Dearest Diary,

Christmas is finally here! This is the day I wait all year for!

It's not even about the presents for me, to be fair, it's about spending time with each the people I love. Speaking of which, Bucky's family is coming over too. We're having Christmas dinner together at six but I don't think I can wait that long to see him... I mean, it's 9am. Ugh.

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"Oh lovely, Steven, James and Rebecca and George are here," she announced, walking towards the front door. "Welcome! Come on in, all of you!" She stepped aside and allowed them to walk in.

I watched him a he walked in. He turned to my mom and thanked her with a big white smile on his face. He looked at me up and down with big eyes, the smile falling from his face (as no one was in front of him to see, he was the first one to walk in).

"Hey... Steve..." he walked right over to me and pulled me into a hug... It was one of those side hugs, but it felt deeper and more meaningful than that. When we separated it feel like a part of my soul was ripping away from me.

• • •

Dinner was good... Only one fish instead of the traditional seven but it was still good because, well, because Bucky was sitting to my left the whole time. In the end, we were all just sitting around the table and talking about what we planned on doing in the following week.

I wasn't really listening. I was looking out the window to my left, observing the pink-grey sky as the sun set. At the fluffy clouds that rolled along the skyline and the flurries of snow that fell and eventually piled up on the grass (which wasn't even visible anymore at this point).

Bucky turned to me, "y'alright?"

I blinked and paused a second before I looked over at him. "Oh, uh, yea... Why d'you ask?"

"Well you were kind of staring out the window and everyone else... Uh..." I looked up and everyone else had gone. They were in the living room listening to the radio and it was just Bucky and I sitting at the table.

I chuckled, "wow. They've just up and left without us."

"Well I did tell them to after all. I knew you were thinking about something and I wanted to get down to the bottom of it... you know, both figuratively and literally."

My voice turned to a hushed angry whisper of sorts. "Buck! Hold your tongue here, jeez. They're right in there... I can't have someone, uh,"

"Finding out? Hmmm?" He leaned closer to my ear. He slowly brought his tongue out and licked my earlobe, then bit down on it lightly. "Find out that..." His voice got shallow and quiet. "That you want things you shouldn't? That you want me. That you like our kisses. That you like it when I hold you against the wall and whisper sweet nothings into your delicate ears. That you like my cock and fucking crave it,"

"... Buck..."

"That you want to do it all over again. The kissing and whispering and touching and... moaning and grunting and... licking. You want me to go down on you again. You know you do, Steve. You know you do. Don't you, Steve? Steve. Steeeeeve? Hello?" And I snapped back into reality. The two of us sitting at the table and no one else. I was daydreaming.

"What?" I asked.

"I asked if you wanted to go to your room or if you'd rather go in the living room with the rest of them...?"

"Oh... oh, uh... let's go upstairs, yeah," I replied shyly.

"Okay, lemme just tell my dad," he got up and walked to the living room doors here he called out to his dad, "Mrs. Rogers... Uh, dad? Steve and I are going upstairs."

My mom looked at Mr. Barnes, "Alright, have fun."

Bucky walked back and put his hand on my shoulder. "Ready?"

"Yea," I replied. We walked over to the kitchen and through the arched doorway. But then Bucky stopped.

"Come on, Buck, what're you stopping fo-" he put his finger on my lips and shushed me.

"Shhh... look," he whispered, pointing up at the arch that we were standing under. "Mistletoe." I looked up at it. The green leaves extending down, nearly touching his head. The little red bulbs hanging and hiding amongst the fresh plant. I completely forgot that mom did this every year. She would go out to the store and buy fresh holly every Christmas season (usually December first) and hang it in two or three of the arch ways.

"Bucky..." I whispered back. I looked up at him. His eyes, that icey-blue cut through my soul and sent me to a completely different world. I was spinning around the Galaxy with the stars and the planets with nothing in my way. Nothing holding me back , nothing pulling me back down from the clouds. Nothing, except myself.

"Don't Bucky me. It's a rule. You have to kiss someone if you're stuck under the mistletoe with them."

"But... they're watching," I replied.

"They aren't watching anything. They're talking and listening to the radio and really not paying any attention to us right now whatsoever and I just really, really wanna kiss you, Steve." He sounded nearly desperate. His hands had made their way to the belt loops on my slacks and he was pulling me closer. He looks distracted, like he couldn't bear to look at me any longer if he couldn't kiss me. And he knew I wanted it too. I just didn't know how to go about it.

He looked over at the closed glass door that led into the living room to see if they were looking. They weren't. Then he turns back to me and tugs on my belt loops, sending us crashing together. He bit his lower lip as he looked longingly at my face. His hands met my neck on both sides of my face as he bent down and rested his nose next to mine, hovering his lips just out of reach. Every time I would push myself up to reach him, he would let our lips just barely touch before he put them out of my way again.

He took a slow breath in and kissed me slowly. His tongue and mine both stayed in their respective places and we just savored it. Then, he pulled away. I let his saliva remain on my lips for a moment before I licked them.

"Wow..." I whispered.

He smiled, "what?"

"That was... wow."

A smile crept onto his face as he pulled my face up to meet his... I nearly fell into him, but he caught me and held me up. His pointer finger met my chin and he tilted it up so as to meet my lips with his again. It was nothing too sloppy and there wasn't too much saliva but it was definitely deep. He unexpectedly pulled my into him and it was like nothing I had ever felt before. My body practically shivered from this sort of internal feeling of euphoria... it was inexplicable how it made me feel. It was as if my blood went hot and was beginning to boil.

He backed away from me, but still held onto my arms... he exhaled and continued to look at me. At my eyes and my lips and my hair and just... just seemingly taking everything in. "And that?" He asked.

I didn't say anything. "I- that... uh, wow. I'm at a loss for words."

"A loss for words, huh? Must've been pretty good then," he smirked down at me.

"Yea, I'll say..." I looked up at him. All these thoughts rushing through my mind at once made me feel like I was flying. It's almost like I couldn't stop them from flooding in... they pushed their way in and wouldn't leave and it was amazing to finally see clearly what I was thinking even though I still wasn't sure... I wasn't sure if it was okay that I was thinking these things. I thought about him kissing me like that again. Pinning me to the wall and his hands through my hair... heavy breathing and his hands all over me. Ripping my shirt out of my slacks.... taking my belt off and grinding on me and- shit.

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Why do this to myself?

Sometimes I feel like being involved here isn't doing me any good... but most of the time I don't doubt that fate is playing his role in my life. That everything happens for a reason. That this feeling I'm getting is strong enough to keep us safe and to let us move forward.

It's been so, so many years like this and I feel like, sometimes, we aren't moving forward. I feel like there's so much more we could have if only one of us was willing to start it... like a chain reaction. I see it starting and never ending, and almost that that's just a given with us.

It might take a lot of courage from me to do this, to finally do this for real... to put my heart into it. Hopefully, I'm capable.

~ Steven G. R.