Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Sam teased Bucky. He harassed him, insulted him, called him names.

Cyborg, Terminator, Robocop, Tinman, Buckaroo, Mr. Roboto, Frosty the Snowman, Elsa. (“That last one doesn’t make sense, Sam. I don't have ice powers.” “Yeah, but you were frozen, so it works!”)

To be fair, Bucky insulted him right back, happily calling Sam his own litany of names. Birdbrain, Big Bird, Samikins, Chickadee, Cap – okay, that last one wasn’t really an insult but depending on the tone, it could successfully express an impressive level of frustration.

And all of this was okay you see, because Sam knew where the line was.

He knew exactly how far he could push before his insults went from “oh my god you’re so old and ridiculous and therefore deserve teasing about every aspect of your grumpiness” to “oh my god I'm so sorry I shouldn’t have brought up that particular piece of mind-numbing, life-altering, gruesome trauma.”

In return, Bucky also knew that some topics were off limits. No jokes about Riley or kids or race (obviously). No jokes about being Blipped or turning to dust. Bucky knew Sam still had nightmares about that. Sam hadn't explicitly mentioned as much but more than once in the deepest parts of the night, Bucky had seen Sam staring at his hands as if waiting for something to happen. He could put two and two together and not come out with five.

Jokes about someone falling to their death were dangerous but could be pulled off in the right circumstance, with the right tone and usually with the right mixture of teasing words and comforting touch.

For example, Bucky could joke about falling off the train, and Sam could joke about Bucky falling off the train, but anything even resembling a joke about getting blown out of the sky was a showstopper and was more likely to get Bucky left behind at the airport in a small European country or shoved fully clothed into the ocean than anything else.

All in all, there was a long list of topics Sam could harass Bucky about.

(And he did, and he enjoyed it.)

He could tease Bucky about his age and his lack of technical know-how, which was ridiculous because the centenarian was far more tech savvy than he let on and Sam knew it. There was no way Princess Shuri, the literal smartest-person-on-the-planet, let him leave Wakanda without at least a basic understanding of how to use an iPhone.

Sam could also insult Bucky for being a Yankee, a New Yorker, or a Brooklynite. Or for living through the ‘30s. (“I know you like your coffee like you like your men – dark and hot – but you don’t gotta ration sugar when making snickerdoodles! This ain’t the Great Depression!”)

Other safe topics included his lack of personal belongings (“I get that your aesthetic is ‘spartan,’ but man would it kill you to buy a damn hand towel?”) and even his former Winter Solider days. (“Get your ass over here. This busted AC needs some of your Winter Soldier energy.” “That’s not how that works!”)

He could joke about Bucky fighting Nazis or punching Hitler. (“That was Steve, Sam. Not me. I never got the chance.”) His propensity to stare. (“You’re gonna be the death of me, but it ain’t gonna be what people would expect. Nope. I’m gonna die from the holes you drilled through my skull from all your staring!”)

Even his “murder strut” was a safe topic. (“What the hell is a ‘murder strut?’” “You know, it’s that ominous, sexy, get-outta-my-way walk you do.” “...You think that’s sexy? That’s messed up, Sam.” “Shut up!”)

So were countless other aspects of his personality including, but not limited to, his paralyzing fear of alligators (“Aww, is the super-secret assassin spy afraid of an itty bitty allegator?” “They’re basically dinosaurs, Sam! They deserve a certain level of respect! And they deserve that respect from way over here!”) and his stubborn refusal to wear sunscreen. (“I don’t care that you’ll heal in like 10 minutes. You look like Elmo now.”)

Then there were topics that had to be played off the right way.

Bucky’s “scrambled eggs for brains” was one that Sam knew was okay because they were Bucky’s words. In fact, Bucky had been the one to show Sam the quote, “your brains are all scrambled up like eggs, but you’re still my favorite breakfast” and then had chuckled about it for far longer than anyone without breakfast-brains would have. The fact that he had followed it up with “am I your favorite breakfast, Sam?” and an all too innocent blink-blink-blink broke Sam down into guess-my-brains-are-breakfast-foods-too laughter as well.

He could tease about Bucky spending 70 years as an assassin. “Brainwashed murder ‘bot” was his favorite phrase to throw around because the first time he’d said it Bucky laughed soda out of his nose – seriously, it was gross – so of course, Sam kept using it.

He could joke about Bucky’s metal arm, about how it’s probably worth more than the total GDP of many small-to-medium sized countries, but he couldn’t reference anything about how or when Bucky lost the flesh-and-blood version.

---

One time, AJ had gotten a fishing hook stuck right in the palm of his hand and Sam had carelessly joked, “Aw man, we’re just gonna have to chop the whole thing right off. Just whap!” and he’d mimed a hacking motion. The moment the words were out of his mouth Sam realized his mistake; he realized it even before Bucky went stock still behind him. The way Bucky slinked out of the house and spent the rest of the day who-knows-where was more than enough evidence to drive home the point.

Sam hadn’t apologized – he knew Bucky well enough by now to know that Bucky wouldn’t appreciate the topic being raised outright again – but he had intentionally and publicly taken Bucky’s metal hand when they were out walking home from dinner that night and he had made sure to sit on Bucky’s left side and curl under his metal arm that night on the couch.

---

So yes, there were things Sam learned he couldn’t harass Bucky about.

And then there were some topics he never, ever would.

He’d never joke about torture or anything having to do with sexual assault. Bucky’s pain tolerance and more specifically, why he had such a ridiculously high pain tolerance was off the table. So was the way he called Steve’s name more than once as he woke half mad from a PTSD nightmare, confused and unsure where and when he was.

What made things complicated was that there were things Bucky could joke about regarding his own life that would tear him to pieces if someone were to say. Bucky using humor as a coping mechanism was fine and dandy. Sam poking at bits and pieces of his history and trauma because he knew where the soft spots were and purposefully avoided them, that was fine too. (More than fine – it was practically their love language.)

Other people simply didn't always realize that just because Bucky said it, or even just because Sam said it, it wasn’t okay for them to say.

Basically, it came down to the fact that Sam knew Bucky’s limits and Bucky knew Sam’s. Did they sometimes cross the line and cause actual harm? Sure. But those instances were increasingly rarer as their relationship progressed from semi-stable and into very likely (albeit not expressly discussed) permanent. It especially helped that their animosity towards one another these days was purely for show.

So yes, they knew each other’s limits and knew when to pull their punches.

The problem was...well, the problem was other people.

Other people didn’t know the line. They didn’t know how much force they could put behind a punch and keep from breaking bones, metaphorical as they might be.

Joaquin, for instance.

---

For several months after the GRC conflict in NYC, Joaquin Torres was one of the few individuals Sam and Bucky worked with regularly. Everyone wanted something from Captain America and learning who to trust was potentially dangerous. Thankfully though, Sam had enough experience with Torres even before assuming the mantle of Cap that he knew the man was solid and loyal.

Eventually however, Sam and Bucky could no longer work solely with “Baby Falcon” (as Bucky so lovingly nicknamed him), and Terry Collins, a young man barely out of high school, joined their ranks.

In truth, they kind of adopted him after a disastrous night-drop rescue op in remote Mongolia went south.

Terry had been on a decidedly not school-sponsored cultural exchange expedition to northern Asia when unexpectedly one night the camp he’d been visiting was attacked by raiders.

Despite the shock of the attack and his inexperience at any sort of real combat, Collins had stood his ground with nothing more than two butterfly knives (Sam was horrified to learn later that the young man had learned to use them primarily from watching YouTube videos and an off-brand superhero movie called Kickass) and kept the invaders in a state of shock and awe until Captain America, Falcon, and the Winter Soldier arrived. He only actually injured a few people but it was enough to bide time.

Overall, it was a surprisingly positive (albeit stupid) ending to what could have been a very deadly standoff.

Therefore, after the fateful encounter, Collins happily accepted the nickname “The Butterfly” from Torres. He hadn’t even soured to the name when Bucky had coughed “Baby Butterfly” with a pointed look.

Cap took the young civilian under his wing, so to speak, but it was Bucky who took responsibility for the young man’s training.

While they quickly learned that he was wickedly competent with a blade, Collins was also incredibly cocky and had a lot of bad habits. Dangerous habits. Habits that would inevitably get him and his teammates killed. So Bucky, with Cap’s fully support, went hard on the young man, training and drilling him until one frustrating session where he went so far as to pin the young man down and intentionally nick the top of his ear with his own blade to drive home a point. (The point was that against someone with more experience, muscle mass, and speed, having a bladed weapon doesn't necessarily protect you, dumbass.)

Torres, who had been on the receiving end of more than a few of Bucky’s tough love lessons as well was glad he wasn’t the recipient of the former assassin’s skills for once and joked, “Better look out, Baby Butterfly. I should have warned you that like the Winter Soldier isn’t afraid to dirty his blades with baby blood.” and then he laughed.

Bucky froze with the blade still in hand; Sam froze on the sidelines, watching.

A beat. Two. Then, without a word Bucky rose to his feet, cleaned the blade on his pantleg and extended it back to Collins hilt first.

Bucky’s teeth were clenched so hard that Sam could see the muscles in his face twitching even from across the gym. The lines across his forehead seemed to multiply exponentially.

Collins didn’t seem to notice. He rolled to his feet far less gracefully than his teacher and joined Torres in laughing.

Sam could hear Bucky’s arm whirring as he clenched and unclenched his fist and strode off.

---

Then there was that one time in San Diego when the baristas also crossed the line.

---

Both baristas working the counter, one a classic beefy California surfer dude and the other a spindly tall dark-haired woman in a beanie, clearly had a thing for Bucky and were not even remotely subtle about it. Within the span of about ten minutes Sam heard no less than four innuendos and guessed there were a few more he probably hadn’t.

This was fine. It was good even as it gave Sam the opportunity to watch Bucky’s cheeks flush and his usually cat-like motions grow gawky and stilted. Seriously, for a man who was supposedly such a “ladies' man” back in the day, this Bucky had no game. The only time he’d ever seen Bucky be a remotely confident flirt was with Sarah and Sam knew well by now that he did that more to make Sam uncomfortable than to actually take his shot.

They paid for their coffees and of course Bucky’s ended up with a phone number scrawled across the sleeve (and a more-than-slightly pornographic image drawn directly on the cup beneath the sleeve) and Bucky’s cheeks were rosy and all in all Sam was having a great time until they stepped away from the counter and heard flirty barista number one banter with flirty barista number two.

“You think he’s still got the mask? That shit was hot!”

“Yeah, he might murder me in my sleep, but I imagine everything got enhanced when he got the super solider serum, yeah?”

“Hey, who doesn’t love a good dominatrix fantasy? You think the trigger words still work?”

Whether they didn’t think Bucky could hear or they simply didn’t care, it didn’t matter. The damage was done and the coffee in Sam’s mouth turned to ash.

Bucky’s jaw clacked shut audibly but he made no other acknowledgement that he’d heard or been affected by the comments. Sam knew that set of his shoulders though; he knew that tension that ran up Bucky’s spine. 

Bucky tossed his still-full coffee in the trash and left.

---

And then, even loved ones sometimes crossed the line – even Sarah.

---

Despite what most people might have thought, when the SHIELD files originally dropped Sarah did not read them cover to cover. Instead she had taken Sam’s advice and read the overview and then moved on with the business of caring for her children and ailing husband and struggling business.

So when Sam began to work with Bucky, she only had a cursory knowledge of who he had been and what he had done. That was why, nearly six months into their partnership (and barely a month into the ‘let’s finally get our heads out of our asses and realize that we mean something to each other’ phase), Bucky asked Sam to bring the files – the unredacted files – for Sarah to read.

He wanted her to understand in full technicolor and bloody glory who he was and what he had done.

Sam thought this was a self-sabotaging maneuver on Bucky's part – clearly, whether he meant to or not, he was trying to ruin the good thing that he and Sam had going – but Bucky had insisted regardless.

The Wilsons’ had already welcomed him wholeheartedly into their home and their family, Bucky argued, and that that was unfair. He’d then argued something about “Sarah having every right to know what potential dangers were living and playing in the immediate vicinity of her children” and although Sam had rolled his eyes at Bucky’s theatrics, he’d relented.

There was a tense night when Sam brought over the files and he and Sarah sat on the front porch together as she read them. She polished off a bottle of merlot, but she made it through. There were also tears and one moment where she needed to rush to into the bushes and empty her stomach, but when she was finished she gave Sam a long, lingering hug and told him in no uncertain terms to bring Bucky to the house tomorrow for breakfast. She would make pancakes with blueberries. Bucky liked pancakes with blueberries.

Then she went to bed.

Bucky got an extra kiss on the cheek that next morning but nothing else changed between the former Winter Soldier and the Wilson matriarch after that...until a few months later when Sarah began to feel comfortable enough with her knowledge to begin making soft, tentative jokes here or there.

“Hey metal man, come carry this crate.”

“The AC is at 76 and you’re cold?! Weren't you supposed to be the Winter Soldier?”

“Barnes, you’re old enough to be my grandfather and dishwashers didn’t exist in the ‘30s. I know you know how to scrub a casserole pan.”

The joke that crossed the line though was as unexpected as falling off of a train or getting blown from the sky.

Bucky and Sarah had ventured into town to grocery shop and had run into Henry Fischer.

Henry was a fellow Chalmette High School alum and he happily started to chat them up, first hitting on Sarah and upon realizing she was uninterested, turning his interest to Bucky. Bucky quickly also made it very clear that he was uninterested for a myriad of reasons.

It was on the ride home that Sarah made the innocuous comment.

“There is no way that boy could handle either one of us. Me, ‘cuz I'm too much of a real woman for him to push around, and you, ‘cuz you could take him out using only your pinky toe. In fact, I’m pretty sure the only thing he’s ever killed was a housefly. And he probably cried.”

Sarah had then turned her attention to an asshole in a tiny sports car who cut her off (“overcompensating much?!”) and missed Bucky’s reaction.

Later, when Sam wrangled the reason for his dour mood out of him, Bucky confessed that more than anything, he’d been taken aback. In his mind, Sarah and Louisiana were just so emblematic of his life now, that to be reminded of his life then had felt like a shot to the gut. And he should know, having experienced more than one bullet to the gut.

Bucky refused to allow Sam to say anything to Sarah – he'd been 100% adamant – but even though Sarah never made a comment like that again, the damage had been done. It was as if once the soap bubble had popped, there was no repairing the magic that it had provided.

---

And there were others. Lots of others...

When someone went over the line, poked a little too hard at a still-healing wound or made light of something deep and dark and personal that no one but Bucky had the right to joke about, Bucky was never the one to react with anger or frustration. No, it was always definitely Sam.

Sam, the councilor. Sam, “Captain America.” Sam ‘I can talk down terrorists and play hostage negotiator better than paid professionals.’ That Sam.

He was golden at keeping his cool in professional situations and when lives were on the line but when someone hit his partner below the belt? That was cause for a no-holds-bared knock-down-drag-out fight, as far as he was concerned.

Or it would be, if Bucky would let him.

To Sam’s surprise though, Sam's usually short-tempered partner never let him engage.

He’d catch Sam’s eye and shake his head firmly or he grab Sam’s forearm and squeeze just tight enough to get his point across. Occasionally he’d try to smile – it usually ended up looking pained. Sometimes he’d just leave. Never once did he engage.

In Sam’s experience, Bucky wasn’t good at hiding his emotion. If he was mad, he’d get loud and in your face. If he was scared, he’d hover close and get protective. If he was sad or confused, he’d grumble and frown and practically bristle with emotion. Usually, the man was an open book, except that in certain situations – situations like these – he wasn’t. Or at least, he wasn’t to other people.

That’s why it took Sam a while to realize that no one else seemed to pick up that Bucky was affected by other people’s words. It was eye opening to realize that because Sam spent so much time with Bucky lately that he’d begun to observe tells that other people missed.

Still, all of Sam’s Bucky-related observational skills didn’t change a thing when Mrs. Mayor Smalltown McTightass shuffled Bucky away from photographers at the newly opened Steven Grant Rogers’ Veteran’s Center with a giggling, “We’ll get a cleaner shot if you're way over there. Get it?! A cleaner shot?”

In that moment, all Sam wanted to do was wring the tiny woman’s neck – he could see the headlines now: “New ‘Captain America’ murders small-town mayor in cold blood!” – but as he reminded himself, a) he didn’t want to land in prison (unlike some people, there was no way he’d get away with murder while in full Cap regalia and still walk free) and b) he was not Bucky’s therapist.

(“I am not Bucky’s therapist, I am not Bucky’s therapist, I am not Bucky’s therapist.” Maybe if he said it often enough, he’d start to internalize it.)

If the man didn’t want fuss about shit like this, then he had the right to make that decision.

It was a stupid decision, but it was still his decision.

Instead, Sam clenched his teeth, took a deep breath, and tried to keep his mouth shut. And yeah, maybe he had to clench his fists a bit. More than a bit.

As it turned out, for as much as he had been watching and learning his partner’s tells, apparently Bucky had been doing the same in return.

Bucky immediately noticed Sam’s tightly coiled discomfort and for the first time since hearing an obvious joke-gone-wrong in Sam’s presence, he caught Sam’s eye. Then he glanced around the room quickly – the room wasn’t large by any means, but they certainly weren't alone – before sighing and giving Sam his best ‘the shit I do for you’ look.

“Hey, uh. Mrs. Mayor?” He shook off her arm with purpose and narrowed his eyes at her. Sam knew that wasn’t his actual ‘I spent the last 70 years as an assassin so maybe don’t fuck with me because I could snap you in two with just my pinky’ glare, but it was icy enough that she froze all the same. “I may be, may have been, you know, but maybe don’t make a joke like that about me, a literal veteran, at a Veteran’s Outreach Center opening named after my best friend, yeah?” And then, with a mischievous glint to his eye that Sam knew all too well, Bucky leaned down and whispered lowly, “it’s probably not a good idea. Especially in a room likely full of other snipers.”

After that, Bucky kept his chin down but he didn’t leave and he wasn’t exactly frowning.

Sam took it as the biggest and best win he could have possibly imagined.

All through the rest of that day and into the evening, Sam waited for the chance to get away from the crowds and finally, finally, discuss this with his partner.

It was late when they made it home. Not so late that they were ready to pass out but late enough to afford some intimacy to the darkened porch where they sat sipping their beers. “So what was it ‘bout today that finally got you to tell that lady her joke was shitty?”

Bucky flicked his gaze in Sam’s direction but immediately turned his attention back to the firefly-lit yard. “She upset you.”

That was not the answer he had expected. “Upset me?”

Bucky shrugged with one shoulder. “Yeah. Gotta say, I'm not a big fan of that.”

Taking a moment to think, Sam knuckled at his eyes before folding over to rest his forearms on his knees. “Let me get this straight. You won’t defend yourself for your own sake but because I was upset that you were upset, you stood up for yourself?” Sam felt the mental gymnastics it took to wrap his brain around that was Simone Biles’ worthy.

Bucky shifted in his chair, took a sip of his beer, and shrugged again, but this time Sam could tell that Bucky was only feigning nonchalance. Sam could easily see, even in the dim light, how firmly set his feet were on the porch boards. In an attack, Bucky could rise and be away before Sam likely could blink.

“Pretty much.”

Without much to say but “Oh my god, Buck!” Sam literally threw his hands up in the air.

The corner of Bucky’s mouth twitched up. “Oh, and there were like 10 guys behind us who clearly heard what she said. I clocked them as snipers right away. If she was insulting me, she was insulting them.”

“So again, you only said something for someone else’s benefit.”

“Pretty much.”

Sam blew air out through his nose and knuckled at his eyes again. It had been a long day. “That’s...messed up, man, but it’s also oddly in line with what I'd expect from you.” He snorted, feeling an absurd amount of affection filling his chest. “Progress is progress though, I guess?”

At Sam’s lack of judgement, some of tension in Bucky’s posture began slipping away. He would still be able to get up and be away in a less than a heartbeat, but at least now he let himself lean back into the chair, legs crossed at the ankles. “Fake it ‘til you make it.”

“Repeat it until you feel it.”

Bucky nodded, grinning now. “That one.”

Sam shook his head again, unable to contain his laughter. “Alright, alright. I'll take it guess.” He thought for a moment. “For the record though, if you ever don’t wanna fight the fight yourself, I can do it for you. I can be a downright ass too if I gotta be.”

Bucky snorted indelicately. “Damn right, you can. Pain in my ass, usually.”

Sam’s answering smile tried to compete with the moonlight for radiance. “You’re a pain in my ass, I'm a pain in yours. We bicker, banter, insult one another. But no bruises, okay? No one is allowed that, even if they’re just words.”

Bucky rolled his eyes at Sam’s clichés, smiled softly, but didn't disagree.

Chapter Text

Buck, I can’t control what other people say, how they tease and joke and insult. And man, I get it more than some that there are some real dicks out there.

And sometimes even people we love can say hurtful shit. So here’s what I gotta say: you, James Buchanan Barnes, don’t deserve the bad shit that gets flung your way. You definitely don’t gotta hide when people say things that bother you. You can let them know. Now I'm not saying you hit back or anything when the people aren't generally of the asshole variety, but you don’t gotta go all quiet inside. Yeah, don’t look at me like that. I know that’s what you do.

You’ve always fought the battles you needed to fight and until now, they’ve been for other people's benefit. You’ve gotta go ahead and use some of that hardheaded, stubborn jackass-ness I know you have for your own benefit every once in a while. You hear me?

And if you don’t got it in you to fight a particular fight, then you gotta let me. I can be diplomatic if I gotta be, and I can be a downright ass if I gotta be too.

Also, if I ever cross the line myself, if I ever step over it, or even come too close to it, you gotta tell me. Cuz I’d be lying if I said I was gonna stop harassing you about your old man shit or your cyborg ways or your ridiculous lack of self-preservation. Okay? But you got a line and I need’ta know where it is, okay man?