Chapter Text
Steve only had to go and come back. We all know he didn’t. But the platform didn’t come back empty; there was a somewhat frightened twelve-year-old boy there, with no idea what he was doing, standing right in the same spot.
“Bruce…” Sam looked at that doctor, confused.
“I… I don’t know what happened.”
Bucky watched the scene in silence, as confused as Sam and Bruce.
“Where am I?” the boy asked, bewildered. “My uncles are going to kill me,” he muttered.
“Stay there, buddy, you’ll be home soon,” Bruce blurted out, a little quick, nervous, and confused.
Bucky pulled his hands out of his pockets and walked slowly forward. “He looks like Steve as a kid,” Bucky’s words caught the attention of the other three. The boy let out a sigh when he saw him.
“What’s up, Uncle Buck?” the boy’s words made everyone widen their eyes.
(…)
Bucky didn’t have a clear idea of how events had unfolded to the point that the teenager, three years later, was living with him.
“It scares me to think you’ve had practically no fuck for ages,” the fifteen-year-old was sprawled on the couch, his legs on the table, tossing popcorn up and catching it in his mouth. Bucky looked at him incredulously while putting things away to go buy groceries.
“Can… um, don’t talk about that?” he asked, frowning.
“It really bothers me that you can’t form a relationship with anyone,” he confessed, nodding while watching the soccer game at full volume.
Bucky sighed, annoyed, toward where the kid was. “First of all, get your feet off the table,” he pushed them away casually with his metal hand. “Second, stop eating that crap.” He took the popcorn bowl away. “Third, turn that down.” Bucky snatched the remote, tried to lower the TV but ended up switching it off; he looked at it with a grimace and tossed the remote onto the couch.
“Great, fossil, you turned it off,” the teenager complained, getting up and begrudgingly carrying the popcorn bowl to the kitchen.
“James,” Bucky’s tone was warning.
“Boring!” James tossed an apple off the counter; Bucky caught it from behind— the teenager knew his uncle would catch it, so he just went ahead with what he was going to do.
Bucky was at a disadvantage with this connection; the kid seemed to know him his whole life, because he definitely did in some other timeline; while Bucky had no idea about him, other than that he was a strange copy of Steve with Natasha who… god, when did that happen? What weird moves of the universe? He didn’t even want to think about it, and he was terrified of what might come from that mix, or whatever Natasha might have raised.
“Couldn’t you have taken anything from your father? Who the hell raised you?”
“We’ve talked about it a million times,” James opened the fridge. “Seventy-five percent of the time with my parents, twenty-five percent with you.”
“Your father was definitely very flexible regarding your mother’s influence.”
“My father was submissive to my mother.”
Bruce had done everything to return the boy as fast as possible three years earlier; however, the time it took him to come back to do that was what James used to tell his story: days before, his mother had simply collapsed and his father aged suddenly and died, all within three days.
They hadn’t told the boy, but Bruce suspected the timeline problems had been caused by them—by Steve taking the stones and Natasha giving up her soul. However, the Bucky from his own timeline had simply disappeared along with his father.
And since Bucky always seemed to be looking out for Steve in every timeline, he felt obliged to take care of this James. And now, three years later, they were here.
“Are you going to go embarrass yourself in Congress today too?” James mocked while watching his uncle tidy up the living room as he messed up the kitchen.
“It’s not funny. I do my best. Besides, you need to eat, so I have to earn money.”
“A real warrior mom,” James sneered, taking the milk bottle and drinking from the spout.
“I’ve told you a thousand times to stop doing that,” Bucky sighed, knowing it would go in one ear and out the other.
“Mhm—” James replied, closing the milk bottle and putting it back in the fridge. He wiped what dripped from his chin with his sleeve; Bucky grimaced at the sight. “I’m going to buy notebooks to start school.”
Bucky frowned. “Can you at least put some effort into coming up with a lie? I know you still have the first pack of notebooks I bought you the first year.”
“I’m glad we see eye to eye on that.”
He looked at him with a sour face and a sigh. “Honestly, James, I’m way too busy keeping you alive to worry about your grades. As long as you pass your year, I don’t care how. Just finish high school; if you get into a university, go; if not, join military training.” He shrugged.
“If not, I’m not going to do the same as you and my father—nice try.”
“No, of course not,” he denied. “With your father we didn’t have the chance to go to university, so you get to choose.”
“I’m leaving,” James said, grabbing his coat.
“I want you here early. Remember I have your location,” Bucky said, making a face and pointing at his phone.
“Relax, uncle, I’ll make sure to be here early enough to see your pathetic performance in Congress. The stuttering suits you perfectly,” he teased, watching Bucky grab a cushion to throw at him. “Rude!” he mocked before closing the door.
The older man shook his head, sighing but unable to hold back a laugh. That kid was going to give him gray hair, just like his father. “Damn it, Steve, couldn’t you have left me something better than a red notebook and a teenager?”
When the sun had already set, James was sitting on the couch, feet on the table, watching the news.
“Well, I’m not on the impeachment committee, but—ah, the rumors of wrongdoing umh—are very worrying. They are very, very concerning and umh, worrying. And—umh, I think that my Brooklyn constituents deserve better. So umh—we’re going to get to the bottom of this—umh, worrying issue. Thank you.”
And with that, James burst out laughing, from the moment he saw that clip live until his uncle walked into the house. He heard him laughing before he saw him.
“Don’t say anything, James.”
“No, no, I don’t want to stress you out more.”
Bucky came in frustrated, dropping his jacket in the entryway before slumping down next to James on the couch. “I don’t know what the hell I’m doing.”
“Language,” James teased. His uncle shot him a look. “Well, the bright side is you can at least confirm you still have some charm, ‘cause otherwise I can’t figure out why people voted for you to be a congressman.”
“I’m not cooking anything. Order food.”
“Understood, soldier,” James said with amusement as he unlocked his phone. “Are you sure you don’t want me to set you up on Tinder and write ‘I’m very shy and very worried about everything’? I mean, it would be an accurate description.”
Bucky raised his metal arm to smack him on the back of the head. “Ouch!”
“Order the food, I’m going to shower,” he muttered, getting up and heading down the hall.
By the time Bucky came back, now in sports clothes, James was still in the same position. “Dillom’s ten minutes away.”
“You invited a friend?” Bucky complained.
“Dillom is the delivery guy,” James clarified.
“Ah,” Bucky muttered, looking at him. “Was I really that bad?”
“You’re better as a soldier,” James said with a smirk.
Bucky huffed. “Put a damn game on that console.”
James raised a brow. “What?”
“Nothing, nothing. It’s just… weird to hear you say you want to play on the PS5.”
“I just want to forget the embarrassment I went through.”
“Hard to do when I’ll remind you forever.”
So, when the delivery guy showed up, they were playing with both controllers. They didn’t even pause to eat, just smudged the controllers with greasy fingers while playing a FIFA match. Inevitably, living day-to-day with a teenager forced Bucky to develop some skills with technology; later he’d forget and go back to being a clueless old man, but when it came to console games… that was different. Though God forbid anyone asked him to turn up the TV volume, because he always ended up switching it off instead.
“I beat you twice!” Bucky gloated, getting up from the couch. Then he frowned. “It’s two in the morning,” he muttered, gathering the mess. He looked at James. “Don’t stay up too late.”
James shook his head. “Just one more game,” he promised.
Bucky pressed his lips into a smile and ruffled James’s hair. “Good night. And you’re getting a haircut before next week, ‘cause you’re not going to class looking like that.”
“Good night, uncle,” James said without taking his eyes off the screen. Bucky shook his head with a faint smile, tossed the pizza box away, and headed to his room.
(…)
“James, for God’s sake.” Bucky had already passed by the bedroom door and knocked, but James hadn’t gotten up, even after ten minutes. Now, Bucky came back down the hall grumbling, already having made breakfast. He opened the boy’s door and made a face of disgust. “Smells like… balls, sweat, and… teenager,” he said while stepping over the mess on the floor to open the blinds. James groaned, covering his face with the pillow.
“Leave me alone.”
“It’s your first day of high school, you’re not going to be late,” Bucky reminded him, pulling the pillow off his face. “And when you come back, you’re cleaning this room. And for God’s sake, open a window.” He tossed the pillow back at him, and James groaned, sitting up in bed.
“Same hair as your dad, huh,” he teased, ruffling it even more before leaving the room.
Bucky was leaning on the kitchen counter, sipping his tea and flipping through the newspaper when he heard James’s footsteps. He looked up and frowned, seeing him dressed with his backpack slung over one shoulder.
“What?” James asked.
“When you defend yourself before I say anything, it’s because you know I’ve got something to say,” Bucky muttered, eyeing him from head to toe, shaking his head. “You’re not going to school like that.”
“And why not?” James asked, crossing his arms.
“Because you already look like you’re going to be the worst student in the class, and on top of that, you’re dressed like you’re about to rob the place,” Bucky shook his head again, taking another sip of his coffee. “Go change, and if you actually want to be on time… you should already be leaving.”
“Well, I don’t want to be on time,” James complained, turning back toward his room.
Bucky didn’t reply, and just a few minutes later he saw him come back wearing different clothes.
“Happy now?! Do you like it better now, grandpa?”
Bucky nodded. “Better. Aren’t you going to eat breakfast?”
James grumbled, grabbing the toast from the plate with his hand. “On the way.”
“Good start to the school year.”
“Impossible,” James muttered, shaking his head.
“Have a good day, James.”
“Have a good day, James,” the teenager mimicked, annoyed, as he opened the door.
“Thank you very much,” Bucky replied, watching him slam the door on his way out. He shook his head, half amused, before turning another page of the newspaper. “Teenagers these days,” he muttered in disbelief.