100 Marvel One Shots✔️

Wednesday >> Punk!Bucky Barnes X Reader

Yep. He's probably drunk.

"I'd have thought you'd have figured out by now," she titters, "I'm a dancer. Bachelor's degree."

Bucky takes a swig of his drink, processing. It explained the leotard. Just not the fact that she was always running late. "Dancer?" He muses, but the words probably come out less than elegant. "Like West Side Story?"

Nat chuckles. "Yeah, buddy, like West Side Story." From her grungy wallet, she whips out cash to pay for _______'s drink, and a tip for the bartender whose brow sweat Bucky can relate to on almost a spiritual level. "Alright. While you two keep chatting up, I have a booty call to attend to." She winks at him, and ascends from the barstool like she's an otherworldly being and not the 5"3 crimson horror.

But all the wit has left him for the night, and as ________ claims Nat's stool, all he can think about is the assignment that needs to happen as soon as possible, and that he used to be able to sing the alphabet backwards as a kid.

"So, you know Steve?" he stammers. He sounds like a fourteen-year-old in his adult body, but the words have already left his lips, and there's no going back. What happened to the suave as midnight, rotten-to-the-core punk Bucky the world knew him as?

She nods. "Yeah. I didn't realise we took Professor May's portraiture together until the seating arrangement changed, but yes. He practices form when we're dancing." She takes sips between sentences, acting more her age than Bucky sure is. An afterthought, she adds, "I probably should work on my project..."

Buck nods. Before he'd run off and joined the army, Steve was a budding artist, scraping pennies to go to school and try to learn more about the whole business. On some whim, the army had taken him in, and in return for his tours (where he'd not gotten his arm blown off, lucky bastard) the military paid for his education. Neat deal.

"So, how long have you known Steve?" She asks.

He stops to think, but not long enough to remember how drunk he really is, and what that does to the filter he doesn't have. "I can't remember. Forever? We were in the same day-care." He blurts.

"Nat was wrong about you, James." She considers aloud, tipping the last of her glass up. "You're sure as hell not an idiot."

_

As usual, it was a Wednesday, but instead of studying in class like he was supposed to, he wasn't. Well, nobody was, their professor had texted everyone a picture of an overflowing toilet with the text beneath reading can't teach gotta stop an impromptu swimming pool. But still, old habits die hard, and he sat in the room like always, flicking through his phone trying to find a joke he'd jotted down after dreaming out it, wanting to bring it up next time he saw Steve. His pal was always hanging out with new crowds, like the hippy Wanda, and her athlete brother, and the smartass Tony who built his first computer when Bucky was still in nappies.

But it was a Wednesday. And every Wednesday, without fail, Nat's friend _________ would run through the conjoined classrooms in E Block, regardless if advanced physics was on or not. Upon ruminating this, he heard the door push forward, and the patter of her feet as she fled through the rooms.

Curious, and for once, not distracted by the beauty of crazy maths that took his mind off the shitty realities of life after service, and able to follow, he did. His clunky boots were as quiet as they could be, as he threaded his way behind her, tracing her footsteps toward the F Block where he knew the physically-artsy people did their things. As he entered the dance room, obeying the sign to take off all shoes with hard soles before standing on the sprung floor. But when he saw the group that congregated in the centre, his breath was taken away.