[oom] all those times we looked up at the sky

[from_the_outside]

Karli's on the move; she'll strike soon. Bucky and Sam have been in long, tense conversations with each other and with Torres, and she herself has been keeping an obsessive eye on the tracker blip that is Batroc.

It's a lot. The air in the apartment is tense. But she still has to laugh at the sight that greets her when she walks into the living room: Bucky crouched down, his phone out as he takes a photo of Alpine, who is lounging in lazy grandeur, soaking up a puddle of sunshine.

"That'll be a good one," she approves. "Baby, I've been wondering – what happened to your nice camera? You didn't leave it in Wakanda, did you?"

Comments

[from_the_outside]

"Mhm," she agrees, and gives him a faintly arch look. "I knew you wanted the camera. And I was pretty sure you wanted me, too."

[nerves_of_ice]

He smiles at her as innocently as he can manage.

"Were you?"

[from_the_outside]

"Pretty sure," she teases, with the confidence of years since those confused first weeks.

"You just needed a little convincing."

[nerves_of_ice]

"Just a little," he teases back, and slips his arm around her waist to draw her close.

"And now I've got you. And you've got me, too."

[from_the_outside]

She smiles up at him, sweet and warm and adoring.

"That was the first night you kissed me," she murmurs. "When I gave you this. Remember?"

[nerves_of_ice]

"I remember," he promises. "A lot happened that day. But I remember."

[from_the_outside]

"A lot did happen," she agrees. His memories in the lab, the market, Steve's surprise arrival... but what she remembers best is sitting with him in the cool grass, looking up at the night sky as the camera slowly clicked nearby.

She leans up onto her toes and kisses him now, as light and sweet as the kiss he'd given her then. "Come on," she murmurs. "Curl up with me."

[nerves_of_ice]

He kisses her back once more, slow and lingering, then smiles down at her.

"Okay," he says. "I'm in your hands, angel."

Bucky tips his head toward the framed photograph on the wall. "That print's from that night, by the way."

[from_the_outside]

"Yeah?"

She looks over at it, her expression warm, then closes her eyes, smiling as she remembers. "I can just hear the camera clicking."

[nerves_of_ice]

He lays his hand against the curve of her throat, running his thumb lightly back and forth over her collarbone.

"Easy to hear, when it's quiet enough."

[from_the_outside]

"It was always quiet there."

At the hut by the lake, where peace reigned, with only the soft sounds of night birds and insects might compete. She opens her eyes and lifts her hand to his, pressing a kiss to his fingers before she draws him over to the couch.

[nerves_of_ice]

"It was," he murmurs, following after her and sitting down beside her on the couch. Across the room, Alpine rolls over in his sleep, unconsciously chasing the sunbeam that's moved with time.

"I was happier there than I'd been anywhere. For years."

[from_the_outside]

"I loved seeing you so happy."

Sharon settles next to him and curls her legs under herself, settling her head on his shoulder as she puts her arms around him. "I was happy there, too."

Even in the times when she'd been restless, trying to find her way. She'd have given anything, in the last six years, anything at all to have gotten back to Wakanda and the hut by the lake and their peaceful existence there. "I used to dream I was back there with you."

[nerves_of_ice]

"I'm glad. That you were happy." He sets the camera on the ottoman and puts his arms around her in turn, drawing her against him.

"Did you mean it?" he asks, after a few seconds' silence to consider whether or not he wants to ask at all. He feels unusually fragile right now, as though one wrong move or word could shatter him apart. "What you said before."

[from_the_outside]

She rolls her head to look up at him.

"Which part, baby?"

[nerves_of_ice]

"When you said - when you asked me to stay," he says, very carefully.

[from_the_outside]

She hardly remembers everything she'd said, but the clarification is enough. I want you in my life forever, had come spilling out of her mouth, off her lips. Stay with me. Sharon sits up to look at him, lifting one hand to run her fingertips from his temple over the curve of his ear in the old familiar gesture.

"Every word," she promises. "I meant every word."

Maybe it's unfair to ask. She doesn't care.

[nerves_of_ice]

He tips his head, leaning into her touch.

"I love you too," he whispers. "I'm yours as long as you'll have me. I want you to stay, too."

[from_the_outside]

Her smile flickers, fragile at the edges. "I will," she murmurs, and leans to kiss him, slow and lingering. When it breaks, her breath shakes a little. "I'll stay with you."

[nerves_of_ice]

He makes an oddly stifled sound and buries his face in her hair, holding her just this side of too tight.

[from_the_outside]

"Sweetheart," she murmurs, and makes soft comforting sounds, letting him hold her as close and as tight as he needs, her hand on his hair.

"I'm here. You have me."

[nerves_of_ice]

"Don't leave." Barely a breath of sound, as though he's fighting himself to even say the words.

"You said I could -- if I had before, if he knew, maybe Steve wouldn't, wouldn't have..."

The words crack open and bleed in his throat, or so it feels.

"So I'm asking you. So you'll know. Don't leave me. Please."

[from_the_outside]

"Oh, God."

It tears out of her at the pain in his voice, at the way he struggles to say those words. "I won't. I won't, Bucky."

She pulls back and ducks her head to meet his eyes, her own brimming as her heart breaks, as it rages against Steve, as it yearns desperately for the man in her arms. "I promise," she says, holding his gaze, willing him to believe her. "I'm not going to leave you. I won't. Not again. Never again."

[nerves_of_ice]

Bucky searches her face until his vision blurs, softening every line of her.

He has to believe her. He has to. Things are different now than before, aren't they? Maybe it'll be enough, even if he's not.

Slowly, he nods.

[from_the_outside]

"I won't leave you," she promises again, softly, and reaches to cradle his face in both her hands, gentle. "I want to be here with you. I need you, Bucky."