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Wonka's Sweets Shoppe | Sunday

It was a regular day at Wonka's.

Because a regular day at Wonka's involved there being a small fort made of various kinds of gummies on one of the display tables. Bucky'd been by the store late last night and it hadn't been there. By this morning, it had just sort of appeared. He wasn't entirely sure, but he felt like some of the strategically placed gummy bears outside it were guarding the thing.

The HELP WANTED continued to hang in the window of the store, and Bucky was behind the counter, wondering whether he'd already been here too long when that whole gummy business seemed to make almost perfect sense to him.

(open!)

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Steve had ~~run himself into exhaustion~~ taken a long run around the island, learning the lay of the land (and keeping a wary eye out for more talking ponies). He took a wrong turn trying to find the coffee shop and poked his head into Wonka's to ask for directions...and stopped, poleaxed.

"...Bucky?"

Bucky'd straightened up as soon as he heard the door open, ready to put on his best customer service smile, thankful for the distraction from steadfastly ignoring the gummies.

However, his smile faltered a little because that was a confusing greeting.

"... Yes?"

Waaait a minute.

Steve had run out of words. Bursting into tears in a candy store was something he hadn't done since he was about eight and he wasn't looking to break that streak, so talking right now was not going to happen.

There was a lot of staring going on instead. God, he'd missed this guy.

Well wasn't this the weirdest damned moment to be having? And that was saying something, after the gummy bears. Here was this guy who was obviously an expert at some kind of manual labor because you didn't get to be built like that if you weren't, and he was staring at Bucky – and speaking of Bucky he was confused as hell.

Because see the thing was, he hadn't seen this guy before in his life, but he'd seen that face before. It'd been significantly closer to the ground when he had, but he had.

"S––"

That was insane, he couldn't say that, that made no sense. Couldn't say that.

But, the face. "Steve?"

Steve rubbed his hand over his jaw and nodded. "Hey, Buck," he managed. "How'd you get here?"

"Took a bus." He wasn't one for very complicated answers in general. Also: "Thought you'd know that."

Wasn't even that long since he'd left again after Christmas. Of course, that wasn't the only thing that was different from what it should've been. Bucky slipped out from behind the counter.

"How'd you get tall?"

"I joined the Army," Steve said a little defensively. "It's not that important. It is...it's really good to see you."

"You joined the Army? When did that happen?"

He was resisting the urge to poke you in the chest right now, Steve. Appreciate that. (Seriously though, this... This made no sense.)

"Couple years ago," Steve said. "What year is it for you?"

"Just made it into the nineteen forties," Bucky replied, head slightly tilted. Weird. So weird. "Don't tell me that's relevant, Steve."

"Well, a bit," Steve said. "Germany and Japan aren't blowin' smoke, as it turns out."

"And how the hell do you know this?"

That wasn't really what he was asking. That wasn't the meat of it.

Steve's cheeks went pink. "I've seen some stuff?"

There was no point in him trying to lie to Bucky. There never had been.

Bucky's eyebrows climbed way up.

"What the hell, Steve?"

"I'm from 1945!" Steve blurted.

Of course he did.

"... Uh, I don't know if I quite caught you, pal."

No, he'd caught it just fine, but it was still processing.

Edited 2016-01-10 23:03 (UTC)

"Think this is a timeline thing like Stark was telling me about," Steve said. "I'm Steve, but not your Steve."

And then he blushed to his ears because that sounded, well...that sounded a little odd.

Honestly, Bucky was far more focused on the general weirdness of this, rather than a detail like phrasing.

"That's... something else, pal," he said, scratching the back of his head. "And, Jesus, I've been here too long 'cause all things considered, that sounds like it almost makes sense."

"Yeah?" Steve said, taking a few steps closer. "Because I gotta say that the talking pink pony threw me for a loop."

Bucky huffed out a sound that was sort of like a wry chuckle , if you listened closely enough.

"She worked for me."

Steve stared at him.

"But she doesn't have hands."

"Yeah," Bucky admitted, glancing down and raising his eyebrows, "I try not to think too hard about that."

He looked up. "But this is pretty weird too."

"Hey now," Steve said, fighting back a smile. "I'm not pink pony weird, jerk."

"No, you're all... tall and strong kinda weird," Bucky retorted. "Punk."

Steve's chin wobbled. He'd missed this. "I was always kinda weird," he said.

"You got that right."

He reached out. Squeezed Steve's shoulder.

It felt exactly nothing like it had before.

Sorry, Buck. You were getting a completely clingy back-pounding hug right now.

Steve'd had a very long last few weeks.

Bucky wasn't that surprised. Not after the wobbly chin, no. He huffed out some small noise of surprise anyway, though that was mostly because he was more used to this from someone smaller. Also, less clingy.

He went with it. It was damned good to see him, after all, weird as it was.

Although the clinginess made him wonder. "You okay there, Steve?"

Not really, no. "'m fine," Steve said into Bucky's shirt.

He was being hit by a wave of homesickness so extreme it was almost buckling his knees. He'd never get to do this with his Bucky ever again, and that was too much to bear right this second.

Bucky wasn't buying that 'fine' for a second, obviously. He was actually vaguely unsettled by that.

He patted Steve's back.

"Yeah," he said quietly. "Okay, big guy."

"The pony talks, Buck. And she's got a cannon."

It wasn't the worst by a long shot, but had definitely been a tipping point for Steve. "Don't think I love this century."

Bucky chuckled. "Hey now, it's got its charms," he said. "Talking ponies not withstanding. They don't boil everything anymore, Steve. And the girls are just as pretty."

Steve let out a slightly sniffly-sounding laugh. "Of course you've noticed the girls."

"Fashions in this century are very nice, too."

So. Yes.

That, not surprisingly, helped Steve regain his equilibrium. Laughing at Bucky always did.

"The pony's hardly wearing anything," he teased.

"I am not looking at the pony, Steve," Bucky objected.

If a little relieved, because the sniffling kind of broke his heart, even though he had no clue what it was for. Or, because he had no clue.

"I've had two different people tell me what a wonderful new century this is," Steve said, giving Bucky a little smirk. "You can look at the pony and I won't even judge you. Much."

Bucky rolled his eyes.

"Punk."

"Jerk," Steve replied with a big smile. "And even if she has a friend, I don't want to double."

"Hey, with the way you look now," Bucky retorted, "I'm not sure I'd invite you along anyway."

He'd be a giant distraction.

Steve looked abashed, reaching up to swipe at his bangs in a nervous habit. "It's that bad?"

There was a beat while Bucky processed.

Then he huffed out a laugh and patted Steve on the shoulder.

"Jeez, Steve would you look at yourself in the mirror sometimes? I'm worried the girls won't look at me at all."

Steve laughed. "Trust me, pal, that is never going to be a problem for you."

Well, other than with Peggy, but details.

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Wonka's Sweets Shoppe | Sunday

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