bakerstreet | the floor is lava!!!

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[meme] characterization

the floor is lava!!!

Just share the bed with me.
For whatever reason, the floor is unacceptable as a place to sleep. It's messy, the dog is there, THE FLOOR IS LAVA, or maybe there's flooding. Who cares why it's not acceptable, it just isn't. Normally, that's not an issue, but tonight you have a friend over. Maybe it's the safest place, maybe it's tornado season and your house is the only one out of the path of the storm. Stop trying to figure out the details, just get over it and share the bed with that person! Sexy times are not required. Intimacy is not required. Just share the damn bed already.

Do you need options? Here! Have some options!

1. It's late. You're tired. Too tired to drive and THE FLOOR IS LAVA.
2. It's late. You're drunk. Too drunk. Honestly, how did you drink that much and not die? Should we take you to the hospital? Here, just stay in this bed with me. No, you can't sleep on the floor. THE FLOOR IS LAVA.
3. It's early. You thought you'd just come by and visit but you can barely function. The bed seems inviting. Guess what, you're invited into the bed! Yes. The bed. Not the floor. THE FLOOR IS LAVA.
4. DO YOU LIKE TO SPOON? SPOONING IS OKAY. And yes, the floor is lava.
5. Figure out a reason why you need to share the bed.
6. The Crack Fun Insane Option - Actually Play the Floor is Lava Game!! Move about the room without touching the floor... because the floor is lava.

Do you really need options? I feel like everyone gets the idea of this meme.

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Keep him. Words that go back to their very first day of whatever this is, words that remind him how deep they’ve gotten. He can’t pinpoint when it became so easy, only that it had.

He can pinpoint exactly when it got so hard though. That’s very, very clear.

The hammock is a curse more than anything else; designed for one person it really just means there’s no way to hide from Tony’s gaze. It means all that hurt, all that pain is far too visible and he’s the one who put it there. It twists the knife in his chest viciously. “Are you sure that you still do?” And he hates that he has to ask, hates that he knows the answer should be no.

Even so he raises his right hand, hesitating before cupping Tony’s cheek, running his thumb along the bone. He’s never deserved Tony’s smiles, and doubts he’ll ever be a good enough person that he truly will. “I know you’re not faking those things. I do.” But how does a flashlight feel in the face of the sun? How plain his heart and mind next to Loki’s brilliance?

“I want to be here. I want you. I do.” There’s so much honesty in his voice that it physically hurts to say the words. “I guess I just don’t know why you’d want such a broken thing like me.l

Tired as he is- Tony flinches without any attempt to hide it. His eyes go wide, his head jerks back, that tension he'd carried to the hammock but no further makes a miraculous reappearance, knotting up his shoulders, his spine, tightening his grip on Bucky's shirt. This is- it's familiar. He's seen it in the mirror, saw it plain as anything in Bucky's eyes that first morning after. A quiet desperation to remain, to be kept while feeling horrifically underqualified.

Which explains the easing away. The creation of distance. Trying to give room for the other party to make a clean break and it cracks right through Tony's heart.

He'd thought-

It's unconventional, he knows it is. It's greedy, it's selfish, it's- not easy for any of them and he'd thought, he'd hoped that if (when) either of them took issue with the arrangement, if (when) it started to hurt, they'd talk about it. How long has this weighed on Bucky for it to only come to light in full now? Without rest to shore up his masks and walls, his easy assurances, he can't help the damp threatening to well in his eyes. "Then why do you keep leaving?"

Not for missions. They had that talk, he understands that urge, he wouldn't, hasn't ever held that against Bucky. He couldn't. But this is- the space he'd made safe for him, a refuge, a home suddenly not suiting-

Though it isn't that sudden.

Though there is a singular inciting incident, a span of twenty-four hours where everything went sideways and out of line like a disjointed limb. "You think I'm not?"

Shifting, squirming to find Bucky's other hand he clasps his wrist and drags it up to the arc reactor, thrumming under his metal palm. An echo of the battle that nearly destroyed them both. That did shatter something vital to Tony in so many ways. "You think Loki isn't?"

He feels it when the tension snaps back in, when the loose ease tightens to steel. He can’t help the way his hand finds that spot right between Tony’s shoulder blades, rests there for a moment before working its way down his spine. He has no defense against it, no defense against the pain he sees in Tony’s eyes. Wide and red and tired, underlined with the bruising and puffiness characteristic of no sleep and he can’t hide from that gaze, can’t hide the way it cracks him right open to see starlight reflecting in the threatening dampness. “I don’t... know.”

Doesn’t have the words for it, doesn’t know how to describe how and why it hurts. Doesn’t know how to deal with how right things had felt, in those few sweet months before.

Maybe it’s that he truly asks for so little. Tony had teased him about it, their very first time. Encouraged him to selfishness, to take something for himself. He hadn’t been able to do it then. He still can’t do it now, and has kept his presence minimal. It’s only practical after all; Ross is a regular enough figure, no doubt hoping to catch Tony in some kind of misdeed as he’s pretty much the only one still within the man’s grasp, and Bucky an outlaw. He can’t do anything that would put Tony at risk, can’t risk being so careless. But seeing Loki fitting into the spaces in the compound so smoothly, so seamlessly, only highlights how much he doesn’t belong. It’s why he’s spent increasingly more time in the garage or out on the grounds, grease and dirt an armor all their own.

But where else would he have the freedom to do even that?

He doesn’t resist as Tony takes his hand, guides it to his chest. He doesn’t touch him here often; the memories are too painful for them both, steeped in misunderstanding and desperation. “Tony...” It’s all he can say, one word, two little syllables. It’s all he can do to lean close, press his lips to the corner of Tony’s mouth, to try to hold on to one of the best things that’s happened in a life full of anything but.

"What do you want? From me, from this." He stares into Bucky's eyes, aware of every inch of contact shared, every mile of distance between them he can't quite cross. He knows why it exists and-

It hurts. It hurts both of them, but he understands why it's there. Better than anyone else might.

"Tell me what you need, and it's yours. Tell me something selfish and I'll give it to you-" In a heartbeat. As long as it isn't one thing, one thing that might be hurting him most. A splinter he can't dig out for as deeply as it's burrowed into his own heart, jade green, golden, and glorious- for all the ache and all the overwhelming emotion, he does love Loki. Does want him, need him.

No more or less than he wants, needs, and lo-

Cares for Bucky.

It's too soon to say it's love, too soon, too much baggage, too many new wounds for him to hand over his heart in its entirety. Part of him wants to and that? That's the first sign it's not that far off. Tony leans into the kiss, damp spilling over, holding tight to Bucky like he might slip free and leave him here in the cool spring morning if he doesn't hold on tight enough to bruise. He'd survive it. Bucky would, in time, survive it as well, that much he knows.

But why should they have to?

He’s not sure how to answer that question, to shape it into words that aren’t needlessly cruel. He wants what he’d once wanted, what Tony had once offered: if you don’t have anywhere to be, be here. Though it’s gotten so much harder to be here, and that has to be on him.

“I don’t—” It’s halting because it’s hard to express, another wound to tear open and spill at Tony’s feet. So much blood on him already yet he turns the blade of his words toward himself again, cutting deep and hard to try to find something worthwhile to give to Tony. “I don’t know how to be.” Still struggles sometimes with who he is, never mind the how.

He tastes salt against Tony’s skin, the sting of it on his lips. Feels the tremble in Tony’s hands, the pulsing thrum of the reactor. Soaks in the heat of his body, traces down his spine, trying to memorize again each and every vertebra. “Just stay here,” he says finally, the request sounding small and pathetic but it’s all he has. The only selfish thing he can come up with is wanting this time right now, both of them a mess and curled into a hammock meant for two, the most meager camp not even a quarter mile away from one of the most high tech facilities in the world. “Tonight. With me and the stars and the night air.”

They'd taken that from him, over the years. Wanting. Trying to want, to need- having that? It's a human thing. Hydra made a tool of him and it's been years that he's had to put himself back together but there's- there's a resistance still that he doesn't understand. There's a variable he's missing that he can't slot into place, can't sort out and uncover. For now, he leaves it alone in favor of pouring every inch of missing Bucky into the kiss. Every ache, every warm, fond thought he had and wanted to share, every lonely night in the press of lips and trembling clasp of his hands.

Eventually, Bucky will leave. For a mission, for good, and he won't come back.

Eventually, Loki will realize how broken and human Tony is, and he'll have had his fill. All his talk of devotion is well and good and Tony trusts it, now, he must or hell go mad- but humanity isn't something immortality prepares someone to endure.

He will die cold, aching, and alone with nothing but a shattered legacy left behind.

"Come home in the morning? We'll spend the day in the garage. I have a new engine-" Anything. Something. Whatever he can do that Bucky wants, that'll make him stay. Tonight is this, tangled and trembling and fighting back a million questions, tomorrow? He just. He wants Bucky there. "I'll spend all weekend with you just-"

His voice cracks and he hates himself for it, blinking past exhausted tears. "Just don't leave."

They've kissed more times than he can truly count, but the number of kisses like this one are a scant handful. It's painful, filled with as much uncertainty as certainty, as much longing and wanting as having. There's sweetness threaded into it, alongside the pain; sweetness and something not unlike a feeling of belonging.

It makes no sense. But so much of his life makes no sense; what more does this add, truly?

He kisses Tony again, lingers in his taste, the feeling of their lips pressed together. Lets it build slowly but without heat, without the frantic need that leads to them tearing clothing off each other. This isn't the time for that; a wild, passionate tumble isn't what either one of them needs. No, this is the time for trying to express through a kiss what he doesn't have the words to say, and not parting from it until they're desperate with the need for air.

"I'll come home," he murmurs when they finally part, pulling Tony close until their foreheads touch, until the air they each breathe mingles in the small space between them. His hand slides up from Tony's chest to the side of his throat, then curls around to the back of his neck, begging Tony through touch to stay close. Huddled in this hammock and it's pathetic, really, how this is how he'd intended to spend a day that turned too easily into three. "You don't have to, to change your plans, anything like that. Not for me." Tony's already compromised so much for him; the weight of it is staggering sometimes. He's taken far too much from Tony's life and what he's able to give back is broken and tired and splintered into far too many pieces. Tony deserves so much more than what he is, what he has, yet here he is gathering up all the shattered, incomplete pieces and offering them up to this one man.

It's not enough. He knows it's not enough but it's all he has to give.

"I won't leave." A hesitation and he hates himself for that as well, hates that he not only hesitates but feels he has to, because the next part is big. It's huge and in a way it's everything, because it's something they only say to each other when they're sure they can come through. And because he's saying it, it means he will follow through, no matter how hard it feels right now; they've both had too much of broken promises. "I promise."

"I want to- James you've been here but not...not with me. Not happy." Not as easy, not as light and warm and relaxed as those first few months and he knows why. A green-eyed shadow lingers for all that Loki has the grace to allow this, has the patience to attempt to share that which he has fought for, that which he's probably killed for (he never did find out what happened to Tiberius). He knows he's asking so much, too much, from both of them. That they're not given to sharing- James is less obvious in his upset but it's plain none the less when Tony reaches for him and finds his smiles smaller, his eyes pained.

Tangled close like this he can't miss the trembling. Can't miss the ache in Bucky's voice, the way he's felt diminished. "I want to make you happy."

And if it's a day in the garage, if it's staying out here at night instead of in the warm bed they usually share, if it's coffee over an open fire and not in the kitchen where he'd cracked Bucky open all over the countertop- he doesn't care. He doesn't care as long as he's able to bring that light to his eyes again, that warmth to his smile. That wry ease that's been missing since they invited Loki to their games, their bed.

The two person puzzle's become three, become more sharp edges and deep pits of emotion, more broken lines digging in rather than settling. Is he hurting all of them, asking for this? He is. He must be. But why can't he let them go?

Two words and that last edge of tension vanishes. Bucky promises and- he's always kept those. They try not to lie to each other, try not to leave room for misunderstandings save for the nebulous, unnamed thing they share in the quiet hours of dawn between games and working with engines, the place where there's no sensuality and only pure sentiment. Tony leans up and in, lips pressing to Bucky's softly, sweetly. Gratitude plain on his face and in the softening of his grip.

"It's fine—" He doesn't need to be happy. He's long since settled for simply being free to make his own choices, to attempt to scrape out something of a life in between eliminating the remaining pockets of HYDRA. Happiness doesn't factor into that, isn't something meant for someone like him. And that's fine. But here Tony talks about wanting him to be happy and he just doesn't know what to say, doesn't know how to handle something like that.

"Just let's stay here tonight? It's... simple." They don't do anything like this; they don't go camping or hiking or any of those outdoorsy hobbies. There's nothing to associate with this, a blank slate and a new memory and the chance that maybe it won't cut either of them. "I just want to feel you close."

Not that they don't get close in Tony's bed, or in the garage, or the lab, or the kitchen, or on the couch. But there's something about the quiet of the night, the slight chill in the air, the way Tony finally starts to relax again. He tastes it in his kiss, sees it in his eyes. Feels it in the way his hands trace down Tony's sides, then slip under the hem of his shirt to trace patterns against the small of his back. "I didn't mean to hurt you." It's a quiet murmur as he tries to encourage Tony to settle in a little more, to see why a hammock in the relative middle of nowhere can have such appeal. "I'm sorry."

"Not going anywhere anytime soon." Not when he's tangled warm, the chill of the air not even registering until Bucky's metal hand makes contact with the skin of his back and even then? It's not enough to make him flinch- but it is enough to twist a soft chuckle out of him as he leans in, burrowing close. Like he could climb inside Bucky's skin, his heart, and live there for awhile protected from the world and all its assumptions. "I worry."

That's- that's all. "I know this is hard and- I'm grateful you're trying. I know you're trying, I know it's complicated. I'm glad that you're willing to-"

Put up with him having both of them. Willing to stay around, to take what he can offer and give back as much as he does. "I'm glad you're willing."

Most of their relationship comes down to that. Consent and agency, what they're willing to take from one another, to offer, to endure and this? This is a whole new weight to carry. Tony shifts enough to tangle their legs, nosing at Bucky's stubbled jaw. "...I hurt you too, that morning. I left you alone and when you wake up to slip out of bed it- it hurts you to wake up with him there. We don't have to all share the bed if it's painful for you, I don't want that."

He presses a quick kiss to Tony's temple at that reassurance, the tiniest of little thank yous for staying in a place that's probably a lot less comfortable than he really needs, if his current state of exhaustion is anything to go by. He'll make it up to Tony with a massage later, he promises himself silently. It's the least he can do. "You don't need to—"

But this isn't about do and don't, and it's not even about need. It's about what they want, and that's infinitely trickier.

He closes his eyes against the hurt he feels when Tony gives him those simple thanks. It's his fault it's even needed, his fault these reassurances need to be spoken and not just silently understood. He hooks a leg around Tony's, tips his head so his partner can nuzzle as close to his throat, his jaw as he desires. It's a different shade of the comfort they so easily offer each other, a quiet understanding that they do need what they offer to each other.

He runs his hand up the back of Tony's head, fingers burrowing into his hair, scratching lightly at his scalp. It feels good; he feels good. "You don't— It's not that." It's in part that, but it's not the entirety of the situation. Explaining it hurts though, because he hasn't shared the depth of this part of him. "It's just... private. I'm not ready to share the things my mind does at night. Not until I know I can trust myself not to be a danger to you."

He opens his eyes, turns his head to nose into Tony's hair. "I didn't want to hurt you, and I just ended up hurting you a different way."

He always unwinds the more Bucky touches him. Smooths his hands down his back, his fingers through his hair. Like he knows where all his stress rests (he does) and just how to wipe it away with the right amount of attention (he does). Being known on this level is- usually it comes after years of barbs and playful threats, not a few months of desperate clinging and distraction. Holding fast to some nebulous, fragile something that's different from the stresses of their lives, that's a fresh start devoid of all the pain and echos of ghostly memory on both sides- it's not how he does things. He's not sure if it's ever how Bucky did things either, but that's not as important.

That knowledge exists. That familiarity exists. That comfort offered and accepted shouldn't be so easily intuited, shouldn't be offered up and understood- and yet.

And yet, and yet, and he can't make himself upset over the time they've stolen together.

Tony's in no hurry to lose this thing, this relationship. If it means sleeping in a hammock when he has a bed waiting for him not far away? He'll do that without blinking. If it means trying to sort out what it is that's bothering Bucky inch by inch? He'll wait quietly for Bucky to find the words. Hands pressed to warm skin, lips to his throat with no real intent other than to breathe him in, Tony soaks in that fear.

It's familiar enough.

"And now that you've explained? It doesn't hurt. I get it, baby." An endearment he doesn't pull out often- but it feels appropriate, here. "I had- still have issues. You've seen them. I'm not as dangerous as you, but I understand."

He can feel Tony relaxing against him, feel the way he starts to release the tension in his muscles. His hands keep up the slow rhythm of lingering against skin and in hair; the metal of his left slowly warming to Tony's body temperature where it lingers at the small of his back. Tony even drops his little endearment so easily and Bucky closes his eyes at the two syllables.

They don't give pet names to each other. Well, Tony does but he gives little names to everyone, silly things he comes up with on the fly, things to make people laugh or smile or just look at him like he's grown another head. Baby is different, a quiet sincerity in the word and he's not always entirely sure how to deal with it. But Tony says he gets it and Bucky does believe him. He also knows that there's no way to truly get it without living it; his lover has been through something tangentially similar, but it's still not the same. He'd never had his mind subverted the way Bucky has and though he knows Tony trusts him, he still can't trust himself.

And if something happened when Loki was around? Bucky definitely doesn't trust the Asgardian with the existence of the Winter Soldier.

He nuzzles into Tony's hair for a moment longer, enjoying the softness of product nearly worn out of it by hands running through the strands. "I'll stay in bed if you want me there. If it'd make you feel better." He doesn't really need that much sleep, after all. He can manage with catnaps through the day, and staying awake all night.

Baby isn't for Barnes, the soldier, or the sweet surrender of James. It's for this quiet, honest sliver of self that's between all three and none of them at the same time. It's from Tony- not Iron Man, not Stark, not sir. Just...two men finding their wary way through a complicated field of emotions and trauma that overlaps more than either of them probably likes.

Tony hates that some of Bucky's baggage is familiar. A lot of it is beyond his ability to grasp but- that any of it at all is similar? That it was done to him, that he carries those scars?

That he contributed, a little, to more than a handful?

It aches to recall.

But when they're like this in the quiet, fingers trailing with somber reverence, sharing air and the ragged scraps of their souls, their damaged hearts, it's appropriate. It's- he means it, that Bucky matters. He's always meant it. "I always want you there. But I understand if you need to go. Kiss me awake first and let me know it's a rough night."

So he doesn't worry. SO he can plan to give James something good when the dawn rolls around. "to hell with what makes me feel better. I want- whatever helps you most. Whatever makes you happiest. That's what I want."

Maybe baby fits out here with the stars and the night, a place where they don't typically linger together but there's no one else around to witness any of it. True privacy and it's nice; privacy is a luxury Bucky doesn't at all take for granted. Not anymore. But having the privacy to hold Tony like this, to welcome him in with few of his own walls and defenses raised?

He doesn't think he'd be able to share this with any other person. Not even Steve, and he tries to banish the discomfort that thought causes in him. He can't think about it right now.

Tony gives him an out and it hurts, a little. Hurts that Tony can recognize that he needs one, hurts that Tony can see that there are times when he simply can't be comfortable with his lover's other lover. He wonders again why Tony even bothers, but he's careful to keep it from his voice. It's at least made a little easier like this when they're not looking at each other's faces. "I will. Before I head to the garage or something." He won't; he already knows he won't take the out. And it's fine.

He shakes his head a little, just a slight little movement because he doesn't want to disturb how Tony is nestled close. "You don't have to change things for me. I don't want you to do that." Tony's compromised so much already; so much of his life had been shaped by Bucky, before either of them really knew it. He doesn't want Tony to have to give up anything more on account of him.

"If a system isn't working, it needs to be debugged. If something isn't- if it doesn't fit, if it hurts when it shouldn't, if someone's unhappy? I need to change things. Letting stuff sit until it gets worse and worse until it's unbearable isn't an option, here. This only works if we're honest with each other- you and me." Loki and Bucky don't need to be honest with each other. Will it help? Yes. Is he going to expect it? No. They're both incredibly private people with every last shade of their emotions and issues and have every right to their walls and masks with one another.

He can't ask them for the same bare-boned honesty they give him. It's- he's earned what they offer him. To each other, they're strangers bound only by a common interest in Tony. That's not enough to give up any kind of trust.

Tony has to shift, now. Lean back a little to look James in the eye, just to be sure. Just to know that Bucky, James, understands why this is vital to him. "I don't want to hurt you. Not through negligence or ignorance, I mean-" And they only ever tiptoed around this wound between them, his hand coming up to stroke the edges of Bucky's left arm. "Haven't I done that enough already?"

Before he knew him. Before they found this fragile, wonderful thing.

"But what if you're not the one who needs to make the change?" It's a quiet question, one he allows to fall into the small space between them. In the short time he's known Tony, it's been easy to see one simple fact: he's always the one trying to solve every problem, have the solution to every situation. It's not fair, and it shouldn't have to be his responsibility.

This isn't on Tony. It's on Bucky, and he's the one who needs to just buck up and deal with it.

He makes a small sound of protest when Tony pulls away, but only because he'd been getting pretty comfortable with the other man's weight on top of his own. The hammock is surprising that way, or maybe it's just that Tony fits so well into the lines and planes of his body. He's gotten used to it, and that should probably put him on guard more than it does. But he feels like he has so few walls left that Tony hasn't pulled down, so few ways to protect himself. Maybe it's how things should be; he doesn't know. But he does know he'd rip his own heart out just to make Tony smile.

"This isn't..." He reaches up to place his hand over Tony's, pressing it along the seam between metal and flesh, the part that can be felt through his shirt. "It wasn't your fault. You know that I don't blame you, right? I don't blame you for anything that happened then. And you're not doing anything hurtful now."

"I- I can't change other people but this situation hinges pretty well on...me." He's the one asking them to share him. He's the one demanding their time, their affection, and trying as hard as humanly possible to give them all he has in return when they're together. Whatever's bothering Bucky has to be something he can change. He can't see anything in this situation that's not his fault. But...He frowns, gaze settling in the middle distance as he tries to puzzle out how this is on Bucky.

It's not coming.

Before he can say anything before he can argue the point? Their hands curl together, pressing against flesh, bone, and vibranium. "I was trying to hurt you."

Back then. Specifically. Killing either of them would have been very easy, very simple, and would've gotten rid of many a complication over the past year or so. But that hadn't been the goal. Pain had been the goal. "How does that make me any better than-"

Than the men that put him in the chair. The men that broke Bucky just because they could.

But if he can, has, forgiven Bucky for what happened when he wasn't himself- could he accept Bucky's forgiveness of what he'd done when he wasn't in his right mind? He could argue he chose to do harm but...he might not have been entirely on an even keel at that moment. Maybe. He hates the idea of shifting blame. "If you don't blame me, who do you blame for that? Please don't say yourself, you were only trying to not die."

"And I'm telling you it doesn't. You don't have to change anything Tony." Hadn't he told Tony something similar even before all this started, before Loki came back? If he hadn't, it's a grave oversight. "Why are you do convinced that everything is your problem to solve?"

He squeezes Tony's hand at that little confession. He won't insult either of them by denying it; Tony had been trying to hurt him. And though everything had happened so fast, he'd had ample opportunity to digest the fight afterwards. Tony had opportunity to use deadly force. And he hadn't. Sure it says a lot about Tony's temper at the time, his intentional want to cause pain, but it also says something very important: he's not inherently a killer. He's not inherently like what HYDRA turned Bucky into. That's important.

"You are better." He leans in enough to press his lips against Tony's, fierce and brief. "You yourself were hurting Tony, over the Accords, over your family, over Steve, all of it. That's a lot for one person to handle. Of course I don't blame you."

There's a difference between causing pain because you're in pain, and causing pain because you can. Bucky's felt both, extensively so, and he'll say it as many times as it takes for Tony to believe him. "At the time I blamed Zemo. As soon as I saw my... the cryo chambers, I knew we'd been set up. And knowing what I now know, I blame Ross as well, for the pressure he insisted on putting on you. They were both trying to cause pain for their own agendas. You were reacting to being hurt. There's no blame in that, and I'm just a tin man anyway. Pull me apart and put me back together again."

He does blame himself as well, and he blames Steve too. But saying that, going into that conversation, isn't something they need to visit right now, and won't bring closure or comfort to either one of them. So he chooses to stay quiet instead, nuzzling back into Tony's hair and pressing kisses into it.

"Because most of the time it is? Especially in relationships. Something's off or wrong or not working it's- it's always on me." Even with Loki on occasion. And it seemed even with Bucky but now? With this vehemence? He's not all that certain he was right to think it was something he had to do.

Some of the earlier warm contentment drifts away in the face of ragged memory. He's not proud. It- it was a complicated time but that was no excuse to try and hurt someone that had no agency over anything that happened to set him off, or anything that Rogers pulled him into because he had a misplaced sense of loyalty. He can't, doesn't, blame Bucky for the shit Rogers did. That's all on him. Bucky had been trying to get by without causing a fuss.

Having some affirmation that he wasn't terrible- that someone else saw every straw that broke his bak in the bunker? Closes up old wounds still festering in exhaustion and resentment for what he had to do, what he tried to fix things.

Even if he failed.

It's hard to assume otherwise in the face of Bucky's firm belief and affection. Tony's eyes flutter open, dark and assessing as he slides a hand up to stroke Bucky's jaw. As much as he hates to think back to that moment? Bucky has to hate it more. Everything of The Soldier propped and wrapped up like skeletons in the worst kind of closet by a man that triggered him into losing his autonomy. "You're not."

Tin. That's not- Tony's lips press thin as he burrows back against Bucky's chest, nose in his throat. "You're more than that, baby, you know it. Right?" The blame game can wait. This? This can't.

"Most of the time isn't all of the time." And he truly doubts that most of the time was really, honestly most of the time. Sure, Tony is a lot sometimes, but it's also what makes him so wonderful, and so wonderfully unique. No, Tony is perfect; Bucky is the one who needs to adjust, needs to figure out his own head and his own place. He'll manage. "This one isn't on you Tony. Okay?"

He leans into the hand on his jaw, holding Tony's gaze. Neither of them are at their best right now, cracked open and rubbed raw. It's a side of himself he doesn't like to show, because Tony's too much of an engineer, too much of a fixer. The mess that is Bucky Barnes isn't Tony's fault; it shouldn't have to be his to fix.

It was never about fixing each other anyway.

He holds that quiet, dark gaze until Tony breaks it, letting him see some of the raw, ragged feelings that Bucky normally keeps so completely hidden. His hand sinks into Tony's hair again as he burrows close, and he allows himself a few long moments of enjoying the way they feel as they breathe together, surrounded by the quiet of the night. "Depends on who you ask," he finally replies, punctuating the sentence with a kiss to the top of Tony's head. "Here I am, that's what's important."

"Okay." He relents, if only for the moment, if only because...if Bucky's insisting? IT might not actually be on him. So. This is out of his hands, which is frightening enough to think about. Communication is meant to fix complications in relationships, not show how it's something completely out of his control. Not that he doesn't trust Bucky to tell him when something hurts but-

Outside of very specific circumstances? He kind of.

Doesn't.

It's done without malice every time, he knows- done to spare him the worry, the stress, and he appreciates it once the initial panic passes but he'd much rather know from the beginning. Which meant he needed to look at his own patterns and adjust them- he can't give Bucky shit for pulling tricks he does all the time. It's led to a more honest, emotionally available side of himself in their relationship.

And he'd thought it'd ben going well. It is, he decides, burrowing close, hands curling in Bucky's shirt. Like if he thinks it loud enough, pretends hard enough, everything will work out okay. "You're not hollow. You're full of salt and heart and sarcasm."

Trauma, too, but that goes without saying.

He holds Tony a little tighter when he gives in and stops pushing the point; it’s on Bucky to figure out how to live here, how to exist alongside Tony’s other lover. Tony’s had to change so much of himself because of the demands of the world; Bucky doesn’t want him shouldering all that responsibility here too. It’s not fair, especially when Bucky is clearly the problem. He just has to push his own discomfort aside, and for Tony that’s something he’ll do without complaint.

Letting his arm curl around Tony again he gently pets along the line of his hip, hand working its way to his lower back. Tony always holds tension here and this is no place for a proper massage but he can at least maybe rub away a little of the ache.

He sighs into Tony’s hair, tries to lose himself there. It doesn’t work because there’s still a conversation they need to have, but it was a nice thought. “Guess so, when you put it that way.” It’s not how he’d been thinks of it; Bucky’s own line of thought had been less generous, commentary about being easily broken and easily replaced. Tony doesn’t need to hear those thoughts though. “Least they had the forethought not to use actual tin, or you’d be fixing dents in me constantly.”

The tangled knots of tension ease under Bucky's skilled hands. The position and surface aren't entirely conducive to a massage, true, but mostly it's feeling safe. Having that contact. Knowing Bucky will...will try to stay. Try to be present when he's around. It's more than he thought he had a right to ask for but reached for all the same, needing some kind of reassurance he shouldn't demand. And yet Bucky gives it to him without batting an eye. Scrapes himself open raw and real and Tony lo-

There's a feeling, here, that he's afraid to name. Something new that could be so much.

Should be.

"Missing the point of your own metaphor here, dear." He reaches up to press one hand flat against Bucky's chest, over the meaty thud of his heart. "Had a heart all along, remember?"

Tony's weight is welcome against his chest, his torso. Tony helps hold him down and keep him here, and right now it underlines how Tony is actually here with him. Tony had made the effort to come out and find him, and he's making the effort to stay with him. It's more than Bucky deserves, especially since he's pretty sure the hammock isn't exactly the best support for his lover's back.

He'll make it up to Tony, he promises himself. An indulgent massage and breakfast in bed and Bucky will stop sneaking out at nights. It's the least he can do.

"Was that the point of the metaphor?" He covers Tony's hand with his own for a moment, before tugging it to his lips so he can press kisses to each fingertip. He'd been thinking more along the lines of being made up of spare parts and easily replaceable, but he's not going to mention that to Tony.

"You're missing a pretty good sky, you know, all burrowed down in my chest. Stars are out. 's nice."

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