What the Water Gave Me

Chapter Forty-One

That time, Steve stayed up instead of Bucky. The day had just started when Bucky had returned, looking upset, and had immediately dropped down on the sand exhaustedly, and Steve watched him and almost found himself feeling bad. He felt guilty when Bucky delivered a nice pile of fish into his hands, but he was still running on empty. It really wasn’t quite fair, Steve thought. Maybe for another siren, he wouldn’t feel an ounce of pity, but for this one? Bucky was different. Steve didn’t think he deserved this.

Bucky fell asleep on the sand and Steve approached him slowly, settling down on the sand near him. He took up his board and uncapped one of his pens and studied the siren’s face and body, deep in thought.

He found himself drawing before he could stop himself. It wasn’t easy with dry erase markers underwater, but he could capture the lines. The curve of his hip. The curl in his tail. The fine angles of his jaw. Steve wanted to admire him all day. He’d started noticing Bucky’s features earlier, like he was looking at the artwork of a fine sword or a sleeping wolf. Something lethal and powerful and dormant. But the more he gazed, the more he began to see Bucky instead of the siren. Not like they were two different entities, but as if together, they made something even more than either of them had been originally. He wasn’t just the scary sea monster and he wasn’t just the bubbling, clinging personality. He was somehow both. He was a person. It was fascinating.

Steve inched closer and closer, part of him still afraid that if he got close enough to Bucky, Bucky might reach over and snap his head off. He realized they’d never been this close while Bucky was awake. At least, not intentionally. Not happily. Steve kept a wide radius for himself, just to be on the safe side. Despite how much of him inside was starting to like this Bucky, starting to grow fond him, Steve couldn’t let himself forget the potential in the sharpness of his teeth.

Steve erased his rough drawing with the heel of his palm and scooted closer, drawing now the way his hair floated around him. Then closer, to perfect the shape of the scales on his shoulder. Then, finally, frustrated with the shape of his lips, Steve dropped his board on the sand directly in front of Bucky’s face and laid out next to him, stretching out his tail and lying on his stomach. He was literally just a breath away. He could feel Bucky’s exhale against the back of his hands and for a while, he just stared, equal parts enamored and afraid. Then, he continued to draw.

When Bucky stirred a few minutes later and his eyes opened, Steve didn’t notice immediately. He was studying his hard work, adjusting lines, but he looked up soon enough to find dark eyes looking back and his breath caught in his throat. They were so close their noses could have brushed if Steve moved another inch.

Steve remained frozen in the sand while Bucky hauled himself up slowly. Steve’s eyes followed him and then his body did too and he sat across from him, trying to lean as far away as he could. Bucky was looking down at the whiteboard and he reached out and turned it around, studying. Steve tried to read his facial expression to gauge what he thought, but Bucky’s face was frustratingly blank. All Steve could see there were those sad, sad eyes.

Bucky picked up the whiteboard and examined it closer. Steve watched his eyes dart across it and wished he could take it back and use it to write, like he was supposed to. He wasn’t sure what he would say exactly, but a million thoughts flashed through his head

It’s just a doodle, he thought. It’s not very good. If you don’t want me doing it anymore, I won’t. It’s just that your face… Steve stopped his inner monologue, stumped. He couldn’t think of a good excuse. Your face… I guess I lost myself in the angles of your face. Steve couldn’t say that!! He wasn’t exactly sure if it was the truth because a hundred emotions were warping together in his mind and he couldn’t pick them all out, but regardless, he couldn’t tell Bucky that.

Bucky was still staring at the drawing when Steve dragged himself out of his thoughts and he thought of something to say and reached behind himself for Bucky’s board.

I’ll write ‘do you like it’, Steve thought.

“Are you staring because my art’s bad or because you’re just that enamored with yourself?” He ended up writing.

Unfortunately for Steve, emotions never translated well into words. They felt soft and gentle in his head and came out with sharp edges. He supposed it only made sense, though. After all, he had to protect himself with something. Soft and gentle wouldn’t do, would never do, unless he had the claws and muscle to back it up if need be, which he didn’t. He couldn’t afford soft and gentle, especially not like Bucky could.

Bucky looked up at the words and Steve’s scowl behind them and back down at the drawing. He reached over and Steve handed him the board. Steve thought they might trade, but Bucky set the drawing down on the sand instead.

“I guess I have a lot of questions,” he wrote in small letters at the top.

“Yes, I’ll sign it for you,” Steve wrote sassily in return when he got the board back, which made Bucky crack a small smile.

“You were so close to me,” he replied and although it was a sentence, it came off like a question.

“Yeah, so what,” Steve wrote.

“I thought you were scared of me,” Bucky wrote back and Steve scoffed, rolling his eyes overdramatically.

“You’re pretty scary,” he wrote. “But I could take you.”

“Do I really look like this?” Bucky asked.

“Yeah, that’s sort of the point of life drawing,” Steve wrote. Bucky looked down at the drawing and he looked like he wanted to touch it, if only it wouldn’t smudge.

“I don’t know if that’s good or bad,” he wrote slowly.

“That’s rude,” Steve replied. He wiped off the rest of the conversation. “You’re supposed to say, ‘oh Steve, your art is great, good job’.”

Bucky didn’t even laugh this time. He was still staring.

“No, it is good,” he wrote back almost absentmindedly. “I’m just… I guess I just don’t see my own face very much. We look very different.”

“Aw geez, Bucky, don’t get all hung up on that again,” Steve scrawled and shoved the board back.

“I’m not, I’m not,” Bucky replied. He hesitated. “I’m not.” His eyes were still on the other board and Steve studied his face for another second before deciding that was quite enough of that and reaching over to swipe the ink off the board. Bucky blinked, startled. Steve took his own board back and rubbed it all off. “Why did you do that??” Bucky wrote quickly while Steve was erasing and Steve looked up and let out a huff of breath into the water.

“Cause I need something write on, doofus,” Steve replied after a minute.

“Have you drawn me like that before?” Bucky asked. Steve lied right to his face.

“No, of course not,” he wrote.