Work Text:
Steve Rogers had always been a little afraid of Peggy Carter.
Not in a bad way, though—he respected Peggy just like she deserved, and he recognized that she would have to be a little more forceful with the men if she was going to be taken as seriously as her male colleagues. Still, that had been a pretty mean right hook. Peggy Carter was the kind of woman you wanted to impress. Steve hadn’t thought that he was impressive at all before the serum, but apparently Peggy had seen something in him even before he became muscly, and Steve was grateful for it. It quickly became obvious that brawn wasn’t enough to impress Agent Carter, and brains alone weren’t either (her complete disinterest in Stark was enough to make that clear). Peggy valued bravery, and wit, and all the things Steve had been led to believe didn’t matter if you were in your twenties but only weighed 90 pounds. From the start, Steve had adored Peggy Carter. Her opinion of him mattered.
70 years later, Steve learned that Peggy still intimidated the hell out of him.
He visited her as often as he could, updating her on his new life in the twenty-first century, and she paid complete attention to even the most mundane things. His stories varied from recaps of long, tiring battles with supervillains or the occasional alien army to long rants about the price of coffee or how irritating it was that Tony kept forwarding him chain emails. He wasn’t an idiot— he knew that even if he didn’t forward it to twenty of his contacts, he wouldn’t be cursed with fifty years of bad luck. (Besides, he’d already spent seventy frozen in ice; it seemed a little unfair to get another fifty.) But regardless, Peggy listened to all he had to say and even offered a few stories of her own. Very few of them were about anything recent, since her memory didn’t let her retain very much of the new things happening to her, but she had plenty to say about the seven decades she and Steve had been apart. He spent hours with her, holding her wrinkly hand and laughing at her tales of how she’d constantly been cleaning up Howard’s messes, cringing when she told him about the Captain America radio show that constantly portrayed her as a damsel in distress. When she told him it had been cancelled within a year, he felt only a little bit better.
Once, he was talking to her about JARVIS and how the AI still managed to scare the crap out of him when it suddenly spoke without any warning. He hadn’t been looking at her directly when he told her, otherwise he would have seen the way her face softened and her eyes became melancholy.
“What’s its name? What is it called?”
Steve turned to her, surprised at her tone of voice. “JARVIS. I don’t remember what it stands for, but it wasn’t very scientific-”
Peggy let out a watery, almost exasperated laugh. “He named his robot butler after his real-life one. Don’t ever let Tony Stark make you think he doesn’t care about anyone.”
She wouldn’t elaborate any more, but when Steve mentioned it to Pepper the next time he saw her she had the same reaction as Peggy.
“Jarvis was Howard’s butler, he practically raised Tony,” she explained. “I think he used to work with Agent Carter back in the day. Kind of her sidekick, from what Tony’s told me.”
Steve couldn’t help but smile at that image— Peggy kicking ass in her heels and typical red lipstick while Jarvis fretted over injuries and drove the car. He wondered if they usually got tea together afterwards, and then mentally chastised himself for assuming that just because they were both English meant that they could only bond over tea. He’d still asked Peggy, though, because he couldn’t help it— she had laughed more brightly than Steve had seen in a while and told him that they did, in fact, go for tea quite often.
Steve didn’t see Peggy for a while after the whole Winter Soldier fiasco in DC. He did receive a call from one of the nurses from the nursing home where Peggy lived shortly after Natasha dumped all of S.H.I.E.L.D.’s files onto the Internet and it broke the news.
“Mrs. Carter saw the news, Mr. Rogers,” the nurse said. “She’s been so worried about you, and she insisted I call to say that she’s been thinking of you and that she wants to see you the moment you’re available to.”
Steve had been touched and told the nurse to tell Peggy as much.
“This is the longest she’s gone without having a lapse of memory,” the nurse informed him softly. “She’s never been this lively, either. I mean, she’s never been the type to just wither away in her bed, but this is… well, it makes me want to have seen her when she was twenty and still kicking ass.”
Steve chuckled. “She was really something. Still is.”
The nurse hummed in agreement. “Captain Rogers, sir… this might be out of line but I just wanted to say everyone at the home stands with you. We all know who you are, and we all trust you. Just,” she coughed, “so you know.”
Steve swallowed loudly and readjusted his grip on the phone. “Thank you, that-”
“And also Sergeant Barnes,” she said hurriedly, cutting him off. “Peggy talked about him a lot. We heard the kind of man he was, too. We stand with both of you.”
Steve could feel his throat getting tighter, and his eyes welled up. “Thank you,” he told her wetly. “Thank you. It means a lot to me. More than you know.”
The nurse was quiet for a moment before saying that she probably should get back to Peggy.
“Yeah, right, and please tell her I’ll see her soon. Thank you so much, ma’am.” He hung up and turned to see Sam facing him with a curious look on his face.
“That was a nurse from Peggy’s home,” he explained. “Just wanted to tell me that Peggy’s all fired up about the whole situation. It makes sense, since she founded S.H.I.E.L.D. and all. It’s gotta be a really horrible thing to her.”
“That all she say?” Sam said casually, flipping through some takeout menus.
Steve cleared his throat. Obviously Sam had picked up on his slightly teary expression. “Just wanted to say that she stood with us. Me and Bucky. All of the nurses do, I guess.”
Sam looked up from where he was scanning through a list of different curries and reassessed his expression.
“Yeah?” he said, offering a small smile. “You got Peggy Carter and all her nurses on your side, man. The other guys don’t stand a chance.”
Steve laughed brokenly and Sam crossed the room to clasp his shoulder. “You wanna see her before we head off to find your guy?”
“Yeah,” Steve replied. “Just to see her. Then we’ll leave.”
Sam nodded kindly and headed back to the kitchen to continue perusing the menus, and Steve let out a shaky breath. If all else failed, surely the wrath of Peggy Carter would be enough to bring Bucky home.
-
When Steve arrived in Peggy’s room, she was sitting at the chair in front of the window and frowning at the garden outside like it had personally offended her.
“Hey, Pegs,” Steve greeted quietly from the doorway.
“Steve?” she had, her expression hardening even more. “What the bloody hell are you still doing here?”
“What?” he said, confused by her less-than-friendly reaction.
“Is Barnes home?”
“What? No. He hasn’t been seen since the fight on the helicarrier-”
“Then why are you here? Weren’t you going to go after him? That was two weeks ago, Steven. He could be anywhere by now! He could be in all kinds of trouble, you two had a knack for that-”
“Peggy!” Steve interrupted. “I’m going after him right after I visit you, I’m not going to let him just wander around the globe, I want to bring him home too-”
“Then why aren’t you there! What a terrible time to just pop in to chat, you need all the time you can get, and frankly-”
“The nurse said you wanted to see me the moment I could come over, and I had a moment before I left, so-”
Peggy groaned and Steve immediately stopped talking, rushing toward her and extended his arms before realizing she wasn’t in pain, just aggravated.
“Do you remember when you were a USO showgirl wearing tights, only minimal basic combat training, a body that you weren’t used to since you’d only had it for a few months, yet the moment you heard Barnes had been captured you were going to walk all the way to the camp to rescue him with just your stupid little shield? Do you remember how desperately you needed him to be safe, and to be back with you? I do. I remember.”
“Peggy,” Steve said gently, “this is different. We needed to try and track him down, come up with a game plan. I don’t—I don’t know if he’s going to remember me, or how he’s going to react, or what he’s doing out there. I wanted to leave the minute I got out of the hospital but Sam- you remember Sam, and he was probably on the news- stopped me and reminded me that things were different. Bucky’s different. I don’t want to do the wrong thing and scare him off forever, Pegs. I can’t be reckless like that again. I want him home as fast as possible, and in this instance it means taking my time.”
Peggy sighed but seemed to accept it and reached out a hand. Steve stepped closer and took it, giving a gentle squeeze.
“He’ll remember you, Steve,” Peggy said quietly. “Barnes and I grew quite close during the war. We both fretted over you rather a lot. He’ll remember you. Soon enough.”
Steve turned away, squeezing his eyes shut against the tears. He’d forgotten how friendly Bucky and Peggy had eventually become, how they’d gang up on him and tease him. Peggy had made it her mission to collect all the photos of Steve during his USO days that she could find and laugh over them with Bucky. Once, Peggy had casually mentioned the grenade incident during Basic and consequently had to talk Bucky down from ripping Steve’s head off.
“A grenade, Rogers?” Bucky had shouted, turning cherry red. “Were you even big enough to absorb the impact? Jesus, pal, one day you’re gonna do something so dumb I’m not gonna be able to rescue your ass, and the papers will have to lie about how you died because the real way you got offed will be so dumb that they won’t want to tell the American people-”
Peggy laughed, throwing back her head and full-on giggling and Steve slumped lower and lower in his seat.
“Peggy ran toward it, too,” he muttered grumpily, and Bucky whipped around to face her. No longer laughing, Peggy shrugged and looked meekly down at her laugh, fighting a smile.
“Christ Almighty, does anyone here have a shred of self-preservation?”
When he finally collected himself he turned back to Peggy with a smile. “I’ll bring him to see you soon. I promise.”
Peggy beckoned for him to lean closer and pecked him on the cheek. “Go get him, Captain.”
-
Finding Bucky wasn’t nearly as hard as Steve thought it would be, but that was mostly because Bucky wasn’t in some obscure Asian village or hiding in the crowds of a large European city. He hadn’t even left DC— Nat called him one night during the first month of their search with news.
“Hey, Rogers,” she said in her usual carefree tone that masked her real emotions very well. “Got a delivery at your apartment. Might want to come home and see it.”
“What?” he said, not understanding at all. In his defense, it was three o’clock in the morning and he had been sleeping. Who could blame him for being a little slow on the uptake?
Natasha sighed and elaborated, “Barnes is here. He got into your apartment, went through your contacts list, called me, and now I’m here with him. Hi, Barnes.”
Steve immediately got out of bed, pulling on a pair of pants over his boxers and flitting nervously around the room, not entirely sure of what to do with that information.
“How is he? Is he alright? Is he hurt? I have some cans of minestrone in the cabinet over the toaster if he’s hungry, no wait, he hates minestrone don’t give him that, maybe just some tomato soup?”
“Steve,” Natasha cut him off amusedly. “Want to just talk to him? He’s literally right here.”
“Yeah,” Steve said breathlessly. “Does he want to talk to me? Yeah, of course I will-”
“If you keep talking a mile of minute you’re gonna lose all your hot air,” a familiar drawl came. “And I don’t like tomato soup, either.”
“Bucky,” Steve said, and when he tried to say more he found nothing could come out other than that name.
“Steve,” Bucky replied, but far more sarcastically. “Kind of a shitty welcome home committee, pal. You wanna get your ass home so you can greet me in person?”
Sam wasn’t even all that pissed when Steve made him board a flight from Glasgow to DC at five in the morning.
-
Bucky wasn’t like how Steve had expected.
He wasn’t his usual chipper self like that late night phone call had led Steve to believe, but he wasn’t totally silent and unresponsive either. He was quieter than he ever had been, more jumpy than he had been during the war, and sometimes flinched away when Steve touched him from behind or spoke too loudly without any warning. He was faking it sometimes. Steve could tell by the way the accent was too thick, the smile too big, the jokes more self-deprecating than usual. At night, he could hear Bucky crying and had to help him down from a panic attack more than once. Bucky wasn’t embarrassed, because it was nothing that wasn’t happening to Steve too. They were a wreck, basically, but they’d always sort of been a wreck and at least they were together again.
One morning Bucky was making breakfast and Steve came out warily from his room, sniffing the air cautiously. It smelled cinnamony, which reassured Steve that Bucky wasn’t experimenting in the kitchen again and the food would be safe to eat.
“Morning, Buck,” he greeted, peering over the brunette’s shoulder to see what it was (just in case). To his relief, it was French toast- just French toast, too, no added spices or food items.
“Hey,” he replied. “Is there any orange juice left? Barton might have drank the last of it when he came over yesterday and put it back in the fridge empty.”
Steve sighed. “He still does that?”
“Mmhmm,” Bucky replied, sounding like a disappointed mother.
Steve padded over to the fridge to investigate and found that while the jug wasn’t entirely empty, there was about a millimeter of juice left. Laughing, Steve approached Bucky from the side so that he knew Steve was coming and placed the container on the counter beside the griddle. Bucky’s eyes flicked over to it and he groaned upon seeing the tiny amount of liquid left.
“What a dick! He owes us, like, five cartons by now,” Bucky said. Steve grinned and placed a consoling hand on his shoulder.
“We’ll just tell Nat. I’m sure she can do something about it.”
This seemed to appease Bucky and they shared a wicked grin before Bucky nudged Steve with his hip and pointed at the cabinet with the plates. “Set the table, would you? And don’t do any origami shit with the napkins, either. The food got cold before you were done folding the last time you did that.”
Steve blushed and collected the plates and forks before giving Bucky a dirty look. “That was once, and it happened like a month ago. Give me a break.”
Bucky just smirked at him in response and flipped a piece of French toast his way. Steve expertly caught it on his plate and winked. It was Bucky’s turn to blush and he piled the rest of breakfast onto a plate and brought it to the table along with a bottle of syrup.
“What’s your plan for today?” he asked, spearing several pieces of toast with his fork and dumping it on his plate.
“I was gonna visit Peggy,” Steve informed him. “It’s been a while since I last saw her.”
Bucky nodded politely at this, eyes flickering away as he focused on buttering his French toast.
Steve did the same, waiting a moment before adding in a casual tone, “You wanna come with?”
Bucky’s eyes flickered back up, and he raised his eyebrows. “Yeah?” he said.
“Yeah,” Steve replied. “You wanna?”
“Um,” he hesitated, looking conflicted. Steve was getting ready to tell him it was fine if he didn’t, and he could tag along some other time, when Bucky nodded. “Sure. If she wants me there.”
“She does,” Steve assured him. “She’ll be over the moon.”
-
“Well, well, well,” Peggy drawled, raking her eyes up and down Bucky’s body. “If it isn’t James Barnes, looking fit and fresh as ever. Do you two just keep getting handsomer with age?”
Bucky absorbed that reaction in for a moment before adopting a mirroring grin and making his way over to Peggy’s bed.
“You have,” he commented, kissing her gently on the cheek. “It’s good to see you, Peggy.”
The deviant smile on her lips was replaced by a softer, more genuine one. “The same to you, Barnes.”
Steve watched them interact for a while from the doorway before he heard a nurse approach from behind. He turned to see her and quickly stepped away from the door in order to make enough room for the nurse to enter. She shook her head at Steve, instead just stopping next to him and watching the two catch up like Steve had just been doing.
“I’m so glad she got to see you both before… you know,” the nurse said tearfully, and Steve recognized her voice as the woman on the phone from a few months previous. “She talked about the war a lot, and especially about you two. She never got to say goodbye, she always said. I’m so grateful that now she can.”
It was a harsh reminder that Peggy’s days were numbered, and Steve swallowed around the lump in his throat.
“I’m glad to see both of them, too,” he whispered, and out of the corner of his eye he saw the nurse’s expression become sorrowful before she turned and left them.
“Steve?” Peggy called from her bed. He turned and looked at her, waiting for her request. “Will you get Samantha? I want to get out of this old bed and see the world with my two boys again.”
Bucky licked his lips nervously and turned to Steve. Steve knew that the brunette was worried about being surrounded by so many people— he hadn’t had an incident any of the other times he and Steve had ventured out of the apartment, nor when he was hiding in DC, but it still made him anxious.
“Buck?” he said quietly, trying to assess his best friend’s willingness.
“Yeah,” he replied, clearing his throat. “Yeah, let’s do it.”
Steve nodded and left the room to try and find Nurse Samantha. As he was leaving, he heard the two others murmuring to each other again, and his heart warmed at the thought of his best girl and favorite guy being back with him. It was more than he deserved.
-
When they got back from the park and returned Peggy to the nursing home, Bucky excused himself to go shower and Steve tried not to have a panic attack.
They’d been having a lovely time, really—Bucky and Peggy had a lot to catch up on (mostly Peggy spoke. Bucky didn’t have many stories of his own he wanted to tell) and Steve was more than content to half-heartedly listen and keep an eye out for cameras. The last thing either of them needed was a camera shoved in their faces. Eventually Peggy was tired of talking and settled back to watch the various people walk by their bench, the three of them reminiscing and commenting on the drastic changes from the forties.
Steve and Bucky both covered one of her hands fondly and Steve was opening his mouth to say something when a couple walked by, hand-in-hand, smiling at each other, and both female. Steve froze, remembering that there were some drastic changes from their childhood that Bucky wasn’t yet aware of, and he was terrified to see his reaction. Terrified to see Peggy’s, too. He risked a glance at Bucky and Peggy only to find the two with their heads bowed together in conversation. Neither seemed to notice the couple walking by, and Steve didn’t know if he was relieved or disappointed. Either way, he resolved to inform Bucky of this new acceptance the moment he had a chance. He let himself relax again, tuning back into the conversation, when Bucky’s eyes flickered up and focused on a point beyond Steve’s shoulder. When his eyes widened slightly, Steve didn’t have to turn around to confirm what it was. The rest of the time in the park passed in the same way, and they promised to meet up again soon.
Steve heard the water shut off and immediately stood up straight, forcing himself to calm down.
Since waking up in 2011, Steve had done quite a bit of… personal research. He’d stumbled across the term bisexual, and suddenly Steve didn’t feel like such an anomaly. He didn’t feel like he was diseased, or that there was something wrong with his mind. There were other people out there who liked both genders— or, according to his research, more than one gender— just like he did. It relief like he had never experienced before. When he remembered the times he’d fantasized about this kid Johnny who lived two streets over, he felt less dirty. When he remembered that he thought Johnny’s sister was something else, too, he felt less confused. But he especially felt less guilty over his feelings for Bucky. He’d struggled with them since they were kids, and knowing that there were probably little boys out there who might look at their best friend’s lips a little too long, or girls who liked to hold hands more than platonically but couldn’t admit it either made him feel less like a terrible person. Like a predator.
He hadn’t come out to anyone. He didn’t know if it was because of fear of himself or others, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it. He trusted his friends, and he knew Sam and Nat would understand completely, but still. He thought that maybe before telling other people, he would need to find peace with himself first.
The bathroom door swung open and Bucky emerged along with a cloud of steam. Steve refused to look, hoping that Bucky wouldn’t mention it at all and Steve could put off the impending conversation for as long as he possibly could. Sam and Nat might understand, sure, but they’d had time to live with that acceptance. It was normal, for them.
It was Bucky he was afraid to tell most of all. Bucky, born and raised in Great Depression-era Brooklyn, had decidedly not been raised with such tolerance and could very easily hate Steve for who he was. It seemed out of character, sure, and Bucky had never used homophobic slurs even back in the day, but it was a possibility. A terrifying one.
It wasn’t long before Bucky was dressed and had joined Steve at the counter, newly cropped hair still soaking wet. Steve shifted a little nervously and asked Bucky if he wanted coffee or anything. Bucky raised an eyebrow and Steve blanched a little, knowing that offering to make Bucky refreshments in their shared apartment was definitely odd and a little suspicious.
“Nah, I’m fine. I actually wanted to talk to you about something.”
“Yeah?” Steve said, feigning nonchalance. He steeled himself, bowing his head to examine the countertop. If it was about the two ladies in a relationship, he was going to come out. He had to. He didn’t want to hide from Bucky. They didn’t have many secrets.
“At the park today,” he began, and Steve’s heart grew heavy, “there were these two dames. They, uh, they were together. Holding hands, acting all cutesy, the usual couple stuff. They must’ve been together.” He paused, eyes scanning Steve’s face for a reaction, but Steve didn’t lift his head to give him one. “Is that… allowed, now?”
Steve swallowed and ignored the churning in his gut. “Yeah,” he finally responded. “Yeah, there are laws and stuff that let same-sex couples get married and everything. There are still groups of people who hate them and attack them, but. It’s pretty widely accepted, at least in the States.”
Bucky nodded, absorbing this information. “Oh,” he said in the same falsely casual tone that Steve used. “That’s… good.”
Steve finally looked up, hope swelling in his chest. “Yeah,” he echoed. “It is good.”
The two men stood there watching each other, both of them clearing wrestling with themselves over something.
Steve licked his lips and fiddled with a placemat, summoning his courage and looking back up.
“Listen, Buck—”
“Steve—”
They both froze, waiting for the other to continue. After nearly thirty seconds of waiting, Steve decided to go first.
“When I first got out of the ice,” he began, “I had to do research to sort of catch up on all the cultural changes. A lotta history can happen in seventy years.” Bucky nodded, encouraging him to continue. “One day, maybe a week or so from the Battle of New York, I noticed these two guys walking on the street, hand-in-hand and smiling and laughing and kissing, and I felt terrified. I felt terrified for them, and I was so afraid that someone else would see them and they’d get the shit kicked out of them for daring to be so open about having that kind of relationship. That’s what would have happened before, at least. I wanted to run over there and hide them and tell them to stop. I knew what was coming.
Except it never came. No one confronted them, no one approached them or threatened them or spit at them or called the police. They just kept kissing and kept laughing and they were safe for as long as I could see them. I didn’t understand, so I asked JARVIS and Bruce and a couple of the more kindly, accepting people I knew. And that’s how I found out that nowadays, that’s alright. And I felt relieved.” He broke off, still not looking at Bucky. “And then I came home and did a little more research. I found a few terms that I had never heard before. You wouldn’t believe it, Buck. It’s like an entire new world. People can be who they want and tell who they want and it’s not a big deal. It’s… it’s amazing, Buck. And one term I came across was, uh, was bisexual. It means you’re attracted, you know, to guys and gals. And people outside the gender binary, but we can talk about that later. And so, I guess I just wanted to tell you that’s me. Bisexual. I like men, Bucky. And dames, of course, ’cause of Peggy and I, but… yeah. I didn’t want to keep that a secret from you.”
“Steve,” Bucky said softly. “Look at me.”
He didn’t want to. God, he just wanted to stare at the granite and pretend that he hadn’t just come out to his best friend who had really been left in 1944 just like he had been. He didn’t want to know if Bucky was going to be awkward and grow distant, or punch him in the face, or just carry on like he’d rather forget the whole conversation. So he didn’t look up, just accepted that he was a coward and continued tracing the outline on one of their placemats.
“Steve,” Bucky repeated, moving quietly around the counter until he was just inches away. “Please look at me.” Sucking in a large breath, he finally did.
“All my life I’ve been terrified too,” Bucky whispered. “Please don’t be afraid of me. Even if I— just know that no matter what I would accept you, Steve. All my life I’ve been terrified too.”
It was the easiest thing in the world to slot their mouths together, and when Bucky’s cool metal hand curled its fingers into his hair and held on, Steve felt the last of his fear melt away. Steve thought about how long and how desperately he’d wanted this, and how surreal it was that he was actually allowed to have it. He wanted to cry and laugh and shake from relief, but mostly he just wanted to hold Bucky in his arms and kiss and kiss and kiss.
Bucky backed him against a counter and hitched a leg around Steve’s waist, and for several hours after that, they celebrated the acceptance of the twenty-first century.
-
“Are we going to tell Peggy?” Bucky asked nearly a week later. They were laying tangled together in bed, making a list of people who they wanted to tell about their relationship.
Steve didn’t say anything for a long time, just ran his fingers through his boyfriend’s hair and considered it. He had taken a risk with Bucky, which had paid off ridiculously well, and decided that he definitely wanted to tell Peggy. Hell, he wanted the whole world to know that James Buchanan Barnes was finally his, after nearly a century of pining and separation and even a bit of brainwashing. He’d have to run that by Pepper, first.
“Let’s do it,” he decided. “Let’s tell her first.”
“Today?” Bucky suggested, and Steve stopped messing with Bucky’s hair in order to wrap his arms around the other man’s waist and pull him closer.
“Today,” he agreed.
-
Peggy had not been expecting to see them that day and was delighted when they arrived unexpectedly with a bouquet of flowers. The nurse had warned them that lately her memory had been getting more and more spotty, and she very often forgot whom she was speaking to during a conversation.
“Hey, Pegs,” Steve greeted, presenting her with the bundle of flowers. “How’re you feeling?”
“Like an old woman,” she sighed, reaching out to pat his hand. “To what do I owe the pleasure? Or are you just dropping by for no reason at all?”
“What, we can’t come visit you just ’cause we feel like it?” Bucky teased, coming closer to her bed and flopping down in an armchair.
“You can, but you aren’t,” Peggy observed. “Something’s different.”
“How do you know?” Steve asked and Peggy rolled her eyes.
“Because I know you, and also you brought me flowers.”
“Actually, we have something to tell you,” Bucky said, rubbing at his nose. It was a tell that he was nervous, and Steve knew that Peggy had picked up on it.
“Oh?” she said simply, waiting for them to continue.
Steve glanced at Bucky quickly before taking the initiative. “Peggy, Bucky and I are together. Like, together together. We, uh, we’re bisexual. Since last week. Well, we’ve always been bisexual I guess, but we’ve been together since last week—”
Peggy meanwhile, was shaking in her bed. Bucky got to his feet, approaching her with a panicked look.
“Peggy?” he said, touching her shoulders and fretting over her. “Peggy, are you alright?”
It wasn’t until a solid ten seconds later that they realized she was laughing.
“Christ Almighty I wish the boys were here to see this,” she chuckled, wiping away tears of mirth. “They would have cried of relief. We spent years watching you two pathetically pining away, not even being subtle, and now you finally decided to pull your heads out of your arses and get together. I bet your whole neighborhood would have cried, too. All of Brooklyn.” She continued to chuckle, and Steve and Bucky shared a baffled look.
“Not the reaction I expected,” Bucky muttered.
“Oh, I can just imagine you two being utterly conflicted about seeing me,” Peggy added, looking a little more solemn. “I understand that, boys. I really do.” She wiped her eyes again, offering them both a hand. “Now,” she said, looking cheerful again. “Have I ever told you about Angie?”