The Avengers tower was almost empty when Bucky entered, cautiously making his way from the door to the elevator and then from the elevator to Steve's room. He followed his usual path, not deviating to look around even though many things called for his attention: he had not been allowed to explore, as Stark put it, and his tracker —a device Bucky considered as wrong as his cryogenic prison— never let him deviate from the allowed path.

Once at Steve's room, Bucky threw himself in bed. He closed his eyes and inhaled the scent of cleanliness that told him Steve hadn't been there since last Monday, when it had been laundry day. Another mission, perhaps. Bucky wanted to be out on a battlefield with Steve but nobody trusted him yet, and to be let free with the man he tried to kill was not permitted. It didn't matter that he had tried to kill them all: Captain America was their unacknowledged leader and the Avengers needed him.

His frustration rose, and Bucky punched the bed with his human arm.

"I'm sure the bed did nothing wrong to you."

He was immediately alert, though he didn't move.

"The Tower told you I was here?" Bucky asked the woman known as Black Widow, and he could picture the half smirk and half grimace in her face. "Steve said I would not be left alone while he wasn't here."

"Steve is right," the Widow told him. "Tony set an alarm to warn any of us when you get home."

"This is not home," Bucky interrupted, thinking of wooden homes in a time where a floating car was the novelty. He thought of the recognition in everybody's eyes and remembered the pride burning in his chest from when he had been one of the good guys. These days, he didn't know what he was.

"As much as I'd like to agree with that, this has earned a place in my heart."

He sat up in the bed in time to see her touch the wall with nostalgia. Right then, she was not the infamous Black Widow he had fought before, but Natasha in front of him. She was not the assassin who fought along with Stark to stop Bucky from doing more damage, but Steve's friend, who helped them escape because she trusted Captain America to do the right thing.

"Don't tell me it's because of the good memories. It wouldn't matter to me because the only memories I have now are of blood and monstrosities."

Natasha smiled sadly, crossing her arms over her chest and lowering her eyes. She looked almost vulnerable, but Bucky would not fall for her mind tricks. Black Widow was manipulative and he wasn't sure anymore if he was talking with the assassin or the woman.

"All of us have bled together now," she told him warmly, as if remembering a fond memory instead of the disgusting crimes they had committed or prevented. "If that's not family, if that's not home, I don't know what can be."

Bucky did. For him, family would always be Steve and home would be nineteen fourty-five until the day he died.

"You speak of nonsense."

"I speak of blood-bound friends. A family who would do anything for you, even kill you if they had to. People who can see your soul when touching your arm or hearing your voice, and not let the darkness inside you keep them from caring."

"Soulmates, Natasha?" Bucky laughed at the idiotic words coming from her mouth. "Is that what you're getting at?"

"Soulmates are not real," she quickly corrected him. "But whatever it is we share, it goes beyond that."

She got closer to where he sat on the bed, standing a single step away from him and looking down at his eyes. Bucky inhaled the sharp scent of leather and steel of Natasha. Or Black Widow, he wasn't sure.

"You are part of what we have now, Winter Soldier," she assured him. "Not all of us trust you yet, but we will get there."

"Who knows how many times we'll have to bleed together before you do," he retorted.

Natasha gave him the same sad smile as before, then turned around and left the room.

Bucky sighed and punched the bed again.