You Can't Remember What He Looks Like ?!?! ToT

Deana Lawson, Girls with Oiled Faces

Marvin Koner. New York, 1958

In The Long Run

Pairing: Stucky (Steve Rogers x Bucky Barnes)

Word count: 12.8k

Rating: explicit (18+)

A/N: While I'm chipping away at my multi chapter fic, here's a little Shrunkyclunks AU I've always wanted to write! It's mostly 💫 vibes 💫 and unapologetic smut, with a bit of soulmates and angst thrown in the mix, too. Hope you enjoy! Endless thanks to the marvelous @sparkagrace for the beta help! ♥︎♥︎

Excerpt:

“That looks broken,” Bucky says, with a nod at the stranger's face.

“I’m fine,” the man glowers.

Bucky can't help but smile at his surliness. “Whatever you say, lone ranger.”

It takes another moment, but eventually, the cracks a tiny smile of his own. He wipes his hand on his faded jeans and holds it out to Bucky. “Steve,” he says.

Ignoring the residual blood, Bucky takes the proffered hand, which is big and warm. “Nice to meet ya, Steve,” he offers with a crooked grin. “Name’s Barnes. James Barnes. But of course, everyone calls me Bucky.”

Read on AO3

Extended author's note under the cut for anyone who'd like to know more about the inspiration behind this one ♥︎

I've always loved 70s rock and classic country music (Eagles, America, Glenn Campbell, The Byrds, The Band, Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Aliotta Haynes Jeremiah, Bread etc.) and been a little obsessed with the vibes of so many of the songs in these genres. A while ago, when I was listening to Peaceful Easy Feeling and heard the lyrics,

"I wanna sleep with you in the desert tonight / With a billion stars all around"

&

"I get this feeling I may know you / As a lover and a friend",

and was inspired (possessed) to write a Shrunkyclunks AU, so… voilà. Bonus points to whoever can spot all the lyric references in this one lol.

— August 5, 1966 / Susan Sontag, Journals and Notebooks

Julian Fałat (Polish, 1853–1929)

'the ladies on the bridge,' edvard munch, oil on canvas, 1903.

Annie Hall (1977)

Director : Woody Allen

Director of Photography: Gordon Willis

KAZIMIR MALEVICH “BLACK CIRCLE” | 1923 [oil on canvas | 105.5 × 106 cm.]

Eternal Hero. Version 1 Oils on primed watercolor paper.

bucky finds a damp cardboard box of kittens abandoned in the alley near their home. he brings them inside, wraps and dries them with care and uses the heat pad that soothes his shoulder to keep them warm. they take the kittens to the vet because you can tell theyre all sickly, and steve can see how this is going to end (because, after all, what is he but a stray that bucky couldnt help but take in), yet bucky insists. lovingly, he cleans them with damp cloths as if it were their mother’s tongue, and gets up every hour on the hour in the night to feed them. still, every few days like clockwork one of them dies. steve slips from their bed to find bucky in the harsh kitchen light, mourning, milk bottle forgotten and growing cold on the table. he is devastated for each one as he cries whilst cradling their little bodies, and steve cradles him. you did your best, steve tells him. in the end only one lives; her fur had been the most stubborn to clean, but now its a soft, brilliant white. when she opens her eyes they’re blue. theyre going to keep her. she likes to curl in the palm of buckys hand, purring, her body warming the metal plates. steve and his dark humour says they should call her alley, and though bucky finds it funny they compromise and call her alpine - ally for short.