Dearest Diary,

It was such a nice day out and, well, I don't really know what happened. We didn't expect it to down pour when we left this morning, is what I mean.

We didn't bring rain gear and it really was sunny all day. Well, then it was 7 and the sun was starting to set and everyone vanished from the streets and a fog seemed to settle on the sidewalk ahead of us.

That's when I started to worry it'd rain, seeing as we were kinda far from the apartment.

—————

I walked beside him and looked around... it was like a ghost town. It was like the wind had blown everyone away. It wasn't that bad though, right? Ib mean, I'm sure we'll make its home before it starts down pouring.

"Steve, did you listen to the radio this morning?" he asked me, casually.

"No, did you?" I replied.

"No... I thought you did... I didn't think it'd rain because you hadn't said anything."

"Oh, well, I hate to break it to ya, Buck, but I definitely think it's gonna rain," I said sarcastically.

He looked down at me, "thanks, Captain Obvious."

I smiled to myself and looked down at our feet. Perfectly synchronized, I thought. It was like we were subconsciously connected to one another. Like he was me and I was him and we were one. He looked down too, and for a second I was going to say something and ask him if he had thought the same thing, but then, I didn't.

I looked up and put my arm out to the side because I thought I felt it but thought that it couldn't be happening to us. There was no chance that everyone had evacuated the sidewalks and that there wasn't a single car or taxi on the streets for a reason, right? There's no way we're a mile from home and it's about to rain on us, right?

I felt it again, a droplet hitting my head. I closed my eyes and turned to him, looking him in the eyes and seeing the same look on his face as I imagined to be on mine.

"I'm sorry," I said.

"Why?" he questioned.

"I didn't check the weather and, as a result, we're about to get drenched."

"It's okay," he told me. I looked at him in confusion. "It's gonna be fun, you'll see."

I tried to believe him, but I couldn't imagine it getting any worse than having to walk a mile home in torrential down pour.

I saw a streak of lighting in the darkening sky ahead of us between the skyscrapers and waited until I heard the boom. As it crackled and fizzled away, I felt the rain start to slowly fall onto us. I looked over at his light blue shirt and watched as little dark blue speckles began to accumulate on his shoulders.

I hoped that it would pass, that it wouldn't rain too long... or that it would just hold off another twenty minutes until we got home, even though I could already feel the wind picking up and saw more lighting bolt across the sky.

I exhaled and closed my eyes, hoping that maybe if I didn't look at it, there might e a chance that it'd just go away. It didn't.

I heard a crack and looked past Bucky's face to see the buildings light up as lightning hit the top of one nearby. His face went yellow for a second as a result of the bright strike of light on his left, then he looked down at me.

The rain had gotten heavier and I felt as if I had been pelted with bullets. My hair was flopped all over my face, so I pushed it all back and met Bucky's gleeful eyes. I reached up and fixed his hair, which had been plastered to his forehead. He smiled at me.

"Ready?" he asked me. I could barely hear him over the roar of the thunder and the whipping wind that had suddenly enveloped us.

"What?" I yelled back. "Ready? For what?"

He bit his lower lip in attempts to hide his smirk from me.

Then, he looked around me and darted straight out into the middle of the street.

"What the hell are you doing?" I shouted, running after him.

He grabbed my shoulders and shook me. "Running will get us home faster, Steve."

"Running in the middle of the street will get us killed, Bucky."

"Do you see anyone out here?" he asked, pointing out the one thing I had already known.

"Bu-"

"Ah," he interrupted me. "No buts," he told me. "That's more of a waste of time than this conversation... Unless, of course, it's yours... in which case, we'd have all the time in the world."

"Buck!" I yelled at him. "We're in public!" I tried to explain.

"Again I ask, Steve, how many people are there out here besides us two?" he waited. "Just what I thought. Now then," he continued. "Let's go."

I looked at him like I really, really did not want to do this right now. Like, really. But then, I found myself thinking about running ahead of him, in order to get the upper hand.

"Alright but..." I looked down and stalled for a second. "Only if you can catch me!" I yelled as I jolted forward, running up the street and hoping to God I wouldn't wipe out... or get hit by a car.

"Hey!" he shouted at me. I heard his shoes slamming onto the wet pavement as he chased after me, but there was no chance of him catching me... I was already so far ahead.

But just as I had started to let this feeling of being so high take over me, I felt my energy start to fade as my lungs realized what I was doing. My legs were slowing down and my breathing was labored... damn it! He was gonna catch me if I continued at this rate.

I felt his hand grab at my arm but I kept running and he quickly let go. I spun around and started laughing as I watched him fall onto the street... though, I stopped as soon as I realized that I was slipping, too. Then I landed straight into a puddle and we were both laughing at ourselves.

I looked down and saw I had cut right through my slacks when I had fallen and that there was blood pooling around my knee in the water puddle. Then, I saw he had gotten up, so I jumped off the ground and started sprinting away, ignoring the sharp pain shooting through my chest making my lungs feel as though they were on fire and the dull burning that radiated from my left knee.

I looked back to see that he was chasing me again. "Come on, Steve!" he grumbled, trying to catch up to me.

Then, out of nowhere, his arms wrapped around my waist and I felt my body go weightless as he managed to hoist me into the air and over his shoulder. I kicked and waved my arms for a moment before giving in entirely and letting him do with me what he wished.

As he stopped walking, he put me down right before him. We were still connected, though. He held me tight up against him and looked straight into my eyes, making me feel like he was boring a hole right through my soul.

I listened carefully at the incessant rain all around us as it seemed to get louder and as the lightning and thunder somehow managed to boom seemingly even more often. The pitter patter of the droplets hitting windows and cars and buildings and puddles sent me into a daze, actually believing for a second that there wasn't anything but us, neither now, in the future, nor ever before.

He looked at me like I was his world, despite the fact that I saw galaxies in his eyes.

The rain seemed to come to a halt and stop completely in this moment, as it was all happening so unimaginably fast.

Then, he grabbed my face, closed his eyes and kissed me like nothing he had ever done before. The moment seemed to fill with passion, sending me spiraling through the atmosphere and giving me this incomparable sensation that I was falling. I felt my arms maneuver around his waist and pull him tight up against me as he breathed in through his nose. Our lips moved like the beat of a song and our tongues, as a result, managed to dance. It all just felt so... perfect.

As we parted, we managed to remain in a world all our own, simply so that we may continue to experience this undeniable feeling, the one that had just grown between us even more than ever before imagined. As his eyes looked down at me in all of their haze, I couldn't tell if he had tears falling down his cheeks, as a result of how overwhelming the moment had felt, or if what I had noticed were just droplets of rain water trickling down his face because... that feeling was something I had felt, too.

We stood there for a second, in the arms of one another, wondering if that had been real. Was it? No, how could it be? We were in public... though, there wasn't a single person around and it just felt so right. So incredibly and undeniably right.

I took a breath in and, with that, the rain seemed to fall anew yet, somehow, remain as it was just before. Thinking about it, before had just happened and what had just happened felt like it was a million years away. Everything commenced around us as usual, making me feel like what just occurred was insignificant in that it had only lasted a few seconds.

How, then, could this be insignificant if it meant everything to us? If it meant everything to me?

We pulled away from one another like polar opposite magnets, resistantly but somehow, nonetheless. In that moment thereafter, as we both looked at one another through the rain and fog, there was this collective, agreed upon, feeling of unsureness... of the unknown and of the unexpected.

This was something we hadn't done before, kiss in public. Sure, there weren't any people here to witness it other than us, but perhaps it was better that way. If there had been someone there all along, maybe the magic would have never been.

I wanted to stand there with him forever. I didn't want this feeling to go, this feeling of freedom that had originated from nothing. I wanted him to do it again, so that I might be sure it was really real.

I let my fingers meet my lips, in recollection of the fact that he had just been there. I remembered what it had felt like and knew that I would never forget it, and that he wouldn't either. I let my eyes fall from his gaze as a way of bringing the moment to a close.

"Steve," he said, somehow seeming to cut through the air with his words. "We gotta go, it's probably gonna start getting cold."

I nodded, unable to trust my voice with what it might sound like or come up with.

We then started walking home, leaving the moment behind us at the intersection of Henry and Middagh Streets. I looked back only once, trying to imagine what it might have looked like from an outsiders perspective.

As we, eventually, made our way to the apartment building, I looked over at him with an expression on my face that I'm not exactly sure how to describe. He sent me a similar look. It was a sort of longing to stay. It felt like worry, but wasn't exactly the same. I wanted to stay outside forever... to stay in the rain for as long as it would continue so that the moment might continue to replay in my head.

We stepped inside and, immediately, I felt uncomfortable. My clothes clung translucently to my skin and, honestly, it was not something I wanted to deal with at the moment. I looked over at him, on the other hand, and couldn't find it in myself to look away because of the exact same thing. Sure, he was almost definitely uncomfortable, but he looked damn good.

We made our way to my front door and I unlocked it. It was Monday, and so the mail had been delivered. The document on top was for Bucky, as I noticed when I picked it up. It read, in all capitals and bold print: ORDER TO REPORT FOR INDUCTION.I felt my eyebrows crinkle in confusion, as I had never seen something like that before.

Before I could open it, though, he had pulled it from the stack and walked away from me, yanking off his wet shirt and placing it onto the counter. I pulled my shirt off too, as it was starting to get cold. By the time I was going to ask him what his mail was, he had already stashed it away somewhere that I couldn't find it. Oh well, it was probably nothing anyway.

"Come on," he began. "We should change, we can't have you getting sick over this, now, can we?" I smiled and followed him to the bedrooms, hoping that wasn't the only reason he wanted me to get out of my clothes at the moment.

—————

Looking back, we probably could have been more careful about what we were doing... I guess that's what made it so amazing in the end, though.

It's things like this that'll stay with us in our memories forever. Maybe, some day, we can both look back upon it and reminisce about these golden times together.

~ Steve Rogers