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The day her contractions start, Sarah finds the bucket, shiny and brand new, sitting on the fire escape one morning in all its galvanized aluminum glory.
She asks her neighbors on the shared escape if it's theirs. "No ma'am, never seen that before," they say politely, and once she's asked all of them, she feels confident in her initial reaction: the bucket is a gift from the universe, and she knows what to do with those. It’s to be taken care of, kept nice and pristine until its purpose is finally revealed. She gets home from asking everyone, tired in a way she never knew was possible - Joe's loss still keenly felt, seven months on, the muggy summer heat, trudging up and down what feels like fifty sets of stairs but was only three in reality - and the moment her posterior hits the chair, the contractions start.
Doc MacNamara in the building next door takes a long look at her. “Mrs. Rogers, are you alright?” he asks politely.
She shakes her head, correcting herself. “Well, I’m fine, but it’s time,” she says tiredly, rubbing the underside of her belly. He nods, turning quickly to get his bag together. He hails them a cab and gets her to the hospital with all haste, where fourteen hours later, she delivers a tiny baby boy with a very noisy set of lungs. "Steven Grant, after our fathers," she breathes as they try to get him to latch at her breast. He finally does, once he's clean and dry, and she is too, and they fall asleep like that, and she dreams that her husband got to meet their son.
Her Stevie is never more than a dozen feet from the bucket. It holds his clean diapers while he's still in them. When he outgrows those, it holds his few toys. It's his drum when he's two, it's his sink when he plays house when he’s four, and one way or another the bucket ends up cherished by him without her ever having to tell him how or why. (She's really glad the drum phase is over, as is every neighbor on their floor. Steve lights up so bright when he plays that it's impossible to want to take it away from him. Thankfully he seems to understand 'quiet time'.)
She takes him to the beach for his sixth birthday, for a day of hot sun, hot dogs, and all the cool lemonade he can drink. She got a promotion to the the pediatric floor of the hospital not long ago, adding a healthy amount to her previously just-decent check. For once, she can afford to treat her angel to a nice day out.
He's liberally coated in the sun-stopping cream her Nana taught her to make. Higher up the beach, a few feet away from the high tide line, she hides from the sun under her large new umbrella with a book. She watches Steve scoop the sand into the bucket, then haul it back to his construction site and dump it out. He repeats the process a dozen times at least before he's satisfied. Then he digs, and digs, and digs some more, chatting happily to himself as he goes, down almost a foot until he finds the water line, and then he finally starts to build, filling his bucket to the top, patting the sand down, then upending it to create towers and walls. Smiling contentedly, she turns her attention to her book, leaving him to his work.
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Steve finds the tiny creature - no bigger than the span of his hand from the tip of his pinky to the tip of his thumb - on his last wet-sand scavenging run. He peers into the bucket of salt water and sand, waving down at the thing he found. Squid? Is it a squid? At first, it moves too fast for him to be able to count its legs, but it soon settles down on the bottom, and he giggles. It's pretty, color changing from brown to green and then to a sort of a greyish color. Steve waves at the thing in the bucket - the octopus, he corrects himself, it has eight legs - and it picks up one leg and waves back, making Steve laugh with high, loud delight. His mom looks up at his giggle and waves at him, seeing his upraised hand, and he waves back at her too, so she doesn't feel silly. He wasn't waving at her, but it's not her fault she can’t see the creature in the bucket.
He has building to do, and he hefts the full bucket, marine life and all, back up to where the rest of his haul of sand rests. He digs a hole with a piece of driftwood. It's fun, because he can see exactly how he wants the castle to look in his mind. He just has to built it, so he can see it for real! And so he digs and he digs, finding the water line, and how nice and cool the sand is there. “I can make you a little pool, so you aren’t stuck in there all day!” he says as he turns back to the bucket, only to find the octopus hatchling - he thinks that’s what octopus babies are called? - the adult ones at the Castle Clinton Aquarium are SO much bigger - peering at him over the rim, four legs holding it in place on each side. It clings there, alien eyes meeting his, before dunking back under the water. It bobs back up a moment later, re-moistened, and suctions itself back into place. They stare at each other, Steve squinting back at it fiercely, before it squirts him with water from one of the things near its eyes, waving its little legs in the air and ducking back below the surface.
"Hey!" he sputters, wet and laughing. It creeps back up the inside of the bucket slowly, stopping most of the way to the top. He gives his mother a grin and a wave when she checks on him again, after his outburst, and he turns back to his octopus as she turns back to her book. "'M building as fast as I can. I don't see you helping," he whispers, and it waves its tiny legs in the air again. "Yeah, yeah, you're small. I'm small too, so cool your jets." Steve grins, thinking he’s pretty clever, thank ya kindly. Jets! he thinks. He laugh as he digs, hoping the thing never squirts him with ink. He’d seen the octopuses at the aquarium do that. It looked...messy.
The octopus dunks itself again, resurfacing like it had before. To Steve's surprise, it crawls all the way to the outside of the bucket, onto the sand, and into the hollowed out divot full of water that Steve dug, swimming in joyous circles, propelling itself weirdly with its tentacles.
"Sorry buddy, if I knew you wanted outta the bucket, I woulda taken you ba-" Steve starts to say in apology, before he gets a full jet of water to the sternum. "Okay, okay. You don’t want back back in the water?" He gets that happy leg wave of agreement before the thing starts zipping back around the pool. Steve idly wonders if he's been in the sun too long, and he shakes his head before he starts building up some sandy castle walls. Usually, he wouldn't have built the moat first, but he doesn't normally have an occupant for his sandcastles besides himself, either.
Steve gets three walls built and starts on the fourth. Sometimes he has to plop a leg - with an apology in advance - into the little pool to reach the far side without getting up. His companion doesn't seem to mind, investigating his toes and toenails with tiny, tiny suckers, before moving to his ankle and his leg.
"That tickles," he laughs when they detach for the first time, because it feels weird. Not bad, not good, just bizarre. It's less strange the more it happens though, and by time the fourth wall is done, it doesn't bother him until the suckers attach to the sole of his very ticklish foot. He manages to not shriek with reflexive laughter, instead gently guiding the octopus away from the sensitive area.
"Here. Wanna see your kingdom?" he asks, resting one cupped hand in the pool, and it quickly jets itself into the palm of his hand and latches on. Steve grins and brings it up to eye level so his companion can survey the castle. It does that leg-wiggle again, so he lowers his hand to the closest wall. The little octopus darts off his hand, scrabbling to grip where the sand isn't quite packed down and dry. It disappears over the wall and down, and Steve feels a pang of sadness. He didn't want it to run away, but it's a wild octopus and he's had a lot more time with it than he’d expected. Of course it ran. But it was so...friendly, somehow?
Just as he’s accepted that it’s likely gone for good, a round, squishy head peer up over a different wall, legs slithering up and over as it explores, and Steve feels a weirdly powerful sense of relief. He's never felt anything like it, except for when he can't find his Ma at the park, and then she's suddenly there again, like magic.
"Oh!" he exclaims quietly, and it does that fast, goofy run again, zipping down the wall and up his foot and leg. It suctions its way up his arm and stops on his shoulder so it can stare him down again. "I'm glad you didn't leave," he tells it with a smile, holding a finger out in offering. A tiny leg reaches out, slow and careful, followed by a second, until both wrap around the tip of Steve’s finger. Its colors change in rippling patterns, blue and that slate grey alternating, and Steve doesn't know what it means, but he likes it. They sit like that for a moment, then it lets go of his shoulder and pulls itself up to his hand, using it as a springboard to dive back into the pool below.
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Sarah watches, the book forgotten in her lap, while Steve plays with a sea creature (or something that looks like one, at least) barely the size of his hand, smiling to herself. Her sweet boy, so shy and kind and brilliant. He’s coming further out of his shell than she's ever seen him do with anyone but her, and she knows his new friend is coming home in that bucket with them. The world is far larger than most humans realize, and that it reveals itself in strange ways, if it chooses to reveal itself at all. Fae or faceless one or something in between - or even more other, she doesn’t know - whatever the creature is, this is her and Steve’s destiny. Her home is its home now; that's her end of the bargain. The universe's gifts are to be honored, even when they seem incomprehensible.
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"Stevie!" his mother calls, and he feels a wave of panic. She's already all packed up and headed towards him. "Sunshine, it's time to go home." An icky ball of distress forms in his throat and he cups the octopus protectively in his hands. She's going to make him leave his friend, he's going to be alone again, just him and Ma, no friends but the ones he draws for himself, and he's starting to pull in the air for a good cry when she continues. "Stevie-love. Go fill up your bucket so we can all go home, okay?" She smiles, hands cupped in front of him, kneeling so she’s eye level with the octopus. It bolts to her hands, waving its little legs more excitedly than Steve's seen all day. He grabs his bucket with a shout of laughter, running down to the waves to fill it, running back trying to keep water from sloshing over the sides.
"Careful, baby. Don't set your lungs off," she chides, and she trades him their beach towels for the bucket. His new friend drops in with a splash, and peers over the rim their whole way home. Steve grins at it every chance he gets.
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Once they get back, the bucket and its occupant get temporarily placed in their tub. Sarah didn't expect to need a large container of water before they left for the day, and she certainly doesn't own anything suitable to keep an octopus in. Her single vase is watertight, even if the rim is chipped, but it's even smaller than the bucket, too small for anything to live in. She finally ends up taking the bucket back out of the tub so she can give Steve his bath. Afterwards, she rinses the tub and fills it back up halfway. She adds most of the salt in the house and lowers the bucket into it for the occupant to investigate at its own leisure.
"Alright," she tells the room as a whole, putting it out into the universe, "that's the best I can do. I hope it'll suit, and if not hopefully it'll at least do for the night. We'll see what we can find in the morning. I mean no offense if it's...not to your standards."
Steve looks at her funny. "Aw, Ma. You did real good. Look at how much room they got now!" he reassures her, and she looks back in the tub.
The little octopus zips around the bottom of the tub, around and around the curved part, coloration rippling through blue and grey. It plays for at least a minute while they watch, until it finally stops in front of them and climbs up the side of the tub to attach itself to the wide, curved rim. It lifts a pair of legs and Sarah kneels down so they're the same height, reaching a finger as Steve had done earlier. She can't help a grin when it attaches suckers to the tips of her finger, still rippling through its soothing colors. She sighs with relief. She got this right, she knows in her bones, and she rises when the tiny suckers detach.
"Just a few minutes, my little bear. It's time for bed," she says, ruffling his hair before she goes to change into her sleep clothes.
The day has been... good. She gave her son a fine birthday, and now she knows why the universe led her to the bucket, even if it brought something far more strange home with it. Sarah wishes desperately that her mam or her grandmother or her great-aunties were still here; they knew so much more about these sorts of things than she does. She’s disconnected from home and her past more than ever, not that she'd have anyone back there were she to return. They're long gone and buried, and sure, she knows people from home here too, but - she's not sure she would want to start up a conversation about...this.
There's a loud splash, and a yelp of surprise, and she pinches the bridge of her nose as she prepares to chide Steve for - for falling in the tub, from the sound of it.
"What in heaven's name-" is as far as she gets before she sees the soaked, sheepish-looking kid in her tub. Brunette and chubby cheeked, grinning up at her with oddly familiar slate-grey eyes, knees up and hands wrapped around them, naked as the day he was born. (What day is that, anyway? she wonders. Was he born? Did he hatch? Did he… manifest??) Steve's been staring at him since she came in the room.
"Ma'am?" the new boy asks (how does he have a thick Brooklyn accent? she thinks distantly, not that that’s the weirdest part of all this), "you got any clothes I can borrow?"
She laughs hysterically, going to find one of her old nightgowns - Steve is too small for his clothes to fit - and she hears her son pull up all his courage with an inhale, and he asks, "Hey, um. You got a name?" He sounds rattled, but like he’s putting on a brave front, and she feels pride clutch her heart.
"Yeah, I got one, but you can't pronounce it with these mouths. You need a beak," he replies, and he sounds sad, before the brighter follow-up of, "Wanna give me one?"
Steve laughs as he immediately answers, "Bucket?" and she comes back into the kitchen in time to see the boy flick water at Steve. She hands the nightgown and a clean towel to her son, shaking her head and waiting for them to work it out, heading off to her own bed.
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"I might be an octopus, but even I know people aren't called Bucket," the strange boy huffs.
Steve hands him the towel and turns around. "Jimmy down the street's got a great-uncle called Bucky. So there you go. You can be a Bucky?" he offers.
The towel stop moving for a moment. "Okay," the boy says slowly, grinning as he continues. “Yeah. Yeah, that’s a great name! With how you found me, ‘n everything.” Pulling the nightgown over his head, he taps Steve on the shoulder until he turns around, sticking his hand out flat and vertical. "Hi Steve, nice'ta meet you. I'm Bucky," he says warmly, grinning at his friend, the one he's waited eons and eons for.
Steve grabs it with a matching grin, and shakes it vigorously. "Nice'ta meet you too, Bucky," he replies, and they grin at each other until Steve drags him into the living room to pull the cushions off the couch and dump them on the floor.
"Wanna learn how to make a pillow fort?" he asks eagerly.
Bucky giggles before he answers, "Yeah, Stevie, can I help?"