Next To Me // A Stucky Au

Chapter Twenty-Four

Bucky lay in his bunk on the bus with his phone in his hand. They were driving from Vancouver to Seattle,and had just crossed the border between Canada and the USA. The bus was quite big, for a bus. At the very front was the seat for the driver (they all took turns driving), and behind that was the door where you came onto the bus and a small shower and toilet compartment. If you turned the corner and went through a door, there would be a small kitchen and a fully working fridge and oven. After that, was the living area. This room was the biggest in the bus, and mainly consisted of couches, but there was also a small table they could pull out to eat at if they wanted to (they never did). At the very back, there was where they slept. There were six pod-like beds, stacked on top of each other, on both of the walls. That did mean that there was a spare bed, but no one minded because it was used to put all the random stuff they found left lying around.

Bucky was the only one with a bunk on the very bottom of the stack of beds. He was very close to the engine,  and he could hear it rumbling as they went along. Everyone asked if he found it annoying, it was so noisy so close to his head, but Bucky found the low pur off the engine more comforting then annoying.

Bucky clicked the face-time button. Almost immediately, Steve picked up. "Hey Stevie!" Bucky said exitedly, as the video image of Steve crackles to life. "How's it goin'?"

"Hey Buck," Steve replied happily, "it's goin' good." Steve smiled, then he paused for a second. "Hang on, aren't you ment to be starting a concert right about now?"

Bucky laughed at Steve's worried and confused face. "Nah, I ain't. That's in three hours."

"Oh yeah, time difference 'n' all," Steve said. 

"Yeah. We crossed the border, like, two hours ago," replied Bucky, changing the subject. "The guy at the toll booth gave us a bit of a hard time 'cause the bus' so big. I'm sure as hell glad Sam was drivin' and I weren't"

"We can hear you, arsehole!" Sam yelled from the other room, where he had probably flopped onto one of the couches closer to the bunks. Steve laughed and they both continued chatting.

"Aren't you ment to have bodyguards, or somethin', for after the concert?" Steve randomly asked after a while of talking.

"You don't need bodyguards when you have a Natasha Ramanoff," Bucky said without a pause. God knows what she did in Russia before she moved to the USA but it sure wasn't the military because the military don't teach you moves like that. Bucky was afraid of her even though the only time he'd seen her fight was when she knocked out that old, creepy dude at the bar.

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Steve had found himself counting down the hours until he'd see Bucky since yesterday. He was now at the airport with Laura, Peter and May and they were making their way to the terminal. Steve knew it was still exactly 32 minutes until th airplane was supposed to land, but he could still feel himself getting exited. Though, to be fair, Steve had been exited since two days ago.

Once the odd group had run out of things to talk about (although May and Laura were still chatting quietly in the backgeound), they stood in an odd kind of silence, the minutes crawling past like a snail. Well, more like an old grampa snail in quicksand and the snail was pulling a two ton weight behind it. In other words, it took forever.

After what felt like days, they saw the plane land. Everyone knew it still would be ten minutes or so before the team came to where they were waitin, but the four of them still got up and walked to the door, eagerly anticipating the arrival of their friends.

Steve was about to go and sit down, until he caught sight of a familiar figure. "Bucky!" He yelled, causing a lot of the people waiting to turn and look at him. Bucky's head whipped around, as Steve started running towards him, and decided to run to Steve as well. The others followed, walking (or jogging in Clint and Laura's case) exitedly towards each other. Bucky and Steve launched themselves into each other's arms.

"God, I missed you," Bucky said quietly, releasing Steve. Steve nodded in agreement, before they both moved to greet everyone else. They seemed to have a mutual understanding that they'd properly say hello to each other once they got back to Bucky's house.

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After they all met, Natasha headed back to the studio with Peter and May, because she had promised Peter that once she'd got back she'd give him an extra-long lesson to make up for all the ones she'd missed. She'd also told Peter where the spare key to the studio was hidden, and once they were in the car, May told her that once the school holidays had started, Peter had been down there almost every day. Nat smiled at this, grateful that Peter hadn't given up drumming for the while, although she had told herself that he wouldn't.

"It's a nice place you've got here," said May admiringly as they walked into the studio. "You planning on moving now you've got more money?"

Nat looked around the place fondly. "Nope!" She answered, putting her stuff down. "Just wouldn't feel right, y'know?"

May nodded, and Nat started her lesson with Peter. He really had been practicing, and he was eager to show Nat what he had taught himself while she was away. Nat sure as hell was impressed, and she could tell May was too, although she suspected that she'd heard it before. Once he had finished, Peter looked around the room proudly, and the two of them clapped. He went slightly pink at this.

"That was great!" said Nat enthusiastically. None of them could stop smiling.

A/n: hellollolooooooooooo!!!!!! Why the hell did that take me so long!?!?!!!???? Who knows? Who cares? Ok bye bye bitches.