They'd been happy once. The life they'd had together had been simple, Steve studying and tutoring where he could and Bucky working, the two of them looking after each other. But it had been more than that, they'd lived nearly as more than friends, but never quite crossing the line. If people had known, had seen how they were together it would have been trouble. They'd kept up appearances, what with Bucky still dating and enjoying himself and Steve clearly too small and undesirable to keep a girl, no one thought too much about them. But they'd been happy and Steve missed it, sometimes he wished they could go back and things could be that simple again.
In the war it had become more serious, both of them damaged and neither could be without the other. The tent they shared a refuge from the things they had seen, the things that they had to do. But as much as it hadn't been normal, it hadn't quite been anything, the risk had seemed too much, too huge. Steve had always assumed it was a matter of time before Bucky found someone and Steve would lose him.
"I wouldn't have had to ask questions! You could have just fucking told me, it could have been that simple!" Steve snapped back.
Steve felt Bucky's words like a slap in the face and he looked like he'd been slapped too. "You never see me? That's not Tony's fault. I'm usually by myself building something, trying to keep busy and trying not to just go over everything that happened again and again," Steve said, his voice quiet now in contrast to how he'd raised it before. "I always want you with me, you know that. You should know that."
Bucky's words sucked the fight out of the air and his shoulders dropped, his heart dropped into his stomach. There was a long pause before Steve reached out to grab his bicep of his metal arm. "Buck," he said as his voice broke in his throat. "I'm sorry, I- I never want to hurt you."