Stranger Who Knows All My Secrets [A Marvel FanFic]

Chapter 28: This Is Totally Not A Birthday Melody

Some months seemed to fly by without much thought. One moment it was January and Bucky was bored to death, the next it was March and he was celebrating his birthday and making out with the same woman as Elena who then proceeded to almost die in an earthquake a few days later. Later on, in March, it was Wanda's thirty-first birthday. Then April blew through, there was that whole kissing thing in Phuket and when they got back Stark held a big joint party for Scott Lang's fifty-first and Maria Hill's thirty-eighth birthday and honestly, birthdays and ages began to seriously confuse Bucky. 

Everyone who disappeared during The Snap had a different idea about just exactly how old they were. On paper Wanda should have been thirty-six, Scott should have been fifty-six, and Maria forty-three but they decided to fudge the numbers and it led to a lot of confusion. Nick Fury on the other hand had no problem being a seventy-four-year-old man and Bucky agreed, he really didn't think five years mattered once you hit a hundred.

Most of the disappeared people seemed to disagree and picked up at the age they had been before The Snap, choosing to follow their biological age instead of actual math and set dates. Bucky himself was now a hundred-and-eight and he sure as hell felt it on most days. However, according to the dating profile Elena made him several months ago, Bucky was only thirty-eight which at least was realistic based on his physical appearance. 

Sam joked that she should have made him twenty-eight but the exhaustion and crow's feet around his eyes would have raised red flags for any woman viewing his profile. Plus, Bucky kind of liked being in the rugged bachelor group as Natasha once labeled him and Steve. Honestly, Natasha made it sound way sexier than it actually was but alas, he was willing to work with it not that he was really even trying to date anymore.

That was just a pain in the ass and he was sick of being unable to get hard or get off, and you know, accidentally killing the moment as he had in Prague with the violinist. Hell, Bucky couldn't even make magic happen alone by himself with his laptop and some lube but he played along with everyone else and tried to make it seem like he had some successful second and third dates although they never panned out the way that he had wanted them to. 

Oh yeah, that one wanted me to join a commune with her he once told Steve which wasn't entirely a lie. Bucky was almost certain that the woman he had met for drinks on a Tuesday night in early April was part of a cult. He didn't do cults and if he was being honest, he was kind of still thinking about his kiss with Elena... The one they never talked about. That hot, wet kiss on the kitchen floor and... What the hell Bucky stay focused, he'd think to himself anytime his brain wandered there.

It took a while but he finally convinced Steve to stop moping around about Kristen... You know, the girl from statistics and while his best friend wasn't quite ready to talk about the breakup yet, he still gave himself permission to have fun. Bucky was going to make sure Steve had fun and they did eventually manage to wrangle enough Avengers together to head to Coney Island, the weekend they chose ended up coinciding perfectly with Elena's suggested birthday. 

Bucky remembered it at the last minute while they were doing laundry together and before you ask, her building had machines in the basement and he really hated the laundromat in his neighborhood because half the washers never worked. She was simply helping him out by letting him use her laundry card and throwing their shit in together to save on water and money but holy fuck was it awkward whenever one of her panties or bras ended up in the pile of clean clothes he brought home.

FOCUS!!! he'd yell at himself whenever they made their dramatic appearance in his hamper before tossing them into a reused paper bag from Macy's he had begun to store her interloper things in. Anyway, the day he remembered her birthday, they were arguing about who was older while folding clothes. The debate was over Carol, Wanda, and Elena because Bucky could have sworn the Sokovian was the youngest and that Elena and Carol were the same age but apparently he was wrong!