Work Text:
They’re crowded around Astrid’s kitchen table in her apartment, papers scattered across the table. Ambrosius has a laptop open. Toph is kicking her feet against the kitchen chair. Thump. Thump. Thump.
James smiles at her over the paper he’s looking at, and catches Ambrosius’ eye as he looks up. For a moment, they’re both smiling. James thinks they’re imagining how little quiet they’re about to have in their lives. How delightful a prospect that is.
“...citizenship documents,” Astrid is saying. Erin appears to be the only person paying full attention. Like usual, he’s taking notes, nodding along, wide-eyed. Beside him, Tess is making up for it by taking a nap, head buried in her arms. Her hair glints silver-white in the afternoon light.
James looks back down at the paper in his hands. A form. They’ll have to invent things. Play it safe. They’ll need work. Toph needs to go to school. Getting the documentation sorted out is part of that process. But still, the first empty line, box one, is putting a strange knot in his chest.
Name.
They’ve already talked it over. Ambrosius is taking Toph’s surname, Beifong. They’re trying to pass her off as his biological kid. Fewer questions that way. Less risk. They can choose to be whatever they would like, in this new world, and Ambrosius and Toph are claiming one another.
And that empty box. He knows what’s supposed to go there. James Buchanan Barnes.
He’s been starting to remember more of that man, the one who died on a winter afternoon so many, many years ago, and then died again and again and again for many years after. Not much. Nothing cohesive. His dreams, the most vivid piece of the past he has, are apparently reserved for the Winter Soldier. But sometimes a smell, a sound, a laugh will bring to mind a face. A moment. A hand in his, Steve’s face-- God, Steve. A hand traces a tree trunk and he’s somewhere in France, Jones cracking a joke over his shoulder. He can’t remember Jones’ face, but he smelled like cigarettes and told dirty jokes in French to make Bucky laugh.
It was easier in Erin’s world, somehow. Maybe the smell of the sea and the city did it.
James Buchanan Barnes.
He’s already left Bucky behind. It’s a good name, he thinks, but it’s not his anymore. It’s what Steve called him, and there’s no Steve in this world. He gave up a world where Steve could call him Bucky when he said he’d never go back. That he’d never have to.
James is his to keep. That’s certain at least. But he’s got a blank spot, and he’s not sure what’s supposed to go there.
Astrid is wrapping up her explanation. “-- sooner, rather than later. If you have questions--”
Erin has questions.
Tess sits up and stretches. There’s a metallic popping noise, like a cracking spine. James is not going to think about that. Toph leans over and whispers something into Ambrosius’ ear. He snorts gracelessly. James stifles a grin. He loves seeing them smile. They make all of this…easy. Easier than it has any right to be.
But when they shuffle out into the hall, Ambrosius is the one who spots the furrow between James’ eyebrows. He bumps their shoulders together, easy and familiar. “Whatcha thinking about?”
James shrugs.
“Stop being mysterious,” Toph says. “And brooding.” She stomps on his foot. James thinks he should get steel-toed boots. It probably wouldn’t help against Toph, though.
He laughs, a little ruefully. It’s a little frightening how well they seem to know him. Better than he knows himself. “I was just thinking about the paperwork,” he says.
“Tell me about it,” Tess says cheerfully, slinging an arm around his shoulder. “I’m making Erin do mine.”
“I offered,” Erin corrects.
Ambrosius is too clever to be distracted. “What about it?” he says. He’s a good listener. Too good. James realizes he’s chewing the inside of his cheek and makes himself stop.
“The name,” he says finally. He’s trying to say it lightly, but he’s no good at that. “You’re changing yours. I was wonderin’...I have one. It just…doesn’t really feel like mine.”
“Buchanan,” Toph says, elbowing him. She has unfortunately not forgotten.
“Barnes,” James corrects. “I…Sergeant Barnes was my name when I was…with Steve. During the war.” He can’t remember what he’s told them about that. If they even know that part. But like everything else, they’re taking it in stride. “I don’t know.”
Erin’s walking a pace in front of them, and he only turns his head when he says, "I mean, you could always be James Ruunaser if you wanted. That’s what Tess did."
“True!” Tess says.
James realizes he’s stopped walking. Or breathing. He starts again automatically. Ignores the look Ambrosius gives him.
Erin says it is as easy as breathing. As if he’s not even thinking about it. That can’t be true, but-
But.
"What do you want to do?" Ambrosius says. He doesn't look up from the vegetables he's chopping. Sometimes James resents how easily he asks that question. As if wanting was something as easy as anything.
"I mean, you could just take my name. Amby's done it already!" Toph is lounging in a chair, snatching up vegetable pieces when Ambrosius turns away. She doesn't seem to notice how James stops breathing, but Ambrosius does. He always does. Their eyes meet over the back of the couch, and James turns away first, not sure why he’s so suddenly embarrassed. Toph’s apparently oblivious to the bashful silence. “I mean,” she says. “Ruunaser is a dumb name anyway.”
“It’s Tess’s name too,” James reminds her.
Toph wrinkles her nose. “Well. Not as dumb as Goldenloin.”
“Yeah, giving that up was a real sacrifice,” Ambrosius says dryly. He seems just as excited to linger at the change of subject as James is. “Darling, you can do whatever you want.”
James bites his cheek. Stops. “I should talk to Tess,” he says finally.
“Oh!” Toph says, “If you decide to be a Ruunaser, does that mean Tess is your sister? Does that make her my aunt? James. James. You gotta do it. I need a cool aunt.”
“I think she’d be happy to be your cool aunt no matter what,” James tells her. He wanders over and snatches a slice of pepper from the cutting board over her shoulder. Ambrosius swats at his hand a moment too late and misses. “But I’ll talk to her and see.”
James stumbles into Tess early in the morning, coming back from a run. Ambrosius comes with him most mornings. But today, when the alarm went off, he’d rolled over with an air of sleepy luxury and muttered “five more minutes,” and James couldn’t bring himself to prod him awake.
So he’s been by himself, enjoying the predawn cold, the relief of movement and effort. He’s outside the lobby doorsteps, stretching and sweaty when Tess jogs up. She’s got what looks suspiciously like a donut box in one hand and a drink carrier with coffees in the other.
“Hey,” she says, slowing to a stop. She offers him the coffee. He takes one gratefully. The warmth is comforting.
“Thanks.” James eyes the box of donuts. “Breakfast?”
Tess grins. Her smile is as blinding as the rest of her, even in the gray light. “Yep. Astrid asked me to pick them up. She’s taking some of the others through the paperwork later.”
“Ah,” James says. “I hope it’s not Chip. Or Mark. She needs at least one quiet day.”
Tess makes a face, half humor, half sympathy. “I think it’s both.”
“Damn.” He sets the coffee on the step so he can put his hair up with the red scrunchie that lives on his wrist. “Uh, actually.” He says. “If you’ve got a minute. I want to ask you something.”
“Sure,” Tess says, easy as anything. She sets the coffee and donuts on the step and sits down herself. James joins her. Sips his coffee. It’s scalding. The burn of it against his throat is steadying. Tess flips open the lid of the paper box. “Donut?”
James takes a donut. “It’s about— it’s Erin. And the paperwork. And— well.” He stops, laughs a little helplessly. “The name.”
Tess raises an eyebrow. His discomfort seems to amuse her more than anything.
“I guess I’m just trying to understand,” James says, after another bracing sip of coffee. “Ambrosius is going to take Toph’s name because he’s going to be her father. Legally speaking, at least. I kind of doubt she’ll let us do much parenting. And I’m honestly not sure we’re entirely qualified for that.”
Tess laughs.
“When Erin says you’re a Ruunaser—“ James runs a hand over his face, trying to clear his head. “I mean. You’re his sister. I— I guess I don’t want to take it for granted. I want to— to take what he’s actually offering.”
Tess selects a donut from the box. The first rays of real morning sun are seeping through the buildings, turning windows to gold and laying out patches of warm light along the sidewalks. “You gotta actually say it, man.”
James sets his jaw. “Is he asking me to be his— your— family? Or was he just saying it because I have a problem he’s trying to solve?”
“Erin's always trying to solve a problem.” Tess bites into her donut. She talks with her mouth full. “He wouldn't be trying to solve your problems if it didn't mean something. It's how he shows he cares. Taking everything you're burdened with and trying to take it on himself.”
James stares down the street. The city is slowly coming to life around them. More joggers. A few delivery trucks rumble by. People walking their dogs. He’s thinking about Erin, quiet and apparently unshaken, saying, the offer is open, if you’re interested.
“Yeah, it's stupid,” Tess says, as if she's read his mind. “But if he's decided he wants to dedicate that brilliant mind to whatever's troubling you? It means he'll never stop caring about you.”
The words settle in. James remembers how Erin had decided to take care of him, long before James realized what he was doing. That first terrible spike of confusion and fear when he’d started to understand. The moment he’d caught Erin as he crumpled to the ground, lifted him into his arms (almost weightless, pain ripping across his face, even as he’d protested) and thought: Oh. He's a kid.
He smiles tightly down at his coffee cup. “I might be overthinking this.”
Tess pats him on the shoulder. “I've seen overthinking. I think you just aren't trusting yourself. You already know what you want, don't you?”
“I do.” He admits. The words are strangled in his throat. Wanting. He’s too out of practice. The enormity of it never stops frightening him. “You are both. Ah. I—” he can’t make himself finish that sentence. “I’d like to be your family. If you’ll have me. If that’s what Erin’s… if that’s what he wants?”
“Erin might be way too quick to make a plan, but he'd never say it out loud if he didn't think it would work. He's too proud for that.”
Tess pauses for a moment, then clarifies. “He wouldn't have offered it if he didn't want it. I mean, hey, you've seen how he brushes off actual sentiment. He probably wants it more than he's letting show.” James looks up and catches her eyeing him with amusement. “You make quite the pair.”
“Don’t say that,” James protests, but it’s true. He suddenly feels heavy. “But—Thank you.”
“You’re welcome,” Tess says brightly. “Another donut?”
James shakes his head. He suspects that when he walks into their little apartment in a few moments, he’ll find Ambrosius making pancakes and Toph setting the table. Erin will probably be there too, drinking coffee in the patchy armchair by the window.
Tess takes another donut. “You seem like the kind of person who hasn’t settled in a while. You know a name doesn't need to be an anchor, right?”
“I know,” James said. “But. I think I might want one. I- I didn’t have a name. For a long time.” He sees, out of the corner of his eye, the way Tess’s face grows sharp as she looks at him. There’s so much he hasn’t told her. Hasn’t told any of them. He forgets that. All they know of him is this small, lovely fragment. He thinks he might be okay with that. “And the name I had, once. I don’t know. It doesn’t belong to me.”
The Barnes name doesn’t tie him to the worst of his past. But there’s a weightlessness in letting it go. In admitting that, as much as they shape him, none of those memories actually happened to him. That Bucky Barnes is still out there somewhere, and James isn’t him. He can be something else. He can tie himself down here, to these people he’s known, in a very technical sense, as long as he’s been alive.
Tess laces her fingers around her knees, considering. “Erin gave me the name, too,” she says. “And I'll always be Erin's sister, no matter how far either of us travels, no matter what time and space separates us. It’s not a tether. He’s not asking you to be anything you don’t want to be. But if you want to claim it for yourself, you can decide what it means. I didn't choose to meet Erin. But I chose to make him my family. You know? And I use the name for him.” She shrugs. “And to spite his father. That was motivating.”
James thinks about looking up in a room with three strangers.
“Okay,” he says. Stands up, crumples his empty coffee cup. “And you- are you okay with sharing it? With-- with me?”
He thinks he knows the answer to that question. He probably doesn’t need to ask. Maybe he just wants to hear her say it.
Tess laughs like she knows what he’s thinking, and leaps to her feet. She retrieves her donut box and her coffee, and as they walk up the steps, she bumps her metal shoulder against his. It makes a ringing noise, bright in the morning air. “You're the reason why Erin and I get to keep being a family. I'd be happy to have you be a part of it."
James feels the burst of light in his chest. His own personal sunrise.
They make their way up the stairs, six flights up. James suddenly remembers something and chuckles to himself. “Toph wants you to be her cool aunt, by the way.”
“Aww,” Tess beams. The metallic hum of her voice echoes up the stairwell. “I’d love to be her cool aunt.”
“It’s an honor,” James agrees, shouldering his way through the door to the hall. “She’s a cool kid. We’re trying to find a school that won’t make her wear shoes. It’s the best compromise we could manage.”
“Relatable,” Tess says. They’re outside Astrid’s door now. “So does that mean you and Ambrosius are…?”
He’s saved from answering that question when Mirabelle answers the door. “Thanks,” she says, taking the donuts and coffee. “You want to come in?”
“Nah,” Tess says. “We’re fine. You need anything else?”
Mirabelle glances over her shoulder. Inside, there’s the sound of running water. A kettle boils. “I think we’re okay for now? But thanks a lot.”
“For sure,” Tess says. They leave Astrid’s door behind and return to the stairs. James, Ambrosius, and Toph are on the floor above. “So…” she says, clearly pleased to have found a subject that can get safely under James’s skin. “You and Ambrosius? Dads?”
James flushes. “Ah. Uh. I don’t know. What we are. It’s. I mean.” Tess is grinning at him. He resists the urge to kick the stairwell door open and instead pushes through just a little bit faster than he should. “Uh.”
“Lucky guy,” Tess says.
James glares at her, but there’s no heat. He’s thinking of a little sister, somewhere, lost in the corridors of his memory. They’re almost to his door. And the smell of pancakes is drifting down the hall.
Astrid doesn’t have time to help review their documents until next week. So it’s ten days later when they find their small crowd-- their family-- gathered around her door.
James has the paperwork filled out except for that one box. He has a pen in his pocket. Mirabelle opens the door and offers them coffee and tea, while Astrid hugs them and takes their jackets. They leave a small pile of shoes by the door.
Ambrosius is already talking to Astrid about the schools they’ve been visiting as they crowd around the table. He’s decided, after a few late nights of research, that Toph would benefit from a Montessori school, and they’ve got to figure out the funding.
James feels nervous. It’s silly. He’s known fear, the kind that burns out everything else. The slight, dark-haired kid across the table shouldn’t be making him anxious. Ambrosius puts a hand on his knee and smiles at him.
Cups of tea are distributed. Toph is already fidgeting. Astrid is talking about how the paperwork will be filed. “It’s all done, I hope?” she says brightly, looking around the table. “Does anyone have questions?” She’s already collecting documents, shuffling through papers. Ambrosius Beifong. Toph Beifong. Erin Ruunaser. Tess Ruunaser. Forged dates of birth, though Ambrosius’ calendar lines up enough to keep his own. James can’t remember his, but he’s picked out something between Toph and Ambrosius, early summer. Forged birthplaces, words, numbers, and dates, and endless little fabrications that knit them into this world.
Astrid reaches for his paper, but James says, “I just- I’m almost done.” He tugs the pen out of his pocket. Looks at Erin across the table. Their eyes meet.
“I’ve been thinking about it,” James says. Tess is smiling at him. He takes a breath. He doesn’t know why he’s scared of this, but he is, and he thinks, as he meets his eyes, that maybe Erin might be a little scared too. Somehow, that’s the encouragement he needed. “I’d like to use the Ruunaser name, if you’ll let me.”
Erin has his hands folded on the table in front of him, but James can’t miss the way his fingers grip one another. It occurs to James that Tess is right. He wouldn’t have made the offer if he didn’t want it, even more than he was willing to admit.
“Of course I will,” Erin says. “But…it’s only a name.”
James goes to open his mouth, almost hurt, but Erin plows on.
“I mean,” he says, “that back at home, it meant something. You know? That’s why I wanted Tess to have it. My Father was powerful. I was powerful. The Ruunaser name- well, it opened doors. Here it doesn’t do anything.”
“Yes it does,” James says, almost without thinking. “It’s your name. You’re sharing it. That’s something to me.”
Erin blinks. And then he smiles. “If you’re sure?”
“You offered me your home, once. Your family.” That memory is seared into him. “And I didn’t get to say yes. But, if you’ll let me— I would like to— to say yes now. If it’s not too late.”
Erin offers a hand across the table. James shakes it. It’s a contract, of sorts. There’s something strangely formal about it. Not an adoption, no courthouse. The paperwork is even forged. But there’s weight there, in the words. The pen in James’s hand.
James hesitates over the empty space only a second longer. Then scratches out the name in black ink in box one: name.
James Buchanan Ruunaser.
He’ll keep the dumb middle name. Toph won’t let him lose it anyway. She wants all the ammunition she can get, and if his parents, somewhere in his past, forgotten in the maze of his broken memory, saw fit to name him that, well, he’s gonna have to respect it.
But he’ll give himself this. A new christening.
He looks up from the paper and passes it off to Astrid for her inspection. Meets Erin’s eyes. Bites back a smile that’s creeping out anyway. “Thanks,” he says. It’s not enough, but it’s a start. And he’ll have time to figure out how to say the rest later.