When Steve meets TJ Hammond, the Vice President’s son, TJ isn’t in a
good place. Perhaps it’s that which draws Steve to him – subconsciously
he recognizes something of himself in TJ, and maybe the same is true for
TJ. It’s an unlikely friendship they strike up, but it deepens and
eventually expands into something else.
TJ Hammond didn’t expect to fall in love with Steve
Rogers. He didn’t expect to want a long-standing relationship with the
superhero. He didn’t expect to ever be told he was the carbon copy of
Steve’s dead past lover, Bucky Barnes. He also didn’t expect the utter
heartbreak he felt when Steve said Bucky Barnes was alive…and that he
needed to find him.
With Bucky in the picture, how is TJ supposed
to compete against Steve’s real lover, when all TJ had was just Barnes’
face to begin with?
HYDRA goes too far and injures the Winter Soldier beyond repair. They
turn to a dangerous new procedure to reverse the ageing process and,
hopefully, the harm they have done to their greatest weapon. Fast
forward thirty years to TJ Hammond, a late night kidnapping, and a blond
man who feels like home coming to his rescue.
With Hydra still trying to kill the dangerous people on their list,
Steve ends up protecting the Hammond family. But with some help from
Bucky and the rest of the Avengers, plus a lot of confrontations with a
very opinionated family, he also finds that right partner.
Steve Rogers is a warrior without a war, a soldier without a
mission, and a man without a plan. Bucky doesn’t need his help, the
other Avengers are busy with their own lives, and not even a move back
to Brooklyn has given Steve a purpose or any idea on what to do with his
life.
But when he meets TJ Hammond at a charity event, he thinks
maybe he’s at least found a new friend. That he’s found someone who
understands a little of what it’s like to rebuild one’s life from the
ground up. Someone who could help him rediscover just who exactly Steve
Rogers is.
And maybe – just maybe – they discover a deeper connection along the way.
(see her 2015 index for more ficlets in the Second Time Around universe)
Three weeks after his ‘defrosting,’ Steve Rogers is
lost and depressed, wandering the street of New York, haunted by his
memories. Things only get more painful for him when he sees Bucky
walking up the street. Except. It’s not Bucky.
Instead he meets TJ Hammond, son of a former President and the
current Secretary of State, a man troubled by past mistakes, current
addictions, and his family’s political ambitions.
Together they tackle their own demons and try to make their lives a
little better, all the while forming a friendship that will heal them
both. And maybe become a little something more.
“You probably don’t remember me,” the guy said with an apologetic smile, “but my name is–”
“Stevie,”
TJ said as it dawned on him. It literally felt like the sun coming up,
like waking up out of a long sleep, and TJ surged to his feet without
thinking. “Oh my God, Stevie, I missed you so much.”
TJ has been with Steve Rogers and Bucky Barnes for
quite some time, but things might change when it’s put to the ultimate
test; Elaine Barrish’s campaign trail.
Or the one where Bucky learns to bond with people, Steve hates the right wing, and TJ is just happy to cuddle his boys.
Or how T. J. Hammond went looking for himself – and kept running into Steve Rogers’ broad chest along the way.
If
this is a love story, it was inadvertent. Also, ridiculously
unsuccessful supervillains, dear old dead friends, Secret Service, TJ’s
grandmother being inappropriate, and a lone match-making deer.
Steve and Bucky have decided to come out publicly. Tony
hooks them up with someone he considers an expert in that area –
trouble maker and all around lost soul, TJ Hammond.
HYDRA gets a hold on important American security information and now
they’re using information about cabinet members’ families to get what
they want. Special forces from SHEILD are called into help. The
Hammonds, America’s favorite family, are forced to wait it out in the
White House under supervision of security and SHEILD agents.
TJ Hammond, America’s bad boy, is under supervision of the one and only Steve Rogers and things go better than planned.
He’s not supposed to share it with anyone, but Dum Dum had seen the same movie he did and got the reference immediately. The latter lost no time in sharing this with the rest of the Commandos.
Hell, none of them could miss that and poor Colonel Philips eventually had to institute a Rule, muttering all the while about what the hell did he ever do to end up with a fucking fairy tale Disney princess in his army.
Seventy-odd years later, it was immensely comforting to Steve that Bucky still had that knack.
So, it was Sam’s idea to get them all out to the zoo, right? Look at the animals, maybe get some cotton candy, feed peanuts to the elephants. Something nice and normal and totally relaxing.
Sam forgot that he hung around with the Avengers.
Normal fled screaming out the window a LONG time ago.
So Bucky ends up being doted on by the birds, the squirrels and the deer. The giraffes and the elephants gently snuffed at his hair. The grumpy tiger even padded up and was obviously demanding to be petted. Even the freakin’ penguins wanted to waddle up to the Winter Soldier and it was only by the grace of God, national heroics and Tony Stark that the zoo personnel didn’t freak out at the sight of their wards wanting to comfort and reach out to one very bewildered Bucky Barnes.
“This is insane. I have killed so many people – I mean, WHAT ARE YOU ALL DOING?!!!” Bucky was terribly Not Intimidating with a squirrel on his shoulder and a bird gently grooming his hair and the stray kitten that was definitely going to be a new pet, meowing in his pocket.
Steve had a name for this, even as he solemnly listened to the OTHER squirrel importantly telling him Things About the Care and Feeding of Bucky Barnes™.
Snow Bucky.
Snow Bucky tried to maintain his Pout™ after hearing and REMEMBERING this nickname but it was very hard to maintain said Pout™ when one’s baby kept trying to kiss it away.
Snow Bucky and the More Than Seven Avengers (via darthstitch)
There’s nothing new about the consideration of male superheroes as icons of masculinity. Superman representing the pinnacle of wholesome, idealised masculine power, or The Hulk as an allegory for the angry, repressed male id. And these types of masculinity are not innate or inevitable. Masculinity, like all gender roles is a socially constructed performance.
But performative masculinity has a tension to it that performative femininity does not, because performing itself is seen as innately unmasculine. You cannot learn to be a real man, you are or you are not. You can’t make one or learn to be one. Because our story about masculinity is that it just is. It is an ur state of being. The most natural way for a human to be.
Steve Rogers came out of a bottle.
And Steve Rogers’s weapon is a shield. Steve does not attack, he defends. Steve Rogers is the only Avenger who does not thrust forward with a phallic weapon. From Loki’s staff to Clint’s arrows, Black Widow (who pairs so well with Steve because she is a phallic woman) has guns, Tony essentially is a giant penis (sorry, friends, that’s all I see), and of course no one would even pretend that Thor’s hammer isn’t Thor’s penis.
But Steve has a shield. And a shield isn’t particularly feminine. It is not a cup or a sheath or a hole. It is just anti-phallic.
And that is Steve. the non-phallic man. Because you can’t make a man in a machine. Only a strange kind of monster.
ealdor 