Fuck.
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
FUCK.
Bucky hesitated only a few seconds before shoving himself up from his bed, yanking on a nearby pair of flannel pajama pants, and yanking his sweaty hair back into an unkempt knot at the nape of his neck. He opened the door a crack, listening for any signs of life, and muttered another curse under his breath – "Shit" – when he heard nothing but silence.
There was no way on earth he would sleep until he had this problem sorted out, though, and he had tried everything he could think of.
Steve's bedroom door stood partway open, as always, and in the faint glow of the soft white fairy lights Tony had hung in the window as a joke – the joke was on him, because Steve actually liked them – Bucky could see the hulking form of his best friend curled up on his side with his broad back to the door. It was nearly one in the morning, and since Steve usually went to bed by eleven, he was surely sound asleep.
Are you sure you need to wake him?
Do I have a choice?
FUCK.
Bucky approached the bed with the stealth he had cultivated out of necessity over the course of many unspeakable missions, hesitating again as he stood by Steve's bedside, watching his bare shoulder rise and fall with his slow breaths. Before he could decide how to approach this, Steve's deep voice broke the silence. "What's wrong?"
With a sigh, Bucky climbed onto the bed, leaning against the headboard, and Steve rolled over to face him. "I had no idea this was a problem before tonight. I haven't even tried, or even thought about it, since the war, but I started to remember things a week or so ago, and I finally figured I'd give it a try, but nothing happened, and I kept trying and trying, and I tried everything, but—"
"Buck." Steve sat up next to him and rested one of his great big paws on Bucky's shoulder, his blankets falling to pool in his lap. "What did you try? What are you talking about?"
Bucky closed his eyes, misery sliding across his face. "I can't get off, Steve."
Steve was quiet for a moment, and when Bucky opened his eyes, Steve's were trained on him with confusion. "You can't—"
"I remember the things that used to turn me on, and I thought about them and it worked," Bucky said, shaking his head. "I can get hard – that's no problem. Actually, that kind of is the problem." He gestured somewhat angrily at his crotch and noticed when Steve's gaze flickered there for an instant. "I got hard just fine, but I can't fuckin' come. I jerked off for ages, and it felt great, just like it always did, but I just can't... get there."
Steve sucked in a breath. "Oh. Wow."
"Yeah." Bucky grimaced, shifting position and palming his painful hard-on, hoping rearranging it would relieve some of the pressure. It didn't. "I think I rubbed it raw, for fuck sake. But nothing. I never had this problem before. I think all the freezing and thawing and re-freezing must've broken something."
He let out a dry sob, hanging his head, and Steve's hand slid from his shoulder to the back of his neck, rubbing gently.
"You're not broken."
"Yeah," Bucky huffed, "tell that to my therapist."
Steve chuckled, shaking Bucky lightly with the hand on his neck. "Funny you should say that, actually. My therapist was the one who suggested the only thing that actually worked when I had the same problem."
Bucky's eyes widened. "You—"
"After I came out of the ice, it took me a little while to get around to, uh... getting reacquainted with myself." Bucky couldn't see well enough to tell, but it sure as hell sounded like Steve was blushing. "The same thing happened," Steve continued, "and I figured the same thing you did – that the ice ruined something in me. But we heal, remember? So that meant it couldn't be physical, right?"
