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The invitation comes out of nowhere.
“Hey Sam,” Bucky says, a Hydra goon dangling from one hand and a gun in the other, “Wanna come over Friday night and play some board games?”
Sam is so startled he lets his guard down and gets punched in the jaw. He gives the goon who did it such a dirty look the guy actually starts to back away, like he’s had a change of heart in the middle of battle and is considering a career change. Too late. Sam knees him in the balls, then knocks him out with a swift uppercut.
Sam tastes blood, spits. The fucking goon split his lip.
A gunshot goes off, and an agent trying to sneak up behind Sam goes down with a yell, clutching his kneecap. Sam winces in sympathy, because no amount of physical therapy is going to get that guy back to drug running on the weekends, and turns towards Bucky.
“I had that,” he grouses.
Bucky just shrugs. “Sure.”
Which, infuriating. But in the last couple months of working with Bucky, he’s learned a few things; like how not to take the bait. So Sam just sends him a quick glare before getting back to the business of busting heads.
And business is good.
“So..? Bucky asks, once the goons are all unconscious or groaning on the concrete. He’s leaning up against the warehouse door, looking like he’s barely broken a sweat. Like he’s spent the last hour posing for GQ instead of throwing Hydra agents into walls. “Board games?”
Sam looks down, taking his time zip tying the last goon, feeling conflicted. On one hand, what Bucky just asked him sounds suspiciously like a date, and while Sam would love that to be the case, he’s not sure that’s what Bucky meant when he asked the question. Maybe he just wants to play board games, or his therapist recommended he spend time doing something with Sam besides punching people. Despite what Sam’s heart might want, and Sam’s heart is a conniving little traitor with no sense of self-preservation, there is no reason to read more into this than the simple request it is.
Except that Bucky has never invited him over before. Sure, they’ve crashed at his place after missions, when it was convenient, but they’ve never just hung out. Not just the two of them. So...Sam’s not sure which column that’s a check in. Date? Not date?
He’s probably overthinking this.
“Sam?” Bucky asks, frowning, and Sam feels like a heel.
“Friday night?” he asks, like that’s what he’s been thinking about. Whether or not he’s free.
Bucky nods. “Yeah, but I’m free over the weekend too, if that works better for you. Or next weekend.”
And really, who are they kidding? They both basically share a google calendar at this point. And Bucky, Sam knows, has very little social life outside the Wilson family. Not that Sam can throw stones in that particular glass house.
“Nah, Friday’s fine.”
Bucky straightens up. “Really?”
And wow, now Sam definitely feels like a heel. He gets up, starts making his way towards Bucky. “Yeah, sounds fun.”
“Really?”
“Yes, Buck, really! Just, no Monopoly, ok? I hate that game.”
Bucky puts his hands up in surrender. “Alright, alright. No Monopoly.” He gives Sam a tentative smile, somehow managing to look both sly and shy at the same time. “See you at seven?”
“Sure,” Sam says, eyeing that smile, feeling oddly like he’s signed on the dotted line without properly reading the fine print.
“Great,” Bucky says, then claps him on the back. He gestures at his lip, gives Sam a shit-eating grin. “You, uh, got something there.”
Sam scowls.
*****
Bucky answers the door before Sam can finish knocking, a serious look on his face.
“I ordered pizza,” he says.
Sam cocks his head to the side. “Uh, good for you?”
Bucky’s brows dip down, and Sam gives him a quick once-over. He’s wearing a black hoodie over a grey t-shirt, the sleeves of the hoodie pushed up to expose his forearms, and his requisite black jeans. He looks good. Comfortable.
“Can I come in?” Sam tries instead. He waves a bag of twizzlers in Bucky’s face. “I brought dessert.”
Bucky blinks, then takes a step back, angling his body so Sam can slip past him.
“Hi Sam, how are you?” Sam says, toeing his sneakers off in the entryway. “How was your day? Welcome to my apartment-”
Bucky scowls. “You’ve been here before.”
“Oh I’m good, Buck, thanks for asking. I love what you’ve done with the place. Is that couch from ikea?”
Bucky just slams the door, then turns and heads towards the kitchen. Sam follows.
“Your disgusting pineapple insult-to-the-pizza-gods is over there,” Bucky says, waving at a box by the stove. It’s set across from the kitchen island, where the other boxes are lined up, as if it might infect them by proximity alone. “Beer’s in the fridge.”
They grab their pizza and beer, some paper plates, a stack of napkins, and then head to the living room, where a board game Sam’s never seen before sits unopened at the center of the coffee table. Sam sits down on the fluffy, charcoal colored rug Bucky had chosen from HomeGoods and takes a moment to run his fingers over the soft material.
“I freaking love this rug.”
Bucky shakes his head at him, but his lips quirk up.
“Don’t front,” Sam says. “This thing is totally comfortable enough to sleep on. It’s like a cloud.”
“Yeah I know. That’s why I bought it.”
Bucky’s new apartment is world’s above his last place, not that that’s saying much. Sam and Sarah had found it while visiting their favorite local coffee shop, a cozy little place called The Coffee Corner with armchairs and bookshelves stacked with old hardbacks and games. The second floor window had been plastered with a “for rent’ sign, and Sam and Sarah had taken one look at each other and realized they were thinking the same thing.
Gently suggest Bucky move to Delacroix.
Get the boys to beg and plead if necessary.
Surprisingly, it hadn’t been necessary. Bucky had said “You want me to move to Delacroix?” in a tone of voice that Sam hadn’t been able to identify, and when Sam had affirmed that yes, they did, he’d simply said “Ok” and that was that.
A few weeks later Bucky had arrived with his motorcycle and backpack, and when Sarah asked what furniture he was having delivered and what he would need to supplement, Bucky had just stared at her while Sam watched his sister’s face morph from confusion to horror. It would have been funny, if it wasn’t so sad.
What had been funny was watching his sister drag the former Winter Soldier around Ikea. And the twinkle she’d gotten in her eye when she’d realized Bucky had opinions and good taste. He liked greys and tans, neutral colors, and soft things. Watching him run his hand over every single throw blanket, pillow, and rug in every store they visited had made Sam’s chest ache.
Sam couldn’t remember the last time he’d had so much fun - and shopping, of all things.
And then, after everything had been delivered, and he’d brought Sarah and the boys over to help set everything up, Bucky had smiled one of his rare eye-crinklers and Sam had literally lost his breath.
He can admit to himself that he hasn’t really been able to catch it since.
*****
The game is some type of cooperative, role-playing, choose-your-own-adventure. With Zombies. And an apocalypse, of course.
“Where’d you get this?” Sam asks, holding up the lid of the box, where two shotgun wielding zombies stand atop a mountain of bodies in front of a lightning streaked sky. Zombie V Horde is plastered across the top in big, electric green, block letters.
Bucky doesn’t glance up from where he’s laying out the game pieces. “Amazon.” Then, “Lindsay recommended it.”
Sam frowns. “Lindsay?”
Bucky smooths the board out on the coffee table. “One of the barista’s downstairs.”
“Wow,” Sam says, and Bucky finally looks at him, expression wary.
“What?”
Sam grabs one of the little plastic zombie figurines. “Just impressed you had a conversation long enough to discuss something other than your drink order.”
“I talk to people.”
Sam raises an eyebrow, and Bucky holds his hand out, palm up. “That’s it,” he says, “invitation revoked. Give me back Sambie. I’m asking Sarah to play instead.”
Sam nearly chokes on a bite of pizza. “Sambie?!”
“What else would you call a Zombie named Sam?”
“Uh, how about Sam?”
“I’m disappointed,” Bucky says, shaking his head. “Who knew you were so uncreative?”
*****
“So we’re the zombies.”
“Yes.”
“And we’re on a journey to find a cure. So we can go back to being human?”
“That’s the gist.”
“But, aren’t we dead though? Wouldn’t we just go back to being corpses? I feel like we haven’t properly thought this through.”
Bucky sighs.
*****
Two hours in and Sam is on his third beer, his paper plate is full of crusts, and they have yet to start playing the game.
Across the coffee table Bucky stares down at his character creation sheet, gnawing on the back of his pen, his face scrunched in concentration, and that’s when it hits Sam: James Buchanan Barnes, Captain America’s right hand man, Howling Commando, Winter Soldier, White Wolf, bane of Hydra and steering wheels everywhere, is a capital N nerd.
It shouldn’t be such a revelation. Really, he should have known. Steve was a total dork, and Bucky and Steve were childhood best friends. But Steve had always talked about Bucky with stars in his eyes, had always described him as suave and cool, a charming lady-killer and excellent dancer. And sure, maybe he is those things, but he is also the guy who has spent the last hour poring over the instructions for a board game about zombies and the last thirty minutes working on the backstory of his character.
And damn Sam to hell if it isn’t doing something for him.
We’re just a couple of guys, Sam tells himself. Just a couple of guys playing a board game.
But that hadn’t been convincing the first time they’d said it, and it isn’t any more convincing now, when Bucky looks up, catches him staring, and gives him a tentative smile.
I’m screwed, Sam thinks, as Bucky hands him the small round game pieces that denote the starting class, armor, and weapons of his zombie character, then opens the sealed envelope with the first part of the storyline they will be playing.
“Ready?” Bucky says.
“As I’ll ever be,” Sam replies, and is rewarded with another smile, this one with eye crinkles, and if this is indicative of what the night is going to be like, Sam is in serious trouble.
*****
Luckily, Sam’s heart is saved from melting into a puddle of goo by their complete inability to agree on strategy.
“We should go around,” Bucky says, pointing at the map, “take the mountain pass.”
Sam shakes his head. “That will take forever. We should go into town. Take our chance with the villagers, see if we can buy some supplies.”
“Are you crazy? We’re zombies. Getting the villagers to trust us has got to be an impossibly difficult roll. Unless…”
“No, we are not killing all of the villagers.”
Bucky scowls. “Why not? It’s not like their real people.”
“Because these things always have consequences, and a man’s gotta have standards.”
“Well then,” Bucky says, looking smug. “I guess we’re taking the mountain pass.”
“Fine. But I want it on record that I think this is a bad idea.”
*****
It’s not a bad idea, it’s a terrible one.
Sam’s character trips over a pebble and breaks an ankle, which is irreparable, since he’s a zombie, and results in him having a permanent shuffle, like, well, a zombie. It also has the added benefit of making him slower, which reduces his attack speed.
“Damnit Buck, I knew we shouldn’t have taken the mountain pass.”
“Well, maybe you should be more careful where you're walking. Watch your step.”
Sam narrows his eyes. “Oh, so this is my fault.”
Bucky shrugs. “Well, if the shoe- oh wait no, you lost your shoe, didn’t you? My bad.”
How is it possible to want to punch someone and kiss them at the same time? Bucky is the most infuriating person, man, assassin, cyborg, he has ever had the displeasure of working with. He can’t believe his traitorous heart thought the guy might be charming. Can’t believe he thought he might want to date him. Might want to pull him close, run his hands over the skin beneath those stupid tactical vests, smooth his frown lines with a careful finger-
Shit.
Sam grits his teeth and rolls the game dice. They are currently in a battle with a pair of giant, man-eating arachnids, because of course they are. Just one more feature of the scenic route.
“I hate you,” he says, when he ends up taking poison damage and loses a turn.
Bucky grins at him, unapologetic, his mouth full of twizzlers. “Aw, Sambie, don’t be like that.”
“I know where you sleep at night,” Sam grumbles.
“Is that a threat or a promise?” Bucky asks, wagging an eyebrow.
“Wouldn’t you like to know,” he says, and honestly, he would too.
*****
He doesn’t make his way back home until after two in the morning.
“So?” Sarah asks, when he’s pouring himself a cup of coffee in the kitchen the next morning. “How was your game night?”
Sam shrugs, yawning. “It was fine.”
Sarah gives him a disgusted look.
“What?”
She sighs, then tips her head up as if asking the universe for patience. “Nothing.”
*****
Their second game night is rudely interrupted when Sharon calls with a mission.
New intel, last minute, top secret, emergency, blah blah blah.
Sam shoves the rest of the chicken nuggets into his mouth while Bucky puts on his lucky leather jacket and grabs what looks like a drawer full of knives. Sam’s suit is already in the truck, so they hop in and head immediately towards the airfield to meet up with Torres.
The night is quiet, the roads mostly deserted. He passes by the local gas station, the church, his elementary school, the playground where he lost his first tooth. It feels surreal, driving by these places that belong only to Sam - not Falcon, not Captain America. Just Sam, the gap-toothed boy that gave his mother a heart attack every time he leapt from the swingset, little legs reaching for the sky.
He imagines what she would think if she could see him now: shield on his arm, wings on his back, Bucky Barnes at his side.
Somehow, he doesn’t think she’d be surprised.
There is a rustling sound from the passenger seat, and then a twizzler flopping in front of his face. He leans forward, grabs it with his teeth.
“Where’d you get these?” He asks, chewing.
“Grabbed ‘em on the way out,” Bucky says.
“Good idea.”
Bucky flashes him a cocky grin. “I’m full of good ideas.”
“Oh really? Are you referring to ye ‘ol mountain pass of doom or your brilliant plan to sell our souls to the ghosts of witchwood in exchange for the book of mists?”
Bucky sighs. “Well, maybe if you had been a little quieter sneaking into their lair we wouldn’t have gotten cursed.”
“I have a perpetually broken ankle! And whose fault is that, by the way?”
“Yours?”
Sam shoots him a quick glare. Bucky just passes him another twizzler.
*****
They kick ass, of course, and Sam would like to know when it became more difficult to win a board game than save the world from supervillains.
*****
“Ok, so we need to avoid the horde long enough to collect a bunch of magical items and bring them to the Witch so she can make us a potion to restore our humanity?”
“Yes.”
“Why a witch?”
“I don’t know Sam, I didn’t write the game. Maybe because whenever someone needs a cure for warts or a brand new pair of legs, they visit their local Ursula.”
“Yeah, but- Wait. You’ve seen The Little Mermaid?”
“Like twenty times. Who hasn’t?”
“Steve.”
“Huh. That’s too bad, actually. He would have liked it.”
“Where’d you see it? Twenty times?”
“In Wakanda. Real popular with the kids. The goats, too.”
“The goats.”
“Yeah, the goats. They really liked that one movie about the unicorn.”
“The Last Unicorn?”
“That’s it. I mean, it makes sense they would like that one.”
“Right. Sure. This entire conversation makes total sense.”
*****
After their third game night, Sam comes home to find all of the lights in the house off and Sarah waiting for him in the dark, like he’s a teenager trying to sneak in past curfew.
He freezes in the hallway when he sees her sitting at the kitchen table with a book-light clipped to a paperback and a glass of water. She gestures at the seat across from her and Sam is pulling the chair out before he even realizes what he’s doing.
Sarah marks her page, then sets the book aside. She takes a sip of water. Studies him over the glass.
Sam raises his eyebrows.
Sarah leans back, apparently finding him wanting. “I can’t believe it. You haven’t made a single move, have you?”
“What?” Sam asks, confused, because she’s being even more cryptic than usual.
“A move,” she articulates, slowly, like he’s an idiot. “On Bucky.”
“What?!” He yells, and Sarah shushes him with a frown, looking up at the ceiling. They both pause for a minute, waiting, but nothing stirs.
Sarah glares at him. “Don’t even try to pretend like you don’t know what I’m on about, Samuel Wilson. I’m not blind. Hell, half the town thinks you two are dating.”
“What?” He says. Again. Now actually feeling like an idiot. “No. We aren’t, we’re just- Bucky is straight.”
It’s Sarah’s turn to raise her eyebrows.
“Oh really?” She says, voice dripping with incredulity.
“Yes, really. He’s like 106 years old, Sarah.” Her expression doesn’t budge. “He likes women.”
“There’s this thing called bisexuality, Sam. I know you’ve heard of it.”
“Yeah, but-” And Sarah must see it on his face, the fear clogging his throat, that even if Bucky is interested in men, that he’s not interested in Sam, because her gaze softens.
“Sam,” she says, “the man moved to Delacroix to be closer to you.”
“Only because it’s more convenient. For missions.”
Sarah looks unimpressed. “Uh huh.”
“And there wasn’t any reason for him to stay in New York. He was basically living like a squatter anyway.”
Sarah slowly shakes her head, like he’s hopeless. “Sometimes it’s hard for me to believe we share common genetic ancestry.”
“I don’t know why I talk to you.”
“Neither do I,” Sarah says, throwing her hands up. “You never listen to a word I say.”
Sam lets that go, because she might have a point, and they sit in silence for a moment, listening to the sounds of the marsh floating in from the window. The kitchen smells like spice, a familiar scent, one from hundreds of family dinners spent around this very same table. Sam looks down at the scored wood, traces a line with one finger.
“You really think-”
“Yes, Sam. I do.”
*****
Sam’s not sure when it started, this feeling in his chest. When he’d started leaning, naturally, into Bucky’s space, noticing his quirks in a more-than-just-coworkers way. Watching his hands, his eyes, his jaw. Bucky is surprisingly expressive, for someone that spent over seventy years behind a mask. Sam has slowly, these past few months, started putting the pieces together; the clues Bucky leaves around for you to find, if you are observant enough, if you care enough, to see them.
So when Bucky answers the door a month into their Friday nights of playing Zombie V Horde, Sam can tell that something is off. Bucky won’t meet his eyes, looks down and away, at the gameboard or Sam’s socked feet. He fiddles with his little zombie character, picks at invisible lint on his shirt, runs his flesh hand across the carpet, over and over and over, until Sam sighs and puts down the card he’s trying to read.
“Alright,” he says. “What’s up?”
Bucky looks up, catches Sam’s eye for a moment, then looks away. Sam’s eyebrows lift. Is that a blush? Is Bucky blushing?
Bucky picks up the game dice, starts shuffling them from hand to hand, like he’s restless. The dice make odd clacking noises whenever they hit his vibranium palm.
“Nothing,” he says.
Bullshit , Sam thinks. He hasn’t seen a single eye crinkle all night, which, he now realizes, is unusual. The thought is startling. When did Bucky’s smiles become so common that he even has the opportunity to miss them?
Sam looks down at the game board, where the Horde has backed them into a corner. They are going to have to fight their way out, and with limited resources and low health, there’s no telling how it will go.
“You know,” Sam ventures, “Even if we lose, we can play again.”
Bucky stops fiddling with the dice.
“Who said anything about losing?” He says, a glint in his eye. “You worried you won’t be able to seal the deal, Wilson?”
Sam stares. Bucky lifts an eyebrow in challenge. So Sam does what any self-respecting man would do.
He makes a wild grab for the dice.
Bucky holds them up out of his reach, so Sam switches tactics, starts poking him in the side. Bucky yells, arms coming down to defend his kidneys, and Sam ducks to avoid the zombie figurine Bucky lobs at his head. He shoves at the center of Bucky’s chest until he starts to tip backwards, which turns out to be a miscalculation, because Bucky grabs his shirt and brings him down with him.
They go sprawling, Bucky letting out a soft “oof” when Sam lands on his chest. Their faces are inches apart. Close enough for Sam to feel the ghost of Bucky’s breath.
Bucky gives him a self-satisfied look, one corner of his mouth pulling up. “Well, this position feels familiar,” he drawls. “Although, if I remember correctly, last time I was on top.”
This fucker , Sam thinks, and then, before he can chicken out, before he can overthink whether or not he is reading the situation right and miss his moment, he kisses him.
The angle is a little awkward, and Sam has a brief moment of panic before Bucky’s arms come up around him, pulling him closer and slotting their mouths together in what Sam would call a perfect fit if he was feeling sappy and romantic.
And well, maybe he is.
When they come up for air, Bucky lets his head fall back against the carpet. “Took you long enough,” he says.
Sam pinches him.
*****
The next morning, they head down the back stairs to The Coffee Corner, Bucky grumbling the whole way.
“It’s too early, Sam.”
“Hence, the coffee.”
“We should still be in bed,” Bucky says, eyes traveling lazily over Sam’s frame. He licks his lips, and Sam feels a rush of heat.
“Maybe later,” he replies, and Bucky grins.
It’s a Saturday morning, and The Coffee Corner is bustling with activity. There is a long line between them and the counter. Bucky eyes it ruefully, then sighs and presses himself up against Sam’s back, wrapping his arms around Sam’s middle and hooking his chin over Sam’s shoulder.
“Wake me up when we get there,” he says, and Sam laughs.
The barista at the register gives them a big smile when they finally reach the front.
“Hi Bucky,” she says, already grabbing a cup and scribbling on it with a green sharpie. “The usual?”
Bucky nods, his chin digging into Sam’s shoulder.
The barista takes Sam’s order, then, while he’s swiping his credit card, says, “So, how’s the game going?”
This must be Lindsay, Sam thinks, then confirms it with a quick glance at her name tag.
Sam feels Bucky shrug. “It’s good. I think we might be losing though.”
Lindsay looks at Bucky, then at Sam, then down at Bucky’s hands where they are wrapped around Sam’s stomach. Then back at Bucky.
“Are you sure?” She asks.
Bucky squeezes Sam lightly. “Maybe not,” he says.
*****
“You know,” Bucky says, later, after they’ve finished not losing the game, a fact which Sam is embarrassingly proud of, “I hear they have a bunch of expansion packs.” He’s laying out on the fluffy charcoal carpet in a patch of sunlight like an overgrown cat, being absolutely no help at all, while Sam packs the game pieces away into their respective plastic bags.
“Oh yeah?”
Bucky rolls onto his side, rests his cheek in the crook of his vibranium arm. “Yeah,” he says. “We could play them. Maybe. If you wanted.”
“Sure Buck,” Sam says, and then has to bite his lip to keep from smiling like a loon at the look of quiet joy that transforms Bucky’s face.