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Despite his frequent—and loud—derisive comments about them, Bucky was always the first to snag the latest Captain America comics when they arrived. He somehow seemed to know before anyone else that they were there, just as he was always the first to know about Red Cross boxes and mail drops and where the liquor ration was hidden. So Steve was not surprised to return to their tiny cabin and find Bucky sprawled on his bunk in his undershirt and shorts, with a comic book splayed against one raised knee and a chocolate bar clutched in the hand not occupied with contemptuously turning the pages.
“What a load of crap,” Bucky said, scarcely a second after he’d nodded to Steve in greeting.
“If you hate them so much, why do you keep reading them?” Steve didn’t even try to keep the teasing lilt out of his voice.
“What can I say,” Bucky gave an expansive shrug, “I’m a glutton for punishment.”
“Or maybe just a glutton,” said Steve, casting a look over his shoulder as he began unbuttoning his jacket. Meetings with the brass always left him feeling stiff, stitched into his uniform. It still shocked him sometimes, the extent to which old generals with greying hair listened to him, looked at him with respect, but it was hard to shake the weight of those venerable, steely-eyed stares.
Bucky was all loose-limbed and languid, laughing as he flipped a square of chocolate into his mouth with a small flick of his tongue. “How else am I supposed to grow big and strong like you?”
Steve felt himself flush. He concentrated on hanging his jacket on its peg and fought the way Bucky’s laughter tugged at him as it changed from something light to a low, dark chuckle.
“I was thinking about you earlier, Cap. Before this scintillating entertainment arrived, I was pretty bored. I had nothing at all to do.”
“You could always—“ started Steve, a knee-jerk toss toward responsibility.
Bucky ran right over it. “How’s a kid like me supposed to keep himself occupied with no one but a bunch of big boring men for company?”
Steve’s shoulders were tense as he turned. Bucky had hardly moved: he was still lying on the bunk. The comic was still spread across his lap, but his knees had fallen open and the hand not holding the chocolate bar had slid down. A knowing smirk cut across his features. It was a strange, old look on a young face.
Steve shivered. Bucky confounded him. He had the ability to appear overeager and youthful one minute, then serious and mature far beyond his years the next. He was small—not the way Steve had been, but naturally, athletically short-statured, wiry and sharp. His face was still boyish, round and smooth-cheeked, but his dark brown eyes had a depth to them that normally only time could bring. They were disconcertingly old eyes, eyes that had seen too much too soon—and so much of it had been at Steve’s side. Steve was responsible for him.
But he was only four years younger than Steve. Steve frequently had to remind himself of that—though whether the reminder was meant to be a comfort or a caution was still something he hadn’t quite figured out.
“Fuck, Steve.” Bucky threw his head back against the pillow with a histrionic sigh. “Are you going to get with the program or what? I’m dying of old age over here.”
“Uh—“ said Steve.
“Okay, forget the slow seduction scene.” Bucky flicked the comic off his lap, revealing the full extent of what his hand had been up to. “You going to do a fella a favor or am I going to have to take care of myself?” He looked at Steve steadily as he licked a smear of chocolate off his lips. “You’re letting me down here, partner.”
“Bucky—“ We shouldn’t. That’s what he always meant to say. Doing his duty as the older one. The responsible one. And he had said it, many times, but Bucky had always overridden him. Bucky had taken that wiry body of his and wormed his way into Steve’s space, set himself squirming atop Steve’s lap, again and again and again, and—well. There were times when instead Steve had to remind himself that the difference in their ages meant that he had only just stopped being a teenager himself. It seemed like eons ago, most of the time, but Bucky—Bucky reminded him. Bucky made him young and irresponsible.
“This is a bad idea,” Steve said, even as he walked toward the bed.
“This is the best idea,” Bucky countered. “The only sane idea. We’re out there fighting and nearly dying every day, and you think we oughta come back here and be content with our comic books and chocolate bars?” He sat up, sliding his feet down to the floor with his legs spread wide, and coaxed Steve into the space between them. “I’m not actually twelve, you know.”
“I know,” said Steve. He knelt down, slow because his legs were shaking, and stretched out his hands atop Bucky’s knees.
Bucky smiled. He reached out and dug his fingers deeply into Steve’s hair, gave a possessive tug. “Prove it.”
From this angle they were nearly of a height. Steve even had to tilt his head up a little to capture Bucky’s mouth. He had a fleeting thought, and for a moment mentally chased the image of them meeting when Steve himself had been Bucky’s age, before his body and his responsibilities had expanded. Would Bucky have even looked twice at him—Bucky who was so confident, so comfortable in his own skin? He looked up to Steve, Steve knew, Steve remembered with a lurch, but what kind of role model was he if—
“Hey,” snapped Bucky, pulling away. His fingers shifted across Steve’s skull and he tapped at Steve’s temple. “You reciting army regulations in there? Stay with me.”
“I was just thinking...”
“Well, stop,” said Bucky with contempt. The point of his tongue danced across his lower lip. “Want you to use your other brain for me.”
Steve dropped his head onto Bucky’s thigh. “Where do you come up with these things?”
“Rumors to the contrary, I read things other than those comics.” Bucky’s fingers were moving with surprising gentleness across Steve’s scalp. “I’ve been told I’m a very worldly young man.”
Steve snorted.
“Pfft,” Bucky responded. “You know what, Steve,” he said, still stroking Steve’s head, “if you like it so much down there, why don’t you go ahead and make yourself useful.”
Bucky, Steve knew, Steve had been trying not to notice, was already hard and leaking, straining against his shorts. Up close like this, he could smell him: a musky, earthly smell. Steve pushed hard against Bucky’s thighs and squirmed closer, pressing his mouth against the arching bulge, kissing him through the fabric. Bucky sucked in a breath.
“Oh, fuck, Steve. Fuck. Come on.”
Steve nosed the waistband down until the head of Bucky’s cock poked free. He gave it another soft kiss. Bucky’s legs were already vibrating under the press of Steve’s hands.
“Fucking hell, yes. Wanna fuck your pretty mouth.”
The words washed over him in a rush. It made Steve feel almost light-headed, hearing Bucky talk like that. “Buck,” he breathed, “language…”
“Oh, what?” said Bucky, nails digging in as he mistook the praise for censure. “You want me to talk like they got me doing in the comics?” He lifted his voice into a boyish chirp. “Gee wiz, Cap! I sure would like it if you stopped foolin’ around and put your mouth on my prick!”
Steve felt a jolt rip through his body. He could tell Bucky had felt it too. His mouth was an inch away from the dripping head of Bucky’s cock and it felt like an act of self-defense, taking him in deep. He ripped the shorts out of the way and swallowed Bucky down, hollowing his cheeks out as he sucked.
“Oh god,” panted Bucky, “you do like it.”
Steve could tell he was going to leave bruises on Bucky’s thighs, but Bucky was clasping him just as tightly. One thumb moved down the side of Steve’s face to caress his cheek, rubbing along the line of Bucky’s own cock as it thrust inside him.
Bucky sucked in a sharp breath. “G-Golly,” he said.
Steve’s hips seized and hitched forward in a useless thrust. Bucky’s voice had returned to its normal register, dark and rich as the chocolate smeared around his lips and capable of making even the most innocent things sound obscene. He had reduced Steve to this. With his quick smiles and his bouncing steps and his sure, spry hands by Steve’s side. With his unnervingly ancient eyes that stared into Steve like they knew him.
Steve sucked desperately at the cock in his mouth, dropping a hand from Bucky’s thigh and fumbling frantically at his own fly.
Bucky’s whole body was trembling. His voice seemed to vibrate out of his throat. “That sure is s-swell.” His fingers clenched in Steve’s hair. “Aww, f-f-fudge—“
Steve held on as Bucky’s thighs jerked and he shuddered and spilled into Steve’s mouth. Normally Steve liked to take the time to lick him clean, tuck Bucky’s spent cock neatly away as if that settled things, normalized it all. Now, though, he found himself surging forward like a man possessed. He pushed Bucky back onto the bunk and climbed up on top of him. His cock was already straining against his fist and it only took a few rough, hard jerks before he was spilling expansively on Bucky’s stomach.
“Shit,” he said.
Bucky was beaming. He reached for the back of Steve’s neck, tugging him closer. “That was pretty filthy, Cap—for you. C’mere.”
His soft pink mouth was rough with its kisses. Steve could taste the chocolate on his tongue. “Bucky,” he said, helplessly.
Bucky laughed. He sounded young when he laughed, and his eyes danced, warm and happy. His eyes never leaving Steve, he ran a contented hand over his stomach, then brought the dripping digits to his mouth. He parted his lips, but at the last second, rotated the direction of his wrist, offering the fingers to Steve. Steve didn’t think, just sucked Bucky down to the knuckle, suckled from him. He felt his eyelids flutter closed and the sound of Bucky’s low moan as it throbbed through him.
“Who’s the glutton now?” Bucky asked after a minute.
“You’re a menace,” Steve said, going for rancor and achieving only heat. He looked up at Bucky from where he’d lain his head on his ropy chest and tried to mimic Bucky’s skill with a sardonically raised brow. “You sure you’re not some secret Hydra plant, sent to thwart me with your, your—”
“With my wiles? There’s a job I’d do for free,” Bucky said, displaying superior eyebrow skills. “But nah, I hate to tell you, pal: I fight and fuck strictly for the ol’ U.S. of A. And you,” he added.
His cheeks went abruptly pink. Bucky wore his bashfulness more awkwardly than he had his cockiness, his swagger, his mid-mission ruthless calm. Steve felt something loosen in his chest.
“Buck,” he said, reaching for him. Bucky folded easily into Steve’s broad arms. Steve could feel the fierce beating of his heart, the clutch of his hands with their scarred knuckles, all his sharp and soft places.
“I wish they could print the truth, those comics,” Steve said quietly. “I wish everyone could know the truth of you, Buck. You’re so—“
Bucky snorted against Steve’s shoulder. “I’m not sure America’s quite ready for me as I am, Cap.”
He pulled back, his arms looped loosely around Steve’s neck. They sat there for a moment, face to face, skin to skin.
“But thanks all the same.”
Steve nodded and kissed Bucky just to kiss him; kissed him because he wanted to, and because it made them feel young.