Bucky hums in response. It's not really like the old days anymore. They've both been through so much and they've both changed a lot and not just physically. The fights are bigger now. It's not Steve risking bruised ribs in an alley, it's aliens and world decimating events and they're both pretty traumatized. Bucky can see that now.

Back when Steve had brought him to Wakanda, Bucky had thought it was just him and that Steve had been mostly okay. Now that he's got Steve clinging to him, he can see that he'd been wrong about that, too. Even as Steve's lying here promising to take care of Bucky, Bucky can see that he needs to be taken care of, too. Maybe Bucky had been just as tricked by the muscles as everyone else, because he never would have thought Steve hadn't needed him before.

"So are you." Smell and all, he'd just so relieved to have Steve here.

Something coils in his chest, like a spring threatening to break through his rib cage. He could have lost Steve. Steve had thought that he had lost Bucky. He doesn't know how much more of this either of them can take, but he still feels so raw from the fight and the feeling of almost-loss of the one thing he knows he'll never survive without.

He turns his head and presses his lips to Steve's throat, just above the neckline of his undershirt. It's barely a kiss, but it's there.