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It’s a dumb thing to be proud of, Bucky knows, being able to hide his perversion this well. He is sick enough to go out and suck the cocks of random men but not brave enough to flaunt it like all the queens back in Brooklyn did. He is a sinner on two accounts, three if you count skipping Mass, and also in hundreds of more little ways.
But Bucky is still so damn proud of himself, of being able to tuck away his secret like he isn't almost drowning. He always felt like it was tattooed on his forehead: LIKES SUCKING COCK AND LIKES STEVEN G ROGER’S COCK IN PARTICULAR. He supposes that is the real secret he is glad he's kept hidden away. Even though Steve has never looked at him that way (even when Bucky flexed and went around without a shirt and posed himself on the bed). Bucky has been holding it in for years, for it to come out now would be humiliating, and mean a blue discharge. And Bucky won't let that happen. He won't leave Steve here in this Hell.
So Bucky keeps up this charade of chasing skirts and winking at all the pretty nurses, and then he sneaks into Stark’s lab at night under the guise of working on a new rifle. It isn’t even the biggest lie; He works over something all right. Bucky stays true to his sniper precision, Howard shoots off every time.
Then it all goes to Hell. The fog that hangs over London means the girls that Dugan, Morita and Jones are all following miss a turn and stumble into an alleyway only to see Bucky on his Goddamn knees moaning like a whore with the barkeep’s cock in his mouth.
Thank God Dugan is drunk and cheerful enough that he just says “Sarge?” in a baffled tone. Jones shrugs his shoulders and pulls the ladies away before they can see anything. He laughs and tell them it is a sight unfit for their eyes. The girls are nurses and have undoubtedly seen worse things, but they let themselves be led away. Morita gives him and the civilian, who has now awkwardly tucked his cock away, a look that says We Will Be Talking About This.
Shit.
* * *
The next day he walks up to Morita and waits. If he’s gonna get punched or cursed out it’s gonna happen no matter what he says. So he might as well face it head on.
Instead of yelling about what a disgusting degenerate he is Jim calmly says “We won’t tell him.”
Bucky hadn’t even let himself think about that possibility. It’s hard to get out, but he mutters gruffly, “Thanks, I mean it.”
“When did you know you were…” Morita trails off.
“A pervert?”
“No. In love with him.”
Bucky turns to look at Morita; this isn’t at all where he thought this conversation was headed. “Fourteen. We were on the subway and he was drawing a something -bird, I think- and I looked over at him and wanted to kiss him.” A small shrug. “That’s when I knew, but it wasn’t surprising. I had been thinking ‘bout men in that way since I saw a painting of Jesus spread out on the cross.”
Morita lets out a low whistle. “I don’t know how I didn’t realize before. I saw your eyes when we go out of Azzano. You wanted to get the Hell away. Then one drink with an old buddy of yours and you're right back in? I thought you were insane but I shoulda guessed that you were in love.”
“If I'm insane for joining up 'cus of him, then what is your excuse?"
"Well, I really hate the Nazis, and I'm probably a little crazy too. Normal crazy though, not crazy for a piece of Captain Americ-"
Bucky shoves Morita over before he can announce to the whole camp that Bucky is lusting after Captain America.
“No, but seriously, I’m not gonna say or do anything. My brother, uh, has a good friend that he lived with, before we had to move to the camp. They still send each other letters.” Jim was staring at the ground hard. “He’s never said anything, but I can tell. And I’m not gonna say anything. Ever.”
“Well thanks, I doubt DumDum’ll be able to keep his mouth shut, but I appreciate it.” Now Bucky only has to worry about two other loud-mouth bozos telling the whole camp about what they saw last night.
* * *
A week or so later Gabe bumps his knee against Bucky’s while they’re on watch together.
“I get it, you know.” He slides his eyes over and must see Bucky’s shocked face. “No. No, no! I’m not like- that. You. But. There was a girl, such a sweet thing. Her Daddy found us kissing and he turned me black and blue. Broke my arm.” He heaves a deep sigh and smirks. “Worth it though, she kissed me better all over. After that I would slip notes to her when I bagged her groceries. She has to write the notes in secret and ask her friend to pass them along.” A sweet smile is on Jones’ face before he clears his throat and it falls off.
Bucky knocks their knees again. “I’m real glad you met her. You deserve a good girl like that.”
Gabe thumps his knee harder against Bucky. “You deserve a nice guy too. You don’t even so much as twitch when girls start giving Cap those looks.”
“It’s different. He ain’t my guy. Besides which- I don’t even need to worry about those girls Steve is so dead set on Peggy.”
“Yeah, that’s what I mean. You like Peggy, don’t even try and glare her away.” Gabe seems to be trying to get at something, but Bucky can’t figure out what.
“Why the Hell would I try to keep Peggy and Steve away? I’m real glad there is a dame out there who really sees Steve, in the same way I -like he deserves to be seen. I would never even want Steve to, to be like -you know. He’s good. He don’t deserve it.” Bucky fumbles, he’s never expressed how sick it makes him feel when he accidentally finds himself wishing for Steve to look back. That’s the worst thing he’d ever done before shipping out, wishing this on someone else.
“I guess, I’m just saying it’s good that you are letting him be, and that you deserve- you should get a boy and have everyone else leave you be.” It’s awkward, Jones telling him this like he should get a reward for keeping to himself. They both fall quiet.
They sit for a while, keeping watch and staring into the forest before Bucky breaks the silence again.
“Tell me, what’s her name?”
The smile is back on Gabe’s face as he whispers into the night all about Annabelle and her county famous pecan pie.
* * *
Peggy is one helluva gal. If Bucky could muster up the energy to do anything but sleep and, apparently, make obvious cow-eyes at Steve he might try to take her dancing. She looks like she could teach him a thing or two.
Instead of getting a nice dance she corners him in the Colonel’s tent. She dismisses the Howlies, but beckons him to stay. Steve gives them both a betrayed kinda look, like they’re gonna go at it right on the map they have of HYDRA bases.
She starts up as soon as the footsteps fade away. “Look Barnes, I’ve worked long and hard to get where I am today. I need to know that you aren’t going to get any ideas in your head about how I’m just a dame and easy to run off. I value my work more than your feelings or Steve’s so don’t get any foolish ideas in your head and try to get the SSR to drop me.” She speaks so fast, and Bucky is still more used to tilted New York accents than he is her smooth English one, that he almost can't understand her, and when he does Bucky thinks he might give himself whiplash.
“Damn, Carter, you don’t mess around. I know you have no real reason to trust me, but I swear you don’t got any reason to worry about me." Bucky is speechless for a second as he tries to gather his thoughts, he hadn’t even considered trying to cause a problem for Peggy. He was her biggest fan after Steve. "I have no delusions about the situation I am in. And besides, Steve only has eyes for you anyways.”
They both eye each other a bit more, seeing if the other one is gonna say something or fuck up the quasi-truce they seem to have set upon. Bucky nods, after a moment, and starts to leave.
“Wait, Barnes, I did hold you back for a legitimate reason. We have information that tells us a principal HYDRA operative is going to be visiting Bucharest soon.” She gives him a sharp smile. A dangerous one. “How do you feel about taking a little vacation to the Little Paris? You don’t need to pack light as we will won’t be bringing back any souvenirs.”
“Well that depends wholly on the company I will have. Let’s say you, me, and Springfield?” Bucky knows he shouldn’t be glad to be going on an assassination mission, but the idea of dismantling HYDRA only excites him at this point.
“That sounds like a good time to me.” Peggy grins at Bucky, the uneasy conversation forgotten. “And I do trust you, that is why I’m giving you this mission.”
* * *
Bucky never heard any of the Commandos talking about it, but Monty strolls up and claps him on the back while they are trekking back to camp after a horribly damp three week mission.
“Cheer up chap! I went to a boarding school and all the stories are true. I can fix you right up with some nice pretty thing.”
This is horrifying. First they find out he is queer, then they realize he has been in love with Steve for years, and now they think he is so pathetic that he needs their help getting some? “Thank you so much, Lord Montgomery, but I do not need your help with anything.” He wants to shoot himself in the Goddamn fucking head.
Monty ribs him more, “Oh? Do you already have a sweetheart tucked away in London? Someone we know?”
Bucky doesn’t want to be having this conversation at all, and even less so with Steve a few yards behind. “Why, Monty, if you didn’t have that rat’s tail on your face I'd’ve thought you were a twelve year old girl! Shall we talk about how to best curl our hair next?” Bucky bats his eyes ridiculously at him, and pretends to flick his hair.
He must have heard the sharp tone in Bucky’s voice because Monty leaves off with nothing more than a “Find someone to untwist your panties or else I’ll find someone to do it for you.”
* * *
Bucky is in the process of finding out exactly what it takes to make Howard Stark shut up, when he says “You can call me Steve, I won’t mind.”
“Howard, what the Hell are you talking about?” Bucky pulls out and flips Howard around so they can look in the eye. This seems like a headache inducing conversation that will go better if they aren’t fucking.
“Well I know that you’re in love with him, so if you would rather pretend that I am him I’d understand.” Naked and laid back Howard looks vulnerable, even though he is in a lab filled with weapons of his own design.
Jesus. “Howard, I like you fine, and I would like to continue fucking you and saying your name when I come. It feels a little rude to be saying a different name anyways.”
“Rude?” Howwie looks shocked, like being on good behavior is a foreign concept. “How on earth?”
Bucky doesn't even know how to begin to seriously approach this, but Howard generally lets humor and deflection work when sufficiently distracted. “Well Steve isn’t doing any of the work, why should he get any credit? Anyways, can we be done with this? I have better things to be doing than talking about my lack of a love life.” Bucky punctuates his last sentence with a little hip thrust that gets Howard gasping and perking back up again.
“Yeah, there we go.”
* * *
They are all at a bar again getting drunk after far too long in the fucking woods and the fucking cold and the fucking dirt. Really Bucky wants to get back to wherever the fuck they are staying and use up all the hot water. Instead he is sitting at the bar sending looks to a cute red-head a few stools down.
“Okay Sarge, you gotta stop leading her on. It’s not fair to her or to me” Dugan has, yet again, taken the opportunity to get sloppily drunk.
“Well, pal it wouldn’t be fair to me to send her off to you anyways.” The comeback is a beat late, but not enough so that Dumdum notices.
“What? Are you impu-impugni- implying something about my honor?” Dugan tried to take a hand to his chest in mock horror but instead manages to spill almost all of his larger on his shirt. “ Fuck.”
Bucky cannot help but snicker, Dugan looks like a fool with his shirt sodden and creating a small puddle on the floor. “DumDum, I would find it very hard to imply anything about your honor seeing as it doesn’t exist.”
Dugan begins to undo his shirt -thank God he is wearing a vest underneath- and fumbles with the small buttons. “But seriously, tell me how you do it. You don’t even like women do you? And yet here you are almost drowning in ‘em! Unfair I say!” He ends his speech by tucking the bottom edge of his shirt into his mouth and sucking. At Bucky’s raised eyebrow he explains “Waste not, want not. I paid for this beer and I will be Damned if I won’t drink it all.”
“Well first off, I don’t go around making a fool of myself for every lady to see, and secondly… I have no skin in the game. When you got the nerves and act all jittery it turns the women off. If you can hold it together and act confident they’ll like you more.” Bucky declines to add that he would often target the girls he saw looking at other girls, and would offer them one dance, and a walk to the nearest queer bar.
"Oh ho! So what does make you jittery Sarge?"
Barnes sends a pointed glare to Dumdum, but he blissfully ignores it in his drunken state.
"Was it the lil’ heels he got? Or-or the blue shorts with the tights on underneath? Think he used a garter to keep 'em up?" Dugan slurs more and more as his head tilts down until it rests on the sticky countertop.
"Shut the Hell up Dugan.” Bucky adds, "And I wasn't thinking about there being a garter belt, but now I sure as Hell am."
There is no reply from Dumdum, and a glance shows him face down on the bar and ass balancing precariously on the stool. His shirt is still tucked half into his mouth, leaving stains on his pants.
“How did you even get this drunk Dumdum? This place watered everything down to piss.”
A grunting snore is the only reply.
* * *
Steve gets hit right below his knee because the motherfucker never covers his legs, but it isn’t too bad. Steve only stumbles for a few moments before getting back up again and tossing the shield at the nearest HYDRA soldier.
Afterwards, while Morita is dressing the wound, Jacques wanders over to Bucky and offers him one of his sacred and highly superior Gauloises. Bucky wasn’t one to pass up free nicotine, but he didn't know what had caused this bout of charity.
“Laurie wishes to join la résistance and I keep telling her non until she told me of how sick she gets when I am out. She could only stop if she can do something to help.” Jacques took a drag and blew the smoke straight up in the air. “Afterwards she was much happier but now I am sick, thinking of the Nazi’s hurting her." Another deep drag and exhale, a pointed look. "Only to be saying it is okay to be sick”
Bucky loves the Howlies, he really does, but it’s hard to remember this when they are all sticking their noses into places that they shouldn't be. “I am fine, it ain't like I’m the one shot”
Jacques took another drag and blew the smoke into Bucky’s eyes. “Non? You are fine? Okay. The moon is also made of cheese and C-rations are better than my Maman’s cooking.”
“Well it’s hard to get upset anymore. Stevie’s gotten worse than this from goons back in Brooklyn,” a shrug, “and being sore about it won’t change anything. Best to watch his back a little better next time.” Trying to stop Steve from barrelling into dangerous situations never worked when he weighed less than a bag of flour, and it sure as Hell wouldn’t work now.
Jacque stubs out his cigarette and steals back the one he gave to Bucky, then he goes over to Gabe to gossip in French. About him, probably.
* * *
They’ve only got two more days of leave and Bucky is trying to make the most of them. He has convinced a mechanic named Olivia to teach him some fancy Balboa tricks and they're showing off to the rest of the club. When he and a girl get moving fast enough it's easy to pretend that he is in some dive in Brooklyn or Harlem and that when he opens his eyes he won’t see bombed out streets. That his best friend won't be a colossus.
When the song ends Olivia goes back to her WAC friends and Bucky wanders over to Steve.
“Are you taking notes for when you finally ask Carter for a dance?” Bucky doesn’t really understand why neither of them make any moves towards the other -just intense staring and coded phrases- but it isn’t hurting Bucky any so he leaves them be.
“No. Wondering how on Earth you and her could dance like that. You just met each other and you two were dancing like Fred and Ginger.”
“Well if you had ever taken me up on my offers to teach you, you would know it's all about the push and pull.” This was a familiar conversation, they’d had it after many dances, at many bars, and neither of them ever gave in.
“Well I woulda booked a class if you weren’t such a terrible teacher.” Rogers shoots back, and it’s true. Whenever he tried to teach Steve a move he would forget whatever it was he was trying to say and stumble around.
“If you weren’t such a terrible student I wouldn’t hafta be such a taskmaster.”
“Well it ain't my fault that I was born without rhythm! And a teacher should be able to teach any type of student. So there.” Steve sticks his tongue out childishly, and Bucky makes like he is gonna punch him in the shoulder before dropping his fist. He’s more likely to hurt his own fist than do any actual damage to Steve.
Bucky grabs the whiskey that Steve had been nursing and swallows it all before slapping it down and saying, “C’mon, let's get out of here before they court martial us for indecent behavior.”
They pick up their jackets and walk out into the cold air; there are a few other couples out and laughing, but the night is quiet for the most part.
“I truly am sorry for all the times I got short with you when I was trying to teach you. I know you didn’t have anyone else.” His past rudeness now seemed inexcusable.
Steve looks at him in surprise. “Aww, Buck, you don’t need to be caught up on that. I was always too ‘fraid of looking like a fool next to you to really try anyways.”
“Okay, so what’d’ya say about giving it one more go?”
He is drunk enough on the whiskey and dancing that this seems like a harmless little fun. Steve gives him an indulgent smile and says, “Alright, but no yelling at me ‘cause we can’t wake up the neighbors.”
“Jeez. Okay, so. Charleston, that’s easy, we’ve seen it about a dozen times. Right foot back -not that far, we’re dancing not boxing! Right foot back. Then step forward and back with it, small steps. Yeah.”
Steve looks like a big tree in a storm, lurching around like that, but after a few tries it gets a little more smooth.
“So then it’s the same thing with the left foot; backwards and forwards in real tight steps. And start bounce a little.” Steve is moving about three times slower than it should be done properly, but the look on concentration on his face is so sweet that Bucky couldn’t tell him to speed up.
“Now don’t stop but I’m gonna grab your hand -I’m the gentleman- and join in.” He grabs Steve’s left hand loosely, letting it swing between them, before joining in with his feet. Bucky stays there, at Steve's side, for a couple of beats before moving on to the next part.
“So here is where the pushing an’ pulling comes in.” Bucky pulls on Steve’s hand, to get him to shift his body to the left as Bucky steps backwards. They successfully end up with Bucky’s chest pressed to Steve’s back. Bucky slides his right hand from Steve’s left and glides it over his shoulder so it rests on top of Steve’s right. He inserts his left hand where the right one was. Now that he has both of Steve’s hands so he resumes the motions with his feet, and adds in some fancier kicks to show off a little.
“Keep dancing, and don’t think about me, I’m right here behind you.” He pulls slightly with his right hand and moves over to Steve’s right side, while switching hands once more, so that Bucky is on the opposite side of Steve that he started on and is holding Steve’s right hand with his left.
“See, you need someone to teach you a few moves. Real easy, just push and pull.”
Steve stopped dancing and turned to face Bucky. “So maybe I’m not such a clod you aren’t a slave driver after all.”
“Nah, we’ve always been a jerk and a punk.” Bucky tries to loop an arm over Steve’s back, the way he used to, but can’t, and stumbles a little into the street.
“Alright, let’s get you into bed, buddy.” Steve now drapes his arm across Bucky, and pulls him back to the hotel where they’ve been set up.
Once they get up the two flights of stairs Steve stops in front of his own room. “You sure you’ll be able to make it all the way to your room?” Bucky is bunking with DumDum down the corridor.
Bucky turns around to start walking but lets his urge to be a jackass out and calls out “No, Steve, I might get lost between here and the end of the hall.”
“Hey.”
“Yeah?” Bucky pauses, leaning against the wall. Steve looks awkwards, and is fiddling with the ends of his coat.
“Thanks. For dancing with me. I mean -I’m sure Peggy’ll appreciate it.”
That hurts, but just a little. Bucky forces a chuckle and says “Oh well she better, I got my feet bruised for her.”
“Goodnight, Buck.”
“You too, Stevie.”
* * *