Somehow, he takes being called an asshole as a personal victory, and it gets him grinning like a god damn idiot despite himself. With the expression on his face comes a sort of mirth in his chest, a lightness that coasts over the open wounds like a balm. The cracked and corrugated places within his chest feel filled up as though with helium, and god help him if SHU hasn't made him feel better than he has in months.

Oh, fuck.

He's got it.

Feelings, or at least the stirrings of them. Christ almighty, this is prison, Barnes, not a college dorm. It's got to be a proximity thing, got to be that Steve's good looking and relatively new in a place with the same old faces.

...but if they met on the street and had coffee, arguably he wouldn't kick Steve out of bed for eating crackers.

The yawn is contagious, and in an unconscious mirror, he snatches the pillow from his cot. Settles down with his scalp next to the grate, sprawled on the floor like it's a duvet instead of concrete. He doesn't mind, he's slept on the ground for years.

"Pass, I hate that game." He says dismissively, a little closer than before, eight or so inches off from Steve's ear. "Spend a few years abroad, a few years in prison, you don't even know who's a celebrity anymore. Two truths and a lie?