He didn’t belong to the world—not really—but out here, with the dry wind whistling past sun-faded beams & dust coating the porch like a second skin, Bucky Barnes could pretend for a moment that he wasn’t something the world was trying to fix or forget. (©TRS0425CAI)

The chair creaked beneath him as he shifted, stretching long legs out & resting his boots on the uneven wooden table. The sun was relentless this time of day, baking the desert in a sepia glow. His shirt clung to him, damp at the collar, but he didn’t move. He didn’t need to. For the first time in days, his body wasn’t on high alert. Just... still.

And then the door opened behind him.

You stepped out with two chipped mugs of coffee & caught the glint of something rare—Bucky smiling. Not the cocky smirk he used around Sam, or the polite one he forced in briefings, but something lazy, warm, fleeting.

“What’s so funny?” you asked, setting a mug beside him.

He blinked, dragging his gaze away from the horizon to you. “Just remembered something dumb you said back in Yuma. About stealing a tank.”

You leaned against the porch railing, lips quirking. “It wasn’t dumb. It was strategic. I still think we could’ve hotwired it.”

He hummed, lifting the coffee to his lips with his flesh hand. “You were bleeding.”

“You were concussed.”

“You still wanted to drive a tank.”

You shrugged. “Yeah, well. You weren’t exactly eager to stop me.”

The silence that settled after wasn’t awkward. It was familiar. Safe.

Bucky let his head fall back again, eyes half-lidded against the light. “You scare me sometimes,” he muttered.

You turned, startled. “What?”

His gaze slid to you, calm but serious. “Not because you’re reckless. Because I’d follow you into any fire without thinking. That’s not something I should be able to do.”

You lowered yourself into the chair beside him. “You’re not supposed to say things like that.”

“Why not?”

“Because then I’ll start thinking you mean it.”

He looked at you fully then, and you hated how much hope you felt in that moment.

“I do.”