that, so much — but there's something wrong with the way he wants Bucky all the same, so much it's as if his heart's swelling to bursting with it. Maybe Bucky's all right, maybe the fire in his chest is a tamer one, but Steve knows, sickly certain, that his desire is near out of control.

And he also knows this: he has to do right by Bucky, because he's got no right to mess with Bucky's soul.

"I don't know," he says, instead of any of this. He looks away so he won't have to see the hurt on Bucky's face.

—

Steve isn't strong enough to say no. Instead he just pulls away, and pulls away, until it feels like he's stretched paper-thin, nearly transparent.

—

Bucky looks at him one Saturday evening. It feels like Steve hasn't looked at him in weeks. "Steve," he says — haltingly, quietly. "I can't do this anymore."

Bucky looks very, very tired. He rubs his hand over the top of his head; Steve watches the spikes of his hair rise up, then flatten.

"Okay," Steve says. His voice sounds like it's coming from very far away. "Yeah."

Bucky looks down at his feet. His hands are in his pockets — before, they'd have been touching steve, a touch at his shoulder, a hand at his waist. "I—" he shrugs suddenly, a sharp motion. "I guess you'll be happy now," he says. "I'm sorry."

Steve wants to say something to that — that he'd never been as happy as when he was with Bucky, and Steve's weakness doesn't change that. But he doesn't know how to put that into the right words, because it'd be wrong to give Bucky hope — it'd be wrong to tell him it was good.

"Don't," he finally says. "We shouldn't talk about it."

They don't.

—

Life goes back to normal: what should have happened if Steve hadn't said anything, if he'd never pulled Bucky down with him. Steve tells himself that he likes it, that it's better now.

But things have changed. Knowing how Bucky tastes under his tongue, Steve is reminded of it at the worst moments: at church during Father O'Leary's sermons, walking down the street with Bucky at his side. At night, when he can hear Bucky's careful breathing in the other bed, when he wants nothing more than to slide his hands down to touch his cock, to feel Bucky's name on his tongue and Bucky's hands on his skin. He wants, but he closes his eyes tight and clenches his hands into the sheets instead. He wonders if Bucky's doing the same thing across the room — but no, he can't think of that.

It's fine. It's better than leading Bucky into damnation.

—

"Steve, I enlisted," Bucky says. He looks almost apologetic.

Steve's got his third 4F this week. He doesn't think about it when he grins at Bucky. "War'll be over soon, then," he says. "Don't win it without me."

"I'll save a German for you." Bucky laughs, though there's not much humor to the sound. He reaches out for Steve's shoulder, then lowers his hand.

(Steve still feels it, a phantom touch.)

—

They'd said that the serum would fix everything. Steve steps out of the chamber and the first person he sees is Peggy, warm and bright in the cold room. He looks at her and looks at her and breathes out, slowly.

The relief lasts for weeks, months. He writes to Bucky, pages on pages of a pretended life, and almost finds it easy to ignore Bucky's I miss you at the end of all his letters.

Then they tell him about the 107th.

—

They write about his tear through the Hydra base, make him out a hero. The truth is nothing so clean. Steve doesn't remember much of it, and what he does he does in fragments: the jaw of a Hydra agent against his fist, Gabe asking if he knows what he's doing.

He hadn't. Most of all he'd been looking for Bucky, his heart and head singing for the same thing for once. He measures time in Bucky — in Bucky dead, then missing, then finally, blessedly alive. He can't explain the bone-deep relief at seeing Bucky on that lab bench — he won't.

—

The commandos liberate Strasbourg and bunk down at a hotel, first warm shower they've had in ages. When Steve gets out of the bathroom Bucky's waiting for him, a bottle of liquor in hand.

"They're giving these out downstairs," Bucky says, staring at the label. "Vive la France."

Steve waves away the drink when Bucky offers, and watches him settle into a chair. Bucky swallows a mouthful, tipping his head back, then puts his feet up with his eyes on Steve.

Bucky's closed the door. Steve flicks his eyes towards the shining wood, fitted well into its frame.

"Do you ever think about it," Bucky says. His hand is tight around the bottle and his voice sounds like it's being dragged out of him against his will.

Steve rubs at his face. "We can't," he says. It sounds thin, very ragged in the dim light.

Bucky stands up, suddenly. He puts the bottle down and crosses the room in two where Steve's settled down on the bed. "Tell me you don't want to," he says fiercely. "Tell me, and I'll leave."

His hands have settled on Steve's shoulders — broader, they've grown, but Bucky's fingers curl around them in a harsh grip, familiar. THere's a frown between his eyebrows and a harsh noise coming from his mouth, like all the words he wants to say are choking him.

He tilts his head and presses in, closer and closer until his mouth is near brushing Steve's; but it's Steve who leans in at last to make contact, to raise his head up and let Bucky's rough breath slip into his lungs. For a brief moment, Bucky's mouth is wet on his mouth and Steve isn't thinking about anything at all.

Then he pulls back. He opens his mouth to say something — anything — but all that comes out is a small, wounded, "Bucky."

Bucky slowly straightens up, his hands slipping back down to his side. "Okay," he says, very softly. "It's okay, Steve."

Bucky leaves with one last touch along the side of Steve's neck. Steve feels it, like a brand, until he falls asleep.

—

Steve slips into Bucky's tent late at night, the day he finds Bucky with a Hydra agent standing over him, a knife in his shoulder. Bucky's sitting up on his cot, shirt off and peeling back the bandage.

"Bucky," Steve says faintly. He touches his arm, the angry red scar curving across his skin. "God."

"Steve," Bucky says. He's half risen up, and he puts his hands on Steve's face, carefully pulls him closer. He gives Steve plenty of time — Steve could pull back, walk away.

He lets Bucky kiss him. He lets his mouth part open, invites him in. He can feel Bucky's breathing against his face and he needs that, tonight, when Bucky had nearly died.

And suddenly Bucky is touching him, his hands hot through his uniform. He tugs at Steve and Steve lets himself be pulled forward, onto Bucky's cot. He presses his mouth to Bucky's jaw, the length of his throat, and feels wetness prickling at the corner of his eyes.

"I missed you," he breathes. "So much."

"I've been right here," Bucky tells him, stroking his hair.

None of this is enough. Steve kisses Bucky again, biting at his lip, and presses his hands into Bucky's trousers. "Bucky," he says as he wraps his hand around Bucky's hardening cock, "I want—"

"Yeah," Bucky says, his hips canting upward. "Anything, Steve."

It's a relief, to be able to touch Bucky like he's been wanting to for weeks. Steve revels in the sounds that Bucky presses into his neck, small noises that he can't hold back between his teeth. He takes Bucky apart, slowly and carefully, and Bucky lets him, which is the best feeling of all.

—

In the morning, Steve wakes up with Bucky's arm across his chest. He slides out from underneath it slowly, keeping his breathing steady, and has already ducked down to unfasten the tent flap when Bucky's sleep-scratchy voice comes from behind him.

"We're not doing this again, are we?" he says.

Steve looks at the pattern his boots make in the earth. "I didn't mean for this to happen," he says without raising his head up. "I'm sorry."

"Don't," Bucky says, suddenly vicious. "Don't tell me you're sorry, not about this."

"I'm—" Steve bites his tongue, so he won't say it again. "I'll just — go," he offers.

Bucky laughs, a harsh sound in the quiet. "Go, then."

It's the right thing to do, leaving. He never should have done this in the first place.

—

Bucky's unhappy, Steve knows — it's in the line of his shoulders and the way he'll touch Steve, unconsciously, only to rock away just as quickly.

Before, Steve would have done everything he could to fix it, to see Bucky's mouth curve into a grin again. But now that impulse is all wrapped up in the wrongness of him, so that he wants to smooth away Bucky's frown with his careful fingers, to touch Bucky's face and mouth like he has any right to.

Bucky would let him, if Steve asked. If Steve went to him with his trembling hands, guilty hands.

And that's why Steve can't do it. Bucky won't say no to him — Bucky never could say no to him.

If Steve were just a little bit stronger, he'd be able to carry Bucky's unhappiness on his own shoulders. If the serum had fixed his mind as well as his body, he'd finally be able to look Bucky in the eye without feeling ashamed.

—

Steve feels Bucky's fingers in his hand for a fleeting moment before they slip away. He watches Bucky fall and his body refuses to follow him down into the snow.

When Steve crashes into the Arctic, it nearly feels normal, natural — like the culmination of something that should have carried him away sooner.

—

There are books about Captain America. Steve's not sure how to feel about that — he reads one, two, laughs at the sanitized version of history.

But there are stories about him, too. It's strange to find himself preserved within the pages, his words and split-second decisions memorialized.

It's a shock, the first time he reads about Bucky and himself. There's a photograph of them, black and white, Bucky reaching a hand out for Steve. For years Bucky's been reaching for him, and Steve has to sit down when he realizes that whatever had been between them, other people could see it, too.

The books wonder whether Steve Rogers had loved Bucky, and there's no condemnation to it, just honest curiosity. Steve puts his face in his hands, thinks, achingly, yes, I did.

—

Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned. Those words feel different now — less heavy, as if his sins have diminished as he slept.

It's a new century. There are men getting married in New York courthouses and no one says a word.

Steve imagines being born into this world. Where the war is a distant memory and it's not a sin to love someone. In a world like this, Steve might never have felt shame at his body betraying him; might have been able to kiss Bucky in broad daylight, had Bucky inside of him and felt nothing but shivering pleasure.

Steve thinks about Bucky a lot, these days.

—

The Winter Soldier's mask drops to the ground, and Steve says, "Bucky?"

There's a frown of confusion on Bucky's face which wipes to blankness. "Who the hell is Bucky?"

But it is — Steve knows Bucky's face and the scratch of his voice. Steve could no more fail to recognize Bucky than he could his own self.

Steve raises his hands up, lets Bucky pin him to the ground. "Bucky," he says again, watches the twitch of familiarity on Bucky's face.

Bucky's breaths are coming hard out of his throat; his weight is on Steve's thighs and his elbows are digging into Steve's torso, and for all that it's everything Steve wants, has wanted since he was old enough to know want.

He cups Bucky's face in his hands and raises himself up, kisses Bucky.

Bucky trembles. Steve can feel that, can feel the tremors running down Bucky's body like it's a part of him. "What are you doing," he says, licking at his lips.

"I'm sorry," Steve says. "God, I'm so sorry."

His eyes are wet. Bucky touches his cheek, carefully, frowning.

Then he stands up. "Not here," he says. He drags Steve off the road, into a vacated building, and Steve lets himself follow Bucky like he never could before.

Inside, Bucky kisses him roughly, slamming him into the wall, but Steve doesn't care — he lets himself be kissed, Bucky's fingers digging into his upper arms, even after he's thoroughly out of breath and his lungs are burning up. He kisses Bucky like he should have kissed Bucky, a long time ago, if he'd possessed half the courage Bucky had had.

Bucky makes a frustrated noise and tugs at his tac vest. Steve helps him take it off, his hands fumbling at the buckles when they tangle with Bucky's fingers, for all the world like he's sixteen again and touching Bucky for the first time.

When it finally comes off, Bucky takes Steve's hand to press it to his chest. "Yeah, Buck," Steve says softly. "I'm here."

"I want," Bucky says haltingly. "You."

"You can have me," Steve says, and means it. He kisses Bucky, presses him down onto the ground. He wants everything, his mouth on every inch of Bucky's skin and Bucky's fingers raising fire along his own body.

When Steve's hands brush along Bucky's cock, Bucky shudders, once. Then he makes a small noise and buries his nose into the crook of Steve's neck."Is this—" he asks. "Are we okay?"

"It's okay," Steve says, his heart thumping loudly. "You were right — you were always right."

Bucky turns his head. "Okay," he says, and raises a hand to his lips — he sucks his fingers into his mouth, and Steve has to close his eyes for a moment, to savor that sight.

When Bucky reaches down for himself, Steve tugs at his hand. "Not this time," Steve tells him, and kisses away the confusion on Bucky's face. "I want you inside me."

So Bucky spreads Steve out under his fingers, stretches him open; Steve feels near floating with sensation. When Bucky finally enters him Steve tips his head back against the ground, his eyes sliding closed.

"Steve," Bucky whispers, his hand coming down to wrap around Steve's cock. "It's — you're—"

"Bucky," Steve says, and he means everything he never said before, too scared of himself and what it meant that he felt like this, too big for his skin under Bucky's gaze. "Do it. Please."

When Bucky comes his eyes are bright, and open, like he's discovering Steve all over again. Steve, sprawled under Bucky's warm weight, reaches out for Bucky, grabs him by the shoulders; his hands are sure and certain this time, and he's not letting Bucky go.