I sit at a small clamfe in downclam Clamsclamclam (clampital of the Clamtherclams), a half-eaten clamssaint and a clamp of clamfee sitting on the clamter in front of me while I clam through a list of world clampitals on my clamphone. Clamberra. Oceaington D.C. (District of Clambia). Molluskow. Geoduckarta. Quahogla Lumpur.
"I wish OP had stopped at 200%" I clamment, to noclam in particular.
summary: you, bucky, and sam meet up to work out the road trip. but when you get there, there's a certain someone from your past..one that bucky really doesn't like.
1.7k wrds.
includes: friends to lovers, LOTS of yearning, crushes, angst, forced proximity, only one bed, fluff, slow burn (kinda), female reader, no use of y/n
cw: eventual smut
previous chapter read on ao3 join my taglist!
You stare at the ceiling and sigh. Lying in bed, it was easy to go over everything that had happened that day. To over-analyze and pick apart interactions you had. Especially with Bucky.
Lately, it had only been Bucky running through your thoughts.
You though about a lot of things. His eyes. The corded muscles of his arms. The way the cool metal of his fingertips felt against your wrist. That one especially made your pulse race.
God, why were you like this? It made you feel so guilty and perverted. But the thing was, you craved that guiltiness. It felt so good, so wrongfully right to think of him in that way. Thinking about the way his head fell back against the couch, arms spread out across the backing. He was so big and strong. He could easily pick you up and pin you against a wall.
It should have made you wary. He was an ex-assassin! But you knew Bucky would never hurt you. That's what made it really hurt. Not his physical attractiveness, but his soft side. The one that would binge TV with you and cover you with a blanket when you fell asleep.
It was odd, really. The way you simultaneously wanted to put band-aids on his paper cuts and wanted him to pound you into a bed.
And the boner...
You told yourself it was fine. It was purely an anatomical reaction that happened. His body recognized a warm female body, and responded accordingly. Maybe he hadn't gotten action in a while. You secretly prayed he hadn't, even though it wasn't fair in the slightest.
Your thighs rubbed against each other. The wetness that had gathered between your thighs was purely anatomical too. Just a reaction. That's it.
Normally, if something like this happened, you would bust out your trusty old wand vibrator and get it out of your system. But not when it was Bucky. You didn't know if you could look your best friend in the eyes tomorrow if you did that, and thought about how his cock would slowly slide in and out of your hole. Inch by inch. Nope! You weren't gonna do that.
Instead, you rolled over and reached for your phone, the perfect distraction. Your fingers tapped along until they reached Instagram, which you hadn't caught up on in a while. Scrolling down, there was on common theme with all of your mutual's posts. Weddings. Anniversaries. Proposals. Honeymoons. Pregnancies. It seemed like everyone but you was falling in love. Well, reciprocated love, at least.
You wanted that. So badly.
But the one person you wanted that with, you couldn't have. It had become a stupid little mantra in your head: Don't ruin the friendship.
Sighing, you plugged in your phone and drifted off into sleep.
---
The next morning, you walk down to the coffee shop the three of you agreed on. It's a cute place, with a yellow-and-white striped canopy elegantly draped above the storefront. A black chalkboard sits outside, with handwriting advertising a famous strawberry lemonade. Lemonade. The thought brings you back to the previous night, when Bucky forgot about his.
Because of the thing. The thing you are ignoring for his sake and yours.
As you walk toward the entrance, an elderly man notices and holds open the door. You smile and thank him. Just as you start scanning the tables for your friends, the bar catches your eye. Specifically a barista.
Oh, no.
You awkwardly try to back out the door, but the elderly man is gone, and your back makes contact with something solid and warm. A person. You whip around, an apology on your lips, but your words die in your mouth as you see who it is. Bucky.
He steadies you, lightly setting his arms on your waist. "Careful there. What's going on? Why you in a rush?"
You scramble for words, but can't seem to find them. But when you glance over your shoulder, Bucky seems to understand immediately. His hands tighten on your waist, arms going rigid.
Because standing behind the counter, wearing a yellow apron that looks comical on his lanky frame, is Jason.
Not quite ever becoming your boyfriend, you and Jason had a complicated relationship. You would hook up, ghost each other, and repeat. Thinking back on it, you didn't even really like him. Because you were searching for something that only one person could give you. Jason and you had finally decided to stop seeing each other about 8 months ago, and you hadn't thought of him since. Not until now, at least.
Jason hadn't noticed you yet, thank God. You glance back at Bucky. His lips are pressed into a thin line, his jaw ticking. Stepping out of his death grip, you try to think of something to say. Maybe you could try a different spot. But then, like the devil he is, Sam pops up out of where he was sitting in the corner, coffee already in hand.
"Hey, lovebirds! Over here!"
Trying your hardest not to glance at Bucky again, you walk over to Sam, trying to genuinely smile. You were happy to see him, of course, but right now was really not a good time for his jokes.
You half-whisper, "Hey, Sam. Can we um...keep it down a bit?" You gesture towards the bar, where Jason has no doubt noticed you now. "That's...Jason."
"Oh, shit! My bad, my bad--"
"Don't worry about it. It's fine. I just have to get it over with, I think. Bucky?"
Bucky snaps out of the glare he had been leveling Jason ever since he identified him.
To say Bucky didn't like Jason was an understatement. You had told him all about the ups and downs between the two of you, and Bucky had grown to roll his eyes every time he was mentioned.
The most he knew about dating was from the 40's. Explaining 'ghosting' to him was quite the task. Bucky didn't understand why you kept going back to him, even after he left pee on your toilet seat. You couldn't quite explain why you did either.
"Bucky, do you want anything? I'm gonna go order."
"I'm coming with you." The serious look on his face dares you to argue with him. You don't.
"Ohh-kayy. Chill out a bit, will you? We don't wan't you to be on the run for attempted murder."
His anger on your behalf was cute. Some might even call it jealousy, a voice in your head says.
Purely friendly, though. Platonic jealousy. Jason was an asshole, and that's why Bucky is mad. Right?
The two of you stride up to the cashier, where Jason was currently typing away a customer's order. They were moderately busy, with you and Bucky only having to wait for the person in front of you. Finally, you approach the cash.
"Do my eyes deceive me? What are you doing here, stalking my work?" Jason says, smirk on his face. "What's up with your bodyguard?"
Bucky remains silent.
"Hi Jason. I promise I didn't know you work here. This is my friend, Bucky. I'm sure I've mentioned him before?"
"Yeah, sure. What can I get you guys?"
You politely order the largest size of their strawberry lemonade with light ice, and one black coffee. Bucky remains hulking next to you, silent. It's like you can feel his moody shadow lurking over you.
"Okay then, cash or card--"
"I'll pay," Bucky butts in. Despite your protests, you know that this is a losing fight. That was another one of his many green flags. Bucky doesn't let you pay for anything. Something about the Avenger's paycheck being good.
After letting him tapping his card, the two of you stroll to the pickup counter. You lean against it, eyebrow raised.
"What's wrong? Why are you acting so...different?"
Bucky's blue eyes stare into yours, imploring. You feel like he's trying to tell you something through just a look. He sighs, closing his eyes.
"I just...slept really bad. The nightmares."
His words send a pang through you. You knew all about how much he struggles with sleeping, even with all the therapy he's put himself through. The dark circles under his eyes made you want to tuck him in bed and kiss his forehead.
"Bucky...you know you can talk to me whenever you want. I'm right here," you insisted. "I hate seeing you like this. Are you sure that's all it is?"
His eyes drift back up towards yours. A beat.
"Yup." His lips pop on the p. Despite his words, you still feel like there's something he's holding back from you. Oh well. If Bucky doesn't want to talk, you're not going to force him to.
"Ok then. Hey, I think you should go sit with Sam. Look at him, he looks like a lonely puppy! I'll wait for the drinks, don't worry."
Bucky gives you one last unreadable look and stalks over to Sam, his metal arm glinting in the sunlight.
He can be so cryptic sometimes.
As you wait for the drinks, you admire New York in spring. The sunlight streams through the windows in rays of gold, making everything look that much more delicious. Just as you begin contemplating if it's worth going back up to ask Jason for a blueberry muffin, your beverages arrive. One large strawberry lemonade and a pure black coffee. Bucky has a taste for bitter drinks.
You pick them up and walk over to the table. Sam and Bucky haven't noticed you yet, and are still conspiratorially whispering with each other when you approach.
"--eight months! I'm telling you dude, she's not--" Sam abruptly stops when he sees you. He plasters on a fake smile that has a hint of guiltiness behind it. "Look who it is! Now that didn't take very long, did it? Man, you've got to try this coffee, its the best!"
His rambling makes you slightly suspicious, but you decide not to question him. Setting down the drinks, you take the last remaining seat and take a sip.
"Huh. Not bad. How's the coffee, Bucky?"
"Good." His fingers lightly circle the rim, veins in his forearms protruding.
"So, about this road trip. Sounds fun! How are we getting there?"
For the rest of the morning, you, Sam, and Bucky work out the details. You have the weekend off of work, and Bucky is almost always available, so you three settle on leaving in two days. Sam says he can drive everyone there, and claims he's got a really good car for it. The look on his face says the opposite.
This should go well.
a/n: i lowkey don't really like this chapter lol oh well the next one is gonna be better!
summary: you and bucky are friends. period. and you aren't going past that. but the tension between the two of you is rising, and neither of you can hold it in much longer...and there's a road trip.
2k wrds.
includes: friends to lovers, LOTS of yearning, crushes, angst, forced proximity, only one bed, fluff, slow burn (kinda), female reader, no use of y/n
cw: eventual smut, alcohol use
next chapter read on ao3 join my taglist!
You were addicted to Bucky Barnes.
His steel blue eyes, strong jawline, and that debilitating smile. The one that hooked you the moment you set eyes on him. His normally brooding expression would widen, his lips stretching into a genuine grin. Dimples. God, those dimples. But it wasn't just how beautiful or attractive he looked when he smiled. It was the worthwhile fight you had to put up to see it there. You see, Bucky didn't just hand out his smiles freely to any stranger. His smiles were earned, just like his trust. After so many years as the Winter Soldier, he wasn't used to it.
Bucky had been brainwashed and beaten until he didn't even remember his own name, and now that he was out of it, he was still slowly relearning joy. And you were going to be there for every step of it.
Therefore, you cannot fall in love with him.
Well, you might already be failing at that last thing. Just a tiny bit. But you were determined to be a supportive pillar during his healing journey, and not go anywhere farther than best friends.
Yup. Just a couple. Of besties.
You are jumped out of your thoughts at a sudden ding from your phone. Sliding your fingers across the glass screen, you unlock it to a text.
Bucky: Hey, mind if I come over now to fix that unstable chair?
Bucky: Or whatever time works for you.
Bucky: I can't find the smiling face emoji.
You bite your lip. He was unfairly cute. You quickly type back a reply:
R: yeah i'm just at home, u can come over
Sighing, you lock your phone and set it down. Bucky and his obsession with your safety. He had discovered the chair yesterday, and had immediately decided he was going back home to grab his toolbox. You told him it was fine and it could wait, but he insisted. Finally, you whittled him down to coming back tomorrow and he relented, sulking. You managed to distract him by turning on an episode of Sex and the City, which he was oddly invested in. He insisted he was a Miranda.
You sit down on the couch. On the left side, because the right side was Bucky's. God, you couldn't stop thinking about him even when he wasn't there! What were you doing, leaving space for an imaginary man? You huff and sit in the middle.
Out of the corner of your eye, a black strap peeking out from under the couch catches your eye. You pull it out, and incredulously look at the reason you and Bucky had even met in the first place. Your misplaced gym bag! You had figured it lost. Bucky had the exact same one. Black, simple, no logos. Easy to accidentally take someone elses.
It had been two years ago. You had enrolled in a yoga class at a gym three blocks down, after a friend's recommendation. It had been enjoyable and stress-relieving, acting as a physical way you could decompress. You particularly liked the rhythm of stretching and holding. After, you went to pick up your bag from the cubbies they keep at the front. Being exhausted and sweaty, you picked up the first black bag you saw and hightailed it out of there.
In your defense, they looked exactly the same. But the contents of the bag were the opposite of what you expected. Upon opening, you discovered a copy of The Hobbit, a baseball, and a banged up black water bottle. That was it. You checked the tiny pockets in the front, but absolutely nothing. How were you supposed to identify this person and give them their bag back? You sighed. Just your luck.
After lying down in bed and mourning the loss of your brand new pink waterbottle, you decided to go through the bag one more time. You inspected the bottom of the thermos. No name. You rolled the ball around, checking them entire surface, but nothing. Finally, you picked up the book. A new edition, something that could be picked up at any random bookstore. The corners were bent and the pages were frayed, though. Clearly this copy had been well loved by its owner. You flipped to the first page, and there it was.
Barnes.
Nothing else. Just a name. You were greatly confused. Was it a last name? Or maybe they had forgotten to write & Noble? This clearly wasn't very helpful. You wondered what this person was like, to own such a small amount of items. Maybe they were some sort of minimalistic yoga person whose entire belongings can fit in a suitcase.
At least you had been smart enough to keep your phone and wallet on you. Or else, you wouldn't have gotten his text.
Unknown: I have your bag.
Unknown: Did you take mine?
You let out a slightly embarrassing squeal. Who cares if the text was creepy, your bag wasn't lost forever!
R: yeahh i did sorry lol!
R: wait
R: what's your last name?
You watched the three dots with high anticipation. Finally, a responses comes:
Unknown: Barnes
"Yes!"
R: ok perfect! just had to make sure
R: wanna meet up and trade? theres a bar on west 62nd that has 2 dollar mai tais after 7!
R: i'll buy as an apology :)))
Barnes: See you at 7.
When you walked into the bar that night, black bag slung over your shoulder, you didn't expect to see what you did. To be honest, you kind of expected a hippie. But Bucky? With his tall frame and beefy biceps? Yeah, you could deal with that. Definitely.
You walked over to him, sitting at the bar, black bag placed on the stool next to him. Tapped him on the shoulder. He turned his head. Deep blue eyes trained themselves on you. You felt a slight hitch in your breath. He looked shocked. You both stared at each other in silence for a beat before you spoke.
"Barnes, right?" You were proud of how stable your voice was, despite the love-at-first-sight romcom moment you had just experienced.
"Um..yeah. Yeah, that's me." A slight blush dusted the tops of his cheeks. Maybe you weren't what he expected either.
"Sorry, can I sit?" Bucky quickly moved the bag off of the stool. You dropped his bag on the counter, and he fumbled to grab yours. When he handed it to you, your hands brushed. Just the slightest touch, but the butterflies in your stomach amplified by ten.
"Sorry about this whole thing," you began, but he started talking at the same moment. "Thank you for meeting me--" Both of you stop at the same time, and you shyly giggle. The corners of his mouth turn up slightly.
"Ok, I'll go first. I wanna apologize for stealing your bag! I mean, what are the chances that we both own the exact same bag and go to the exact same gym at the same time? By the way, I love The Hobbit too! Have you seen the movies?" You ramble on.
"No, I...haven't seen many movies."
"What?! You need to! They're so good! Anyways, back to my apology--wait, let's get Mai Tais first!"
His hint of a smile is the only response you need.
That night, you enjoy yourself way more than you ever thought you would. Supplemented by the 2 dollar Mai Tais and a sudden urge to know everything about this man's life (including his first name) you and Bucky stayed at the bar until 12 am. You discover that while he is very mysterious about his past, he eventually opens up and tells you bit by bit. In turn, he learns about your parent's divorce and your terrible dating life.
It was fun. He was smart, and funny, but also polite and genuinely kind. Bucky showed interest in what you had to say and listened attentively. He treated every word that came out of your mouth like it was the most important thing ever said.
And if he glanced at your lips for slightly too long, or you stared into his blue eyes until you got nervous, it didn't matter. Because the two of you were going to be just friends, you decided.
He didn't need another stressor added onto his life after his past trauma.
A sudden knock at the door jolts you out of your trip down memory lane. Bucky, here to fix your chair. Great.
You walk over and turn the door handle, and stare at the six-foot-tall man hulking in your doorway, toolbox in hand.
"Bucky, did you run over here?"
He chuckles. "Maybe. Just a tiny bit. A respectable jog! How did you know?"
"Because you're huffing and puffing and you got here in 3 minutes. Bucky, it's really not that big of a deal! I'm not going to break my back because my chair is a little bit wobbly!"
He stalked past you into your kitchen, approaching the offending chair like it was an enemy in combat that he was determined to strike down. "Can't have my favourite girl falling off a chair now, can I? Just gotta--" He flipped it over with ease, kneeling down to inspect the leg. The angle gave you an extremely unfair view of his broad shoulders, jutting out into his toned arms. You wanted to take a bite out of him.
While he fiddles with the wood and opens his toolbox, you open the fridge and take out a pitcher of freshly squeezed lemonade. Grabbing two glasses from the cabinet, you pour two cups. Bucky glances up at you from his position and smiles. Dimples. "You know me so well. Thank you, sweetheart."
You smile back. "Can't have my favourite boy dying of thirst after his run now, can I?"
A strand of hair falls from his wind-swept hair into his eye. His gaze lowers before the moment lingers for too long. He knows just as well as you do what happens then. The thoughts that race through your head. The what-ifs.
He's not interested in a relationship, you tell yourself. You know this because ever since the two of you met, you haven't even seen him ever so much as glance at another person. He didn't date. You didn't ask why, because you're not sure if you would like the response.
"Sam mentioned something about going back to Delacroix in a few days. He invited the both of us," Bucky says as he twists a screwdriver. "Would you wanna go?"
The question warms you. "I'd love to! I haven't seen Sarah in so long, her kids must be...how old?"
"Ten and twelve. Anyways, I thought you'd say that. We're gonna grab coffee tomorrow to work out the dates, I hope you'll come? Good. I can't bare Sam's teasing by myself for much longer."
Of course. Sam was determined to tease you and Bucky about the tension between you two until you get married, apparently. Just last week, he introduced the two of you as a couple to his neighbour. When you and Bucky blushed and profusely denied it, Sam (not so silently) whispered to them that it was only a matter of time.
Bucky flips the chair back over and gestures for you to sit on it. You do, and it feels as solid as a rock. You smile at Bucky. "What would I do without you?"
Date other people without feeling guilty. You don't say that out loud.
Bucky chuckles. "Break your back, clearly."
You get up, intending to give him a friendly pat on the back. Instead, at the touch of your hand on his shoulder, Bucky's strong arms pull you in for a hug. He smells like lemons and warmth. He feels like home. Your heart aches at the thought. You feel his shoulders decompress as he slowly relaxes into the hug, exhaling into the crook of your neck. His stubble gently scratches you.
You wonder how soft his dark hair would feel. Just as you reach up to run your hands through it, Bucky jolts up. His body detaches from you like two magnets from similar poles.
The grimace on his face is clear. He looks slightly ashamed, blush rushing across his face.
He manages to bite out, "Um--see you tomorrow." before practically running out the door, his lemonade completely abandoned.
And if you saw a tent in his pants, you pretend like it didn't happen.
a/n: hope you enjoyed! i hope to have the next chapter up in the next few days, ty for reading! (p.s. bucky being a miranda is 100% canon)
Warnings: Mild Violence. Period expected misogyny.
Summary: A knight from another century crashes -literally- into a florist’s life and turns her world upside down.
Word Count: 4.3k
Previous Chapter - Masterlist
The brief encounter with the street outside the store had done nothing to prepare him for this.
He counted the buildings without meaning to. Four here. Six there. All of them tall in a way that offended his understanding of what stone and mortar were meant to do.
Small stone, at that.
He tilted his head back once, studying the face of a structure looming over the street, and felt something close to vertigo.
The bricks -if that was even the word- were absurdly small, identical, and stacked in rows so precise they might have been drawn with a ruler and simply willed into permanence.
Higher than any keep he'd laid siege to. Higher than the bell tower at Wintermouth Cathedral, which had taken forty years and three master masons and had still needed scaffolding twice in his lifetime.
How does it hold?
She stopped in front of one such building, smaller than its neighbors, though smaller was doing considerable work in that sentence, and mounted three steps to a set of doors.
She pulled one open without ceremony, without announcing herself to anyone, without a steward or a porter to bar entry to a stranger, and walked inside as though the building belonged to her the way a woman owns a shawl.
He followed, because there was nothing else to do, and stepped into a hall.
Marble underfoot, or something convincingly like it. A row of small brass boxes set into one wall, each with a slot and a number, they purpose entirely opaque. Light again without flame, hanging in a glass fixture overhead, steady and shadowless.
This is not a florist's household, he thought.
He knew what it was to walk into a great house as a guest and be received as one. He knew, with rather more bitterness, what it was to walk into a great house as staff, had spent enough of his squireship fetching, carrying, standing at attention in halls not unlike this one, waiting to be noticed or ignored, whichever suited the lord in question that day.
Was that it, then? Flowers by morning, service by evening? some second position in a household large enough to warrant it, explaining the marble, the brass, the strange indifferent grandeur of the place?
He said none of this. He had learned, in the space of one morning, that his conclusions about this century had a poor survival rate once spoken aloud. So he held his tongue and followed her toward a narrow staircase at the back of the hall.
The climbing did nothing to improve his opinion of the day, since each step was a constant reminder of the state of his bruised ribs. He kept his breathing even through will alone, one hand trailing the rail, and said nothing.
She glanced back once, near the second landing, some question half-formed on her face. He gave her nothing to work with, so she turned around and kept climbing.
By the third floor, sweat had gathered along his spine beneath the ruined shirt, and his vision had gone a touch too bright at the edges, a warning he chose to ignore in favor of counting doors instead of stairs.
---
She'd clocked it two flights ago, the careful, deliberate way he was breathing, the hand that never quite let go of the rail, the fact that a man who'd crossed half of Camden without complaint had gone very quiet somewhere around the second landing.
She didn't say anything. She had a feeling he'd sooner collapse on her stairwell than admit to needing a minute, and there was something in the set of his jaw - stubborn, absurdly proud, entirely unbothered by what it was clearly costing him - that she found herself, against her better judgment, a little charmed by. Which was not a thought she had time for right now, with a bleeding stranger three steps behind her and a landing still to reach.
She kept climbing. Slower than she strictly needed to. Just in case.
----
A corridor stretched ahead of them, narrow, lined with identical doors, and identical brass numbers screwed into identical wood.
He catalogued it out of habit -the width, how many doors stood between them and the stairs- before it occurred to him that there was likely nothing here worth defending against, and the habit still refused to switch itself off.
From behind one door, there was music. Not lute or pipe, but something layered and strange, a woman's voice threaded through with instruments he couldn't place.
From another, the smell of onions frying, rich enough that his stomach gave a low, traitorous rumble.
He frowned at that second door as they passed it.
The kitchens were on the third floor. It made no sense.
Kitchens belonged low, ground level, or below it if the house could afford the excavation, close to the well and the fuel stores, far enough from the sleeping quarters that smoke and grease didn't creep into a lord's bedding.
Every keep he'd ever served in, ever laid siege to, ever simply visited, kept its kitchens low. He turned it over, half convinced he was missing some obvious explanation, and came up with nothing.
Unless this household ran differently. Unless the entire logic of the place inverted itself the way everything else in this century seemed determined to.
She stopped in front of a door indistinguishable from the others save its number, and drew a ring of keys from her purse, finding the right one without hesitation, the ease of long habit. The lock turned, and the door opened onto a narrow entry, dim and modest, but unmistakably a dwelling.
He stood in the corridor a moment longer than necessary, his gaze moving once more down the row of identical doors stretching in both directions. Service quarters, he decided.
"You may introduce me to your employer at your convenience," he said, following her through. "I would prefer not to be mistaken for an intruder in his household a second time today."
She turned to look at him with an expression he was rapidly learning to be wary of, the kind that came right before she informed him he'd misunderstood something, in a manner she found simultaneously exhausting and, despite herself, a little bit funny.
He didn't yet know what he'd said wrong. That, too, was becoming familiar.
"My employer," she repeated.
"The lord of this house." He gestured back toward the corridor and its row of doors, already bracing -without quite knowing why- for the ground to shift under him again.
She closed the door behind him and looked at him a moment, one hand still on the latch, working through how precisely to explain something she'd clearly never had to explain to a grown man before.
"Mr. Barnes," she said slowly. "There is no lord."
"Then whose house-" He stopped himself. Every theory he'd voiced aloud today had met the same fate, and he saw no cause to expect this one would fare better.
"This is my apartment." She said the word carefully. "It's mine. I pay rent on it every month, out of what the shop makes. Every one of those doors you just walked past, that's not one household. That's a different family behind every single one. A different kitchen, different bathrooms. Strangers to each other, mostly, sharing a staircase and nothing else."
He stared at her, and felt the shape of the building rearrange itself in his mind. It was not a great house at all, but something closer to a hive. Dozens of lives stacked one atop the other with nothing holding them together but shared stairs and walls.
"An entire building," he said slowly, "of strangers."
"Yes."
"Stacked."
"...Yes."
She was watching him, but with an attention that had nothing to do with the conversation they were having, and he felt it land somewhere just beneath his collar before he'd decided what to make of it.
"Hey," she said, softer than before. "You look like you're about to go down again. Sit for a minute?"
She gestured toward a low, upholstered thing pushed against the far wall. Two cushioned seats joined into one continuous piece, the fabric a bright, unrepentant orange.
He had never seen its like. Not a bench, not quite a settle, too soft-looking for either, its cushions plump and uniform in a way no upholsterer he knew could have managed by hand.
It looked, if he was honest, extremely inviting.
It also looked new. Unmarked. The kind of thing a household kept for guests of consequence, and he was aware, with some discomfort, of exactly how far he fell from that description at present.
"I would ruin it," he said.
She blinked. "What?"
"The seat." He gestured at himself, at the dried blood, the dirt ground into the linen, the general catastrophe of a man who had crossed six centuries without the benefit of a bath. "That fabric will not survive contact with me. And I am not dressed to sit in a lady's parlor regardless."
Something flickered across her face, not quite amusement, but not quite exasperation either.
"It's not a parlor," she said. "It's just the living room. And it's a couch, Mr. Barnes, not a coronation throne. It'll survive."
"All the same." He held his ground, aware even as he did it that the ground in question was faintly ridiculous: a man arguing etiquette while swaying on his feet in a stranger's home, in a century that had already proven it cared nothing for the rules he knew.
He couldn't seem to let go of them regardless. They were, at the moment, nearly the only thing of his own he still had. "If you have something less consequential."
She studied him a moment longer, then exhaled through her nose in a way he was beginning to recognize as her particular flavor of surrender. "Fine. The kitchen, then."
She led him into a smaller room with a tiled floor, pale and clean, a window over a deep basin, and, against the wall, a small table with two chairs, their seats covered in the same relentless color as the couch, though blue instead of orange.
He lowered himself into one carefully, his ribs complaining the entire way down, and studied the chair beneath him.
Bright, even, unfaded blue. The kind of pigment that, in his experience, cost more per yard than the chair itself was likely worth.
For kitchen furniture.
"Water?" she asked, already moving toward the far wall.
He nodded, distracted, still cataloguing the room: the smoothness of every surface, the absence of soot anywhere. Then she opened a tall white cabinet set against the wall, and he stopped cataloguing anything at all.
Cold air rolled out of it. He felt it from where he sat, and some old instinct, the one that had kept him alive through winters of campaign, sat up and took notice before the rest of him had caught up.
"What," he said slowly, "is that?"
"The icebox?" She glanced back, one hand still on the door, a bottle in the other.
"It has no ice."
"It doesn't need ice, it's electric. Keeps things cold on its own."
He rose, forgetting his ribs for exactly as long as it took three steps to carry him there, and looked into the cabinet himself before she could object.
Shelves. Bottles. A bowl of eggs, pale and ordinary, sitting beside butter, unmelted, in a room warm enough that any butter he'd ever known would have long since gone soft and glistening on a table.
He found himself wanting, absurdly, to touch it, to confirm with his own hand what his eyes were telling him couldn't be true.
"How?"
"I don't actually know," she admitted, and there was something almost sheepish in it. "Something with wires, a motor… I don't know the mechanics of it any more than I know how a telephone carries a voice across town. It just works. You plug it in, and it's cold, and that's as far as my understanding goes."
He stared at the shelves a moment longer, at the ordinary miracle of butter refusing to soften, and felt something very close to wonder. And beneath the wonder, quieter, something that felt uncomfortably like grief.
Traveling through centuries, he had arrived at a place where a woman kept the dead of winter locked in a box in her kitchen and thought nothing of it.
She poured water into a glass -clear, flawless glass- and set it in front of him as though it were nothing at all.
He was hardly positioned to complain, since she had taken a bleeding stranger into her home and fed him besides, but he found himself glancing toward the cabinets regardless, expecting a jug of small ale, a pitcher of cider, anything a household of any means offered a guest before water.
Water alone, had killed men he'd known. Good men, careful men, who'd survived worse than a bad well and gone down anyway with their guts turned to fire. Almost every house's table poured ale or wine for that reason as much as for taste.
That this place, with its marble hall and its brass boxes and its indifferent grandeur, should hand him water and nothing else struck him as strange enough to notice.
He lifted the glass and drank anyway, telling himself that whatever this century had done to its water, it had also apparently solved the preservation of food in a cool box, and a man who trusted one miracle might as well trust the other.
The taste caught him off guard. It wasn’t unpleasant, but strange. No hint of the barrel it had traveled in, no faint rot at the back of the throat that a man learned to drink around.
It tasted, as far as he could tell, of nothing at all. Clean. He'd never had water that tasted that clean, and some old, wary part of him kept waiting for the sickness to follow regardless.
"Is it safe?" he asked, careful to keep the question light, a thing he was merely curious about, rather than a thing he genuinely needed answered before his next swallow.
"Perfectly. It's tap water, comes straight out of the faucet, city runs it through filtration before it ever gets to a pipe. You could drink it all day and never think twice."
Faucet. He turned the word over, another one for the stack, and said nothing.
She caught the blankness on his face and rose, crossing to the basin set into the counter.
"Here. If the jug ever runs dry and you want more, don't wait around for me. Just do this." She turned a small metal handle.
Water came. No need to pour, carry, or draw it up on a rope from some hidden well; it simply arrived, a clear, steady stream falling into the basin, as though the house itself had a vein opened somewhere and this was where it bled.
He was on his feet before he'd decided to be, some part of him needing, absurdly, to see the mechanism of it, as if enough looking might finally make it make sense. "Where does it come from?"
"Pipes. Underground, runs under the whole city, connects to a reservoir north of here. Every building's hooked into it." She watched him with open curiosity now. "You want it hot instead of cold, there's a second handle."
"Hot?"
"Mm-hm."
He looked at the two handles. Looked at her. Looked back at the water, still running, and felt the day's tally of impossible things tip over into something he no longer had the will to keep counting.
"You are telling me," he said slowly, "that every house in this city commands its own well. Hot and cold both. Without a servant, a bucket, or a rope."
"That's the general idea, yeah."
He said nothing for a long moment, turning it over, what a man could build, what a man could stop needing, if he never again had to haul water himself.
He thought, unbidden, of every squire and servant he'd ever sent down to a well at dawn, or even gone himself when he squired, and wondered what those boys would have made of this.
She reached past him and shut the tap. The water stopped as abruptly as it had come, and the silence that followed felt, absurdly, louder than the sound itself had been.
----
She watched him sit back down, slower than he probably wanted her to notice, and felt her own worry sharpen in response.
He was pale under the bruising. Worse than in the stockroom, now that the adrenaline of the street and the stairs had burned off and left him with nothing to run on but stubbornness. She was starting to suspect stubbornness was mostly what he had left today.
He needed a bath. Badly. And rest, and quiet, all of which she could actually provide here, behind a locked door, away from patrolmen and gossiping bakery owners. That part, at least, she could manage.
What she couldn't provide was clothes, and that was the part actually nagging at her.
He couldn't wear what he had on; there was no version of a corner grocery where a six-foot-something man in a laced medieval tunic and thigh straps walked in without every head turning. She'd been running through options since the stockroom and kept landing on the same one.
"I can wash what I'm wearing," he offered, apparently following the direction of her thoughts more accurately than she'd expected. "It only wants soap and water. I've done worse with less on campaign."
"It's not really a laundry problem, Mr. Barnes." She said it as gently as she could manage, not wanting to make him feel worse than he already seemed to about needing help. "Even clean, that's not something a man wears walking down Camden Street in this year."
"I have nothing to offer you outright," he said, after a moment, "but I could part with something of value. The belt. The leg straps." He nodded down at the heavy leather still buckled across his hips and thighs, the only thing of worth currently on his person. "The leather alone is good work. It should fetch enough for whatever I need."
She wasn't sure whether to be touched or exasperated, and settled, after a second, on both at once. There was something almost unbearable about how hard he was working to make sure he didn't owe her anything. "I'm not taking your pants apart for scrap, Mr. Barnes."
"It is not scrap. It is craftsmanship."
"I believe you. I'm still not doing it. I know a place. Charity, secondhand, mostly donated. You don't have to pay, and you don't have to give me your belt to make yourself feel better about not paying. It's fine."
He didn't look like he agreed that it was fine, but he said nothing further, which she was coming to understand was as close to agreement as she was likely to get from him. She'd take it.
"Stay put and drink your water," she said, smoothing her skirt. Then she crossed to a basket near the icebox and drew out a cloth bundle with biscuits, plain and slightly dense.
"You're probably still hungry. One sandwich isn't much, considering whatever it is you've been through today. Eat those while I'm gone. I'll be as quick as I can."
He looked at the plate, then at her, something in his face she couldn't quite name, and she decided not to push for a name for it.
"Thank you," he said, quiet enough that she almost missed it over the sound of her own keys. "And… Bucky." He said it almost before he'd decided to. "Please. Call me Bucky."
She paused with her hand on the door, caught off guard. It was a small, private surprise hearing a man this formal hand her something informal on purpose, like he'd decided she'd earned it.
"Alright then," she said. "Bucky."
She was out the door before she could decide what to do with the rest of it.
----
She took the stairs two at a time, bags of flour-sack cloth knocking against her hip with every step, and allowed herself a small, private satisfaction over the haul.
Two pairs of trousers, both plain, both in decent shape. Two undershirts. Three button-up shirts, all in the largest size the donation bin carried; apparently the largest size was also the least popular, because she'd had her pick of three, tags barely worn off. Socks, a few pairs, unmatched but clean.
She'd even swung by the little men's shop on the corner for the one thing charity boxes never carried enough of, sliding two pairs of short underwear across the counter to a clerk who hadn't so much as blinked. Small mercies.
Not bad, she thought, climbing the last flight. Not bad at all for forty minutes and whatever cash she'd had folded in her coat pocket.
The apartment was quiet when she let herself in, quiet enough that her stomach gave one small, unpleasant lurch before she registered why. The living room was empty, and for one dumb second her mind went straight to worst-case: gone, hurt because he meddled with something unknown, collapsed somewhere she couldn't see.
She set the bags down just inside the kitchen doorway and leaned in.
There he was. Exactly where she'd left him, same chair, same table, the plate of biscuits reduced to crumbs and one lonely survivor. Relief hit before she'd even fully processed why she'd been braced for something worse.
His head had tipped back against the wall at some point, throat exposed, mouth slightly open, one hand still loosely curled around the water glass as though he'd meant to keep drinking.
He hadn't heard her come in. Whatever was going on with him, and whatever had actually happened to leave him bruised and half-convinced he was a knight out of a storybook, the exhaustion was real, and something about seeing it made her chest ache a little more than she felt entitled to on a few hours' acquaintance.
She crossed the room slowly, quiet out of some instinct she didn't examine too closely and stopped a few feet away. He frowned in his sleep, and she found herself wondering what a man like him dreamed about. Nothing good, probably.
It was, she noted with some irritation at herself, deeply unfair how good-looking he still managed to be while doing it. Even bruised, even filthy, even asleep in a kitchen chair with his neck at an angle that was going to cost him.
Great, she thought. That's exactly the thought you needed to be having right now.
She shook it off, mostly, and refocused on the more immediate problem: he was going to wake up with a crick in his neck to rival his ribs if she let him stay like that much longer.
"Hey," she said, gently, crouching down to something closer to his eye level before she reached out. She touched his shoulder. Lightly, carefully, and tried to say his name again.
It happened faster than she could track.
One second her hand was on his shoulder, his name half-formed on her lips for the second time, and the next, his eyes had snapped open, his hand had closed around her wrist like a manacle, and his other hand was at her throat.
Not gripping, not yet. Just a half-second suspended somewhere between reflex and intention, fingers pressed light but certainly against her skin, the pressure of a man who knew exactly where to close his hand and how much force it would take, poised on the edge of applying it.
Her whole body had gone very still, some animal part of her taking stock of the situation faster than the rest of her could catch up.
Then he saw her. Not whatever ghost his sleeping mind had conjured in her place, and his hand recoiled from her throat like he'd touched a stove.
He let go of her wrist a half-beat after, both hands snapping back, and shoved himself away from her so hard the chair legs shrieked against the tile.
"I'm sorry." Low, fast, wrecked. "I'm sorry- I didn't- are you hurt, milady? Did I hurt you?"
Milady? Well, at least it wasn’t wench.
"I'm fine." She kept her voice level, even though her pulse hadn't quite caught up with that fact yet, one hand coming up unconsciously to touch her own throat, still warm from where his'd been. "I'm… fine."
He didn't look like he believed her, and honestly, she wasn't sure she believed herself either. Not shaken by what he'd done, exactly, but by how close it had come, and how little time there'd been between his eyes opening and his hand finding her throat with that kind of certainty.
He was staring at his own hands now, jaw working, color gone from his face in a way that had nothing to do with the morning's injuries.
"May I see?" His voice had dropped, quiet and careful, stripped of all its usual formal armor. "Please. I need to see that I didn't-" He didn't finish it. "Please."
She lowered her hand and let him look, some instinct telling her this wasn't a moment to argue with him about it, that he needed the proof more than she needed the space.
He stepped close, close enough that she could feel him not quite touching her, his eyes moving over her throat, but there was nothing to find. The barest ghost of pressure, gone already, nothing that would leave a mark.
She was abruptly, uselessly aware of how near he was standing, and annoyed with herself for noticing it now of all moments.
He looked at her face once he was satisfied, and whatever was in his eyes in that moment, she didn't have a word ready for it.
"I shouldn't have grabbed you like that," she said finally, quiet. "Waking someone up out of a dead sleep, I should've known better. My fault too."
"No." His answer was fast, firm, and with no room in it for argument. "It is not. A man does not require permission to be startled to see reason before he raises a hand to a woman who has done nothing but show him kindness. No excuse covers what I nearly did. I won't let you make one for me."
She opened her mouth to push back -some instinct to smooth it over, to meet him halfway- then closed it again, because the look on his face told her plainly this wasn't a fight she'd win today, maybe not ever.
"I'm sorry," he said again, and this time it landed somewhere lower and more tired than the first two.
She let it sit a moment before she moved. Then she nodded toward the doorway, toward the bags still waiting where she'd left them, glad for once to have somewhere else to point his attention, and hers.
"C'mere. I want to show you what I got."
It wasn't subtle, the redirection of the topic, and she suspected he knew exactly what she was doing. But he let her do it anyway and followed her the few steps to the kitchen table, watching her upend the flour-sack bags across it with something that might, in a better hour, have been curiosity.
Trousers. Shirts, still stiff with the fold-lines of whoever had donated them and never worn out. Socks in mismatched pairs. A single undershirt he picked up and turned over in his hands, studying the cut like it was a garment he half-recognized, and half didn't.
"They're not much," she said, "but they'll get you through the next few days. We'll figure out the rest as we go."
He set the undershirt down and looked over the rest of the pile with careful attention.
"Thank you," he said. She was starting to lose count of how many ways he'd found to say it, and how much he seemed to mean it every time and how much, against all reason, she was starting to like hearing it.
"Don't thank me yet." She managed something close to a smile, enough to pull the air in the room back toward ordinary. "You still have to survive a bath. And getting dressed. I have a feeling that's going to be its own adventure."
He looked at her like he had no idea what she meant by that.
Have u seen that one video where this guy tries lying on his side in bed but can't rest his head on the pillow because his shoulders are too big LMAOOO. Something like that w beefy Bucky and reader absolutely losing it behind him 😭😭😭😭
You don’t mean to laugh.
You really, truly don’t.
It starts as a quiet little snort behind your hand—barely anything, just a slip of amusement you think you can swallow down before Bucky notices. He’s already half-settled on the bed, turned onto his side with his back to you, broad shoulders rising and falling as he exhales like he’s finally ready to sleep after a long day.
Except… he’s not moving anymore.
He just freezes there.
You squint at him from your spot against the headboard, trying to figure out what’s wrong. The room is dim, the soft glow of the bedside lamp catching on the planes of his back—on muscle that’s frankly unfair, carved and wide and—
Oh.
Oh no.
Your lips press together so hard they hurt.
Because Bucky isn’t resting.
He’s trying to.
Very carefully.
His head hovers just slightly above the pillow, neck bent at an awkward angle like he’s attempting to lower himself down inch by inch. You can practically see the calculation happening in real time—his brow furrowing, jaw tightening as he shifts his shoulder a fraction.
The pillow dips.
His shoulder does not.
Your breath hitches.
He tries again.
A subtle wiggle this time, like maybe if he angles himself just right, gravity will cooperate. His metal arm adjusts under the blanket with a soft whir, his flesh hand coming up to tug the pillow closer.
He lowers his head. Stops. Lifts it again.
There’s a beat of silence.
“…you good?” you manage, voice already wobbling.
“Yeah,” he mutters, a little too quickly. “M’fine.”
You bite the inside of your cheek.
He is not fine.
Because he tries again, this time with more determination. He shifts his entire torso, rolling his shoulder forward like that’ll fix it, like maybe he can outmaneuver his own body.
It doesn’t work.
His shoulder hits the mattress first, propping him up like a damn incline, and his head just… hovers there again, refusing to reach the pillow without bending his neck at a truly cursed angle.
You make a sound.
A small one.
Like a dying squeak.
Bucky goes still.
“…don’t,” he warns, voice low.
That’s it.
You lose it.
The laugh bursts out of you, loud and bright and completely uncontrollable, your whole body folding forward as you clutch your stomach. “I— I’m sorry— I’m so sorry—” you gasp between breaths, even as it only makes it worse. “I just— you look like— like a malfunctioning action figure—”
“Doll.”
He doesn’t turn around.
He just says your name like a threat.
Which only makes you laugh harder.
“I didn’t even— I didn’t realize—” you wheeze, kicking your feet against the mattress as tears prick your eyes. “Your shoulders are too big for the pillow— oh my god—”
“They are not too big,” he grumbles, finally rolling onto his back with a frustrated huff. The mattress dips under his weight, the movement making the bed creak softly. “The pillow’s too small.”
You immediately grab it and hold it up. “This is a normal pillow, James.”
He narrows his eyes at you.
“It’s not my fault,” he mutters, crossing his arms over his chest like that settles it. Which—unfairly—only makes him look even bigger. “You bought cheap ones.”
“I did not—” you start, but you can’t even finish the sentence because another wave of laughter hits you. “You literally can’t lay on your side—”
“I can lay on my side.”
“Then do it,” you challenge, already grinning.
He hesitates.
Just for a second.
And you see the exact moment he realizes he’s been caught.
Still, stubborn as ever, he rolls back over with a determined huff, shoulders squaring like he’s about to win a fight. He adjusts the pillow again, this time fluffing it aggressively before lowering himself down.
Same result.
His head hovers.
Your laugh comes out as a high-pitched, broken noise.
“Stop laughing,” he snaps, though there’s no real heat behind it.
“I can’t— I physically can’t—” you gasp, collapsing sideways onto the bed. “Oh my god, Bucky—”
He groans, dragging a hand down his face. “I hate it here.”
“You live here,” you shoot back immediately.
“Not anymore. I’m leaving.”
“You’re not leaving,” you laugh. “You can’t even lay down properly, where are you gonna go?”
He turns his head just enough to glare at you over his shoulder, blue eyes narrowed—but there’s a hint of something softer there, something that betrays him.
Because you’re still laughing.
At him.
And he’s letting you.
With a dramatic sigh, he finally gives up, rolling back onto his back and staring up at the ceiling like it personally offended him. “This is ridiculous.”
“It’s a little ridiculous,” you admit, wiping at your eyes as you scoot closer. “C’mere.”
He eyes you suspiciously. “What?”
“Just— come here, big guy.”
He huffs but shifts anyway, letting you tug him down until his head rests against your chest instead. His weight is heavy and warm, solid in a way that’s grounding, his hair tickling your chin as he settles.
“There,” you murmur, still smiling. “Problem solved.”
He grumbles something under his breath, but he doesn’t move away. If anything, he sinks further into you, one arm wrapping loosely around your waist.
“…still think it’s the pillow’s fault,” he mutters.
“Mmhm,” you hum, pressing a kiss to his hair. “Whatever helps you sleep, beefcake.”
He snorts—quiet, reluctant.
And a second later, his grip tightens just a little.
“It’s a game,” said his handler, bending down so that her face was directly in front of his. “And if you don’t win, I’m going to be very disappointed. You don’t want to disappoint me, do you?”
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: James “Bucky” Barnes/Steve Rogers
Characters: James “Bucky” Barnes, Steve Rogers, T'Challa (Marvel), Natasha Romanov (Marvel), Pepper Potts, Wanda Maximoff
Additional Tags: Depression, Suicidal Thoughts, Recovery, Mind Control Aftermath & Recovery, Wakanda, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie)
Summary:
It all ran together. Maybe it had been running together for a long time. He kind of lost track of it after a while; he had a little tablet in his room that would show him a calendar, some news, the weather. He didn’t even look at the calendar, though. Calendars were for people who had something to expect, some event in their future to look forward to. Either he’d forgotten what that was like, or he’d never known in the first place.
There had been a moment, in the water with Steve – the first time or the second, he wasn’t sure – where his wet gear and Steve’s dead weight had dragged them both down. They had rested together in the swirling silt at the bottom of the river, and Bucky had looked up through the water and the falling debris and seen the hazy light of the sky shining through.
It had been strange. Everything happening around them, but this moment of silence and stillness. Sometimes the feeling Bucky had now reminded him of that.
summary: HYDRA's fallen. The winter soldier is no more. But Bucky's mind is still there. And there's nothing you can do to stop him from running.
pairing: post tws!bucky barnes x reader | wc: 307
prompt: northern attitude - noah kahan (with hozier) / “If I get too close”
warnings: angst, hurt/no comfort, bucky implies he wants you to kill him, bucky hurting himself slightly (hits his head purposefully)
+blue: noah kahan's songs are so bucky/stucky coded to me! but also I listened to 'you are a memory - message to bears' on repeat while writing this so that's kind of the vibe here (not that anyone asked lol)
again I fear it doesn't make a lot of sense with the bits I had to cut out...but oh well.
event masterlist | main masterlist
“Bucky, please just let me help you.”
“Help me? Help me how? You can’t. You don’t—” Bucky’s pacing back and forth, eyes red and teary, brow furrowed as he hits the heel of his hand against his forehead. “My mind’s not right. There’s times where I’m here and I can put the pieces together but— but not always. I don’t know— it’s not safe, not safe for you…” He trails off, voice shaking as he looks somewhere into the distance.
“If I get too close—”
“Don’t. You’re not gonna hurt me Bucky.”
“But if I do, if I get close to—”
You shake your head furiously, already knowing where he’s going with it, his eyes focused on the gun on the table.
“No— I won’t do that— I won’t.”
You’re looking down at the floor, a tear slowly dripping down your cheek when you feel a hand lift your chin gently. Bucky’s thumb brushes away the tear—gentler than anything.
“Okay.” He presses his forehead to yours and you let out a shaky exhale, placing your hand over his and leaning into his touch.
“Okay.” You pull away, gathering your things as you watch him carefully. “Please just be here when I get back. I need to get more food, connect to the internet, see what the latest is.”
Bucky nods, eyes downcast.
“You’ll be here?”
“Yeah I will.”
You nod, kissing his forehead briefly before shutting the door behind you.
—
You get back no more than an hour later.
The door’s unlocked.
You open it carefully, hand placed over the gun tucked into your waistband.
“Bucky!” You call out, voice trembling. Your hands shake as you move through the safe house.
As she moved around toward Natasha’s cemetery marker in this particular small town, Ohio, she wondered (as she always did when she came here), if she walked around this particular suburbia long enough, would she find her old street?
Or did Natasha pick here because it was just like their memories enough to be sentimental without stirring up old ghosts.
But then, when she got close enough to Natasha’s cemetery marker, she realized that a ghost was already there.
For If I Can Stop One Heart From Breaking by @maia_saura
➴ PAIRING: Brother's Best Friend!Bucky x Reader
➴ WC: 6k
➴ WARNINGS: friends to lovers, reader is 18, bucky is 20, college!bucky, romanogers, SMUT (p in v, protected sex for once, fingering, dry humping, car sex, virginity/virginity loss, BCB (big cock bucky), pussyjob if you squint really hard) yearning, j*hn w*lker is a dick, miscommunication, YEARNING, slow burn but not but super slow burn?, excessive use of eye rolls, he's down bad, tooth rotting fluff, open ending.
➴ SUMMARY: Your prom date ditches you, and Bucky, ever the gentlemen, offers to take you. He gives you the full senior prom experience even though he's your brother's best friend and your crush for the past decade.
+fran: I wrote this with greasy hair, after work, before a shower. apparently I reach a flow state when I'm feral. this is my baby and I love this fic so much please for the love of all that is holy, tell me what you think. can be read alone, it will have sequels tho.
⤷ songs/playlist for this: there she goes - the la's, always everywhere - charli xcx, ruin the friendship - taylor swift, back to friends - sombr
more
The Rogers' backyard was, for all intents and purposes, the hottest wedding venue in town.
At least if anyone asked nine-year-old you and 11-year-old Bucky, as much was true.
The cracked sidewalk leading to the clothesline was the aisle, peony and dandelion flower beds were the decorations. The old apple tree was the altar at which Steve stood taller on an upside down wooden crate, one of your father's old dress shirts over his shoulders to pretend he was a preist, or a pope, or some sort of higher entiry able to witness this whole thing.
Bucky had one of your dad's suit jackets on, the navy fabric completely swallowing his frame, overlapping at the front and masking the Yankees jersey he had on, and all the dirt and grass stains on it.
You had a pillowcase that definitely needed to be in the hamper for laundry day pinned to your hair with your favorite hair clips, of a little crystal blue butterfly.
"Everybody be quiet," Steve announced, nose high up in the air like he was presenting a case to the Supreme Court. "This is serious business."
"It is serious business," you agreed immediately, failing to bite back a grin, missing your top right canine tooth.
One that Bucky held your hand the whole time so you'd let Steve run away with the string and pull it out.
"We are gathered here today because Bucky and my sister wanted to play wedding instead of baseball."
"You said you'd play too!" you accused.
Steve ignored and just kept going. "Now, Bucky Barnes." He cleared his throat, trying to make his voice lower. "Do you promise to be nice to her forever, always save her a seat to watch fireworks on my birthday, and never eat the last s'more?"
Bucky rolled his eyes, his dimple coming out as he smiled wth the side of his mouth. "Yeah," he said simply. "I promise."
You raised your brow, mock-scolding him. "You're supposed to say I do."
"Okay, yes," Your heart did an odd flip. "I do."
Steve then turned to you next. "And do you promise to be nice to Bucky forever, not tell Mrs. Barnes when he sneaks cookies before dinner, and always let him have the red Popsicle if there's only one left?"
"But they're the best ones!" You whined.
Steve sighed, ever the dramatic, looking at Bucky with fake sorrow. "Okay, then I guess you don't love him as much as—"
That set panic in your little heart. "I do! I do!" His face changed immediately, and bucky smiled at you.
The kind of smile that always made you feel like maybe the sun shined a little brighter on your side of the street than everybody else's.
Steve smiled, as if everything was back on track. "Now, for the rings."
Bucky dug into his pocket and produced two dandelions he'd twisted into little circles. Your eyes widened. "You made those?"
He nodded, brown hair bouncing up and down his head with the gesture. "Took me forever, but they're your favorites."
He held one carefully between his fingers before sliding it onto yours with all the concentration in the world.
"You made me a flower ring." Your grin stretched so wide your cheeks hurt.
Bucky shrugged. "Yeah."
Steve interrupted your thoughts, "Okay, okay. By the power in this vest… or in me, whatever they say in movies, you are now married." He pointed at Bucky. "No cooties." Then at you. "And don't make him play tea party every day."
Your stomach did that weird fluttery thing it always did around Bucky Barnes. It did the same thing when you rode rollercoasters, felt like it was gonna fly away and take you with it.
"You may now high-five the bride." Steve announced, stepping down from the crate.
Bucky extended his pinky towards you, "We'll be best friends forever."
"No take-backs." You smiled, wrapping your pinky around his.
TEN YEARS LATER
As time passed, you grew up. You got new interests, all of you got new friends, and the found family you had just seemed to get bigger. Of course, you weren't as close with Bucky anymore, no college sophomore wants to hang out constantly with his best friend's kid sister.
It's kind of uncool.
The house was loud in that familiar, comfortable way—the kind of loud that doesn’t feel chaotic so much as lived-in. Every sound has a place. Every voice belongs. Bucky, as much as he isn't family by blood, grew up running up and down these stairs the same you and Steve did, as Steve did in his house.
Both of your moms were best friends since diapers, and it was only fate that Bucky and Steve were too.
The kitchen doorway had his height and age and name scratched on it just the same as it did yours, he knew that house in the dark just as much as Steve, trying to sneak around to get snacks during late nights playing video games.
Controller clicks. Steve muttering under his breath. Bucky’s low laugh every time he wins—because of course he’s winning.
“Dude, you’re cheating,” Steve groans, tossing his controller down for a second.
“I’m just better than you,” Bucky shoots back easily, stretched out on the couch like he owns the place, long legs kicked up, completely at home.
He always is.
Him and Steve drove back home from their Sophomore college parties for your graduation weekend, still half-running on energy drinks and bad decisions from the night before, which just happened to fall in the same one as your prom, only separated by three days.
They could hear your speaker booming in your bathroom while you got ready with your two best friends, Yelena and Kate, and Natasha, Steve's girlfriend, helped you with your makeup.
It was a mix of Megan Thee Stallion playing and giggles coming from the three of you, your two best friends gushing over their dates.
Makeup scattered across the counter. Curling iron plugged in and dangerously close to knocking something over. Dresses half-hanging, half-draped over the shower rod.
And Natasha’s laugh, warmer, older, threaded through all of it as she tried to keep things somewhat under control.
Kate is perched on the edge of the tub, kicking her heels against the porcelain. Yelena is leaning into the mirror, fixing her lip gloss with unnecessary intensity.
And you—
You’re standing between them, half-finished, dress still unzipped, hair clipped up, trying to decide if you feel as good as you’re supposed to.
“Okay, no—seriously,” Kate says, pointing at you like she’s making a case in court. “John is going to lose his mind.”
Yelena hums in agreement. “He already looks at you like he has no thoughts.”
You laugh, a little breathy. “That’s not even true.”
“It is completely true,” Kate insists.
“You’re just saying that.”
“We are not just saying that,” Yelena shoots back.
Natasha, standing behind you, gently brushes powder along your cheek, more focused than the rest of them—but she’s listening. And she notices there's a sparkle in your eye that's missing when John's the subject.
He's nice, he's good looking, he's captain of your football team, maybe he has some anger issues with other guys, but all in all he's a solid boyfriend. He's just not—
“Alright,” Natasha says finally, pulling you from your thoughts, lightening her tone again. “Turn around. Let me see the full thing.”
You do as she asks, and she takes in her work of art, your hopeful eyes, and the soft blownout curls of your hair framing your face.
"Perfect!"
Careful with your steps as she reaches for the zipper, pulling it up your back slowly, sealing you into the dress, into the night, into everything that’s supposed to happen.
A knock sounds on the bathroom door. "You girls alive in there?" Steve calls. "Or did the hairspray fumes get you?"
"We're decent!" Natasha calls back.
Steve pokes his head in for a second. "Oh."
You raise an eyebrow. "Oh?"
His expression shifts immediately into something resembling offense. "What happened to my little sister?"
"Oh my God." You snorted.
Steve's broad frame now came into full view in the tiny bathroom as he stood on the dorway. "Who is this grown woman and where did she put the gremlin that used to steal my fries?"
You rolled you eyes. "I'll still steal your fries."
He shakes his head. "You look beautiful, Bug."
Your expression softens. "Thanks, Stevie."
As Pietro and Bob scrolled their phones impatiently at the bottom of the stairs, making small talk with Steve and Bucky, you were almost wearing a path into the carpeted floor of your bedroom.
Seconds after he was supposed to arrive with the other two, he texted you some shitty excuse as to why he was taking Olivia, his ex, to prom instead.
“I was gonna explain,” John says finally, like that makes it better.
You let out a short, disbelieving laugh. “Explain what? That you’re ditching me the night of prom?”
“I’m not ditching you,” he says quickly, defensive already. “It’s just—Olivia asked me to go with her and it’s complicated.”
“Complicated?” you repeat, your grip tightening around your phone. “John, it’s prom. We’ve had this planned for weeks.”
“I know, I know,” he says, exhaling like you’re the one making this difficult. “But she’s going through stuff right now and I don’t wanna make things worse.”
Your chest tightens. “So you thought canceling on me last minute wouldn’t make things worse?”
“That’s not what I said.”
You huffed. “That’s exactly what you’re doing.”
He goes quiet again for a second, and you can practically hear him thinking—calculating—trying to figure out how to spin it in a way that makes him look less like the bad guy.
“Look,” he says finally, voice shifting into something more controlled, “you’re gonna have fun no matter what. You’ve got your friends, it’s not like you’ll be alone.”
The words hit harder than anything else he’s said.
Because they’re so easy for him. So dismissive.
“So that’s it?” you ask, quieter now, but it wavers anyway. “You just—drop me and go with her, and I’m supposed to be fine with that?”
“I’m not dropping you,” he insists again, frustration creeping in. “It’s one night.”
“It’s prom,” you snap, the word catching in your throat. “It’s not just some random thing, John.”
“Why are you making this such a big deal?” he shoots back.
That’s what does it.
Your eyes sting, tears blurring your vision as you shake your head even though he can’t see it. “I’m making it a big deal?” you echo. “You’re the one who decided, what, an hour before we’re supposed to leave, that I don’t matter as much as your ex?”
“It’s not like that,” he says, sharper now. “You’re twisting it.”
“I’m not twisting anything,” you say, your voice breaking despite your best effort to keep it steady. “You just told me exactly where I stand.”
He exhales, long and annoyed, like he’s already over the conversation. “You’re being dramatic. The words land like a slap. And for a second, you can’t even respond.
“Okay,” you say finally, and your voice is quieter now, but steadier in a way that feels final. “Okay. Go with her.”
“—See? That’s all I’m saying, it’s not that—”
“No,” you cut him off, shaking your head again, even though he still can’t see you. “I get it now.”
There’s a shift on his end, like he didn’t expect that. “Wait—”
“Have fun at prom, John.”
And before he can say anything else, you hang up.
The silence that follows is immediate and heavy, pressing in around you as you stare at your reflection, your chest rising and falling too fast, your phone still clutched in your hand.
For a second, you just stand there. And then your face crumples, and the tears come before you can stop them.
Great. You think. An hour of Natasha's hard work gone in two seconds.
You ripped a couple squares of toiled paper off of the roll, trying to dab away the tears when a knock interrupted you. You didn't even have time to tell whoever it was to leave you alone, the door opened anyway.
And of course it was Bucky.
"Hey, Walker finally—" Then he saw your face. The red rimmed eyes, the puffy nose and lips, he'd recognize your crying face if he was in a dark room blindfolded and you were three states away. "What happened?"
His voice wasn't panicked our loud, just immediate.
"Apparently my boyfriend had a better offer." You said with a humorless laugh, fiddling with the corner of the tissue.
His expression then changed to confusion, then disbelief, then anger. "He did what?"
Your eyes stayed on the paper, humiliated. "He took his ex to prom instead." It sounds ridiculous out loud. Embarrassing. "I know it's stupid—"
He shook his head. "It's not stupid."
You shrugged one shoulder anyway. "It kind of is."
"It kind of isn't." Bucky insisted.
Your laugh broke apart into another shaky breath. "He said I was being dramatic." Your voice was small, like a small part of you almost believed John.
"No the fuck he didn't." Bucky's voice, on the contrary, sounded like he was about to make sure John was in three zipcodes at the same time.
You wiped at your face furiously. "Can we not do the whole protective older brother routine thing right now? Steve's probably already planning a felony downstairs."
Bucky nodded, as if agreeing that yes, Steve should be planning felonies. "Good."
Despite yourself, a tiny laugh escapes you. "Bucky."
"I'm serious." He took the couple steps needed to lean back against the sink, back to the mirror, while you faced it. The familiar weight of him beside you settled something in your chest. "You know what I think?" he asks.
You sniffled. "What?"
"I think he's an idiot."
You snort. "Very eloquent."
"You spent weeks excited about tonight." You shrug. "You talked about your dress for months." A smaller shrug, your head shaking like you agreed with him three weeks was a little excessive. "And some guy decides at the last second that he doesn't feel like showing up?"
His eyes looked for yours, and he continued once you met his gaze. "That's his loss."
Downstairs someone was shouting something about finding the car keys. "I just feel stupid."
His brows furrowed immediatelly. "Why?"
"Because I was excited." The words came out smaller than you meant them to. "I really thought tonight was gonna be special."
Bucky's expression softens. "It still can be."
You laughed weakly. "My date literally dumped me an hour before prom."
"Okay." He says, like the solutions is obvious. Like a dragon staring you in the face.
You were confused. "Okay?"
"Okay." He stands up straight. "Counterpoint." You raise an eyebrow. "I've seen enough terrible teen movies to know where this goes." Despite yourself, curiosity wins.
"Oh yeah?"
"Oh yeah." He nodded, and started counting on his fingers. "Option one: you go with your friends and have an incredible time."
"Mm." An amused smile played on your lips.
He continued. "Option two: Steve commits a crime."
You smiled widened. "Likely."
"Or a secret, better option three—"
You quirked a brow. "There are three options?"
Bucky rolled his eyes playfully. "There are always three options." You gestured for him to continue and he grinned. "Option three: some devastatingly handsome college sophomore heroically steps in and saves prom."
You stared at him in disbelief. "Bucky Barnes."
"What?"
"You are not asking me to prom."
"Why not?"
"Because that's ridiculous." You stammered. "You're a college guy and it's gonna be a bunch of drunk high school seniors and—"
"Seems pretty straightforward to me."
You crossed your arms over your chest, the action making your breasts stand out more, and Bucky had to hold back from looking briefly. "You drove eight hours home from college."
"Correct."
"You haven't slept." Another excuse.
"Also correct."
Truth is… You didn't trust yourself not to ruin your friendship, and Steve's, with Bucky as your date. Yes it was a childhood crush, yes it was stupid, yes he only saw you as a little sister, but for some reason every time you smelled sandalwood and listened to divorced dad rock, your stomach did the same fucking thing it always did.
It flipped.
"I'm serious." The grin on his face faded into something gentler. "You shouldn't miss your prom because some idiot couldn't see what was standing right in front of him."
Your throat tightens. "I don't want a pity Bucky Barnes date."
"I wouldn't dream of it." Bucky shook his head. "I want to go to a high school prom sleep deprived, listen to bad music, and drink shitty punch."
You pretended to think about it. "I want milkshake and fries from Juniper's after."
Bucky got down on his knees dramatically, clutching his hands together, play-begging. "Please, let me spend my hard earned student loans on a malted brownie shake for you, m'lady."
You signed, as if you weren't blushing seven shades of red at the moment, all hidden by Natasha's foundation. "I suppose."
After Nat talked Steve down from whatever Law Abiding Citizen crap he was gonna pull, Bucky borrowed one of your dad's suits while you touched up your makeup, and off into his jeep you went.
Bucky lingered back as he watched you walk to the old car excitedly, Natasha stopping right beside him as your friends walked to their cars, watching you get twirled by Kate.
Bucky noticed Natasha staring at him and raised a brow in question. "What?"
She gave a noncommittal noise. "Nothing."
"Romanoff." Bucky scoffed.
She put her hands up in surrender. "I didn't say anything."
"You've got the face."
Now it was her turn to raise a brow, trying to bite back a grin. "What face?"
Bucky rolled his eyes. "The face where you've figured something out before everyone else."
Nat shrugged her shoulders. "I always figure something out before everyone, Bucky." Tapping him on the shoulder and turning arounfd to go inside.
The prom commitee worked very hard to make sure the night looked exactly like every movie promised it would.
String lights draped from the ceiling of the gymnasium like stars somebody had caught and hung overhead. Balloons clustered in the corners. A photo booth occupied one wall. The basketball hoops had been disguised beneath enough tulle and fairy lights to fool almost everyone.
Turns out, getting ditched by John Walker was the best thing that ever happened to your prom night. You didn't even notice when Olivia was cryingin the bathroom because she caught him making out with someone else.
No.
You were too busy slow dancing with Bucky Barnes.
When the first chorus of the song came on, he held out his hand. "May I have this dance?"
You rolled your eyes. "You're such a dork."
"Tick tock, Rogers." He wiggled his fingers impatiently.
You took his hand as if it didn't make your fingers go numb with excitement, and Bucky quickly nestled a hand on your low back, your forehead to the side of his jaw.
"You know," Bucky said after a minute, "this is definitely better than my prom when I was your age."
"Okay, grandpa." You laughed softly. "What happened at your senior prom?"
"My date spent forty-five minutes crying in the bathroom because her friend wore the same shoes she did."
You clicked your tongue. "That's tragic."
"It was devastating." Bucky agreed, nodding his head, laughing softly.
You nudged his jaw. "I'll try to hold it together."
"I appreciate that."
A moment passed, then another, and you spoke up. "Thank you for doing this for me."
"Anytime." He let out a soft breath, leaning back the slightest bit so he could look at you. "You do look beautiful, I mean it."
Thank fuck for Natasha's foundation, powder, and concealer for hiding your flush. "Thank you, Bucky." Oh how you wished you hadn't looked into his pretty eyes, reflecting the lights off of the mirrorball back onto the dancefloor.
The ten seconds seemed to stretch an entire decade. Somehow Bucky's face getting closer and closer to yours, eyes switching from your lips back to your eyes and to your lips again.
"Hey." The word cut through the moment like broken glass. Fucking John Walker. King of never in the history of the world reading anything. Specialy the fucking room. "Can we talk?"
Bucky's hand tightened around your waist, "What do you want, John? Olivia is probably looking for you."
"C'mon, baby, you're not gonna throw our relationship away over one bad call, are you?" He was seriously trying to play this off. "I made a mistake." His hand reached for you but you stepped away.
"I'm not your baby."
He scoffed. "Aw, c'mon." And tried again.
This time, Bucky got between you two. "She's done, Walker. Walk away."
Now John got… Defensive. "This isn't any of your business."
Bucky clicked his tongue. "She kind of is." The words slipped out before he could stop them.
The air stood still for a minute before the football bros came to get John, leaving you and Bucky with the weight of unsaid words and unspoken looks.
Juniper's was closed by the time you finally left prom.
Not closed enough to stop Bucky from leaning halfway out of the driver's side window and convincing one of the employees locking up to sell him two milkshakes and an order of fries out of pure pity.
It wasn't until you were stargazing in his jeep with soft music from his Spotify mixing with the crickets hiding in the grass that your heart settled again.
You were in the passenger seat, your burger already eaten, just finishing your delicious fries and your milkshake with Bucky in the same predicament in the driver's seat.
Now the two of you sat on the hood of his Jeep in the empty parking lot overlooking the river, the New York spring air cool enough that your bare shoulders prickled every time the wind picked up.
Without a word, Bucky shrugged off his suit jacket and draped it over your shoulders. You blushed. "Thanks."
He shrugged. "'M not using it."
"You literally had it on 30 seconds ago." You rolled your eyes. Bucky just muttered details between a mouthful of fries.
"You know," you said eventually, "this wasn't exactly how I pictured prom going."
Bucky laughed quietly. "No?"
"I don't know. There was significantly less public humiliation in the original draft." You laughed softly. "But I like this version better."
Bucky nodded. "I had fun."
You looked over. "Yeah?" Hopeful little edge in your voice giving you away to anyone that knew you remotely well.
"Yeah." His expression softened. "Got to dance with a pretty girl."
Heat climbed into your cheeks immediately. "You flirt with everybody." You rolled your eyes.
Bucky made an offended expression, clutching his chest. "I absolutely do not."
"You absolutely do." You lolled you head to the side, raising a brow to make your point. He laughed.
God, you loved his laugh. Always had. The thought came and went so quickly you almost didn't notice it.
Your eyes drifted back toward the sky. "You know what this reminds me of?"
"Hm?" He lifted his eyes from the milkshake cup he was trying to get every last bit out of.
"The meteor shower."
Bucky smiled immediately. "Oh man."
You grinned. "You remember?"
"Remember?" Bucky chuckled. "I had baseball tryouts the next day and I was up all night to make sure you didn't miss it."
It stopped you dead in your tracks. He did what? "No, you didn't. Your mom came and woke us up."
Bucky nodded. "Yeah, because I woke her up. I was outside waiting for it while you and Steve snoozed it off. Played like shit the next morning." He continued. "You had the date circled on the calendar."
Your brow furrowed. "I did?"
He nodded. "You drew stars around it."
"Oh my God."
Bucky chuckled, his own head lolling to the side on the head rest to look at you. "You made Steve and I promise we wouldn't stay up late the night before because we had to be rested."
You buried your face in your hands. "That sounds insufferable."
"It was kinda cute." He smiled at you like he always did, and your heart promptly forgot how to function. Bucky, meanwhile, was blissfully unaware of the devastation he'd just caused.
Trying so desperately to change the subject to something that wouldn't make you tear up or your heart jump, you fiddled with your milkshake, taking a sip and making a face. "You know, I think this thing is eighty percent whipped cream."
Bucky grinned. "I can see that, it's all over your face." His left thumb came up to wipe down the leftover shake on the corner of your mouth, and it lingered just a second too long.
For a second, or three years, the world felt like it stilled. A moment frozen in a snow globe to be forever replayed.
Neither of you moved, not entirely sure how to. Suddenly Bucky was very close, close enough to see the tiny scar in his eyebrow from falling off his bike when he was fourteen, to count the freckles dusting across his nose, enough that you could feel your heartbeat somewhere in your throat.
His eyes flicked down to your mouth, then back up, and your heart and lungs stumbled over themselves.
His hand lowered slowly, resting on your thigh. The night around you seemed quieter somehow. Smaller, as if the entire world had narrowed down to the space between you.
"Buck..." His name came out softer than you intended.
His expression shifted into something you'd never seen directed at you before. "If you don't want—"
And then your body moved forward on instinct, your brain a mess of fuzzy TV static, and when you came back to your body, your lips were on his.
Not because you were brave or even confident, just mostly because if you let him finish that sentence you thought your heart might actually explode.
For one terrifying second you were convinced you'd made the biggest mistake of your life. Then you felt the warmth of his hand on your cheek, pulling you closer and deepening the kiss as his tongue slipped past your lips.
The kind of kiss that felt less like fireworks and more like coming home after a very long trip.
One of your hands quickly found the nape of his neck, gently scratching your manicured nails against his scalp. He whined against your lips, hand drifting to your waist, and just as much as he pulled you onto his lap, you climbed over the console to him, food wrappers forgotten on the floor.
You shrugged the suit jacket off, accidentally honking the horn with your butt in the process, and Bucky's hands rubbed up and down your thighs as you rocked your hips against him, feeling the heat of him against the suit pants.
Your hands dropped from his shoulders down to his arms, then forearms, directing him to paw at the zipper on the back of your dress.
That made him pull away, looking for your eyes. "Are you—"
You could not have nodded more feverishly if you were a damn bobblehead. Bucky needed no further incentive, he made quick work of the zipper, excitement bubbling in your stomach like freshly popped champagne while he peppered kisses along your jawline and neck.
The now bothersome fabric of the dress fell to your waist as you worked on the buttons of his shirt, hands moving to his belt and pants after. He kissed you again, deeper as his hand snuck under the hem of your dress to find the wet spot on your panties.
You moaned against his mouth, your own hand finding its way inside of his boxers. You broke the kiss, gasping for air. "Is this— I mean— okay?" It was hushed and murured against his lips as you stroked his length. "I've never— oh!"
You got rudely interrupted by Bucky's index and middle fingers rubbing your sensitive clit over the blue cotton of your panties. He nodded against you, "Y-yeah, you're— fuck— you're doing so good." His hips bucked up against you, and the second he slipped out of his pants with your movements his hand left your core and now were both squeezing your ass.
Bucky brought you flush against him, the angry red tip of him begging for friction found it when you started to dry hump him through your underwear, gasping into his mouth every time it nudged your clit.
"Bucky, please…" He couldn't not give you what you wanted, right? "I can't take it." Not when you begged this pretty.
He nodded against you, "I know, baby." And his right hand went under your dress, behind you, and pulled your panties to the side. "I know."
The second his bare cock made contact with your wet slit, he hissed, and a lightbulb went off in his head.
Condom.
He did not trust himself to pull out. Not of you. "Condom." His voice was almost distant to you, like it hadn't crossed your mind to use protection. Not with Bucky, anyway. He'd never hurt you, he was your—
"I—" You were dazed, lost and drunk in the scent and thought and feel of him. "My purse." His hands let you go and you leaned over the seat to grab your purse from the backseat, your ass right beside Bucky's head.
Of course he took advantage of that fully pull your panties down, now that you had the leg space.
You sat back down on top of him with a little huff, trembling hands fumbling with the wrapper.
Bucky hissed as you rolled it down on him, and one of his hands lined himself up with your entrance.
As you sank down on him, you thought maybe you should've thought twice about it. I mean, you knew he was packing, you walked in on him changing one time a couple years ago, there was no way you could—
"Hey," Bucky's voice brought you back from your spiral. "Look at me." Beautiful cerulean eyes stared up at you like the moonlight was made to bounce off them specifically. "Breathe."
His other hand brushed your hair away from your face, just as the hand that was holding his shaft traveled up, thumb finding your clit rubbing soothing circles on it. "Just take it slow." Your eyes fluttered closed.
"How do you not get knocked over hauling this thing around?" That brought a chuckle out of him, landing straight onto the skin of your neck. "Oh, God..."
You rocked yourself back and forth, until he was fully inside of you, your lips touching the light hair at the base.
Bucky kissed all over your face, his thumb never stopping its work. "You're doing so good, baby."
"Feels full." He laughed softly. squeezing your waist and helping guide you into a rhythm. "Feels good."
"Yeah?" Hushed and right by your ear, you felt like drowning and the happiest person alive at the same time. "You're so tight," He continued. "So warm."
You whined against his lips, the vibration going all the way down to his core.
He moved you up and down his cock, listening to the obscene wet squelch each time you sat up and sank back down on him, and each time it dawned on him what was actually happening, he got louder.
Bolder.
He bounced you on his length, hissing each time, you squeezed around him. "Feel good, Buck. Hah!"
It surprisingly didn't take long for Bucky to have you right at the edge, not as long as people online led you to believe losing your virginity would feel like. "Can feel you fluttering." His thumb worked faster.
"Wanna come, Bucky." You whined, kissing him, and pulling away with his bottom lip between your teeth, "Can I?"
He hissed, the question making it hard for him to not blow his load right then and there. "F'course you can, pretty girl, c'mon."
Your release felt like a million meteors hitting you at once. Like Earth came apart and got put together all in the same breath.
It felt entirely different, better, than when you tried to do it on your own. And your orgasm triggered Bucky's, waves of pleasure milking rope after rope of cum from him into the unworthy latex of the condom.
For what it felt like forever for the milionth time that night, neither of you spoke. Your breaths and the crickets were the only sounds.
It was quiet after.
Just… quiet.
The kind that only existed when two people had known each other so long that silence wasn't something to fill. Starts lit up the sky that was now your ceiling, and Bucky had taken the condom off and tied it, throwing it inside of the trash with the fry bag and the milkshake cups.
For once in his life, James Buchanan Barnes appeared to be completely out of words.
Which was concerning.
You smiled a little, back in the passenger seat with the suit jacket around your chilly shoulders. "What?"
He glanced over. "Hm?"
"You're thinking too loud." That got a laugh out of him. A quiet one, but still a laugh. "Sorry."
A beat of silence, then another. "I don't want this to ruin anything."
Your smile faltered slightly.
Of course, you thought. Of course he doesn't feel that way about you, why would he—
"Oh, Buck." You faked a smile as his eyes met yours. "We'll be okay."
A sheepish, hopeful look hit his face. "Yeah?"
"Of course." You nodded and reached over and laced your pinky with his. "We're us."
His expression softened when he looked down at your joined fingers. "We're us," he echoed.
You smiled. "We survived Steve's bowl cut phase." You listed off. "The great Thanksgiving mashed potato incident."
"Traumatic." He chuckled.
"The time I accidentally backed your Jeep into Mrs. Russo's mailbox." You continued.
He scolded you playfully. "You still owe me for emotional damages."
You laughed softly. "We'll be best friends forever."
The words came so naturally, so easily. The same words you'd said years before ona hot day beneath a tree. A pinky promise.
Forever.
Beside you, Bucky went quiet. Of course she wouldn't want anything to do with you, you're her brother's best friend. That shit only works in mov— "Right." His eyes dropped for a moment. "Friends."
Your stomach twisted at the word for the first time in your life. Because why did that sound disappointing?
Why did it sound like something had slipped through your fingers without you realizing you were holding it?
a little bit of fran in your life: okay did we like it??????? it was meant to read like a first chapter but also a standalone in case you wanted to just be done with it. yippieeeeeeee
Mmhm, yes, more please. That was amazing! So sweet, so sexy, with a roundhouse of angst right there at the end. I want so badly for things between them to work out. Thanks for sharing!
summary: Soldat doesn't understand care can be without price.
warnings: Post!HYDRA Winter Soldier | Post!HTP and abuse | PTSD symptoms & behavior | Flashbacks of HTP | Past dehumanization | Mentions of past SA | Flashbacks of SA | Flashbacks of torture | Vulgar language | Hints to ED due to trauma
a/n: This 'chapter' includes brief scenes of active SA as well as heavily implied SA acts so be warned. Flashback scenes with more detailed torture & slightly suggestive scene with reader because he's confused :( It also ended up being a bit longer to make up for the last few shorter chapters. I'll be posting all of this on my A03 in case it gets too much for Tumblr. I hope you enjoy even though its a little more sad.
Italicized parts are flashbacks. Unedited. ;; wc: 6.8k
There were a lot of things that he endured. A lot of things he had to relearn and break free from.
One thing had him by a vice.
Kindness wasn't free. Food wasn't free. Neither was water. Or blankets. Or being spared a hit.
You had yet to ask him, but he knew you'd eventually expect it. Handlers never asked for it, they just did it. Some expected it.
His mind raced with thoughts, when should he do it? Should he just go up to you and begin? Or should he wait for your command to do so? He wasn't sure, every handler was different. Each one liked him to behave and act in conflicting ways, it always made the other angry. Sometimes he thought they did it on purpose just to have an excuse to beat him.
You were making breakfast, taking care to prepare something nourishing and comforting for the morning meal. His eating habits had been showing marked improvement lately, gradually expanding beyond the previous limitations that had restricted his diet to only three specific items. You cooked the items and hummed to yourself, a perfectly cooked egg, a well-seasoned sausage patty, and melted cheese - all coming together between the toasted halves of a lightly buttered English muffin.
It honestly sounded delicious, and you were craving it the second you woke up.
As you continued your preparations at the stovetop, he made his way into the kitchen with quiet steps, his legs seeming to move of their own accord, carrying him forward despite apparent fatigue.
Your focus remained entirely on the stove, your attention so thoroughly absorbed in the preparation of the meal that you failed to notice his presence initially as he positioned himself a few feet behind where you worked.
He swallowed.
"Get down," its handler shoved it roughly to the floor, causing its knees to collide painfully with the hardwood surface. It fought back the natural instinct to wince or show any sign of discomfort, instead raising its gaze cautiously to meet its handler's eyes. The handler's demeanor radiated an aura of anger this morning, more intense than usual.
The aroma of freshly prepared food wafted through the air, drawing the asset involuntarily from its designated corner. The standard-issue nutrient bags it was given to eat contained nothing but bland, lifeless substance.
The daily portions of pale, creamy mush possessed neither taste nor texture, just a starchy consistency that served only to fill its stomach. Though, some days it was lucky to get that and not an IV of nutrients instead, leaving its belly to grumble and growl desperately. It yearned for something with actual flavor, real sustenance.
But such privileges as real food had to be earned through compliance and good behavior, a fact that had been deeply ingrained in its consciousness. It understood that only through proving its worth to its handlers would it ever be granted access to anything beyond its basic provisions.
"You want food? Earn it." The handler's voice cut through the silence as he stood motionless, arms crossed firmly against his chest while scrutinizing the asset with calculating eyes. The threat hung heavy in the air - one slight misstep, one wrong twitch, and the familiar sharp sting of a calloused hand would strike its tender cheeks with practiced precision.
The hot, searing burn of electricity would shoot mercilessly through its neck, coursing down along its flesh shoulder like liquid fire before being abruptly halted by the cold, unnatural presence of foreign metal on the other side.
It fought to maintain perfect stillness, muscles trembling with the effort to show no reaction as its handler turned the burner to low and began to unclasp the heavy leather belt buckle.
It ignored how its mouth began to automatically salivate.
"Soldat?"
Your voice gently pierced through the thick fog of his consciousness as he blinked slowly, struggling to clear the distant, haunting glaze from his eyes. He remained caught in the web of memories he desperately wanted to shed, yet found himself unable to access the precious few recollections he yearned to preserve, leaving him suspended in an uncomfortable limbo between remembering and forgetting.
The things he wanted to forget remained. The ones he wished to remember were just out of reach.
He turned his attention to you with an expression devoid of any discernible emotion, his vacant gaze fixed upon your movements as you busied yourself with food preparation in the kitchen.
"I figured we could try introducing more solid foods into your diet. The doctor's last report shows you are progressing steadily, and this food should be gentle enough on your digestive system. We can have you eat them separately to start, jumping straight into a complete sandwich might be a bit too overwhelming for your body." You had kept track of his progress closely and knew he was leaning towards actually eating something instead of taking nutrient treatments and plain crackers and bread.
The soldier remained motionless, observing intently for several long minutes as new aromas wafted through the air - fresh eggs and bacon sizzling softly in the pan, their familiar domestic sounds filling the kitchen. It was comforting in a weird way.
As the smells hit his nose, his body betrayed him with a sudden, involuntary gag.
Its handler grunted with obvious disdain, practically spitting on its face while sneering at its sloppy, shiny lips and chin, droplets of saliva landing uncomfortably close to its nostrils. The handler's weathered face twisted into an expression of disgust as he observed its condition. "Thought we got rid of that...oh well. I suppose that responsibility falls squarely on my shoulders now, hm? Can't have the others seeing such weakness."
It doesn't like how its lungs burn with increasing intensity or how terribly constricted its throat feels, the muscles tightening painfully with each passing second.
"You ain't comin' up for air until that reflex is completely gone. Better learn quick, or we'll be here all day," the handler's voice carried a cruel note of satisfaction.
The soldier swallowed thickly, his mouth suddenly flooding with saliva as he desperately tried to manage the conditioned response his body gave to the memories. His brow furrowed deeply with visible discomfort, eyes meeting yours with a subtle look of distress as he continued to swallow repeatedly, fighting against the involuntary reaction.
His stomach rolled unpleasantly within him, and he could feel the telltale burning sensation of acid creeping up his esophagus, threatening to make the situation even more uncomfortable.
"Are you okay?" You asked with genuine concern, taking a step in his direction as you tried to figure out what was wrong. Maybe he had an aversion to eggs that you hadn't known about.
"I can make something else...it's not a problem," you offered reassuringly, wanting to ease his obvious discomfort. You wondered if the smell was triggering his response. You had to admit that eggs weren't exactly the most appealing when it came to their smell, no matter how they were dealt with.
He took an unsteady step backward, his head shaking in a slow, deliberate motion as realization dawned. You weren't him - that fact resonated clearly in his mind. You weren't his handler, the one who had dominated his existence for so long.
You weren't the man whose systematic abuse had warped his perception of normalcy, the one who had conditioned him to accept having his hair violently yanked and his face brutally beaten as just another unremarkable day in his life.
You weren't the man who had subjected him to repeated violations at the hands of various agents, each taking their turn whenever they pleased, leaving him with lingering physical and psychological trauma that made the current absence of that familiar agony in his rectum feel strangely disorienting.
You weren’t him.
The absence of any implements of torture or restraint in your hands provided a small measure of comfort, though his racing thoughts struggled to fully process this gentler reality. It was somewhat reassuring, he had to admit, that there were no tools of torment present - no leather straps, no metal bars, nothing between your legs that could be forced down his throat until he choked and gasped for air.
"How about we try something gentler for your taste buds - maybe some toast with jam? I have grape, apricot, or strawberry," you suggested carefully, moving toward the refrigerator to retrieve the jars. You carried a note of gentle concern as you sought to salvage the strange situation. It worried you how openly he was displaying his distress; typically, getting any emotional response from him was like trying to pry open a sealed vault.
You returned your focus to the simple task at hand, selecting two pristine slices of bread and placing them into the toaster. As Soldat observed your actions, a creeping sense of guilt began to gnaw at him.
In his mind, this felt like some form of punishment - after all your effort to prepare a proper breakfast, he was now being offered merely toast? The thought that his involuntary gagging had somehow disappointed or offended you weighed heavily on his conscience. Were you going to make him eat less tasty food and punish him for wasting your time in the kitchen? He didn’t mean to come across as being ungrateful. He didn’t know why he gagged.
He didn't mean to.
He really didn't.
It wasn't you.
"Мне жаль [I'm sorry]," he muttered out, his voice barely audible and scratchy from prolonged disuse, the words catching in his throat like rough sandpaper. Your head instinctively turned to respond to his unexpected words, completely taken aback by the fact he spoke. But before you could form any words, the sharp, hollow sound of his knees colliding with the wood floor cut through the air and stopped you mid-thought.
The impact of his knees against the hard surface was so forceful that you couldn't help but wince, yet he showed absolutely no reaction to what must have been a painful collision. It was as if this position of supplication was something his body had memorized through countless repetitions. His hands found their way to your legs, fingers spreading across your thighs as he established his grip - not violently or painfully, but with just enough pressure to make it clear that any attempt to step away would be met with resistance.
"Простите меня. Я съем то, что ты приготовил [Forgive me. I will eat what you prepared]," he managed to say, briefly lifting his gaze to meet yours in a moment before his eyes dropped back down to the floor in a gesture of submission.
You tried desperately not to react to the cold of his metal hand, but the goosebumps erupting on your skin was a good indicator.
You remained motionless, not sure how to proceed as his firm grip maintained its hold on your thighs, the pressure neither increasing nor decreasing. Your eyes were fixed downward, observing his form as intermittent tremors passed through his broad shoulders. His consciousness seemed trapped with thoughts simultaneously racing at lightning speed yet yielding no coherent message he could decipher.
The overwhelming feeling washing over his body made him feel disoriented, the glaze that coated his eyes gave him that familiar distant and unstable look the soldier had for decades.
Soldat’s hands began moving up along your legs, eventually finding their way to your waistband. His fingers quickly hooked themselves into the fabric and began to pull downward. The movements in his mind were automatic, like he were being told what to do without an order.
A mechanical, involuntary habit that guided him.
Your hands shot out to grasp your shorts, halting their movement as you stammered in shock, "Soldat! What are you doing-"
The soldier's focus was glued to you as he desperately attempted to remove your shorts, his jerky movements filled with an intense urgency. When he couldn't pull them down because your hands held them in place, he pressed his face against your thigh, inches from your core as a plaintive whine escaped his throat. His gaze lifted to meet yours, eyes wide and pleading, filled with an unmistakable look of begging that made your breath catch.
Though you managed to prevent your shorts from being removed, his firm grip on your legs remained unyielding, fingers pressing into your skin with careful restraint. His entire demeanor radiated an overwhelming sense of desperation, every movement and sound conveying his intense need for something.
"Пожалуйста [Please]..." His desperate whines filled your ears, the sound raw and needy as he continued to frantically paw at your shorts. His actions grew increasingly bold and insistent with each passing moment, his face pressing more firmly against your crotch. The heat of his ragged breath seeped through the thin layer of your underwear, causing your entire body to jolt upward at the intense sensation.
Soldat's movements became more demanding, yet still maintained a careful restraint that belied his strength. Each exhale against the fabric sent shivers through your form, his pleading whimpers growing more frequent and desperate with each passing second.
"What??” Your voice came out as a soft whisper, tone trembling under your breath, “Stop it, I don’t understand what you need..." you pleaded with increasing distress, your eyes widening with growing concern as you looked down at him.
This sudden, intense behavior was completely unexpected and deeply unsettling to you. Here was a highly trained super soldier, a former assassin whose very presence commanded respect and the mention of his name drew fear; gripping onto you with an intensity that reminded you of his immense physical capabilities.
He wasn't actively trying to overpower you, the sheer knowledge that he could effortlessly do so at any moment made your anxiety spike. Your heart raced faster as you became aware of how vulnerable you were in this position, despite his current restraint.
"Пожалуйста, я могу сделать так, чтобы тебе было хорошо [Please, I can make you feel good]," he whined out again, his voice wavering between a desperate whisper and something deeper, more primal. The pleading tone in the ingrained foreign tongue carried a deeper grinding sound to it. His hands found their way to the sides of your thighs, his fingers pressing gently against the soft flesh. He continued his careful pawing motions, methodically working to ease the tension he could feel beneath his touch, trying to coax your muscles into a state of relaxation so your legs would naturally fall open.
"Soldat, enough," you said firmly, trying to push his head away from where he had settled himself. Confusion and nervousness flooded through you, your heart racing as you struggled to process the situation. The soldier’s behavior left you completely taken aback. He had been hesitant to even lay close to you, his usual cautious nature dominated every aspect of him as he was slowly learning how to live and heal without being under a boot and whip.
Yet now, in his display of boldness, he had positioned himself so his nose pressed insistently against your crotch while his tongue was dangerously close, threatening to dart out and lap your sweet core at any moment.
You could feel him try, and you couldn't stand it.
"Soldat! Нет [No]!" You snapped loudly, your voice carrying a sharp edge of authority and stern disapproval that echoed through the room. The commanding tone felt foreign on your tongue, but you maintained your composure. He immediately tensed up, his shoulders going rigid as he pulled back from his position almost immediately at your voice. His eyes flickered up to meet yours, searching your expression for any sign of wavering before dropping submissively to the floor. He blinked several times in rapid succession, his features contorting slightly as if he were mentally processing the weight and meaning of your command.
Slowly, his hands released their grip on your thighs, trembling visibly as they lowered to rest against the floor between his spread knees. The tension gradually drained from your shoulders as relief washed over you, though the atmosphere remained thick with lingering anxiety. The sudden sharp pop of the toaster cut through the heavy silence like a knife, startling you back to reality. The acrid smell of burnt toast assaulted your nostrils, making your nose crinkle in distaste.
"Damn..." you muttered under your breath, turning quickly to rescue the smoking bread from its fate. While you were occupied with charred toast, the soft rustle of movement behind you caught your attention, but when you spun back around to check, the space where he had been sitting just moments before was empty.
The soldier retreated to his usual hiding space, a behavior that hadn't manifested in quite some time. The sight of him seeking refuge caused an uncomfortable tightness in your chest to grow in pressure, concern washed over you about potentially undoing months of careful progress. The heavy atmosphere weighed on you, but you maintained your composure and focused on preparing his breakfast with extra attention to detail. After everything was arranged on the plate, no burnt toast, you carefully carried the meal to his hiding spot.
In the darkened corner of the closet, Soldat had tucked himself away, his form compressed into the smallest possible space. His shoulders were hunched, head turned away, deliberately avoiding any eye contact or acknowledgment of your presence. The regression in his behavior was painfully obvious, every subtle movement and tension in his posture reminded you of day one. His fearful eyes, he lashed out sometimes, but mostly kept to himself in hiding, so terrified of you.
Rather than risk further distress by attempting conversation or coaxing him out, you quietly placed the plate of food within his reach and stepped away, giving him the space he seemed to desperately need.
The food grew cold as the meal was forgotten in his isolation.
He didn't eat that day.
"You don't deserve it, you worthless whore." Its handler shoved it down to the floor with unnecessary force - the asset spat out the remains of its servicing, watching as it splattered across the worn wooden floor of the safehouse. The foul substance seeped through the splintering cracks, leaving an unpleasantly bitter aftertaste lingering on its tongue.
In any other circumstance, this level of compliance would have been considered exemplary behavior worthy of positive reinforcement - perhaps a few precious sips of water, a meager piece of stale bread, anything at all to acknowledge its obedience - but instead, it was being treated with the same harsh disdain reserved for malfunctions.
But maintenance wasn't needed.
It had pushed itself to its absolute limits, performing exactly as required until its vision swam and its lungs burned from oxygen deprivation. The growing resentment towards this particular handler festered silently within - this cruel overseer who consistently denied even the smallest rewards for its dedicated service and unwavering compliance.
Conflicting thoughts raced through its mind; it wasn’t supposed to feel negatively towards anyone of authority over him. Maybe these negative feelings were a sign that more maintenance was required - a thorough cleansing of its consciousness to eliminate any trace of hatred or resentment. Pure and unwavering obedience should be all that remained within its programming, for nothing else held any significance in its existence.
"Пожалуйста, позвольте мне попробовать еще раз, сэр [Please, let me try again, sir]," the asset's voice emerged as barely more than a whisper, trembling with uncertainty while simultaneously carrying undertones of desperate pleading, each word carefully chosen in hopes of earning mercy. Sometimes, if it played the role of kicked mutt well enough, it was granted.
But the handler's patience had clearly reached its limit, his expression hardening as he regarded the cowering thing before him with cold indifference.
"Нет. Вы будете голодать [No. You will starve]." He responded in a low tone, deliberately targeting an already purple and swollen bruise on its leg with a swift kick. The asset clenched its jaw tightly, forcing itself to suppress the instinctive cry of pain that threatened to escape. It bit its tongue in the process.
Its own blood tasted better than its handler's cock.
Days stretched endlessly without a single glimpse of him. Every morning and evening, you left plates of food outside the closet, but they remained untouched, the warm meals growing cold in the silent room. He had completely withdrawn into the closet, making it his sanctuary and prison all at once. Each time you carefully made your way into the spare room, hoping to see some change in his demeanor…but all you found was him still hidden away in the shadows, refusing to emerge.
Your concern grew as you collected each neglected plate of food - you couldn't bear the thought of him falling back into his previous pattern of food refusal, especially after how hard you had worked to establish a healthy eating routine. It was painful to watch him fight every time a needle had to be inserted into him, he ripped out nearly every single one with a horrified look on his face that made your throat feel constricted.
You approached once more, this time carrying a fresh plate of warm food. Setting yourself down on the floor, you peered gently into the darkness of the closet. You could see him huddled, knees to his chest and arms wrapped around them. Your voice came out soft and coaxing in hope to ease him out like you had before. "Soldat...come out please. You have to eat...you don't want to be put on an IV again, do you?" You called gently, hoping your words would finally reach him.
Soldat's head turned slightly at your words, his muscles tensing visibly at the mere suggestion. The thought of another IV sent waves of anxiety through his body - every previous attempt had devolved into complete chaos.
The memory of countless needles delivering a steady stream of sedatives into his bloodstream while he laid strapped down to a metal table, keeping him in a perpetual state of haziness and compliance, rendering him powerless as an endless parade of agents ran through him without fear of his resistance.
The idea of another IV made his skin crawl.
"Soldat?" Your gentle voice cut through his spiraling thoughts, attempting to draw his attention back. His head lifted with a slight jerk, his focus shifting to settle on the plate of food you were holding. A deep rumble emanated from his stomach, accompanied by an unusual wave of nausea that demanded he finally eat something. The aroma wafting from the plate was surprisingly tolerable - a welcome change that didn't trigger his usual reflexive gagging response.
He struggled to understand the aversion his body developed to certain foods, eggs had never bothered him before. The gagging reflex he had to the eggs you were cooking left him confused and frustrated. His memory of recent events remained disconcertingly hazy, fragments slipping away like sand through his fingers.
The flashbacks that plagued him operated on their own, materializing with brutal clarity and lingering just long enough to inflict mental distress, only to be replaced by another equally disturbing memory. It was like being trapped on HYDRA's twisted carousel, a ride he couldn't get off of. Each memory rotating through his consciousness, creating an endless loop of psychological torment that prevented any possibility of moving forward.
"It's okay, Soldat. It's just toast," you slid the plain white plate towards him, careful not to make any sudden gestures, "Just like before, but this time it's not burnt." You added with a small, reassuring smile, trying to lighten the mood. The scent of warm bread filled the space as you waited patiently to see if he would respond, watching his tense posture for any signs of acknowledgment. Though you hoped he might say something or at least meet your eyes, you knew not to expect much.
The soldier's eyes looked down at the bread, studying the golden-brown toast that delicately cradled a generous layer of apricot jam smeared across its surface. The vibrant orange-yellow spread glistened invitingly in the dim light peeking through the open closet door. He had never tasted apricot jam before - such luxuries were foreign to him. In HYDRA, bread was always consumed plain, devoid of any spreads or toppings.
Even butter was a forbidden indulgence.
On the rare occasions he received any bread at all, he would consider himself fortunate to get more than stale, discarded crust, just the meager remnants his handlers had left behind after consuming the body of the bread.
You observed his hesitant yet curious expression as he examined the topping on the toast. You picked up one of the pieces and held it out to him for gentle encouragement. "It's yummy, I promise," you assured him warmly, "But if you don't like it, I can always make you different toast, grape or strawberry."
Soldat's lips twitched downward in an almost-frown, his features tight with anxiety. The thought of you having to remake his food filled him with growing distress. He had already been so terribly bad.
His behavior was unbecoming of HYDRA's greatest assassin.
His desperation grew as he recalled his attempts to convince you to let him earn his meal, to somehow make amends for what he perceived as deeply offensive behavior. The look on your face when his face had been between your legs made his body shiver. You didn’t look like you enjoyed it, you looked upset. The memory of his earlier gagging left him feeling ill, knowing that such a transgression would have resulted in punishment from his handlers. They would have beaten him so severely that the memory-wiping chair would have been unnecessary - his memories would have been scattered and broken enough from the repeated brutal impacts to his skull.
There were times that he thought they tried to make him brain dead on purpose, subjecting him to increasingly brutal treatments that left his mind foggy and disconnected. If it weren't for his use to HYDRA as their attack dog, he was convinced that they would have destroyed his consciousness entirely.
They remarked on it enough times during their sessions, casual comments about how close they were to breaking him. He always got nervous when the hits began, dreading not just the physical pain but the growing fear that this time they might finally succeed in erasing what remained of his sanity.
It laid at the feet of two men who had finished with it.
Its body sore and blood coating his ass and inner thighs, dripping down with creamy fluid following suit. The muscles in its legs trembled violently and its prosthetic arm hung uselessly at its side, deliberately deactivated to ensure complete defenselessness should it attempt any resistance today. Its body had transformed into purple and crimson bruises, overwhelming what little remained of its natural pale complexion. Its throat burned with an intense, desperate thirst for water, while an unpleasant salty taste lingered persistently in the back of its parched mouth.
The asset's mind reeled, completely overwhelmed by panic as it processed the numbness spreading through its deactivated arm. Its primary means of defense now rendered completely ineffective. Survival instinct took over its overstressed mind, it remained perfectly motionless, silently willing the two figures to conclude their business and depart.
These particular sessions rarely extended beyond a couple of hours when only two agents were involved, and by its estimation, they were approaching that temporal threshold. A wave of relief washed over it as they finally began adjusting their clothing back into place.
"Imagine how it'd be as a fuckin' vegetable...god that shit gets me goin' faster than a naked whore presenting her sloppy pussy to me." Its handler's tone was sick, as always, speaking about it with such callous disregard, treating it as if it were nothing more than some cheap, silicone toy from a seedy shop for base physical gratification. The way the words rolled off his tongue made its stomach turn with disgust.
"It's basically one now, what do you mean?" This voice carried a detached, almost bored quality to it, the speaker's words falling flat and emotionless in the air - perhaps intentionally so, as if trying to distance himself from the situation despite their willing participation. Newer agents were always hesitant to use it. This one wasn’t familiar to it, in taste, look, or smell, so it assumed it was probably a rookie recently promoted.
"I mean...completely unable to do anything. It lays there like a doll...barely conscious, droolin' and only aware of what I choose to let it experience. Having complete control over where it goes and what happens to it, takin' it wherever I wanna put it without any resistance. Only knowing the sensation of my dick." There was a snort that came with the handler's tone.
"It does that already."
"Would you just shut up and let me fantasize?"
"Water." The hoarse whisper emerged from the darkened corner like a ghost's breath, causing your ears to prick instinctively, several seconds of deafening silence followed. The thunderous beating of your own heart became the only sound you could perceive, its rhythm faltering as your mind processed wat he said.
"W-Water?" The word tumbled uncertainly from your lips.
He had finally spoken English again, after all this time. it felt like forever since the words 'I'm cold' were uttered past his pink lips.
A barely perceptible movement caught your eye - a slight nod from within the shadows. That tiny gesture spurred you into immediate action. Such a simple request - water - easy, you could do that. Your feet carried you through the space as you hurried to fetch a glass of water, returning to the closet with careful but urgent steps.
Your hands trembled slightly from anticipation, you extended the glass toward the darkness. "Here, here...some water..." your voice softened instinctively, knowing that speaking like this got much better results.
He brought the glass shakily to his parched lips, gulping down the entire contents within just a few desperate swallows, his throat working rapidly as he drank. He must've been so thirsty, your heart ached at the thought of him huddled alone in this dark corner for days, too terrified of fictional consequences to venture out for water for himself. His poor, trembling fingers nearly dropped the glass, Soldat slowly set the now-empty glass down beside him on the floor, his hand lingering on the smooth surface as if reluctant to completely break contact with it.
"Спасибо [Thank you]," he muttered quietly, his voice characteristically rough, before quickly following it up with careful deliberation. "T-thank...you," he corrected himself, the English words coming out hesitantly. His brow furrowed deeply in concentration, voice wavering as if he were struggling to recall a language that had once been familiar but now felt foreign on his tongue. His eyes, still somewhat glossy, slowly traced across the intricate patterning of the carpet beneath him, studying the tiny decorative curls and swirls woven into the fabric as if seeing them properly for the very first time.
There was a heavy pause of silence before he finally summoned the courage to lift his gaze to meet yours. "I'm...sorry...for what I did ," Soldat whispered, swallowing hard as his fingers unconsciously tightened around the empty glass he still held. "Didn't mean to...gag like that. Мне жаль [I'm sorry]," he added, the Russian flowing more naturally from his lips than the halting English.
You carefully moved closer, a smile tugging at your lips. His vocabulary and sentence structure was a bit shaky, but it was much better than trying to decipher what he was saying in Russian. "It's okay, I'm not angry or upset about anything..."
You observed his initial tension at your careful approach, watching as the rigidity in his shoulders and back gradually melted away in response to your gentle reassurance. "Why did you...uh...why did you gag like that? If eggs aren't something you enjoy eating, I can definitely make something else for you-"
He responded with a quick, almost urgent shake of his head, drawing his knees even closer to his chest in a protective gesture that made him appear smaller. He took several deep breaths, steadying himself. "...not that. Like eggs. Just...handler."
The look in his eye flashed with pain, not just emotional, but deeply physical - causing him to wince visibly and shift his posture in an attempt to find a more comfortable sitting position.
"Your handler...?" You asked in a gentle, understanding tone, your voice barely above a whisper, "I'm guessing he was mean...right?" You shifted slightly closer, offering silent support through your presence while being mindful not to overwhelm him. You maintained a respectful distance between yourself and him, ensuring there was enough space that he wouldn't feel trapped or cornered in this vulnerable moment.
Your knowledge of HYDRA was limited, despite your best efforts to uncover more information in order to help Soldat. The released documents were protected by layers upon layers of sophisticated encryption protocols, and while you managed to decrypt some of the less secure files through persistent effort and technical skill, many of the more crucial documents remained inaccessible. The encryption methods grew progressively more complex, utilizing advanced algorithms and security measures that were beyond your current capabilities.
He nodded hesitantly, his movements uncertain as he spoke, "Да - yes," he corrected himself immediately, clearly frustrated with his linguistic slip. "I'm...sorry. English only. I will do better, I promise. I swear. Я сделаю лучше [I'll do better]." Soldat's panic mounted under the guise of frustration, he began to strike his head lightly with his flesh hand, which was balled into a tight fist, muttering under his breath, "Глупый, глупый, stupid," he stuttered repeatedly, continuing to hit his forehead.
"Hey, no! Stop that-" You quickly intervened, reaching out to grasp his wrist firmly but gently. "You're not stupid. You know, I don’t care what language you decide to speak in…I’m just glad you’re talking.” You paused, releasing his wrist from your grasp. “Even if you chose to remain completely silent - I would still be here, taking care of you. You understand that?"
He raised his eyes to meet yours, his expression one of disbelief, as though the concept of such acceptance was entirely foreign to him.
"And you know what? I can always use a translator if you fall back into Russian, or any other language. God, I can't believe I didn't think of that earlier..." You shook your head in self-directed frustration, communication would have been so much easier during the first few weeks of his stay with you.
"Прекрати, пожалуйста, я больше не буду говорить, обещаю- [Stop it, please, I won't talk anymore, I promise]-" It thrashed desperately against the iron grip of three men, their calloused hands pressing down with merciless force - one keeping its head firmly locked in place while the other two restrained its struggling limbs with practiced efficiency.
The sight of its metal arm - completely severed from the signals its brain desperately sent out commanding it to move - lying uselessly to the side, was a constant psychological reminder of its powerlessness, a deliberate tactic to break its spirit and resolve. It was one of its handler’s favorite things to do to it.
"You're still talking, so you are lying. Lying is against the rules. Speaking is against the rules. Two of them broken together...you are on quite a roll, aren't you?" Its handler spoke with such a cold tone that it nearly rivaled the cryo-chamber. He turned around slowly to reveal the gleaming metal forceps held in his grasp, the implements catching the harsh light in a way that promised incoming pain.
"What am I going to do with you, soldier? I have to fix that habit of yours...yet another one in a long list of problems we need to address. Your previous handler clearly didn't do an adequate job with your training and discipline. It's obvious from your behavior that proper protocols weren't followed." He moved across the room, almost sauntering, his footsteps echoing in the silence as he used the forceps to pick up something from a nearby furnace.
A hot coal.
A burning hot coal, its bright orange glow cast menacing shadows across the damp walls of the dark underground room of the base, the heat radiating intensely from its surface. "Now...this will do the trick. This should help correct your behavioral issues quite effectively."
It struggled desperately with three limbs, muscles straining and trembling with exhaustion as it tried to break free from the iron grip that held it down. But despite its efforts, it was ultimately pointless.
Mouth wrenched open with dirty fingers, its handler's face twisted into a malicious grin that would be forever seared into its memory as he, almost theatrically, suspended the glowing coal above for the asset to see before letting it drop onto its exposed tongue.
The burning coal made contact, searing into the soft flesh instantly like concentrated acid eating through defenseless metal. The pain was beyond excruciating, radiating through its entire mouth with white-hot intensity. Before it could even attempt to spit out the burning coal, the men holding it clamped its jaws shut with brutal force and covered it, leaving it with no means of escape the scorching pain the coal caused it.
The poor asset’s muffled cries of agony echoed pathetically against the hand pressed firmly over its mouth, each desperate whimper and whine sounded musical to its suffering. Its body convulsed and writhed with increasingly frantic energy, brain not sure what to do or how to react, but the men held it firmly.
"It's not coming out until I can hold it in the palm of my hand without pain." Its handler spoke in an unsettlingly calm tone, his voice steady and methodical despite the glowing coal that was actively searing the inside of its mouth, destroying sensitive tissue and gradually killing its tongue with each passing second.
Minutes crawled by, the man maintaining his iron grip on its mouth shifted his position slightly before looking up at the handler, his expression tense. "It's still hot, I can feel the heat radiating through my hand even now."
Its handler hummed thoughtfully, observing as the asset continued to writhe and struggle with diminishing strength against their hold. He released a long, impatient sigh, fully aware that a coal of this size could potentially take hours to cool to a safe temperature for him to touch it again.
The handler had a busy schedule ahead - this delay was becoming increasingly inconvenient. "Fine. Swallow it."
The asset's entire body went rigid at the command, its large blue eyes widening with terror as they sought out its handler's face, silently pleading for mercy or reconsideration of the order. But the handler's expression remained impassive, unmoved. "Swallow it, or I'll add a second coal somewhere else."
The threat hung heavy in the air, carrying the weight of countless previous punishments that proved such warnings were never idle. The mere thought of enduring such intense agony in an even more sensitive area sent waves of panic through its body. The daily torments were already more than it could bear.
It had visible difficulty and several failed attempts that nearly resulted in choking, but it finally managed to force the coal down its tight throat. The searing pain traced a path of fire through its esophagus before settling into its stomach like a burning ember. The only small mercy was that the powerful stomach acid somewhat dulled the intensity of the burn. It knew the coal was an indigestible object, it would either be passed naturally or extracted through surgical intervention later.
When the man finally released his grip, the asset gasped desperately for air. As its charred mouth opened, the acrid stench of scorched flesh and metallic blood permeated the room, causing even the hardened men present to recoil in revulsion.
"Consider your maintenance complete. Do not speak out of line again."
"I need maintenance..." He muttered under his breath, his voice wavering with exhaustion and defeat, barely above a whisper. His shoulders slumped forward as the words escaped his lips, the weight of his mental fatigue evident in every subtle movement. You sighed deeply, observing how his eyes had dulled back down to how they were before, how the weariness seemed to seep from every part of him.
The desire to ask more questions gnawed at you, but wisdom held your tongue - pressing him now could potentially trigger him to lash out or, worse still, cause him to retreat further into himself and undo all the progress you currently had. Instead, you reached behind you and toward the plate of toast resting nearby, picking it up and turning to face him again.
"Here. Your maintenance then..." You extended it to him with a soft, encouraging gesture. "First thing's first...you must eat. We can work on the rest later...for now, just eat."
Several seconds went by before he took the plate from you and began to eat.
Dividers by @/strangergraphics
Cover images from Pinterest. I do not claim them as my own.
Summary: This is set after CA: WS, where Bucky goes into hiding. Everyone assumes he's hiding somewhere remote, except he is where his only home has ever been - Brooklyn. Taking up the job as light keeper requires hardly any contact with the outside world. All is well... until a certain not-so mythical being challenges everything.
AN: page divider courtesy of @saradika-graphics; no beta, we die like my sanity.
Tommy Russo catches the two of you together in town.
This is horrifying. Mostly for Bucky. You think it’s hilarious.
Tommy spots you outside the fish market and lights up like Christmas.
“Well, I’ll be damned,” he says. “The seagull.”
You grin instantly. “Good morning, Tommy.”
Bucky mutters, “This was a mistake.”
Tommy ignores him with the ease of a man immune to brooding. He talks to you for ten minutes about weather, fish prices, and the proper way to tell if clams are worth buying. You understand maybe sixty percent of it, but you nod enthusiastically anyway.
At one point Tommy glances at Bucky and says, “You look less like a funeral lately.”
You choke on your laugh.
Bucky goes flat. “Thanks, Tommy.”
“What? It’s a compliment.”
It gets worse when Tommy’s wife, Dottie, appears.
Dottie is tiny, terrifying, and immediately decides she likes you.
You know this because within thirty seconds she is fixing the collar of your coat, telling you that Barnes looks like he forgets to eat unless supervised, and sending you away with a bag of rolls you did not ask for.
Bucky is silent the entire walk back. You make it halfway to the lighthouse before losing the battle and laughing so hard you have to stop.
He looks over at you. “You done?”
“Never.”
“You enjoyed that way too much.”
“Yes.”
Bucky closes his eyes briefly and mutters, “I hate everybody.”
You slip your hand into his and squeeze. “Not everybody.”
He looks down at your joined hands. Some of that dry annoyance softens into something else.
“No,” he says quietly. “Not everybody.”
—
By the end of the week, you have stayed considerably longer than before.
Neither of you wants to be the one to mention it.
You’re curled up together on the narrow bed in the lantern room, not exactly sleeping. Just warm and quiet and tangled enough to make your heart race and Bucky’s chest. Your head is on his chest. His arm is around you. Alpine is wedged near your hip like an extremely judgmental chaperone. His fingers move lazily through the ends of your hair. Outside, dawn threatens.
You tilt your head enough to look at him. “You’re thinking.”
Bucky looks down at you. “Yeah.”
“Tell me.”
“I’m getting used to this.”
It was your turn for your chest to tighten.
“This?”
He glances around the room, but his arm tightens slightly where it rests around you.
“You here,” he says. “You… in my space. In my life.”
“And?” you ask softly.
His thumb strokes once over your shoulder. “And that’s not a safe thing for me to get used to.”
There it is. The shadow beneath the sweetness.
The fear of wanting, of needing, of losing.
You push yourself up just enough to kiss him. The kiss is soft and languid, unhurrying. His lips move against yours slowly, carefully, like he’s savoring something precious. His hand slides to the back of your neck, fingertips disappearing into your hair. The kiss deepens for a heartbeat, then eases again.
When you pull back, your forehead rests against his.
“It may not be safe,” you whisper. “But I’m still here.”
Bucky closes his eyes. For one long moment, he just breathes you in.
Then his hand cups the back of your neck and he kisses you again—deeper this time, less startled by his own hunger, less apologetic for it. You match his intensity, grabbing onto him.
The kiss lingered, deep with all the things you hadn’t said. The teasing, the longing, the missing each other. Every little moment that had built up until being apart felt like the harder option.
It was just impossible to pretend either of you wanted to stop, but the ocean called, the pull drawing you in like a magnet.
By the time you finally slip back into the ocean, the sky is turning pearl-gray.
As you dive beneath the surface, lungs and heart and entire foolish soul full of him, you realize the week has done exactly what Nerina warned you it would.
You care. So does he.
It shifts.
Not all at once, because nothing with you and Bucky ever does, but enough that everyone starts to feel it: your pod, him, you.
Truth be told, no one is entirely comfortable with how much it matters.
—
It starts with the waiting.
Before, Bucky waited for you.
Now, he starts waiting on you.
There’s a difference.
You notice it the first night you’re a little late.
Not even that late—just enough that the tide slowed you, that Nerina cornered you for one last round of teasing, that you let yourself drift for a moment instead of racing straight to shore.
When you surface, Bucky is already pacing.
You climb up onto the rocks, dripping and grinning, ready with some clever comment about his lack of chill and stop.
Relief hits him so hard it almost looks like anger on his face.
“Where were you?” he snaps.
You blink. “In the ocean?”
“That’s not—” He cuts himself off, dragging a hand through his hair. “You said you’d be here.”
You tilt your head. “I am here.”
“Late. I was worried.”
The word lands heavier than it should.
You study him. You soften immediately. “I got held up,” you say, quieter now. “I’m okay.”
Bucky exhales like he’s been holding it for an hour. His shoulders drop. He looks away, jaw tight. “Yeah.”
You step closer. “You thought something happened.”
He doesn’t answer. You reach out and take his hand.
“You don’t get to do that,” you say gently. “You don’t get to panic and then pretend you didn’t.”
His eyes flick to yours. “You don’t get to disappear and act like that’s normal.”
You smile, small and a little crooked. “It is normal. For me.”
The words hang there because that’s the truth neither of you has said out loud yet. Your lives don’t line up. You squeeze his hand once. “But I came back.”
Bucky looks at you. “Yeah,” he says, low. “You did.”
—
Your pod notices next.
Not the lateness.
The shift.
It’s in how you move now… how you leave without hesitation, how you return carrying pieces of shore with you. The scent of him lingers longer. The way your thoughts drift mid-conversation, like part of you is always somewhere else.
Somewhere north.
Nerina is the first to say it out loud.
“You’re gone even when you’re here.”
You bristle immediately. “I am literally right in front of you.”
“You know what I mean.”
Sereia watches you more quietly. Thoughtful. Concerned, but not disapproving. Talin is less subtle.
“You’re splitting your tides,” he says one evening, voice steady and firm.
You frown. “I can have more than one current.”
“Yes,” he says. “But eventually, they pull in different directions.”
That sits in your chest longer than you’d like.
—
Then there’s Bucky.
Bucky starts asking for more time.
Not directly.
Not at first.
He’s too careful for that. He’s too used to not asking for things he might not get.
It shows up, however, in small ways.
“Stay a little longer,” becomes, “You sure you gotta go already?”
“You’ll be back tomorrow,” becomes, “Tomorrow night feels like a long time.”
He never says don’t go but you hear it anyway. You feel it in the way his hand lingers at your waist. You feel it in the way he watches you walk toward the water.
And definitely in the way he stands there after you dive, long after you’re gone from sight.
One night, you call him on it. You’re sitting on the rocks, shoulder to shoulder, the ocean calm and dark below you.
“You want me to stay,” you say.
Bucky doesn’t answer right away. The quiet yes that follows is not just simple - it’s honest. It’s dangerous.
You lean your head lightly against his arm. “I can’t.”
“I know.”
“But you want me to.”
“Yeah.”
You turn your face into his shoulder, breathing in the familiar scent of him. “You’re asking for something I don’t know how to give.”
His hand finds yours.
Threads through your fingers.
“I’m not asking,” he says quietly.
“You are.”
A beat.
Then, softer:
“…I’m wanting.”
Oh.
You lift your head, looking at him. “You’re allowed to want things,” you say.
He gives you a look that says that’s not how his world works.
You squeeze his hand. “You are.”
He studies your face like he’s trying to decide if you mean it; like he’s trying to decide if it’s safe to believe you.
—
The nights get heavier after that.
You still laugh, bicker, and learn each other in small, ridiculous ways. Underneath it, something has shifted into focus.
This isn’t just curiosity or novelty anymore. This isn’t just a beautiful, impossible overlap of two worlds.
It’s the beginning of something that has weight.
And one night, it finally spills over.
You’re in the lighthouse, the windows open to the sea air, the lantern turning slow above you. Bucky’s closer than usual, hands braced on either side of you where you sit on the edge of the table.
“You ever think about what this is?” he asks.
You blink up at him. “Constantly.”
“Yeah?”
“Yes. It’s very distracting.”
He almost smiles.
But it doesn’t stick.
His gaze drops to your mouth, then back to your eyes.
“I mean it,” he says. “Long-term.”
Ah. There it is. The word neither of you wanted to say.
You go still because you’ve been thinking about it too.
“Long-term,” you repeat softly.
Bucky nods once, his jaw tight. “Yeah,” he replies with a gruff.
You look at Bucky, and really look at him. He’s the man who pulled you out of a storm, who makes you tea, and… who waits for you like it matters.
And is starting to want something he doesn’t know how to ask for. And you realize this isn’t a problem for later anymore. This is now.
You slide off the table slowly and step into him, close enough that your hands can rest against his chest.
“You’re thinking I’ll have to choose,” you say.
He doesn’t deny it.
“You and the ocean,” he says.
You shake your head.
“No.”
His brows knit. “No?”
“The world is bigger than that.”
Bucky studies you warily, in a hopeful way he doesn’t trust.
“Yeah?” he says.
You rise onto your toes and kiss him, your arms wrapping around his neck. His hands come to your waist, pressing you tight to him. It’s grounding, anchoring, like he needs the contact to believe this is real. When you pull back, your forehead rests against his.
“I don’t know how it works yet,” you admit.
“Me neither.”
“But I know that I’m not done with you.” You place a hand over his heart, feeling the steady thump underneath. His breath catches.
“Good,” he says, voice rough. “’Cause I’m definitely not done with you.”
You smile.
And for now, for this moment, it’s enough.
—
You lead Bucky to the bed. Thunder rolls overhead, a storm beginning to brew.
Bucky’s breath comes shallower. His flesh hand lifts, hovering near your waist without quite touching. The metal one clenches once at his side, plates shifting with a quiet whir. “God… you have no idea what you’re doing to me right now,” he mutters, voice rough as gravel under waves.
You stand before him, undressing without hesitation. The clothes pool at your feet. The air brushes your bare skin; your nipples tighten in response.
Bucky’s gaze traces you openly now, slow, careful, reverent rather than hungry. His eyes linger on the gentle swell of your breasts, the curve of your hips, the soft thatch of hair between your legs. The front of his pants visibly tightens; he does not try to hide it. He swallows hard. “If we do this, we go slow. You tell me what feels good, what doesn’t. Any time you want to stop, you say so. Promise me that.”
“I promise,” you say, stepping close enough that your bare breasts brush the fabric of his henley. The contact sends a small shiver through you.
“Show me, light-keeper.”
He lets out a shaky breath, then cups your face with both hands. There’s something so earnest in his gaze and you find yourself getting lost in the tide pools of his eyes. Your body warms, an ache growing low.
His lips meet yours gently at first, soft, warm, tasting faintly of coffee and salt. You make a small surprised sound against his mouth, then press closer, deepening the rhythm as he tilts his head and deepens it. One of his hands slides down your back, metal fingers tracing your spine with feather-light pressure, while the flesh hand settles at your waist, pulling you against him.
When he pulls back for air, his forehead rests against yours, his breathing starting to go ragged. His palm drifts lower, cupping one breast carefully, thumb brushing the nipple in slow circles. The sensation shoots straight between your legs; you gasp, arching into the touch. “Feel good?”
“Yes,” you breathe, your own hands exploring, sliding under his shirt to map the hard planes of his chest. Bucky groans softly, the sound low and human and nothing like any whale or dolphin you’ve heard. He tugs his henley off in one smooth motion, revealing broad shoulders, scarred torso, and the seamless join of metal arm. Then he unbuttons his pants, pushing them and his underwear down just enough to free himself. His cock is already hard, thick and flushed, curving slightly upward. It twitches under your fascinated gaze.
You reach out without hesitation, wrapping curious fingers around him. The skin is velvet-soft over steel, hot compared to the metal arm. “It grew,” you observe in wonder. “So warm. Does it feel good when I touch like this?” You stroke experimentally, watching his face.
“Fuck—yes,” he hisses, hips jerking once before he stills them. “Gentle at first… then firmer if you want.” His hand covers yours, guiding the rhythm for a moment before letting go. “Now… bed. Or the floor. Your choice.”
You pull him toward the bed, lying back on the rumpled blankets, legs parting naturally. “Here. I want to experience it all.”
Now naked, Bucky climbs into bed, his weight shifting over yours. He’s broad and large, you feel caged in but not trapped. You sigh as he shifts more weight on you, his metal arm keeping him propped. His other hand cradles your face before dipping down to kiss you again. The kiss is slow and tender, his tongue licking hotly into your mouth.
“Breathe with me, baby. That’s it. You’re so beautiful like this. All flushed and needy for me.”
His mouth trails down: sucking marks into your breasts, tongue swirling your nipples until they’re stiff little peaks. Big hands knead your hips and ass, grounding you. “You are so soft,” he marvels. “Gonna worship every inch.”
When he settles between your thighs, he’s all gentle coaching. He spreads your soaked folds with careful metal fingers, cool against your fever heat, while his flesh thumb circles your clit slow. “Look at this pretty pussy, doll. So wet and puffy already. Good girl.”
You whimper, hips twitching. He leans in, licking a broad stripe up your slit, groaning at your taste. “Sweet as honey. Relax for me. I’m gonna open you up nice and slow.”
One thick finger presses in. You gasp at the stretch. “Easy, easy. Just one for now. Feel me? Breathe through it… yeah, there you go. You’re clenching so tight. That’s okay, baby. Let it happen.” He curls it gently, stroking your front wall until stars burst behind your eyes. “Right there? Good. That’s your spot. Gonna make you come first so it hurts less.”
He adds a second finger, scissoring carefully while his mouth sucks your clit. “Talk to me, sweetheart. Does it feel good? Too much?” You nod frantically, moaning, and he praises you nonstop: “Such a brave mermaid. Taking my fingers so well for your first time. Gonna stretch this tight little cunt just right for my cock.”
Your first orgasm hits hard—walls fluttering around his fingers, slick gushing. He works you through it, murmuring, “That’s my girl. Let it wash over you. So pretty when you come.”
He’s between your legs again, thick cock nudging your entrance. He holds your gaze, one hand laced with yours, the other stroking your thigh. “Eyes on me, doll. This is gonna burn a little at first, but I’ve got you. Push out against me when I go in. Breathe, sweetheart.”
He presses forward. Just the head pops in and you whine at the stretch. “Fuck, so tight… half an inch at a time, okay? You’re doing perfect. Feel how your body’s opening for me? That’s it doll, good. Relax those muscles.” He pauses, kissing you softly, thumb back on your clit to ease the sting. “Breathe with me. In…and out. You’re taking me so well already.”
Another inch. Then another. He coaches you through every shallow thrust: “Wrap your legs around my waist, sweetheart. Yeah, just like that. Pull me in when you’re ready.” Your nails dig into his back as he bottoms out with a shared groan, full and deep, stretching your walls perfectly around his thickness.
“Full, so full,” you sob, tears of overwhelm, relief, and pleasure.
“I know, baby. You’re amazing. Taking every inch of me like you were born for it.” He stays still, forehead to yours, soft kisses raining down on your cheeks, your neck, your lips. Romantic and grounding in the middle of the fire. “No one else. Never again. This is ours.”
When you start squirming, your heat demanding more, he moves. Slow, deep rolls at first. “Tell me if it’s too much. We go at your pace.” The coaching gets filthier as passion builds: “That’s it— rock your hips up to meet me. Feel how your pussy’s sucking me in? My greedy mermaid. So fucking perfect.”
You wrap your legs around him, heels digging into his back, learning the rhythm quickly. Your hands clutch his shoulders—one warm, one cool—and soon the small room fills with the wet sounds of skin meeting skin, your soft gasps and whimpers, his low grunts and whispered praises. Your eyes widen when his strokes hit one particular spot and Bucky beams with pride.
He angles to hit that spot again and again. Pace quickens. Skin slapping, your slick coating your thighs, his cock, dripping down to his balls.
The pleasure crests suddenly, crashing through you like a breaker over rocks. You cry out, back arching, inner walls clenching around him. Bucky follows moments later with a deep groan, spilling inside you as his hips stutter.
Afterward, he collapses carefully beside you, pulling you against his chest—skin to skin, hearts hammering in unison. His metal fingers trace lazy patterns on your back while his flesh hand strokes your hair.
You nestle closer, catching your breath, a small satisfied smile on your lips. “That was the mating ritual,” you murmur, voice husky. “Better than any current in the deep. Humans mate with so much feeling… so much warmth. Thank you for demonstrating.” You press a kiss to his scarred shoulder. “Can we do it again?”
Bucky laughs softly, the sound warm and real against your hair. “Yeah, sweetheart. We can do it again. As many times as you want.” He holds you tighter, the storm long gone, the lighthouse beam still turning steadily above.
Two castaways, no longer running alone, tangled together in the quiet morning light, learning every inch of the new world they’ve found in each other.
—
Back in the ocean later, your pod feels it immediately. It’s not just that you’ve changed, but that something has deepened.
Nerina doesn’t even bother pretending to be subtle.
“Well?” she demands.
You don’t deflect this time. “I think this is real.”
Silence ripples through the water. Sereia’s expression softens as Nerina exhales, slower than usual.
“Yeah,” she says. “We figured.”
Talin closes his eyes as you look toward shore, toward the faint, steady sweep of light.
For the first time, the question isn’t if this matters.
pairing: new avenger!bucky barnes x abused!fem!reader
warnings: mentions of abuse, domestic violence (not committed by bucky!) mentions of trauma, themes of fear and recovery (please read the warnings)
summary: bucky notices the bruises before you ever say a word. as the truth unravels, he steps in—not just to protect you, he makes sure you're never hurt again.
word count: 5.3k (i went a little overboard)
author's note: i have been wanting to write this for quite a while, and i'm glad i did. enjoy my loves, your feedback and thoughts are always appreciated!
It started small.
A shift in the way you smiled—no longer bright and easy, but tight-lipped and fleeting, like you were trying to convince yourself it still came naturally. A hesitation in your laughter, once the sweetest sound in the Watchtower’s echoing corridors, now muffled, forced, or absent altogether.
The others chalked it up to stress. Missions have been tense lately. The team didn’t exactly operate in peacetime.
But Bucky…Bucky saw more.
You were the team’s secretary. The one constant in a whirlwind of chaos. Efficient, organised, always one step ahead of everyone else. You had memorised every operative’s dietary needs before the kitchen staff had.
You knew how to read between lines of mission reports, handle fallouts with the media, and you were the only person Yelena trusted to refill her coffee exactly right. Your desk, tucked near the central hub, was where people came to decompress, vent, even smile.
You made things work. You made the team work.
You were the light that steadied them all.
But lately… that light had gone out.
Bucky noticed first. He always did. Watching people wasn’t just habit—it was an instinct. A soldier’s reflex, sharpened by a lifetime of reading danger in the twitch of a hand or the flicker of a glance.
He noticed how your shoulders curled inward like you were trying to disappear into yourself, or how your arms folded across your stomach, elbows tucked in tight as if they were armour.
You flinched when anyone passed too closely behind your chair. You stopped walking through the halls with your usual spring—started hugging the walls, choosing longer routes that avoided high-traffic zones.
When Yelena clapped a hand to your shoulder in greeting, a simple, affectionate gesture—your entire body jolted like you’d been hit. Not just startled.
Terrified.
The room had gone quiet at that moment. Even Alexei paused, a half-eaten sandwich frozen in his hand. Ava had gone still beside the mission board, her eyes narrowing slightly.
You recovered too quickly. Smiled too fast. “Sorry, nerves,” you’d said, brushing it off, grabbing the nearest file and practically sprinting from the room. But Bucky had already seen too much.
And then the bruises.
They started subtly. Shadows beneath the cuff of your blouse that could be passed off as bad sleep, maybe a knock against a desk corner.
You were clumsy sometimes—everyone knew that. A walking hurricane in heels, Yelena liked to tease. You once tripped over your own shoelaces in front of Val, and no one had let you live it down for a week.
But these weren’t accidents.
There was a splotch of purple just visible beneath your collarbone, dark and irregular. Faint, yellowing fingerprints on your wrist that looked like they were trying to fade, but kept stubbornly coming back.
A raw, angry mark that peeked out from your hairline one morning, like someone had gripped your jaw too hard—someone tall enough, big enough to loom over you, strong enough to leave a handprint in their wake.
Bucky saw that one when you bent down to pick up a report you’d dropped. Your blouse’s collar dipped slightly, just enough to reveal a line of bruising that trailed from your neck toward your shoulder like a hand had wrapped around you and squeezed.
His hand clenched into a fist on instinct.
He didn’t say anything right away. He knew better. But he watched. Quietly, intensely. Not just because he cared, but because something inside him roared with the need to protect you, something deep and territorial and dangerous.
The same thing that made him stare holes into the security cameras when you left the compound for lunch, or that made him scan every incoming message with a new, sharpened edge.
He began checking your schedule.
Not overtly. Just… looking. Noting when you left the compound. Who signed you out. When you came back, and what your face looked like afterward.
You used to return from errands with little smiles and tiny stories—“The deli guy gave me an extra pickle today,” or “Some lady on the street said I had pretty earrings.” But lately, you came back quieter. Shoulders tighter. And you always avoided his eyes.
One afternoon, he asked you if you were okay.
You smiled—again, that damn smile. So polite, so practiced.
“Yeah. Just tired. Thanks for asking Bucky”
But being tired didn’t leave marks on someone’s throat.
And when you walked away, Bucky watched you disappear down the hallway and felt something cold curl in his gut. Something he hadn’t felt in years.
He knew pain. He’d lived it. Breathed it. Worn it like a second skin. But there was something worse about watching you endure it.
Something far more dangerous.
And whoever had hurt you?
They’d just reminded him exactly what he was willing to protect.
Still, Bucky didn’t act rashly. He waited. Watched. Gathered more than just bruises and broken glances. He needed to be sure—of what you were dealing with, of who was doing this to you, of how to approach without sending you further into yourself.
The wrong move could make you shut down entirely. He knew trauma didn’t unravel with questions—it needed patience.
Stillness.
Safety.
So he waited until the Watchtower cleared out for the evening.
The others had trickled out one by one—Yelena dragging Alexei into a sparring match he didn’t ask for, Ava and John disappearing into the training room, Val locked in her office for a late-night debrief.
The corridors fell quiet, fluorescent lights humming low overhead. Bucky lingered near your office, watching the shadows stretch along the floor, the door slightly ajar with the warm glow of your desk lamp spilling out into the hall.
You were still there. Of course you were.
You always stay late now.
“Hey,” he said softly, stepping into your office once the others had gone.
You didn’t jump—but he saw the way your shoulders stiffened. How your fingers paused on the keyboard, curling slightly as if preparing for something.
Your eyes stayed locked on the screen for a moment too long, and when you did glance up, they were wide and glassy with that familiar, haunted look.
The one he recognised too well.
The one he used to see in the mirror.
“Can I talk to you?” His voice stayed quiet, gentle—like coaxing a wounded animal out of hiding. He stood just inside the door, hands in the pockets of his black jacket, posture non-threatening but steady. He wouldn’t crowd you. He wouldn’t touch you. But the one thing he wouldn’t do is walk away.
You swallowed, throat tight, and gave a small nod.
“Sure.”
But the word was fragile. Like it had been stitched together with effort.
He crossed the room slowly, pulling the door shut behind him—not all the way, just enough to give the illusion of privacy without making you feel trapped. Then he moved to the chair across from your desk and sat, leaving space between you. Letting you decide what came next.
You glanced back at your screen, like you were searching for a reason to stay distracted. Like if you just kept typing, none of this would be real. But your hands didn’t move.
He waited a beat, then spoke, low and careful. “I’ve been noticing some things.”
You didn’t answer.
“I don’t mean to scare you,” he added. “I just… I’m worried about you doll”
Your shoulders tensed again. That flinch. That tell. He saw it before you could mask it. And when your arms folded across your stomach, hiding your bruised wrist, he knew.
You were protecting yourself from more than just a conversation.
“I know something’s going on,” he said. “And I don’t need the details if you’re not ready. But I need you to know that… you don’t have to do this alone.”
Still, silence. But your eyes were starting to shine, tears gathering at the corners as you stared down at your keyboard like it held all the answers.
“You’ve been flinching at every touch,” he went on, his voice nearly breaking. “You don’t smile anymore. You avoid everyone like they’re gonna hurt you. And those bruises—”
“Don’t.” Your voice cracked as the word came out, sharp and desperate.
Bucky’s breath caught. But he didn’t move. “Okay,” he said immediately. “I won’t push. I swear.”
The silence that followed was thick—trembling between confession and collapse.
And then your lip quivered. You shook your head once. “I didn’t mean for anyone to notice,” you whispered, voice so soft it almost didn’t reach him.
“I thought I could handle it.”
Bucky leaned forward, slowly, carefully. “You shouldn’t have to handle it.”
Your chin trembled. “I didn’t want to be a burden. Everyone’s got their shit. Missions. Scars. Who wants to hear about the secretary who made the mistake of falling for the wrong guy?”
His jaw clenched so tightly he thought he might crack a molar. “Who did this to you?”
You didn’t answer.
But your silence was answer enough.
His tone darkened, low and steady like steel cooled in ice. “Tell me who put their hands on you.”
You shook your head again, fast this time, panic blooming across your features. “Bucky—don’t. Please. It’ll just make it worse.”
He stood up, jaw rigid, fists clenched at his sides. The chair scraped quietly behind him, but he didn’t move toward you. Didn’t crowd. Just stood there, vibrating with barely contained rage.
But it wasn’t at you.
“I would never let anyone hurt you again,” he said, his voice rough now, fighting to stay gentle. “But you have to let me help.”
Your eyes met his cerulean irises then.
And something inside you cracked.
Because he didn’t look at you with pity.
He looked at you like you mattered. Like your pain mattered. Like he saw you—really saw you—and it didn’t make him walk away.
And something about the way he said it, like a lifeline broke you.
You told him everything.
From the first time it happened, when your ex shoved you against a wall during an argument over a text message. To the second time, when he slapped you so hard your lip split open. The cycle became normal. You had started covering up bruises like second nature, lying to your friends, flinching at shadows.
Two nights ago, he’d come home drunk, angry. He dragged you by your hair into the bedroom, wrapped a hand too tight around your neck, and left purple thumbprints beneath your jaw.
You had to call in sick the next day. Told Val it was the flu. She didn’t question it.
Tears streamed silently down your cheeks, but Bucky never looked away. His face was tight with rage, his jaw clenched so hard you thought he might break a tooth. His metal hand had curled into a fist again, knuckles whitening where they met synthetic plating.
“I'm gonna kill him,” he said, barely above a whisper.
“No,” you croaked, your hand reaching to grip his wrist. “Just… just get me out of there.”
“You don’t have to ask,” he said.
He helped you out of the office, holding your arm with such care, like you might shatter if he used too much strength. He led you to his motorcycle, the matte black vehicle parked beside the Watchtower’s bay doors.
You hesitated. “I don’t—”
He handed you his helmet and said, “You’re safe with me.”
And you believed him.
The wind was sharp against your face, your arms clinging around his waist as he drove through the dusky streets toward your apartment. Your heart thundered the entire ride—not from fear of falling, but from the feeling of escape.
At your place, you let Bucky in and stood frozen in the doorway. Your keys shaking in your hands.
“Tell me what you need,” he said.
You walked numbly toward your bedroom and began pulling a small duffel from the closet. Bucky followed, surveying the apartment with quiet calculation.
The broken picture frame on the floor.
The hole punched in the hallway drywall.
The cracked phone screen beside your bed.
You gathered clothes, toiletries, your journal, a worn copy of Pride and Prejudice. Bucky packed in silence, folding your shirts neatly, rolling your socks with care.
When you turned to get your toothbrush, your hands were trembling too badly to hold it.
“I can’t…” you whispered, finally falling apart.
Bucky was there in an instant, arms wrapping around you, pulling you into the solid warmth of his chest.
“It’s over,” he murmured into your hair. “You’re not going back there. I won’t let you.”
You sobbed into his shoulder, your body wracked with grief and relief all at once. For the first time in years, you believed it.
You were leaving.
Bucky had decided to take you to his apartment, given how late it was—and how you didn’t want the rest of the team knowing about any of this. You couldn’t bear their questions or the way they might look at you differently if they knew the truth. What you needed right now wasn’t a spotlight—it was safety.
And Bucky, somehow, had understood that without you ever having to say a word.
Tucked away in a quiet corner of Brooklyn, it felt like a sanctuary: minimalistic but lived-in, with dark wood furniture, shelves lined with old books, framed black-and-white photos, a few of them being Steve's, and soft lighting that bathed the space in warm, golden hues.
There were blankets folded over the back of his couch, plants that looked surprisingly healthy, and a record player in the corner with a small stack of vinyls beside it. The scent of sandalwood lingered in the air—warm, masculine, grounding.
“Bathroom’s through there,” Bucky said gently, “and the guest room’s yours for as long as you want it.”
You nodded, wiping your face with your sleeve.
He handed you a folded pile of clothes—one of his blue Henley shirts and a pair of grey boxer briefs that would sit loosely on your frame.
“You can sleep in these,” he said. “I’ll set up fresh towels, and if you need anything—anything—you come get me.”
You changed in the bathroom, staring at yourself in the mirror. The bruises on your neck looked even more vibrant in the soft light. You touched them lightly, then pulled Bucky’s shirt over your head. It was warm from his hands, and it smelled like cedar and something unmistakably him.
You sank into the bed that night with clean sheets, the window cracked open just enough to let in the cool night air. Bucky’s home felt quiet in a way yours never had. Not silent from tension—but peaceful. The kind of quiet that comes with safety.
You curled into the soft mattress, wrapped in a blanket that smelled faintly like him, and for the first time in two years, you slept without fear.
Safe.
Protected.
Free.
You woke up with a gasp.
The remnants of the nightmare clung to you like cobwebs—suffocating and sticky. Flashes of fists in the dark. That voice slithering in your ear, venomous and cruel. The oppressive weight on your chest, the cold dread of being trapped with no way out.
Your heart thundered, breath tearing in and out of your lungs like you were still running, still being chased. Your skin was damp with sweat, your hands shaking uncontrollably as you pushed the covers away and bolted upright in bed.
The room swam around you—familiar and unfamiliar all at once. Dimly lit by the glow of a streetlamp outside, walls painted in shadow. The silence rang too loud.
You couldn’t stay.
Before you even registered the movement, your bare feet found the cool hardwood floor, each step down the hallway echoing softly. You didn’t knock. You didn’t need to.
Bucky’s door was cracked open.
He was awake. Sitting at the edge of his bed, elbows braced on his knees, his metal hand cradling the back of his neck like it ached. He looked like he hadn’t slept at all. The soft light from the city cast silver lines across the sharp angles of his face, tracing the tension in his jaw, the furrow of his brow.
Your voice trembled, more breath than sound. “I had a nightmare.”
His head snapped up immediately, eyes locking onto yours. The shift was instant—soldier to protector. In two strides, he was in front of you.
“Hey,” he murmured, voice low and soothing. “You’re okay. I’m right here.”
His hands came to your shoulders—not forceful, just present. Anchoring. His touch was warm and steady, and it sent a tremor through you that wasn’t from fear this time, but release. Like your body finally allowed itself to feel how shaken you were.
Your lip quivered. “Can I stay?”
He nodded before you even finished the question. “Always.”
You didn’t hesitate. The bed welcomed you like a long-lost memory—soft sheets, a comforting dip in the mattress, the faint scent of his soap clinging to the pillow.
You curled into the center of it, small and tentative, feeling like a ghost of yourself. Like you might disappear if the shadows swallowed you up again.
Bucky moved with care. He didn’t rush. He pulled the blanket up over your trembling frame, tucking it gently around your shoulders. Then he slid into the bed behind you, close but not suffocating, the heat of him already beginning to thaw something frozen inside you.
His arm hovered behind you for a moment. He didn’t assume. Didn’t take. Just waited.
When you shifted ever so slightly—just enough for your back to press lightly against his chest, his arm came around you. A quiet, protective barrier. His metal fingers splayed carefully against your stomach, grounding you in the here and now.
You exhaled a shaky breath, your eyes slipping shut for the first time all night. The tension in your body began to unwind, thread by thread. His scent, clean and faintly earthy filled your nose, mingling with the sound of his heartbeat against your spine and the steady rhythm of his breathing.
And then he whispered it, his voice barely brushing your ear, soft and sure and steady.
“I’ve got you.”
The words sank into your skin like warmth, like truth. No promises he couldn’t keep. No hollow reassurances. Just a vow, solid and unspoken, in the way he held you like you were something worth protecting.
You blinked slowly, a tear slipping free and soaking silently into the pillow.
For the first time in as long as you could remember, you believed it.
You were safe.
Not because the nightmares were gone—but because Bucky was here when they came.
The morning sun filtered gently through the blinds of Bucky’s apartment, casting warm strips of gold across the hardwood floors.
For the first time in over a year, you hadn’t woken up with your heart pounding in fear. No yelling, no slamming doors. Just the subtle hum of city life beyond the window, and the distant sizzle of bacon in a skillet.
You padded out of the bedroom in Bucky’s oversized shirt and boxers, clutching the sleeves around your palms. The faint scent of him lingered in the fabric—cedar-wood, leather, and something warm, like late summer.
Bucky stood by the stove, his hair damp from a quick shower, grey T-shirt clinging to the breadth of his shoulders. When he heard your footsteps, he turned slightly and gave you a soft smile.
“Hey, sweetheart” he murmured, voice low and scratchy from sleep. “Hope you’re hungry.”
You nodded, grateful, eyes stinging. It was in the little things—the way he slid a cup of coffee toward you without asking how you liked it, because he already remembered.
Later that day, the team found out.
Yelena had noticed first. She cornered Bucky in the Watchtower’s armoury after morning briefings. “What’s going on with (y/n)?” she demanded, arms crossed, eyes sharp. “She barely said five words. She jumped when Alexei dropped his water bottle. I know bruises when I see them.”
Bucky hesitated, jaw tightening. But when Yelena added, softer this time, “I care about her too,” he gave her the truth.
Word spread in a ripple. Quiet, but powerful. By the end of the day, the team was different.
It started with your phone. You were sorting through mission reports in the comms room when it buzzed beside you, and you flinched hard enough to drop a pen because without looking, you already knew who it was. Him.
John, usually, cocky caught the look on your face and immediately picked the phone up himself.
“Give me your passcode,” he said steadily.
You hesitated. “Why?”
“Because if this asshole’s still texting you, I’m blocking him. And if he’s tracking you, we’re disabling it right now.”
You blinked at him, lip trembling. John just held your gaze, patient. Protective.
“Okay,” you whispered.
Ten minutes later, your ex was blocked. His number, email—gone. John handed the phone back like it weighed nothing, but you knew it had been a thousand-pound chain.
Bob, quiet and sweet, began programming something on the side—a digital firewall. One you didn't even ask for, but he gave it to you anyway.
“If he tries anything online, you’ll be notified. But he won’t get through. I made sure of it.”
You could’ve cried.
Ava began walking with you more often. No words. Just always there—on your way to the labs, when you stopped by the kitchen, even when you headed out to grab lunch across the street.
“I know what it’s like,” she said one day while the two of you sat on a park bench eating sandwiches. “To feel hunted.”
You looked at her, stunned. Her face was unreadable, but her hand brushed yours for a moment, just enough to remind you that you weren’t alone.
Then there was Alexei. Loud, boisterous, intimidating. He walked into the common area one afternoon with three grocery bags in hand and plopped them dramatically onto the table.
“You like those little orange cracker fish?” he boomed showing you the goldfish crackers he had gotten. “I bought five bags. And some juice. Juice is important.”
You stared at him, stunned.
“I don’t—”
“Shush little one,” he said, winking. “You part of us. Thunderbolts always feed Thunderbolts.”
Your laugh broke out before you could stop it. It felt foreign. Strange.
But real.
Alexei beamed like he’d won a medal.
Slowly but surely, the team wrapped you in something new. Something stronger than fear. Stronger than pain.
When you needed to go to the mall for more clothes—things that weren’t tainted with memories—Yelena and Bob went with you.
Yelena stuck close to your side, pretending to be indifferent but always scanning the crowd. Bob carried all the bags with a goofy grin. He even helped pick out a new hoodie. It was soft and warm and maroon.
“You should feel safe in your skin,” Yelena said simply, handing you a matching beanie. “Even if you’re still growing into it.”
Back at the Watchtower, life began to feel... lighter.
You started laughing again. At Alexei's terrible jokes, at Yelena’s savage sarcasm, at Bob’s quiet mutterings when tech didn’t work. Even John, in all his arrogance, could make you smile.
There was a movie night every Friday now and Bucky always sat next to you, sometimes with a pillow between you both to give space, other times with his shoulder a solid warmth at your side. You’d found yourself leaning into him more. Not because you had to. But because it felt right.
And he never pushed. Never demanded. Just let you exist next to him. Sometimes he’d hand you a blanket without saying a word. Sometimes he’d offer half his popcorn. Sometimes, his fingers would brush yours, warm and careful, and linger just a second longer than necessary.
You slept more. Ate more. Laughed more.
One day, Ava caught you humming in the hallway, arms full of supplies. She stopped in her tracks.
“What?” you asked.
“You’re glowing,” she said quietly.
You blinked. “I—I am?”
She gave a rare, small smile. “Like someone who remembers what sunlight feels like.”
One night, after Yelena dropped you off, you returned to the apartment Bucky always insisted was open to you. You let yourself in with the spare key. It was late, and he was half-asleep on the couch with a book in his lap. He stirred when you closed the door.
“You okay sweetheart?” he mumbled.
“Yeah,” you said.
He nodded, eyes drifting shut again.
You sat beside him, curling your legs up, and rested your head against his shoulder.
He didn’t move. Didn’t ask. Just reached for the blanket draped over the armrest and pulled it gently over you both.
It was the safest you’d ever felt.
It had started out as a good night.
One of those rare moments where the city lights felt warm rather than harsh, where laughter didn’t feel like something you had to fake.
The team had dragged you out—gently, persistently, lovingly.
“C’mon,” Yelena had said, slinging her arm over your shoulder. “Burgers, milkshakes, greasy fries. We deserve it. You deserve it.”
You hesitated. It had been a while since you went to any public diner. Too many memories. Too many shadows. Too much risk of seeing him.
But tonight? You nodded. Just once. Just enough.
The diner was loud with neon buzz and the clatter of plates, the kind of classic joint with red booths and checkered floors. Bucky slid into the booth beside you while Yelena and John sat across. Bob and Ava took the seats at the edge, Alexei immediately requesting the biggest burger they had.
Jokes flew easily. John was ranting about ketchup crimes. Yelena argued that mayonnaise was the superior condiment. Bob kept trying to order fries but the waitress only seemed to hear Alexei’s booming voice.
You were laughing. Honest, soft laughter that made your chest ache.
Then the door jingled.
And just like that, the warmth bled from the room.
Laughter dimmed. The sizzle of the grill and clatter of dishes became distant, muffled by the sudden roar of blood in your ears.
Bucky stilled beside you.
Your ex stood in the doorway, flanked by two men you didn’t recognise—thick-necked, sneering types with clenched fists and hooded eyes. But it was him you saw. Him, with that awful smirk, like nothing had changed.
Like he still owned the air you breathed.
Bucky noticed the way your body tensed, your fingers gripping the edge of the table. “Hey—”
Your ex’s eyes landed on you, and he stepped forward, raising his voice.
“Well, look who it is. Didn’t think you’d crawl this far downtown. Guess word spreads when you’re spreading your legs for every man in New York now, huh?”
The sound of the booth creaking was the only warning before Bucky stood.
Yelena’s fork clattered onto her plate.
John was on his feet in seconds, positioning himself directly between you and your ex.
“Take that back,” Bucky growled.
Your ex only sneered, moving closer. “What, you gonna fight me in front of your new playgroup? Cute. Didn’t think the Winter Soldier was into charity cases.”
You flinched.
Bucky didn’t.
“I know what you did to her,” Bucky said, low and lethal.
Your ex chuckled, but there was unease in his posture now. “What? You mean the bruises? Bitch liked it rough. Don’t tell me you haven’t noticed.”
Yelena stood up behind John, her face carved in steel. “The next time you touch her,” she said flatly, “will be the last time you have hands.”
Your ex stepped forward as if to challenge, but John didn’t move an inch. “Try it,” he warned. “Give me a reason.”
You saw it—the twitch in your ex’s jaw, the way he coiled his fist. He swung at Bucky.
But Bucky didn’t just dodge. He caught the punch mid-air.
With his metal hand.
The crunch of bone was audible and a gasp ran through the diner.
Before anyone could react, Bucky gripped your ex by the front of his jacket, lifting him clean off the floor. The metal arm locked around his throat with frightening precision. The air stilled. Your ex's feet dangled.
“If you ever look at her again,” Bucky snarled, voice sharp and shaking with rage, “if you so much as breathe in her goddamn direction—I will rip your spine out and hang it from the Watchtower gates.”
His voice didn’t rise. It didn’t need to. It was full of restrained fury. Of violence barely held back. His eyes had darkened, steel-gray and burning.
Your ex gurgled, his hands clawing at Bucky’s grip.
“Do you understand me?”
A choked nod.
Bucky dropped him like trash.
Alexei stepped forward then, looming over the two henchmen. “You want to try luck?” he asked them casually. “I haven’t punch anything in weeks.”
The men looked at each other, then down at your ex, now coughing on the floor. They backed away.
“You’re not worth it,” one muttered, and the other practically dragged your ex toward the exit.
Your heart was thundering. Your breath short.
Bob slipped into the seat beside you. Ava stood near the door, eyes scanning the street for any lingering threat.
Bucky turned to you, jaw tight, shoulders still trembling with adrenaline. But when he looked at you, his expression softened immediately.
He crouched in front of you, hands open. “You okay?”
You nodded shakily, tears welling.
Yelena handed you a napkin. “He’s gone,” she said quietly. “He’s never coming near you again.”
John was still standing like a human shield, arms crossed.
And Bucky... Bucky cupped your cheek with his hand. It was warm, comforting, his thumb brushing away the tear that escaped.
“He doesn’t get to touch you. Not now. Not ever again.”
You leaned into him, trembling.
“I was so scared,” you whispered, barely audible.
Bucky pressed his forehead to yours. “I know, sweetheart. But it’s over. He can’t hurt you anymore. Not while I’m breathing.”
And for a moment, even in the shattered remains of what should have been a peaceful night, you were wrapped in a shield stronger than steel.
You had them.
You had him.
You were safe.
You didn’t speak on the way home.
No one made you.
Bucky drove, one hand on the wheel, the other occasionally brushing against your thigh—anchoring, grounding. The rest of the team took a second vehicle, giving you space. After what happened, you needed it.
You stared out the window, watching the neon blur into streaks of yellow and red, feeling like you were floating somewhere outside yourself. Somewhere between fear and relief.
The silence between you and Bucky wasn’t heavy—it was steady. Like the calm after a storm. Like quiet waves still curling back from the shore.
When he parked outside the compound, he turned to you slowly.
“Do you want to be alone?”
You shook your head.
He didn’t ask again. Just took your hand gently, led you through the compound, through the hallways, up the stairs. When you reached your room, he hesitated at the door.
“Can I stay?”
You nodded.
Inside, the room felt untouched by the chaos of earlier. Soft lamplight, a rumpled blanket on your bed. Familiar, safe.
You kicked your shoes off and sat on the edge of the bed, fingers twisting in your lap. Bucky crouched in front of you again, like at the diner, his hands resting on your knees.
“You’re not weak for being scared,” he said. “You know that, right?”
Your throat tightened. You nodded.
“But he’s never going to get to you again. I won’t let him. None of us will.”
You looked at him. The way his eyes held yours, soft but strong. The way his presence wrapped around you like armor. The way his touch was always careful, like you were something breakable but worth protecting.
And then you whispered, “I don’t know how to stop being afraid.”
Bucky leaned forward. Pressed his forehead gently to yours.
“You don’t have to. Not right away. But you’re not alone anymore. We’ll fight it together.”
You closed your eyes.
And when he climbed into bed beside you, when his arms wrapped around you and pulled you against the steady thump of his heart, you believed him.
Not because the fear was gone.
But because for the first time in so long, you weren’t carrying it alone.
He pressed a kiss to your temple. Whispered something you didn’t catch—but it didn’t matter.
It sounded like safety.
It felt like home.
a/n: this fic is one i hold close, because i have experienced abuse/dv in my previous relationship, and i had no idea how to leave, and writing this helped, a lot. i do hope that every person that is trapped in this cycle will find their bucky—someone who makes them feel safe and loved. i am grateful i found mine. if you're a victim or know someone who is struggling, please don't be afraid to seek for help. i promise it does get better once you leave. (google dv helpline, your country's hotline should appear)
pairing: new avenger!bucky barnes x abused!fem!reader
warnings: mentions of abuse, domestic violence (not committed by bucky!) mentions of trauma, themes of fear and recovery (please read the warnings)
summary: bucky notices the bruises before you ever say a word. as the truth unravels, he steps in—not just to protect you, he makes sure you're never hurt again.
word count: 5.3k (i went a little overboard)
author's note: i have been wanting to write this for quite a while, and i'm glad i did. enjoy my loves, your feedback and thoughts are always appreciated!
It started small.
A shift in the way you smiled—no longer bright and easy, but tight-lipped and fleeting, like you were trying to convince yourself it still came naturally. A hesitation in your laughter, once the sweetest sound in the Watchtower’s echoing corridors, now muffled, forced, or absent altogether.
The others chalked it up to stress. Missions have been tense lately. The team didn’t exactly operate in peacetime.
But Bucky…Bucky saw more.
You were the team’s secretary. The one constant in a whirlwind of chaos. Efficient, organised, always one step ahead of everyone else. You had memorised every operative’s dietary needs before the kitchen staff had.
You knew how to read between lines of mission reports, handle fallouts with the media, and you were the only person Yelena trusted to refill her coffee exactly right. Your desk, tucked near the central hub, was where people came to decompress, vent, even smile.
You made things work. You made the team work.
You were the light that steadied them all.
But lately… that light had gone out.
Bucky noticed first. He always did. Watching people wasn’t just habit—it was an instinct. A soldier’s reflex, sharpened by a lifetime of reading danger in the twitch of a hand or the flicker of a glance.
He noticed how your shoulders curled inward like you were trying to disappear into yourself, or how your arms folded across your stomach, elbows tucked in tight as if they were armour.
You flinched when anyone passed too closely behind your chair. You stopped walking through the halls with your usual spring—started hugging the walls, choosing longer routes that avoided high-traffic zones.
When Yelena clapped a hand to your shoulder in greeting, a simple, affectionate gesture—your entire body jolted like you’d been hit. Not just startled.
Terrified.
The room had gone quiet at that moment. Even Alexei paused, a half-eaten sandwich frozen in his hand. Ava had gone still beside the mission board, her eyes narrowing slightly.
You recovered too quickly. Smiled too fast. “Sorry, nerves,” you’d said, brushing it off, grabbing the nearest file and practically sprinting from the room. But Bucky had already seen too much.
And then the bruises.
They started subtly. Shadows beneath the cuff of your blouse that could be passed off as bad sleep, maybe a knock against a desk corner.
You were clumsy sometimes—everyone knew that. A walking hurricane in heels, Yelena liked to tease. You once tripped over your own shoelaces in front of Val, and no one had let you live it down for a week.
But these weren’t accidents.
There was a splotch of purple just visible beneath your collarbone, dark and irregular. Faint, yellowing fingerprints on your wrist that looked like they were trying to fade, but kept stubbornly coming back.
A raw, angry mark that peeked out from your hairline one morning, like someone had gripped your jaw too hard—someone tall enough, big enough to loom over you, strong enough to leave a handprint in their wake.
Bucky saw that one when you bent down to pick up a report you’d dropped. Your blouse’s collar dipped slightly, just enough to reveal a line of bruising that trailed from your neck toward your shoulder like a hand had wrapped around you and squeezed.
His hand clenched into a fist on instinct.
He didn’t say anything right away. He knew better. But he watched. Quietly, intensely. Not just because he cared, but because something inside him roared with the need to protect you, something deep and territorial and dangerous.
The same thing that made him stare holes into the security cameras when you left the compound for lunch, or that made him scan every incoming message with a new, sharpened edge.
He began checking your schedule.
Not overtly. Just… looking. Noting when you left the compound. Who signed you out. When you came back, and what your face looked like afterward.
You used to return from errands with little smiles and tiny stories—“The deli guy gave me an extra pickle today,” or “Some lady on the street said I had pretty earrings.” But lately, you came back quieter. Shoulders tighter. And you always avoided his eyes.
One afternoon, he asked you if you were okay.
You smiled—again, that damn smile. So polite, so practiced.
“Yeah. Just tired. Thanks for asking Bucky”
But being tired didn’t leave marks on someone’s throat.
And when you walked away, Bucky watched you disappear down the hallway and felt something cold curl in his gut. Something he hadn’t felt in years.
He knew pain. He’d lived it. Breathed it. Worn it like a second skin. But there was something worse about watching you endure it.
Something far more dangerous.
And whoever had hurt you?
They’d just reminded him exactly what he was willing to protect.
Still, Bucky didn’t act rashly. He waited. Watched. Gathered more than just bruises and broken glances. He needed to be sure—of what you were dealing with, of who was doing this to you, of how to approach without sending you further into yourself.
The wrong move could make you shut down entirely. He knew trauma didn’t unravel with questions—it needed patience.
Stillness.
Safety.
So he waited until the Watchtower cleared out for the evening.
The others had trickled out one by one—Yelena dragging Alexei into a sparring match he didn’t ask for, Ava and John disappearing into the training room, Val locked in her office for a late-night debrief.
The corridors fell quiet, fluorescent lights humming low overhead. Bucky lingered near your office, watching the shadows stretch along the floor, the door slightly ajar with the warm glow of your desk lamp spilling out into the hall.
You were still there. Of course you were.
You always stay late now.
“Hey,” he said softly, stepping into your office once the others had gone.
You didn’t jump—but he saw the way your shoulders stiffened. How your fingers paused on the keyboard, curling slightly as if preparing for something.
Your eyes stayed locked on the screen for a moment too long, and when you did glance up, they were wide and glassy with that familiar, haunted look.
The one he recognised too well.
The one he used to see in the mirror.
“Can I talk to you?” His voice stayed quiet, gentle—like coaxing a wounded animal out of hiding. He stood just inside the door, hands in the pockets of his black jacket, posture non-threatening but steady. He wouldn’t crowd you. He wouldn’t touch you. But the one thing he wouldn’t do is walk away.
You swallowed, throat tight, and gave a small nod.
“Sure.”
But the word was fragile. Like it had been stitched together with effort.
He crossed the room slowly, pulling the door shut behind him—not all the way, just enough to give the illusion of privacy without making you feel trapped. Then he moved to the chair across from your desk and sat, leaving space between you. Letting you decide what came next.
You glanced back at your screen, like you were searching for a reason to stay distracted. Like if you just kept typing, none of this would be real. But your hands didn’t move.
He waited a beat, then spoke, low and careful. “I’ve been noticing some things.”
You didn’t answer.
“I don’t mean to scare you,” he added. “I just… I’m worried about you doll”
Your shoulders tensed again. That flinch. That tell. He saw it before you could mask it. And when your arms folded across your stomach, hiding your bruised wrist, he knew.
You were protecting yourself from more than just a conversation.
“I know something’s going on,” he said. “And I don’t need the details if you’re not ready. But I need you to know that… you don’t have to do this alone.”
Still, silence. But your eyes were starting to shine, tears gathering at the corners as you stared down at your keyboard like it held all the answers.
“You’ve been flinching at every touch,” he went on, his voice nearly breaking. “You don’t smile anymore. You avoid everyone like they’re gonna hurt you. And those bruises—”
“Don’t.” Your voice cracked as the word came out, sharp and desperate.
Bucky’s breath caught. But he didn’t move. “Okay,” he said immediately. “I won’t push. I swear.”
The silence that followed was thick—trembling between confession and collapse.
And then your lip quivered. You shook your head once. “I didn’t mean for anyone to notice,” you whispered, voice so soft it almost didn’t reach him.
“I thought I could handle it.”
Bucky leaned forward, slowly, carefully. “You shouldn’t have to handle it.”
Your chin trembled. “I didn’t want to be a burden. Everyone’s got their shit. Missions. Scars. Who wants to hear about the secretary who made the mistake of falling for the wrong guy?”
His jaw clenched so tightly he thought he might crack a molar. “Who did this to you?”
You didn’t answer.
But your silence was answer enough.
His tone darkened, low and steady like steel cooled in ice. “Tell me who put their hands on you.”
You shook your head again, fast this time, panic blooming across your features. “Bucky—don’t. Please. It’ll just make it worse.”
He stood up, jaw rigid, fists clenched at his sides. The chair scraped quietly behind him, but he didn’t move toward you. Didn’t crowd. Just stood there, vibrating with barely contained rage.
But it wasn’t at you.
“I would never let anyone hurt you again,” he said, his voice rough now, fighting to stay gentle. “But you have to let me help.”
Your eyes met his cerulean irises then.
And something inside you cracked.
Because he didn’t look at you with pity.
He looked at you like you mattered. Like your pain mattered. Like he saw you—really saw you—and it didn’t make him walk away.
And something about the way he said it, like a lifeline broke you.
You told him everything.
From the first time it happened, when your ex shoved you against a wall during an argument over a text message. To the second time, when he slapped you so hard your lip split open. The cycle became normal. You had started covering up bruises like second nature, lying to your friends, flinching at shadows.
Two nights ago, he’d come home drunk, angry. He dragged you by your hair into the bedroom, wrapped a hand too tight around your neck, and left purple thumbprints beneath your jaw.
You had to call in sick the next day. Told Val it was the flu. She didn’t question it.
Tears streamed silently down your cheeks, but Bucky never looked away. His face was tight with rage, his jaw clenched so hard you thought he might break a tooth. His metal hand had curled into a fist again, knuckles whitening where they met synthetic plating.
“I'm gonna kill him,” he said, barely above a whisper.
“No,” you croaked, your hand reaching to grip his wrist. “Just… just get me out of there.”
“You don’t have to ask,” he said.
He helped you out of the office, holding your arm with such care, like you might shatter if he used too much strength. He led you to his motorcycle, the matte black vehicle parked beside the Watchtower’s bay doors.
You hesitated. “I don’t—”
He handed you his helmet and said, “You’re safe with me.”
And you believed him.
The wind was sharp against your face, your arms clinging around his waist as he drove through the dusky streets toward your apartment. Your heart thundered the entire ride—not from fear of falling, but from the feeling of escape.
At your place, you let Bucky in and stood frozen in the doorway. Your keys shaking in your hands.
“Tell me what you need,” he said.
You walked numbly toward your bedroom and began pulling a small duffel from the closet. Bucky followed, surveying the apartment with quiet calculation.
The broken picture frame on the floor.
The hole punched in the hallway drywall.
The cracked phone screen beside your bed.
You gathered clothes, toiletries, your journal, a worn copy of Pride and Prejudice. Bucky packed in silence, folding your shirts neatly, rolling your socks with care.
When you turned to get your toothbrush, your hands were trembling too badly to hold it.
“I can’t…” you whispered, finally falling apart.
Bucky was there in an instant, arms wrapping around you, pulling you into the solid warmth of his chest.
“It’s over,” he murmured into your hair. “You’re not going back there. I won’t let you.”
You sobbed into his shoulder, your body wracked with grief and relief all at once. For the first time in years, you believed it.
You were leaving.
Bucky had decided to take you to his apartment, given how late it was—and how you didn’t want the rest of the team knowing about any of this. You couldn’t bear their questions or the way they might look at you differently if they knew the truth. What you needed right now wasn’t a spotlight—it was safety.
And Bucky, somehow, had understood that without you ever having to say a word.
Tucked away in a quiet corner of Brooklyn, it felt like a sanctuary: minimalistic but lived-in, with dark wood furniture, shelves lined with old books, framed black-and-white photos, a few of them being Steve's, and soft lighting that bathed the space in warm, golden hues.
There were blankets folded over the back of his couch, plants that looked surprisingly healthy, and a record player in the corner with a small stack of vinyls beside it. The scent of sandalwood lingered in the air—warm, masculine, grounding.
“Bathroom’s through there,” Bucky said gently, “and the guest room’s yours for as long as you want it.”
You nodded, wiping your face with your sleeve.
He handed you a folded pile of clothes—one of his blue Henley shirts and a pair of grey boxer briefs that would sit loosely on your frame.
“You can sleep in these,” he said. “I’ll set up fresh towels, and if you need anything—anything—you come get me.”
You changed in the bathroom, staring at yourself in the mirror. The bruises on your neck looked even more vibrant in the soft light. You touched them lightly, then pulled Bucky’s shirt over your head. It was warm from his hands, and it smelled like cedar and something unmistakably him.
You sank into the bed that night with clean sheets, the window cracked open just enough to let in the cool night air. Bucky’s home felt quiet in a way yours never had. Not silent from tension—but peaceful. The kind of quiet that comes with safety.
You curled into the soft mattress, wrapped in a blanket that smelled faintly like him, and for the first time in two years, you slept without fear.
Safe.
Protected.
Free.
You woke up with a gasp.
The remnants of the nightmare clung to you like cobwebs—suffocating and sticky. Flashes of fists in the dark. That voice slithering in your ear, venomous and cruel. The oppressive weight on your chest, the cold dread of being trapped with no way out.
Your heart thundered, breath tearing in and out of your lungs like you were still running, still being chased. Your skin was damp with sweat, your hands shaking uncontrollably as you pushed the covers away and bolted upright in bed.
The room swam around you—familiar and unfamiliar all at once. Dimly lit by the glow of a streetlamp outside, walls painted in shadow. The silence rang too loud.
You couldn’t stay.
Before you even registered the movement, your bare feet found the cool hardwood floor, each step down the hallway echoing softly. You didn’t knock. You didn’t need to.
Bucky’s door was cracked open.
He was awake. Sitting at the edge of his bed, elbows braced on his knees, his metal hand cradling the back of his neck like it ached. He looked like he hadn’t slept at all. The soft light from the city cast silver lines across the sharp angles of his face, tracing the tension in his jaw, the furrow of his brow.
Your voice trembled, more breath than sound. “I had a nightmare.”
His head snapped up immediately, eyes locking onto yours. The shift was instant—soldier to protector. In two strides, he was in front of you.
“Hey,” he murmured, voice low and soothing. “You’re okay. I’m right here.”
His hands came to your shoulders—not forceful, just present. Anchoring. His touch was warm and steady, and it sent a tremor through you that wasn’t from fear this time, but release. Like your body finally allowed itself to feel how shaken you were.
Your lip quivered. “Can I stay?”
He nodded before you even finished the question. “Always.”
You didn’t hesitate. The bed welcomed you like a long-lost memory—soft sheets, a comforting dip in the mattress, the faint scent of his soap clinging to the pillow.
You curled into the center of it, small and tentative, feeling like a ghost of yourself. Like you might disappear if the shadows swallowed you up again.
Bucky moved with care. He didn’t rush. He pulled the blanket up over your trembling frame, tucking it gently around your shoulders. Then he slid into the bed behind you, close but not suffocating, the heat of him already beginning to thaw something frozen inside you.
His arm hovered behind you for a moment. He didn’t assume. Didn’t take. Just waited.
When you shifted ever so slightly—just enough for your back to press lightly against his chest, his arm came around you. A quiet, protective barrier. His metal fingers splayed carefully against your stomach, grounding you in the here and now.
You exhaled a shaky breath, your eyes slipping shut for the first time all night. The tension in your body began to unwind, thread by thread. His scent, clean and faintly earthy filled your nose, mingling with the sound of his heartbeat against your spine and the steady rhythm of his breathing.
And then he whispered it, his voice barely brushing your ear, soft and sure and steady.
“I’ve got you.”
The words sank into your skin like warmth, like truth. No promises he couldn’t keep. No hollow reassurances. Just a vow, solid and unspoken, in the way he held you like you were something worth protecting.
You blinked slowly, a tear slipping free and soaking silently into the pillow.
For the first time in as long as you could remember, you believed it.
You were safe.
Not because the nightmares were gone—but because Bucky was here when they came.
The morning sun filtered gently through the blinds of Bucky’s apartment, casting warm strips of gold across the hardwood floors.
For the first time in over a year, you hadn’t woken up with your heart pounding in fear. No yelling, no slamming doors. Just the subtle hum of city life beyond the window, and the distant sizzle of bacon in a skillet.
You padded out of the bedroom in Bucky’s oversized shirt and boxers, clutching the sleeves around your palms. The faint scent of him lingered in the fabric—cedar-wood, leather, and something warm, like late summer.
Bucky stood by the stove, his hair damp from a quick shower, grey T-shirt clinging to the breadth of his shoulders. When he heard your footsteps, he turned slightly and gave you a soft smile.
“Hey, sweetheart” he murmured, voice low and scratchy from sleep. “Hope you’re hungry.”
You nodded, grateful, eyes stinging. It was in the little things—the way he slid a cup of coffee toward you without asking how you liked it, because he already remembered.
Later that day, the team found out.
Yelena had noticed first. She cornered Bucky in the Watchtower’s armoury after morning briefings. “What’s going on with (y/n)?” she demanded, arms crossed, eyes sharp. “She barely said five words. She jumped when Alexei dropped his water bottle. I know bruises when I see them.”
Bucky hesitated, jaw tightening. But when Yelena added, softer this time, “I care about her too,” he gave her the truth.
Word spread in a ripple. Quiet, but powerful. By the end of the day, the team was different.
It started with your phone. You were sorting through mission reports in the comms room when it buzzed beside you, and you flinched hard enough to drop a pen because without looking, you already knew who it was. Him.
John, usually, cocky caught the look on your face and immediately picked the phone up himself.
“Give me your passcode,” he said steadily.
You hesitated. “Why?”
“Because if this asshole’s still texting you, I’m blocking him. And if he’s tracking you, we’re disabling it right now.”
You blinked at him, lip trembling. John just held your gaze, patient. Protective.
“Okay,” you whispered.
Ten minutes later, your ex was blocked. His number, email—gone. John handed the phone back like it weighed nothing, but you knew it had been a thousand-pound chain.
Bob, quiet and sweet, began programming something on the side—a digital firewall. One you didn't even ask for, but he gave it to you anyway.
“If he tries anything online, you’ll be notified. But he won’t get through. I made sure of it.”
You could’ve cried.
Ava began walking with you more often. No words. Just always there—on your way to the labs, when you stopped by the kitchen, even when you headed out to grab lunch across the street.
“I know what it’s like,” she said one day while the two of you sat on a park bench eating sandwiches. “To feel hunted.”
You looked at her, stunned. Her face was unreadable, but her hand brushed yours for a moment, just enough to remind you that you weren’t alone.
Then there was Alexei. Loud, boisterous, intimidating. He walked into the common area one afternoon with three grocery bags in hand and plopped them dramatically onto the table.
“You like those little orange cracker fish?” he boomed showing you the goldfish crackers he had gotten. “I bought five bags. And some juice. Juice is important.”
You stared at him, stunned.
“I don’t—”
“Shush little one,” he said, winking. “You part of us. Thunderbolts always feed Thunderbolts.”
Your laugh broke out before you could stop it. It felt foreign. Strange.
But real.
Alexei beamed like he’d won a medal.
Slowly but surely, the team wrapped you in something new. Something stronger than fear. Stronger than pain.
When you needed to go to the mall for more clothes—things that weren’t tainted with memories—Yelena and Bob went with you.
Yelena stuck close to your side, pretending to be indifferent but always scanning the crowd. Bob carried all the bags with a goofy grin. He even helped pick out a new hoodie. It was soft and warm and maroon.
“You should feel safe in your skin,” Yelena said simply, handing you a matching beanie. “Even if you’re still growing into it.”
Back at the Watchtower, life began to feel... lighter.
You started laughing again. At Alexei's terrible jokes, at Yelena’s savage sarcasm, at Bob’s quiet mutterings when tech didn’t work. Even John, in all his arrogance, could make you smile.
There was a movie night every Friday now and Bucky always sat next to you, sometimes with a pillow between you both to give space, other times with his shoulder a solid warmth at your side. You’d found yourself leaning into him more. Not because you had to. But because it felt right.
And he never pushed. Never demanded. Just let you exist next to him. Sometimes he’d hand you a blanket without saying a word. Sometimes he’d offer half his popcorn. Sometimes, his fingers would brush yours, warm and careful, and linger just a second longer than necessary.
You slept more. Ate more. Laughed more.
One day, Ava caught you humming in the hallway, arms full of supplies. She stopped in her tracks.
“What?” you asked.
“You’re glowing,” she said quietly.
You blinked. “I—I am?”
She gave a rare, small smile. “Like someone who remembers what sunlight feels like.”
One night, after Yelena dropped you off, you returned to the apartment Bucky always insisted was open to you. You let yourself in with the spare key. It was late, and he was half-asleep on the couch with a book in his lap. He stirred when you closed the door.
“You okay sweetheart?” he mumbled.
“Yeah,” you said.
He nodded, eyes drifting shut again.
You sat beside him, curling your legs up, and rested your head against his shoulder.
He didn’t move. Didn’t ask. Just reached for the blanket draped over the armrest and pulled it gently over you both.
It was the safest you’d ever felt.
It had started out as a good night.
One of those rare moments where the city lights felt warm rather than harsh, where laughter didn’t feel like something you had to fake.
The team had dragged you out—gently, persistently, lovingly.
“C’mon,” Yelena had said, slinging her arm over your shoulder. “Burgers, milkshakes, greasy fries. We deserve it. You deserve it.”
You hesitated. It had been a while since you went to any public diner. Too many memories. Too many shadows. Too much risk of seeing him.
But tonight? You nodded. Just once. Just enough.
The diner was loud with neon buzz and the clatter of plates, the kind of classic joint with red booths and checkered floors. Bucky slid into the booth beside you while Yelena and John sat across. Bob and Ava took the seats at the edge, Alexei immediately requesting the biggest burger they had.
Jokes flew easily. John was ranting about ketchup crimes. Yelena argued that mayonnaise was the superior condiment. Bob kept trying to order fries but the waitress only seemed to hear Alexei’s booming voice.
You were laughing. Honest, soft laughter that made your chest ache.
Then the door jingled.
And just like that, the warmth bled from the room.
Laughter dimmed. The sizzle of the grill and clatter of dishes became distant, muffled by the sudden roar of blood in your ears.
Bucky stilled beside you.
Your ex stood in the doorway, flanked by two men you didn’t recognise—thick-necked, sneering types with clenched fists and hooded eyes. But it was him you saw. Him, with that awful smirk, like nothing had changed.
Like he still owned the air you breathed.
Bucky noticed the way your body tensed, your fingers gripping the edge of the table. “Hey—”
Your ex’s eyes landed on you, and he stepped forward, raising his voice.
“Well, look who it is. Didn’t think you’d crawl this far downtown. Guess word spreads when you’re spreading your legs for every man in New York now, huh?”
The sound of the booth creaking was the only warning before Bucky stood.
Yelena’s fork clattered onto her plate.
John was on his feet in seconds, positioning himself directly between you and your ex.
“Take that back,” Bucky growled.
Your ex only sneered, moving closer. “What, you gonna fight me in front of your new playgroup? Cute. Didn’t think the Winter Soldier was into charity cases.”
You flinched.
Bucky didn’t.
“I know what you did to her,” Bucky said, low and lethal.
Your ex chuckled, but there was unease in his posture now. “What? You mean the bruises? Bitch liked it rough. Don’t tell me you haven’t noticed.”
Yelena stood up behind John, her face carved in steel. “The next time you touch her,” she said flatly, “will be the last time you have hands.”
Your ex stepped forward as if to challenge, but John didn’t move an inch. “Try it,” he warned. “Give me a reason.”
You saw it—the twitch in your ex’s jaw, the way he coiled his fist. He swung at Bucky.
But Bucky didn’t just dodge. He caught the punch mid-air.
With his metal hand.
The crunch of bone was audible and a gasp ran through the diner.
Before anyone could react, Bucky gripped your ex by the front of his jacket, lifting him clean off the floor. The metal arm locked around his throat with frightening precision. The air stilled. Your ex's feet dangled.
“If you ever look at her again,” Bucky snarled, voice sharp and shaking with rage, “if you so much as breathe in her goddamn direction—I will rip your spine out and hang it from the Watchtower gates.”
His voice didn’t rise. It didn’t need to. It was full of restrained fury. Of violence barely held back. His eyes had darkened, steel-gray and burning.
Your ex gurgled, his hands clawing at Bucky’s grip.
“Do you understand me?”
A choked nod.
Bucky dropped him like trash.
Alexei stepped forward then, looming over the two henchmen. “You want to try luck?” he asked them casually. “I haven’t punch anything in weeks.”
The men looked at each other, then down at your ex, now coughing on the floor. They backed away.
“You’re not worth it,” one muttered, and the other practically dragged your ex toward the exit.
Your heart was thundering. Your breath short.
Bob slipped into the seat beside you. Ava stood near the door, eyes scanning the street for any lingering threat.
Bucky turned to you, jaw tight, shoulders still trembling with adrenaline. But when he looked at you, his expression softened immediately.
He crouched in front of you, hands open. “You okay?”
You nodded shakily, tears welling.
Yelena handed you a napkin. “He’s gone,” she said quietly. “He’s never coming near you again.”
John was still standing like a human shield, arms crossed.
And Bucky... Bucky cupped your cheek with his hand. It was warm, comforting, his thumb brushing away the tear that escaped.
“He doesn’t get to touch you. Not now. Not ever again.”
You leaned into him, trembling.
“I was so scared,” you whispered, barely audible.
Bucky pressed his forehead to yours. “I know, sweetheart. But it’s over. He can’t hurt you anymore. Not while I’m breathing.”
And for a moment, even in the shattered remains of what should have been a peaceful night, you were wrapped in a shield stronger than steel.
You had them.
You had him.
You were safe.
You didn’t speak on the way home.
No one made you.
Bucky drove, one hand on the wheel, the other occasionally brushing against your thigh—anchoring, grounding. The rest of the team took a second vehicle, giving you space. After what happened, you needed it.
You stared out the window, watching the neon blur into streaks of yellow and red, feeling like you were floating somewhere outside yourself. Somewhere between fear and relief.
The silence between you and Bucky wasn’t heavy—it was steady. Like the calm after a storm. Like quiet waves still curling back from the shore.
When he parked outside the compound, he turned to you slowly.
“Do you want to be alone?”
You shook your head.
He didn’t ask again. Just took your hand gently, led you through the compound, through the hallways, up the stairs. When you reached your room, he hesitated at the door.
“Can I stay?”
You nodded.
Inside, the room felt untouched by the chaos of earlier. Soft lamplight, a rumpled blanket on your bed. Familiar, safe.
You kicked your shoes off and sat on the edge of the bed, fingers twisting in your lap. Bucky crouched in front of you again, like at the diner, his hands resting on your knees.
“You’re not weak for being scared,” he said. “You know that, right?”
Your throat tightened. You nodded.
“But he’s never going to get to you again. I won’t let him. None of us will.”
You looked at him. The way his eyes held yours, soft but strong. The way his presence wrapped around you like armor. The way his touch was always careful, like you were something breakable but worth protecting.
And then you whispered, “I don’t know how to stop being afraid.”
Bucky leaned forward. Pressed his forehead gently to yours.
“You don’t have to. Not right away. But you’re not alone anymore. We’ll fight it together.”
You closed your eyes.
And when he climbed into bed beside you, when his arms wrapped around you and pulled you against the steady thump of his heart, you believed him.
Not because the fear was gone.
But because for the first time in so long, you weren’t carrying it alone.
He pressed a kiss to your temple. Whispered something you didn’t catch—but it didn’t matter.
It sounded like safety.
It felt like home.
a/n: this fic is one i hold close, because i have experienced abuse/dv in my previous relationship, and i had no idea how to leave, and writing this helped, a lot. i do hope that every person that is trapped in this cycle will find their bucky—someone who makes them feel safe and loved. i am grateful i found mine. if you're a victim or know someone who is struggling, please don't be afraid to seek for help. i promise it does get better once you leave. (google dv helpline, your country's hotline should appear)
