Bucky just nodded, taking the thank you without really acknowledging it otherwise, falling into step beside her. It was starting to almost become easy, measuring out the right amount of space between them. Close enough for quiet talk that wouldn't carry, far enough that he wasn't crowding her space. He had to work to figure that out with people, a lot of the time. Bucky usually wanted too much space between himself and everyone else, and people noticed. He was getting better - he was closer to people now than he had been since before his Games, both physically and in the sense of knowing them. He didn't regret it, but it was fucked up timing, considering where they were all going now. With people he liked he could be close, be touched. If he still recoiled in crowds - well, they didn't really care that much anyway and he got over it.
He gave her a quick, crooked smile and a one-shouldered shrug. "Hey, don't knock it. My last kiss, I can at least pretend I was decent." It'd been nice, he remembered that much. Probably awkward and strained, but Bucky remembered sweetness and kinship, even if his memory still had a certain distant haze to it. People had probably kissed him since then, but it wasn't something he remembered - or wanted to, anyway. Didn't count. He liked having that memory now, however complicated.
Bucky didn't really have any complex reasons left. The only ones were the ones he'd said - he liked Natasha, and he had admired her. And she'd been kind when she didn't have to. It meant something to Bucky, who had always been bone-deep loyal in his way. It was futile now - they knew where things were ending. But it didn't mean he didn't still give a damn, and that he wouldn't still show that, until there wasn't a chance to. They knew where the other one stood. In the world they lived in, that meant something, Bucky thought.
He gave her another smile and then rolled his eyes. "Petaluna," he repeated. "Fucking hell, and they acted like me wanting to go by 'Bucky' was strange when I got here. Think she's like that to anyone that's not a guy, though. But she's creepy about Barton. Acts like she wants to put him in a bag and walk around with him like one of those little bug eye dogs some of 'em have."