stop clicking your red heels and wishing for home
Captain America; Steve, Bucky (Sam, Natasha); g; 1,755 words
Four times Steve wished he could go home and one time he realized he was already there.

Title from Gaslight Anthem. Happy 99th Birthday, Steve Rogers! Thanks to laurificus for betaing and to angelgazing for brainstorming. It is very shippy gen. There is a meaningful shoulder squeeze and everything. *g*

Or read it at AO3.

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stop clicking your red heels and wishing for home

1.

Steve loved his mother more than anything, but as a kid, he'd always wished for a large family, or at least a brother or sister or two. Becoming friends with Bucky had mostly sated that need, and the Barnes family had accepted Steve without question, making room for him and his ma in their home and in their hearts, even though they didn't have much more than the Rogerses did during the Depression.

It was one thing to sleep over or hang out with Bucky's family on the stoop or at the beach, but after his Ma died, Steve was living with them for real, and it was more difficult to adjust than he'd expected.

There were so many people around all the time. Not just Bucky and his sisters and their ma, but Mrs. Barnes's sisters and their kids were in and out of the apartment at all hours, and sometimes their husbands stopped by too, loud and hungry and occasionally drunk.

Those first few weeks, Steve clung quietly to the edge of Bucky's bed or to the couch cushions where he was sacked out, and pretended to be asleep while the noise and bustle washed over him. He squeezed his eyes shut so he wouldn't cry and wished desperately for his mother--the warm touch of her hand, the clean scent of her soap, and the beloved calm of her voice that told him everything would be all right now that he was home.

*

2.

Steve never thought he'd miss those nights where he'd leaned awkwardly against the bar and got ignored by all the women in the place while Bucky flirted with everything in a skirt. Nobody ignored him anymore, not even when he wished they would. The USO girls were a treat--sweet and sassy and full of good advice once he'd proved he was one of them instead of some kind of stuffed shirt or meathead.

But the long lines of people who waited for them after the show--the ladies with their perfectly coiffed hair and overwhelming perfume scents; the kids who asked if he was faster than a speeding bullet and more powerful than a locomotive, just like Superman; the men with their beefy handshakes and stinking cigars--all of them wanting a piece of Steve Rogers.

It only took him a few days to realize that he, Steve Rogers, was still invisible. No, the man everyone wanted a piece of was Captain America, and Steve just happened to live in his skin.

As much as he loved finally contributing to the war effort--even if it was as a bonds salesman rather than a soldier--sometimes he wished for a familiar face, a familiar voice, someone who knew Steve and was happy to see him, rather than the costume he wore. It was selfish, foolish, small, unworthy of the chance he'd been given or the man he was expected to be, but lying awake at night in the sleeper car on another train between somewhere and anywhere, Steve longed for the comforting familiarity of Brooklyn, where nobody expected him to be anything but himself.

*

3.

Steve knew he was insulated from the worst of the war, that he had the best men and the best equipment and support, and was assigned the most meaningful missions Colonel Phillips and the SSR could provide. He was finally making a difference, finally doing his part, and he was doing it all with Bucky at his side and leading a group of men he was proud to call friends.

So he tried not to feel grumpy about the rain that poured down and soaked their camp, at the feel of damp socks in wet boots--he always gave his dry pair to Bucky, since he didn't have to worry about trench foot himself anymore--and the endless meals made up of K-Rations that never seemed to fill him up.

He didn't feel the cold much in his new body, but days on end of shivering in bushes and ditches while waiting to attack enemy convoys took their toll, and he froze along with the rest of the Commandos, even though he knew he'd never catch pneumonia again.

That night, the wood they gathered was too wet to make a fire, and even Dernier had given up on trying to smoke the soggy cigarettes they carried around.

"They'll dry out eventually," Steve assured him. He hoped so, anyway. He didn't smoke his share, but they were currency with other units and civilians, and always useful to have around. What he didn't trade he split between Dernier and Monty. He still wrinkled his nose at the smell, but at least he didn't cough like he was dying anymore.

Dernier muttered imprecations in French and went back to the foxhole he was sharing with Gabe.

Bucky joined Steve at the perimeter, his M1 slung casually over his shoulder. "Is it everything you hoped for?" he asked, making a sweeping gesture, his lips twisted in what passed as a smile for him these days.

Steve sighed. It was no use lying to Bucky. He'd changed--they'd both changed--since that night at the Stark Exposition, but not that much.

"The sooner we kick HYDRA's ass, the sooner we can go home," he said, clapping Bucky on the shoulder.

"Yeah," Bucky murmured, looking at him with a warm glint in his eyes, "home." And for a moment his smile even looked real.

*

4.

The future was--it was, was the thing. It existed whether Steve approved or not, and while so many great things had been achieved while he'd been in the ice, there were still so many things wrong. So many things he could have fought for had he been around. So many people whose lives he'd missed.

He went back to Brooklyn, but nothing was the same--even the landmarks he recognized looked completely different without the old context.

After he helped save the world from aliens--actual aliens, like out of an old Flash Gordon comic strip--he worked up the nerve to contact whoever was left of his old team. Dugan was in a home up in Boston, and Morita was out in California with his grandkids, and both of them remembered him well enough to scold him for waiting so long to get in touch.

The notion that he could have missed them, could have waited, while he was weighed down with guilt and inertia and what the internet told him was PTSD, drove him to finally visit Peggy.

Even though he knew it was impossible, he'd still secretly harbored the hope that they could pick up where they'd left off. She was luminous, and still sharp as a tack, except for when she wasn't. Steve blinked back his tears and smiled every time she realized he was alive again, and his heart broke just a little bit more.

Moving down to DC to be near her was as much a penance as a blessing, though Steve would only ever think that in the long lonely hours of the night when he was supposed to be asleep.

It wasn't home, but home was gone--if he was honest with himself, which he tried to be, home had been lost the day Bucky left for basic, and Steve had just refused to admit it.

He could make a new home for himself--new team, new friends, new life. It couldn't be any more difficult than taking the serum or beating the Red Skull. He just had to put his back into it.

*

5.

"Do you have any fours?" Natasha asked.

"No," Bucky replied.

"Are you sure?" she asked in a sing-song tone that Steve knew was calculated to be annoying. He remembered Bucky's younger sisters even if Bucky didn't, quite.

"This is why we don't play cards with you," Bucky said mildly. "Go fish."

"You don't play cards with me because I always win," she said.

"That, too," Bucky allowed.

Natasha drew her card and smirked. What that meant, Steve didn't know, but probably nothing good for the rest of them.

Sam walked in then, tucking his phone in his pocket. "My mom says happy birthday."

"Thanks," Steve said with a smile. "Can we deal you in?"

"You know, she didn't believe me when I said I was spending Captain America's birthday with him and all we were doing was playing Go Fish."

Steve's mouth quirked wryly. "That's fine. You should have made something up."

Sam looked aghast at the idea of lying to his mother, which made Steve laugh.

"What you should do is get in the game so we can beat Natasha," Bucky said. He turned to Steve. "Do you have any queens?"

"No queens," Steve replied. "Go fish."

Bucky grumbled and drew a card from the deck.

The table was littered with empty beer bottles and the remains of a birthday cake that had been mostly whipped cream. Steve still found most modern-day food too sweet, but it hadn't stopped him from demolishing piece after piece of strawberry shortcake, made with what Natasha assured him were locally sourced ingredients.

"Not that you bake," he'd said.

"Of course not. What kind of super spy do you take me for?" she'd answered with a sly smile and a wink.

Sam drew his chair up between her and Bucky and said, "Hit me."

"We haven't finished this game yet," Natasha protested.

"You're only complaining because you're winning," Bucky pointed out.

"And I'll win no matter what, so fine, I guess you can join, Sam."

Sam took a sip of his beer and smiled. "Shouldn't we let the birthday boy win?"

"Hell no," Bucky said. "If you let him win, he'll just be a sore winner instead of a sore loser."

"Know that from experience, do you?" Natasha asked.

Bucky nodded and gathered the cards up to deal another hand.

"Why do you only remember the unflattering things?" Steve said.

"Just lucky, I guess." Bucky grinned, and Steve's heart did a little flip. Even four months after the Wakandan scientists had freed Bucky of his triggers and woken him up, Steve still hadn't gotten used to it, to having Bucky back again without anyone trying to kill them and without Bucky agreeing that maybe they should.

"I am," Steve said, more sincerely than he meant to. He reached out and squeezed Bucky's shoulder.

It didn't matter that they were halfway around the world and probably wearing out their welcome. Wherever Bucky was, Steve was home.

end

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