Summary: When you're targeted by a violent stalker, Sam Wilson hires Bucky Barnes to guard you in an isolated safe house. This causes tension as you both get on each others nerves in an increasingly dangerous situation. But, you slowly come to realize you're more alike than you thought. Will it be too late when you finally let yourself trust him?
Word Count (for Part 1): 2.3k
Tags: Slowburn, reluctant attraction, enemies to lovers, forced proximity, bodyguard, hired to protect, fluff and angst, nightmares and comfort, eventual smut, reluctant attraction.
T/W: Some non-graphic depictions of violence, guns, eventual smut.
A/N: Hello. This will be just a few parts. I'm envisioning 5. Who knows though. Will be posted on my AO3 as well (linked here). Also, feel free to send short one-shot requests. I may not answer them all but if one inspires me, I'll write. Enjoy!
“If you keep staring at me, I’m going to sprint down the hill into oncoming traffic.”
“There is no oncoming traffic.”
“I’ll keep running until I find some.”
“Good luck.”
“Shut up.” You mutter, taking another swig of your coffee. Bucky Dumbass Barnes leans against the porch railing, watching you. You flip him off and he rolls his eyes, looking instead at the dirt road ahead.
The day is calm and cicadas are buzzing loudly. You draw your knees up to your chest as you watch the wind play with the grass, making it flatten and swirl into ever-changing circles.
It’s so incredibly boring out here, away from the city. There’s no coffee shops, or long walks down busy streets, or movie theatres. The lack of movie theatres hurts the most.
All you want to do is sit with people, too many people, anonymously sharing a laugh or a cry in a dark room. Free people don’t appreciate the amount of community that is shared within the walls of a theatre. The insight gleaned from hearing their murmurs to their friends about the attractiveness of the actors or the stupidity of the dialogue. You miss connecting with them and feeling, finally, like one of them. Anonymously. With the ability to leave afterwards, free to go about your business.
But now, all you do is watch the grass as Bucky watches you. Solely because of one stupid person with an obsession.
You chug the rest of your coffee and get up, limping past Bucky and letting the screen door slam behind you. He huffs, but you couldn’t care less.
The safe house has a rudimentary kitchen. Though, fancier than your own due to the coffee machine Sam brought as an apology for forcing you here. As you start another cup of coffee, you tap the counter with a finger. Sam said this would only be for a month. Just until they found out how He was tracking you. Then you could go back to your blissful anonymity in New York.
That is, if they could even find who He is.
That’s the flip side of the coin. You can disappear, until someone wants to find you. Then, it’s all that much easier for them to never appear to you at all, except when they want to.
The little voice in the back of your head whispers his name to you, but you close your eyes and silence it. He’s gone. He must be.
The coffee drips from the machine. It’s been overworked the past two weeks, both from you trying to cling on to whatever sense of normalcy you’ve cultivated outside of this house, and from Bucky trying to stay awake.
How long did Bucky say he was going to stay here for? Couldn’t have been more than a month. He’s always been sick of you within the hour in past missions. It’s a miracle he’s still around two weeks in. Once he’s decided he’s done, you can go back. Or when whatever Sam bribed him with is gone. And then, who else does Sam trust enough to know where the safe house is? He barely let you know. You’ll be going back in no time.
Sure, there’s a homicidal maniac after you, leaving traps that have caught you twice already and broken your leg both times, but now that you know his M.O. you can catch him. You’ve handled yourself before, who’s to say you can’t again?
The coffee machine beeps, and you take a sip from the cup. Your bad leg twinges, angry at supporting you for this long, and you grit your teeth. Your own body doesn’t believe in you. That’s a tough pill to swallow.
The screen door slams again as Bucky comes inside.
“There’s no more coffee.” You mutter, and he reaches into the cupboard by the door and pulls out a bag. Opening it, he comes over to the machine to refill, and you move gingerly out of the way. He doesn’t notice, or care, and continues.
“This is the last bag, though. We’ll have to go into town to get more.” He says to the coffee machine.
“I don’t think it’ll answer you.” You say.
“You don’t want me looking at you. I’m happy to grant that request.”
“I don’t want you watching me. That’s very different.”
“You’ll have to get used to me doing that.”
“Not for much longer.”
“Thank god. You’re the most irritating woman I’ve ever met. I don’t know who’s stalking you, but it must be the only person in the world who could put up with your bullshit.”
“At least someone can put up with mine. I don’t think anyone can handle this long with you.”
“I’m okay with not having a psycho leaving bombs on my doorstep.”
“My balcony. He left them on my balcony.”
“Touchey. Or however the fuck you say it.”
“Touché.”
He rolls his eyes, not answering you and instead methodically glancing over the sparse living room. After two weeks you know what he looks at. The boarded up back door, the windows with trip-wires stretched across the sills, the cameras blinking red and pointed at every egress point. If he wasn’t such an ass, you’d be impressed by the level of care he’s putting into his job. You know it’s just about the money, though. Money that’s quickly running out.
“How much did Sam pay for?”
“Coffee? Two months supply. You’ve been drinking it like the damned Energizer bunny, though.”
“No, your money. For your ‘services’, or whatever you call the peeping tom bullshit.”
He closes his eyes and sets his jaw. His neck muscle flexes beneath his collar. You’d think it was attractive if it wasn’t his jaw.
“That was one time. I knocked, and you didn’t answer. I told you to always answer. I didn’t ‘peep’ at anything, anyway.” He finally says after a minute of counting.
“You’re not my keeper.”
“For the next two weeks, I am. And then it some other poor idiots job to watch you.”
That makes you freeze, putting your coffee down.
“What?” You say, and he glances over at you.
“What, you want me to stay now?”
“No! What do you mean someone else will be watching me?”
“Well, if Sam and them don’t find Him, you’ll still need to stay here.” He’s talking slowly, as if talking to a particularly dumb child.
“That wasn’t the agreement. Sam said a month.”
“You’ll have to take that up with Sam. Besides, you want to go back there? Back to your apartment, that He knows about? Hell, He knows the security camera blindspots. And you want to waltz back in like everything is fine?” Now, he’s looking at you. You really hate it when he does that. He seems to always be studying you, picking you apart with his ice-cold eyes. It makes your heart jump into your throat.
You break the eye contact by looking into your coffee.
“I just want to go home.” You finally say into its dregs. You swallow the rest of it, putting it on the counter harder than you meant to. “I’m taking a shower. Try not to come in, weirdo.”
“Easy enough.” He mutters as you walk up the stairs.
- - -
That night, you’re running.
You don’t need to look behind you to know He’s there. You’re barefoot again, running on the rough cement of the lab, scraping your bare skin against the walls as you round the corners of the never-ending basement prison. The burn from your wounds is nothing to the one in your head. It’s making your vision blurry and your eyes red-hot, and you know he’s closing in on you.
Sprinting now, the lights behind you close one by one with an electric thud, like a giants footsteps getting closer to stomping on you by the second.
Thud. You’re blinking back fire. Thud. Your heart is giving out.
Thud. You can feel his breath on the back of your neck, sending chills down your spine as he finally-
Crash. You startle awake, a scream still ripping through your throat. You grab the closest thing to you -another coffee cup- and throw it towards the door that just smashed open. It narrowly misses a barely clothed Bucky as he ducks backward.
“Fuck!” He shouts, “Don’t surprise the guy with a gun! Gun safety 101!”
You notice now that he is holding one, its metal nose glinting off the moonlight coming through the bent blinds. His steel fingers share the same gleam.
“Don’t break into a sleeping woman’s room!” Is the only thing you can manage to yell back, turning away from him to wipe hot tears from your face quickly.
“I think the fact you were screaming loud enough to wake the dead is reason enough to come in here! I told you to not lock this door, by the way, so the whole breaking and entering thing is your fault.” He barks.
“Shut up, Bucky.” You whisper.
“Is someone in here? Why were you screaming?” The floor creaks under him as he steps into the room, looking around the corners.
“No one is in here, just go back to bed.” You’re gripping the mattress now, trying to calm down. He’s not making it any easier as he stops to stand behind you. There’s a soft ting of a bullet hitting the ground as he uncocks the gun, but he doesn’t leave.
“You didn’t answer my question.”
“Yes I did.”
“There were two questions.”
“I’m glad you know how to count.” You need to breathe. 1, 2, 3- shit. 1, 2- shit! Do you know how to count?
He’s quiet for a moment, and you almost think he’s left until he speaks again.
“Why do you insist on being so difficult?”
“Because I need to be.” You say breathlessly. Running a hand through your hair you stand up shakily, moving around the bed and going to the door. He’s standing in front of the doorway, not moving. In the dim light of the moon, the only part of him not shrouded in shadow is his metal arm. You try to avoid looking at it, knowing somewhere deep down that he hides it from you for a reason, with long sleeves even in the harshest sunlight. But the only other place to look is his chest or his face, which makes your cheeks feel hot even now. You settle on looking down at the bullet on the ground between you both.
“I need some water.” You murmur after a moment of him staring down at you.
“You need to answer me.”
“Please, Bucky.” You plead. Your defences fall for just a moment, but your lungs are starting to collapse. The world is starting to swim, and you’re not sure if its panic, tears, or the pain in your leg screaming at you to sit back down. Whichever one, you really don’t want Bucky to see it.
“Go back in bed. I’ll get it for you.” His voice is calm now. Quieter. Exhausted, the only answer you can manage is a nod, doing as you’re told and laying back down. You stare at the crack in the blinds and try to blink away tears as you listen to him rummaging in the kitchen.
He comes back too soon. He sets the glass on the nightstand behind you, but you don’t hear him leave. Sighing, you turn around, and finally look at him in the face.
His eyebrows are knit together, and as he looks at you, you can feel him studying you again. This time your stomach flutters.
You break eye contact again, sitting up and sipping the water quietly.
“Thank you, Bucky.”
“Sorry for crashing in.”
“Sorry for screaming.”
“Not for the coffee mug?”
“I’ve been wanting to do that.”
You flick your eyes up at him, and you think for a moment you see a smile, but it quickly falls away once he looks in your eyes. You both look at each other for a second, two, three, before its his turn to break contact. He runs his metal hand through his tousled hair, glancing down at his gun, the bed, the window, anywhere but you.
“When I, hmm.” He takes a deep breath. “When I have a bad night, I have to ground myself.”
“Ground yourself? Like a naughty kid?”
“No.” He pinches the skin between his eyes. “My senses. Y’know. Five things I see, three things I hear, one thing I feel. Until I calm down.”
“Oh.”
“Are you still on edge?” He glances down at your free hand gripping the mattress. You loosen it.
“I guess.”
“Do you want me to stay in here?”
“What?”
“Do you want me to stay in here. To...watch over you.” He’s still looking away from you.
“Aren’t you already doing that? Hence the gun?”
He rolls his eyes.
“If you don’t want me to, I’ll just-”
“Yeah. If you can. Stay here, that is.” The permission comes from a part of you that you’ve shoved down. Or thought you shoved down. Now, it’s speaking from the middle of your throat, stealing any breath you have with it.
He finally looks at you again, then slowly nods.
“Okay. I can. Let me grab a blanket.” He walks out of the room, and you’re finally able to breathe again.
Laying back down, you try to ground yourself. You see the armchair across from the foot of your bed, the window, the bent blinds, the broken patch of ceiling above you, the barely touched glass of water on the nightstand. You hear the croon of an owl outside, the orchestra of a grasshopper, the creak of the floorboards as Bucky comes back in. Closing your eyes, you try to focus on sleep.
You feel Bucky’s warm hand brushing against your skin as he pulls your blanket up to cover you, leaving you cold when he moves away.
Your muscles relax as you hear him settle into the armchair. Inexcusably, your brain tells you, he calms you. Happily, your heart slows, letting you fall into a dreamless sleep.
Pairing: Bucky Barnes x f!traumatized!reader
Overall Summary: When you're targeted by a violent stalker, Sam sends Bucky to guard you in a remote safehouse. You clash instantly, but in the growing tension, something more fragile begins to take root. If you can learn to trust him in time. No Thunderbolts spoilers!
Warnings: trauma response/disassociation, general violence, bombs, gun mention, kidnapping/experimentation. Reader is hard on herself for a bit :,)
You wake up with a headache and a heartache, legs twisted in the sheets and eyes closed from sleep.
The dreams you get when you’re asleep are horrible, but the reality of being awake is just as bad. Even with the hangover drowning out your thoughts with pain, everything from last night is crystal clear. The bar. The seedy man whose arm snaked its way around your waist. If the alcohol hadn’t numbed your world, the whole night would have blown up then. Your wrists feel heavy with the memory of invisible handcuffs.
And still somehow, the worst part was Bucky. The thought of him, watching from whatever dark corner he melts away into, then coming to your rescue. The fact you needed it is shameful.
Weakness. A word you know too well. One that you know you don’t want to show, especially not to him.
Then, of course, the car. ‘A shield, not a bomb’. How deadly ironic. How sweet. Why did he have to say it then, after you already humiliated yourself?
‘I would do that again for you in a heartbeat.’ He’d said it like a promise, but he doesn’t know what he’s promising that to. All he sees is someone pitiful and small, not the person that’ll hurt him if he gets too close.
And that’s the worst part of it all. You’d take the cuffs if it meant it kept you away from him. It would be easier if he hated you, but the new fact that he doesn’t is worse. That means he’ll try to connect.
Your body is a trap waiting to spring. Why does he insist on keeping with you, as if he’s looking to be caught?
Creaking from the top of the stairs breaks you out of your whirling thoughts. You slow your breathing, trying to sound as if you’re asleep.
Thankfully, the landing creaks again, and you hear the low thunks of his footsteps going down the stairs. Letting out a sigh, you finally open your eyes to the dim room. Time to seize the day.
It takes you ten minutes to get up. Your headache gets worse once vertical.
As you get downstairs, Bucky looks at you over his shoulder, newspaper open in his hands. His clenched jaw softens as he looks you over. You wave a little, feeling a little silly but not wanting to speak. The corner of his mouth flicks up.
“Hey, party queen. How you feelin’?” He chirps.
“Ugh.”
“To be expected. Have some coffee.” He waves a hand towards the steaming cup on the table next to him. After a moment you go over, standing on the other side of the couch as you take the mug. The heat from it easily warms your cold fingertips, and you rub your thumb on the handle. He glances up from the paper, then fully looks up at you before folding the paper and tossing it onto the coffee table.
He looks back at you, leaning back and resting a metal elbow on the armrest, rubbing his stubbly beard with the same hand. He says nothing, just watching you as you drink, using the coffee to stop any words from bubbling out. You know what they would be. Either small pitiful things to make yourself smaller, or barbs to scare him off. Maybe he would take the bait, leaving you alone. Maybe that would help the pit in your stomach.
You look over him, avoiding his stormy blue eyes. Instead, you look at the rest of him, scanning his shirt, his pants, his tanned hand resting on the seat of the pleather couch and playing absentmindedly with the seam. He has a scar on his knuckle. You sip and wonder where he got it from, if it hurt. He scratches his throat and breaks the silence himself.
“You hungover?”
“Nah, I usually wake up with a pounding headache and an aversion to sunlight.” You say dryly. The corner of his mouth tugs up.
“You sound like a vampire.”
“I am. If you aren’t careful, I’ll suck you dry.”
“Hmm. Really? Didn’t think you were that kind of girl.”
You blush lightly, bringing the mug to your lips longer in an effort to hide your cheeks. He still must see it, with that never-ending gaze of his, because he flashes a wolfish smile that makes your chest flutter horribly. You cough before you answer.
“You’re a dirty old man.”
“Hey, I didn’t say it. All you, doll.” He says, like it’s nothing.
Nicknames aren’t new to you, but this one is different. It lands differently when coming from him. You’re not sure why it comforts you. Maybe it’s the roughness of his voice, or the slight twang of an old accent coming through. It sounds distinctly like him, a piece of his inner voice given briefly as an offering.
He stretches as he gets up, letting out a quiet grunt as he raises his arms above his head. His thin t-shirt clings to him, tanned skin peeking out from between its hem and his jeans. His metal arm glitters in the sunlight creeping in through the closed blinds. As he lets go of the stretch, he sighs, the tension in his shoulders melting away. You look away quickly enough that you can pretend that you haven’t looked, distracted instead by coffee and the dregs of sleep still left in your eyes.
He steps towards you and your body reacts first, backing away from him quickly. He pauses, showing his hands, palms open towards you as if surrendering.
“I’m just going to the kitchen.” He says quietly, as if speaking to an animal crouched in the corner. You get onto the couch and fold your legs against your chest, making yourself unobtrusive. He sidesteps you, keeping the distance you’ve made between you both. Once he leaves, you stretch out, rubbing your feet on the rough rug on the floor.
“I gotta fix somethin’ in the car today. Tried going out this morning for coffee and it wasn’t working. So, I’m sorry, but this is the last cup until I can get that going again.” That piques your interest. You quickly turn on the couch to face him. He glances over at you and his brow raises a little, quizzical. “You that addicted to caffeine? It’ll just take me a few hours, I promise.”
“No, no. What happened to the car?”
“Brakes weren’t responding like I’d like them to last night. We were slipping a bit.” Your brain whirs through a million possible reasons, the engine and body of the sedan outside opening in your imagination.
“Common. It was shuddering, right?” The rumbles of the car beneath your legs last night was an afterthought in your drunk mind, but the information comes quickly to the forefront sober. “Sounds like the rotors are warped. 2012 Honda Civic parts come cheap, at least. Still got to wait for them.” You sip again, glancing up at him. His eyes are wide, and you stop mid-drink.
“What?” You ask. Then, he chuckles. It’s a low rumble that washes over you like fireworks.
“You know all that? You’re a mechanic now?” He asks. You bristle, but the look in his eyes is true, admiring instead of accusing. You shrug a shoulder, relaxing and putting the mug down. Bracing yourself on an elbow, you half-turn towards him.
“Nah. Civics are some of the easiest cars to repair.”
“Done it often?”
“Not on 2012’s. Not really even on cars. I’ve mainly worked on pieces of them. Some basic machines, too. They’re all parts at the end of the day; you just have to know how each one works.” Your gaze is firmly on him, but anywhere other than his eyes.
He’s leaning against the counter now, the small of his back pressed against the lip and his arms crossed over his chest. He leans into the room like it belongs to him. Either that, or its a farce. Covering discomfort with confidence. Sometimes, when he thinks you’re avoiding him, he’s curled in on himself. Bent over the table with his arms on either side of his head, as if he’s a boxer defending his face. Now, he’s free and open.
“Wanna come help?” He asks, breaking your thoughts, and your heart leaps against your ribs.
“Really? Help? Or do you just wanna make me do it?” You joke, but you ask.
“I won’t make you do anything, doll.” You match his gaze. You say nothing for a moment, and neither does he as he waits. For you to talk. The words stick in your throat but you force them through anyway.
“Yeah. I’d like to.”
-
“Can you hand me – yeah, thank you.” You place the wrench he needs in his outstretched metal hand, being careful not to touch him. Even with him under the car and you on an upside-down bucket a couple feet away, you feel too close to him. He wheels back under the chassis on the repurposed skateboard you found in the old garage the car is sitting in to keep you both away from the sun.
It was small in here, dark and dank with the smell of gas, grease, and the sickening wisps of cigarettes from the inside of the car. Hot sun streamed through the open garage door. You let your head loll back into it, closing your eyes in a moment of rare relaxation. Both good and bad memories are associated with this smell, but this is a new experience altogether. You can get up and walk back inside if you want to. You’re not chained to the floor, scraps of exploded metal at your feet, cigarette smoke turning the room to haze and confusing your parts together. If you left, Bucky wouldn’t care at all.
“You were right. Rotors were shot.” Metal tings against the stained concrete as he tosses one out by your feet. You pick it up, grease covering your fingertips. It’s bent to hell.
“Lord. How much have you hit the brakes?” You quip. The car muffles his chuckle.
“It’s one of Sam’s cars. I’m pretty sure he abuses them all.”
“I guess if you could fly, being trapped in a tin can on the ground makes you frustrated.”
“Then he needs to fix his cars as much as he fixes that damn red spy-pigeon he has strapped to his back.” He throws out the other rotor, wheeling out after it. His short-cropped hair glitters in the sun, sweat beading at his brow. You flick your eyes back to the garage.
“I think he likes the more finicky things. Cars are big, cumbersome.” You say, shrugging a shoulder. Bucky sits up, going to run a hand through his hair but pausing, looking at his greasy hand. You toss him a rag sitting on the tool bench, him murmuring his thanks. He’s methodical as rubs his hands, going over every inch as if scrubbing in for surgery.
“And you?” He says, breaking your trance.
“And I what?”
“What do you like to fix? Or do you not like getting your hands dirty?” He’s looking up at you.
“I get my hands dirty all the time.” You scoff.
He raises an eyebrow.
“Good to know.” He says, smirking.
You bite the inside of your lip, quickly looking away from him.
“I’ve mainly fixed power generators. Some engines, but they were cobbled together from other engines. Like a Frankenstein of car parts.” You rush.
“Hmm. So you know a lot about a lot, then?”
The compliment heats up your cheeks, and you turn towards the sun, fidgeting with the hem of your shirt.
“I guess you could say that. It does make it difficult when I see a fully assembled engine. It looks too perfect. I don’t know where to begin.”
“Well, usually with the broken part.” You look back at him and roll your eyes. He gives another wolfish grin, making your stomach do a flip. The sun shows off more of him, bathing him in a glow you can’t find in the house. Maybe you should open the blinds more, let more of the sun dance around the dark corners. How much more of him would you see?
“I was gonna do some basic maintenance too. You wanna see this engine? I can give you a tour.”
“Is that your idea of a pick-up line?” You ask, faux innocently. Might as well play with him too. He stills before smirking again.
“Only if you say yes.” He says solemnly.
“Such a gentleman. Just show me the engine, Bucky.” You snort.
He stares up at you for a moment before getting up in one fluid motion, picking the car up off the jack with his metal hand. You quickly kick the jack away and he lets the sedan down gently. Every time he shows his strength, you marvel at it. There’s knowing he’s a super soldier, experimented on, serum flowing through his veins, and then there’s seeing it. You’re split on whether it makes you feel protected, unsafe, or less alone. You settle on an unsettling mixture of all three as he moves around to the front of the car, opening the lid of the engine and beckoning you over. You follow suit quickly.
His shirt brushes against your arm as he leans over to point at something, and your neurons crackle in response. You tell yourself he doesn’t notice the way you lean into him.
“You know what that is?” He asks, and you can feel his eyes on the side of your face as you study it.
“Oil dipstick.”
“Good, you’re right.” His praise makes your stomach flutter again. The air between you starts feeling electric, and you take a small side-step away. He doesn’t seem to notice as he motions to something close by again.
“And that?”
“Uhm...” You stare at it, but all you can think about are the little zaps you feel between your fingers. “Brake fluid reservoir?”
“Close. Clutch fluid reservoir. Over there is the brake fluid.” He waves a hand at some other part, then leans back and crosses his arms. You let out a little breath that you didn’t think you were holding. “If you really want to impress me, show me where the blinker fluid is.”
You examine for a minute, before rolling your eyes again and looking up at him. He looks bemused but holding it in, biting the inside of his lip and smirking down at you.
“Did you really think you’d get me with that?” You scoff, and he laughs. It matches the warmth that comes up to your cheeks. You haven’t blushed this much in your life, but now all it takes is a few nice words and some laughter from him and you’re a mess.
“No, not really. But I thought I might as well try.” He says.
“Blinker fluid isn’t real, muffler bearings aren’t real, and elbow grease comes from hard work.” You say. He nods slowly.
“Alright, alright. I won’t haze you anymore. Check the oil for me, and I’ll check the tire pressures.” He says, tossing you the rag and walking around to the back of the car.
You take your time, taking out the dipstick and running it across a clean part of the towel, watching him from the corner of your eyes. He’s looking at you too, and when you match gazes, electricity crackles up your spine.
This is all getting to be too much. The smell of grease and sweat, heat against your back, tools all around you. Mixing that with the closeness of him, the easy laughter he’s sharing with you, the way he talks with you as if you’re his equal. His friend, even. The war in your head is growing louder and louder, and you count wordlessly. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. 1. 2. 3.
“Tires are fine. Oil?” He’s suddenly next to you again, and you almost drop the stick.
“Could use some, I think.” Your mouth is dry.
“Alright. You know how?”
“Yes.”
“You want to?”
“Yes.” You say it too quickly, rushing around him to the side of the sedan. He comes over and lifts the car again, and you kick the jack underneath.
“You know, I could just hold it up.” He says as he puts it gently down onto the stand, and you shake your head.
“I’d rather not be crushed if you need to sneeze.” You say, and he laughs again.
“You really think I’d let you be crushed?” He says gently. Your brain shorts for a second.
“Not on purpose.”
“Never on purpose. I’m not that mean.” He kicks an old tray to you as you lower yourself on the skateboard, and you bring it with you as you wheel under.
You both sit in silence as you concentrate, unscrewing the drain plug quickly, but not quick enough to get your hand out of the way of the oil. You watch it for a moment, trying to calm down, but not managing to before it finishes draining. Your heart still beats fast, especially when Bucky bends down and smiles at you.
“All done?” He asks, and you nod, pulling yourself out from underneath after re-screwing the oil pan shut. You wipe some sweat off your cheek with the back of your wrist, taking a deep breath. He’s already gotten to the engine to pour new oil in. You stand up to go near him, watching from one side of the engine bay. He looks up at you, smiling at first, but then his brow furrows slightly. He beckons with his free hand.
“C’mere.” Your skin crackles. You hesitate, but he beckons again. Some tiny part of you steps forward as if Bucky is tugging on a fishing line. You have the sinking feeling this will end up bad, but the bait is too tantalizing. The risk that makes your heart flutter and the logical part of your brain scream.
Then, it happens.
With his metal hand, he reaches up to your cheek, thumb wiping a spot under your eye. His fingers curl slightly around your jaw, pawing your face. The combination of the soft touch with his gaze, and the smell of pervasive grease and nicotine from the inside of the car mixing with memories that feel too close to the surface, the numbers are useless.
The warmth of his eyes. The care. The way you want to nudge your face into his palm. Trust it not to grip hard. Trust yourself not to bite back.
You can’t. It’s not safe. You aren’t safe. You can’t be, you can’t-
Boom.
White clouds your vision as Bucky’s hand gets ripped away from you. Heat crawls over every inch of your skin as the ripple of the shockwave tears from you like horses out of a starting gate. Metal tears and screeches against concrete. Things shatter and crack, filling up your nose with the fume of smoke and oil. And the memories. Oh, the nightmares come crashing through. Thick, heavy sobs hit your chest as you’re back in that little room again, chained to the ground in an effort to keep you still amidst yet another chaotically forced explosion. Left to lay there as the data points come rolling in that damned computer, waiting another round. Here, now, you can feel the cuffs on your wrists, weighing you down as your lungs struggle to breathe. Somewhere far away, there’s a thud and a groan, snapping you back to reality. The heat around you diminishes, the wind from your shockwave dying down to nothing, letting the buzz of the cicadas in the summer air come back to the forefront.
Worst of all, Bucky is getting up at the other end of the garage, looking directly at you with a look you can’t decipher. The concrete wall behind him is cracked from his body being thrown against it but he still stands easily. He steps towards you but you back away and he does too, staying near the wall. His jaw clenches as his brow knits together, looking you over.
It almost looks like worry, but that’s not possible. That would be hope. You already know what hope is, the words branded on your heart.
Hope is the worst hurt of all.
He’s holding his hands out towards you, palms out again, and your nails dig into your hair. You both stay in that moment, examining each other.
He blinks slowly, opening his mouth to say something but closing it again. The possibilities rush through your head at once. Too many of them hurt your heart before you hear them.
You both stare at each other wordlessly, neither of you moving a muscle.
Before he can break the silence, you turn on your heels and run back up the road into the house, throwing the door open and running upstairs to the small bathroom. You slam and lock the door, shutting off the light and getting into the tub, bringing your knees to your chest.
1231923124.
1326183.
172631.
The air tingles as you dig your nails into your skin, trying to tamp down the residual energy building up again through useless counting. A sharp knock on the door makes you jump.
“Hey, please tell me you’re alright. Don’t worry about the garage, it’s barely messier than it was before.” Bucky’s words come out rushed, like he can’t say them fast enough. You don’t reply, and he talks again. “If you’re hurt, I can help you.”
You almost laugh, a bitter taste on the back of your throat. You wish he could help you. But you’ve proven you’re not trustworthy. He touches your cheeks once and you lose control? What happens the next time he’s close to you? A blast in this old house would cause it all to come crashing down around him.
“Go away, Bucky. Please.” You choke out, but the shadow in front of the door doesn’t move an inch.
“Do you need help calming down?” He says. Still painfully gentle. You can almost imagine him on the other side of the door, running a hand through his hair like he did the other night, when your nightmare shook him awake.
You pause. A voice in your head continues to spout off numbers, a never-ending river of confusion. Another one lectures you, shows a slideshow of him in the garage, standing away from you like you’re an animal waiting to attack him. A third one screams at you, kicking you into a corner even in your own psyche. The shockwaves always seem to make your brain explode too, splintering it into a chaotic mess.
In that chaos, your racing thoughts throw out a question that comes from the one voice you don’t let speak.
Why is he here, if he’s scared of you?
“Just...just follow my voice, alright?” He murmurs through the door. In spite of yourself, you find yourself yearning for his voice above the others. You take a shaky breath.
“Say five things you hear. Out loud, please. So I know you’re alive in there.”
You take a moment.
“The faucet dripping, the wind against the house, the creak of the foundation settling, a hawk outside, and y-you.” All of them come out in a rush of words, and you add a sixth to the list; him letting out a deep breath.
“Alright. Good, you’re doing good. Name three things you can touch.”
“The tub, the shower curtain, the soap.” Your fingers trace each item as you say them. They’re all cold to the touch, and you dig your nails into the curtain, making it crinkle in your hands.
“And one thing you can see.”
Some half-formed instinct pushes you forward to the door, numbly unlocking it. Pulling it open slightly, you’re met with Bucky’s gaze towering above you as he leans against the door frame. You flinch away but he doesn’t meet you with anger, or pain. Only a quiet, pensive look that you haven’t seen before on a person you’ve hurt.
“You. I see you.” You breathe out. His jaw clenches and relaxes and he runs his metal hand through his hair again. He’s jittery but won’t look away. You can’t either.
“Are you alright?” He whispers. You nod. “Are you sure?”
You nod as you wipe a tear off the same cheek he held before. Will never hold again, if he knows what’s good for him.
“I’ll clean up the garage.” You say.
“Don’t worry about the garage.”
“It’s all fucked up. I think the car-”
“Don’t worry about the garage or the car. It doesn’t matter.”
“It does, that’s the only car we have, and if I broke it then we can’t go into town, or get out of town, or-”
“What happened?” He interrupts.
Any explanation you can think of turns to a stone in your throat.
“What did I do? Did I hurt you?” He whispers and look up at him. His eyes are frenzied, almost panicked as he looks over you, but he keeps himself on his side of the doorway. His metal hand is clenched into a fist at his side, but at your glance he relaxes it, rubbing his thigh with his palm.
“No Bucky, you didn’t hurt me.” You murmur. You almost reach for him before remembering you’re the one who threw him into the wall at the first sign of a kind touch.
He studies you as you study him. Your defences are back up but the familiar adrenaline rush dies down quickly.
“Bucky, I’m...sorry. I can’t...” You trail off, closing your eyes and rubbing a temple. The storm of your thoughts has died down but the rain lingers, drowning out everything you try to say.
“It’s alright.” He says softly.
“I-”
“I’ll be downstairs.” He turns quickly, footsteps thudding quickly down. You stare at the empty doorway. The faucet drips beside you, beating out the seconds in the silent hallway.
When you finally rip yourself away from listening to the subtle sounds of him below, you go to your bed and fall on it.
When sleep comes, it’s not a comfort. Just an escape from yourself.
----------
A/N: This was a cathartic chapter for me to write, but I'm thinking that'll be a trend for the rest of the fic, lol. But it took me a while to get it out, so I apologize. When I started writing this, I didn't realize how hard-hitting it would be for me get everything out. Next chapter is already outlined, so will be quicker updates from now on :)
If you're struggling with C/PTSD symptoms, you are not alone. People care about you.
Overall Summary: When you're targeted by a violent stalker, Sam sends Bucky to guard you in a remote safehouse. You clash instantly, but in the growing tension, something more fragile begins to take root. If you can learn to trust him in time. No Thunderbolts spoilers!
Chapter Summary: After a rough night, you scramble in your mission to apologize and he scrambles in emotions he can't even name. You come together under the stars, and try to find place for each other.
Tags: Hurt/Comfort, Fluff and Angst, Reluctant Attraction, Forced Proximity, Yearning (dear lord the yearning in this chapter had me clawing my own walls lol), Protective Bucky/Reader. Bucky POV in this chapter! In this chapter, you don't know constellations or the legend of Orpheus. Or maybe you do and he's hot and you want to be near him. Whichever.
Word Count: 6.3k
Warnings: trauma response/disassociation, general violence, bombs, gun mention, kidnapping/experimentation. Reader is hard on herself for a bit :,) More description of trauma.
When the shower turns on, you’re already awake. Aching, exhausted, but awake. Your muscles haven’t forgotten the shock of yesterday’s meltdown.
You woke up at the first sign of him, ears attuned to his presence even in a state of half-consciousness. The squeak of the old couch springs, the soft grunt he makes when he stretches, his soft footsteps as he comes upstairs, avoiding the creaky floorboard by your door.
His tired sigh can be heard through the thin wall separating your bedroom and the bathroom as he turns the water on. The guilt starts creeping back up your throat. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. Just be happy he’s there at all, and not shoving you in the back of the car and driving you all the way back to New York.
Why are you happy about that at all?
You’re already dressed (if you can call clean pyjamas ‘dressed’), and out the screen door before you can stop yourself. The sun hasn’t fully risen yet, barely lighting your way to the garage. As you wrench the door open, the dust still dances in the dim light. expecting chaos but instead find it clean.
Normal.
Like you never happened.
The shelves are back up. Tools put away. Dust and debris swept away into nothing. Even the car, pushed into the garage door, was righted and its shattered headlights fixed. You’re frozen in the doorway, gripping the shitty plastic handle with enough force you feel it bend.
He did fix it. All of it. Like he said he would.
The only evidence of your sin is the wall. Cracks spiderweb from a central, deep hole in the plaster, showing the studs hidden beneath. Coming closer, you examine it with bated breath. He hit here because of you. This probably wasn’t the worst beating he’s ever had, but still. It wasn’t your worst shockwave either.
You reach forward and touch the hole, dust clinging to your fingertips. Just beneath your hand, on the floor, you see a dot.
Red. Blood, dried into a few round drops in a pool of dusty white. In your mind, you twist around last nights version of him, looking for any evidence of hurt. Nothing physical. Only in his eyes, staring into yours with that uneasy worry and sharp edge of some other emotion you can’t place. Your mind betrays you, blood dripping down his forehead in rivulets, and you have to pinch your thigh hard to rid yourself of the vision. It has as much efficacy as slamming your brakes on black ice.
Rubbing the plaster off your fingers, you leave the garage. You don’t let the newly risen sun warm you as you hurry inside. Guilt snaps at your heels like a wild dog, and you find yourself flitting around the house uselessly.
Bucky’s couch-bed is neatly made. His duffle bag of clothes, old books, and ammo cases is zipped up and put away. The place is swept clean, surfaces shining. Hell, he even did the dishes.
You pace, looking around the room like a madwoman. Your plan of a silent admission of guilt and reparation is quickly going down the toilet. Your skin still feels barely held together and the thought of having another shockwave and hurting him again makes your chest tighten. You close your eyes tightly and try to breathe.
Damn him. Why does he have to be so thoughtful all the time? He always seems to be thinking, analyzing, acting. No matter how much you shove him away. You tried being standoffish, being mean, yelling at him. Your body even tried throwing him across the room. And yet, he stays. Staring at you from afar, avoiding the creaky step outside your closed door, even doing the dishes.
The thought of him always being in the corner of the room is becoming worryingly comforting.
Damn him.
He’s still in the shower, and you rush through his morning routine in your head. He wakes up without opening his eyes, shifts. His face hardens.
He waits a few minutes, then stands with a stretch and a groan that shows his true age. He showers. He comes downstairs, reads the paper, and has his coffee and dry cereal. Eyes flying open, you look at the table. No signs of any food.
Quickly, before he can get out of the shower, you throw something together. Easy. Quick. Warm. An ‘I’m sorry, I hope this is good, I hope this makes you feel better, please don’t leave me alone even if I’m the worst.’ whispered into french toast, pan-fried in butter and given a generous helping of cinnamon.
As you put it on the table, you pinch yourself absentmindedly, chasing away the image of him throwing it in the trash. That’s not what Bucky would do. You think, anyway. Over the past month, he’s done the opposite of what you’ve expected him to do. Just the fact that he’s still here in the morning is confusing enough. The hopeful part of you is whispering, but you stamp it back down. It doesn’t know what’s good for it.
You look at the clock. The man can’t be bribed into a shower longer than 15 minutes, and it’s getting close. You rush upstairs, avoiding the creaky board. Just making him the food is hard enough, facing him without a built-up shield of indifference is worse. Though, after the past couple days, you don’t know if you can call that particular coping mechanism back up to bat. You open your bedroom door and-
“Mornin’.” His voice is smooth and light, and you turn to face him instinctively.
“Morning.” Your voice is shaky by comparison. Especially when you see he’s barely dressed, towel slung low on his waist and one around his shoulders. He’s almost leaning out of the doorframe, having obviously hurried to open the door. Every inch of him looks like a super soldier; broad shoulders, taut muscles rippling under the skin, ready for whatever problem needs to be done. Drops of water cling to the hair thatched on his lower stomach, falling into the towel and on the bathroom floor. His metal arm is foggy, but you can still see glimpses of your tense body in its reflection.
He’s hot. Red hot. His skin is bright from the boiling water he must shower with, and you see far too much of it for your own sanity. As your eyes flick all over him, trying to find a safe place to land, they fall on the scarred connection between metal and flesh on his shoulder. Healed gashes claw out across his skin, showing a painful past without a word. Your own scars itch at the connection, and you rub the one at the base of your skull absentmindedly.
“Do I have somethin’ on my face?” He says, smooth as butter, and you snap your eyes to the floor.
“Don’t flatter yourself.” You mutter, pasting on a smirk that you’re hoping is aloof.
“How’d you sleep?” He asks. He leans against the doorway, adjusting the towel slightly, it dipping deep beneath his navel. Your face burns. Hopefully HYDRA didn’t give him heat vision.
“Fine. You?”
“I slept alright. You’re up early, are you okay? Do you need the bathroom?” He asks. His head cocks to one side, and you bite the inside of your cheek. Damn him.
“No, Bucky. I’m fine, thanks. I just went to see the garage.”
“Ah. Well, no need to go out there. Unless you want to throw some shit around again.” He shrugs. You look away from him and to the wall, crossing your arms over your chest and rubbing a thumb over the spot you’re trying not to pinch in front of him.
“Sorry for leaving you to clean it up.”
“As I said yesterday, it’s no problem. I’ve cleaned up much worse.”
“I bet. And...are you okay? I saw some...blood.” You spit out the last word and look hurriedly over his wet hair. He shakes his head.
“I’m fine. Again, I’ve had worse.”
“So you did get hurt?” Your heart sinks to your stomach and you step forward, looking closer at his head. He watches your face for a second before bending down, showing you a small gash above his temple.
“Just a little cut. Doesn’t even need a kiss to make it better.” He murmurs, looking at you through his eyelashes.
He stills as you reach forward, taking his short hair between your fingers and pulling it to the side slightly. The cut is small and jagged, but already starting to heal. Static crackles between your fingertips. You step back away and he straightens once again.
“I’m sorry.” You whisper, and he shakes his head and sighs. He cocks his head to the side again and looks you over. This time, you can’t help but look back.
He looks tired. Small lines etch their way down his face, showing their wear. The dark circles under his eyes are more prominent than usual, and he looks at you with a weariness that you know you must have caused. But, the gentleness of his gaze is breaking your heart more than that. He almost bows to you, keeping his palms and arms open as you stand across from him like a cornered rabbit.
Rabbit. Always running. The sharp voice of Him ricochets in your brain, and you pinch the soft flesh of your inner arm.
“You sure you’re okay?” Bucky’s gentle voice comes rumbling through, and you let out a breath you didn’t know you were holding in. He’s smiling softly at you, leaning forward slightly to fill the empty air between you. You smile too, unwillingly, like it’s a dog leash being ripped from your fingers. His grin widens.
Is he really smiling just because you are, or is he just that good at faking his face? It has to be the latter.
“I’m okay. Just a bit tired.” You say, looking away.
“I bet. Eat yet?” He asks, and you shake your head.
“I’m not hungry. I’m just going to go back to bed.” He raises an eyebrow.
“Really? No food at all?”
“I had some cereal.” You lie. He stares at you, obviously seeing through it. His shoulders tense slightly. How bad have you gotten at lying that he can catch that?
“Alright. You’ll eat later, though?”
“Sure.” You acquiesce.
“Good. Let me know if you need anything.”
“I will.”
With that he goes back into the bathroom, holding his towel on his waist, and you go back into your room, slower than before. Now, all you want to do is go back into his presence, all smiles and steam and soft words. Your cold bed has more edges than you remember.
Bucky leans his weight on the bathroom door, forehead pressed to the wood. It’s cool, solid against his tacky skin. He closes his eyes.
You seem fine. Tired. Shaky and small. Not like someone that threw him like a damn ragdoll across the room without breaking a sweat. And yet, you still look at him in fear. Big doe eyes under the black hole of a gun. You hadn’t even said a word when you exploded, just flinched like he had burnt you. He looks down at his metal hand, clenching and releasing it. It shines up, dull, cold. Had he burned you?
And yet, you still crept out to clean the garage in the dim hours. He said he’d take care of it, and thank God he did. If you’d seen the wreck it was last night-
No. No use thinking about your reaction now. You didn’t have it. He made sure of that. Still, he sighs, emptying his chest.
Were you scared of his reaction? The memories of last night race through his head. He wasn’t angry, he thought. That wasn’t what he meant to be. Was he too forceful about you opening the door?
But you did. You opened it that fraction, just enough for him to see the tears streak down your face, the half-moon indents from your nails on your upper arm. But you had said it, in that light voice of yours. “You didn’t hurt me, Bucky.” A band-aid on a bullet hole. Did you mean it?
He takes a deep breath, trying to focus on your words. Last night, they haunted him. Now, it’s the only thing keeping him from falling further into that darkness. A tenuous grip to whatever reality he’s drowning in.
When he comes out of the bathroom, your door is closed. He holds his breath, listening for yours. Calm, slow. Asleep, thankfully. His shoulders relax just a fraction. His tension is a surprise, once it falls away.
As he hurries downstairs, he holds himself lightly so he wouldn’t wake you. There’s still a pile of debris out back to get rid of bef-
The smell hits him first. Warm. Sweet. Unreal. He stops short on the last stair, blinking into the dark living room.
Is that french toast?
He stares across the room at the plate on the table, coffee mug still steaming next to it. Three slices of breakfast instead of his normal bowl of dry cereal. Even the paper is brought in from the mailbox at the far end of the drive. His jaw tenses.
Did you make this?
What did he do to earn this? Cause you to freak out? That isn’t an action that deserves kindness. Hell, he’s pretty sure he has enough bad karma to ensure he never gets a good thing again. And yet, the food is there, at his seat, with his paper. You really went all the way down the drive to the mailbox?
He has to will himself to come closer, examining the plate like it’s an IED. Cinnamon, maple syrup, golden heavy butter. Dropping down onto the couch, he takes the fork gingerly, examining the bread more. Looks fine. He takes a bite.
Damn. The fork handle bends in a little as he grips it tighter. It’s good. He glances behind him at the stairs, feeling like a thief. Your door remains shut. It must be for him. The next bite is hard to swallow.
The plate is finished before he wants it to be. By the end of it, the fork is a hunk of metal, strangled to death absentmindedly. He throws it on the table with a clatter, rubbing his face and glaring down at the maple syrup swirls like there’s a message written for him that he’s too stupid to read.
Damn it. It was hard enough to be here without you being all...kind. Sneaking past his defenses in ways he never expected. You never do anything he expects. Damn it.
He falls back against the couch, closing his eyes and rubbing the spot between his eyebrows, willing his racing thoughts to shut up. The taste of maple syrup won’t leave his tongue, creeping down his throat and to his chest, twining itself around his ribs. It’s painful, this sugary affliction, as it embeds itself into places he didn’t know he had in him.
He about smashes the phone when it rings next to him. He picks it up in a second flat, putting it to his ear without looking at the caller ID.
“What.” He barks.
“Well hello sunshine, you seem chipper this morning.” Sam drawls into the line.
“What do you want.”
“Are you both alive out there?”
“Barely.”
“Really, Barnes? You hate her that much?”
Bucky’s jaw tenses. Hate isn’t the right word. Not even close. But any other word chokes him when he tries to say it.
“No. I’m the one barely alive.”
“What’d you do?” A car door slams from the other side of the phone. Bucky sighs again, taking a minute to will away the flash of your eyes before he got thrown away. Fear, hurt. The little lean of your face into his fingers before you ripped yourself away.
“Touch her cheek.”
“Well yeah, that’ll do it.”
“What?” Bucky closes his eyes, rubbing his temple. Riddles from Sam never failed to make his head hurt.
“She doesn’t like touch. Thought you knew that, Mr. Observant. How’d you get close enough to touch her, anyway? She avoids me like we’re the same magnetic poles.”
“Could you have said that in a nerdier way?”
“Want to hear me try?”
“Not really.”
“Good. Then shut up. I have news. We found the...encampment. Bunker. Hole in the ground.”
Bucky’s brow furrows. He didn’t really pay attention to Sam’s side of the assignment, focusing instead on how to navigate his own. Protecting you was never in the HYDRA training regiment. Hell, it felt leagues harder than most of the assignments they put him on.
“What are you talking about, Sam.”
“The place she escaped from, Buck. In the woods.”
“She escaped from somewhere?”
“Oh. Damn, she hasn’t told you?”
Bucky sits up, ice trickling down his spine. No, you hadn’t told him shit.
Glancing up at the empty staircase and the closed bedroom door just off the landing, he talks low into the phone.
“What happened there?”
“I don’t know. All she told me was some guy was after her. That she escaped from him once, now she has to escape him again. She was going to run off. Asked me to feed the stray cats that come up to her deck. I thought that was stupid and short-sighted. If he already found her once, he’ll find her again. That’s the point of the house. Of you.” Sam mutters, sounding exasperated. Bucky’s mind whirls. The visits before the guard house were full of hushed discussions between the two of them. He never paid attention, looking at the blast patterns in the shithole you call an apartment. The secured entry points to the building. The egregious amount of locks on all of your doors. Dots connect in his head, and he curses under his breath.
Bucky closes his eyes and makes an effort not to crush the phone, counting down from five silently.
“She explodes, Sam.”
“She what?”
“Good God. She blows up. Not physically, she’s all in one piece, but she just...blows up. Things go everywhere. I just finished clearing out the garage of half-broken shit.” He neglects to mention that he was caught in the blast. It hurt you enough to see his cut, for whatever reason. You didn’t mean to. Letting Sam know about it feels like an attack on your character. Sam’s sigh crackles over the speaker.
“Fuck. Well. This place looks like it’s been blown up, so that tracks. I wasn’t joking with “hole in the ground”. It’s basically just rubble. Except, the guys here think some things are missing.”
“Missing? How can they even tell?”
“There’s enough beat-up generators here to power D.C. for a year. But, and here’s the weird part, no tech. No computers, no equipment, nothing. And, even worse, the blast patterns don’t match up with all the pieces.”
“What the hell does that mean.” Sam’s riddles are bad at the worst of times. Hearing them now is just torture.
“It means that someone came here and took everything we could use to trace them. Either their whereabouts, or what they did. Or, with what you’re telling me, all the tools to make a living bomb.”
Bucky doesn’t respond, half-formed thoughts running around his head. Closing his eyes, he presses on his temple in an effort to make them stop. They don’t.
“So this is the guy that’s after her, yes?” He says after a minute.
“I guess so.”
“And we know nothing about him.”
“Nope. Just that he’s out there, and he has everything that he had then. Now, I don’t know anything about the explosions, but-”
“So, there were no placed bombs. She was the bomb.”
“Would stand to reason.”
“Why wouldn’t she tell either of us?”
“Hmm, gee, I don’t know, Bucky. I know every girl locked in a cage, experimented on, and turned into a walking bomb is the most stable and trusting individual walking the earth. I couldn’t imagine why she wouldn’t share this with a guy she barely knows that glared at her for the few months he’s known her.”
Bucky’s tongue is too big for his mouth.
“Caged?” He chokes out.
His own hole in the ground flashes in his memory. The smell of his blood and sweat mixed with the searing pain at his temples. The stinging pain at his fingertips as he clawed his way back to consciousness in a dark cell. The lingering pain in his jaw after biting down too hard on thick leather. Feeling small, cornered, while on display behind bars.
Coming out different. Changed. With blood on his hands, knowing that he did it. Knowing that he couldn’t take it back.
Did you wake up the same way?
“Yeah. The team found metal bars. Half-melted. If it really was her that caused it, she’s pretty damn powerful.”
Crack. Bucky swears and glances at the phone. Fractures spiderweb across the screen. Sam’s face in his stupid profile picture fractured in a web of damage.
“Barnes. You there?” His voice pipes up from the speaker, and Bucky puts it back to his ear.
“Yeah.”
“I have to go. If you find out anything more, call me.”
“OK.”
“Bucky.” Silence. Sam sighs. “Be careful, alright? Both of you. This seems bad on every level. Just be careful.”
“When am I not?” Bucky hangs up the phone, tossing it aside and holding his head in his hands. He takes a deep, shuddering breath, willing the tension in his shoulders to fall away, but his body doesn’t listen to him. Muscles hold firm, coiling under his skin like angered pythons waiting to strike.
He jolts up, he falls into routine. Intent on locking the house down until even a tornado couldn’t rip it away.
The cameras change first. New ones, old ones retooled. Fields of vision stretch across the house to parts unknown except to his tablet. Their red eyes blink steadily, but it’s not enough.
More trip wires next. Spread across the windowsills, the floor beneath the windows, the doors. He glances at your door, then continues on. You’re smart. You’ll look before you step. He rigs motions sensors to the glass, the doors, the bottom of the stairs. Outside, cameras hide under awnings and drain pipes. One red eye blinking at the bottom of the mailbox. Just past it, farther than any delivery guy would go, he adds more wires, stretched across the grass and shining lightly in the light of the dimming sun. He kicks dirt on them to hide them.
And yet, his muscles stay tight, his spine rigid. Eyes locked onto the second-floor window, showing your closed door. He’s up there before he fully realizes what he’s doing.
The final step is one he can’t do, but he can’t turn away from your bedroom door either. Your breathing is still even and slow. He watches the golden light slipping from under your door, tracking the setting sun. He can’t barge in like he did before, though the same unease is in his chest.
Instead, he runs a finger over the cool barrel of the gun in its holster, now strapped tight even in sweats and a t-shirt. He matches his breathing to yours on the other side of the door, letting it take away the marionette string keeping him upright. He sinks down, head tipped back, eyes unfocused.
The house still feels uneasy. Vulnerable. The dark windows feel like eyes looking in rather than out, keeping him blind.
He can see his ghostly shape in the reflection of the one past the bathroom door, crouched in wait like a ghoul.
How often has his body taken this shape in the shadows?
He hangs his head, rubbing a temple with his metal hand, flinching at the cold touch. And still, through it all, maple syrup clings to his tongue. Nothing but a memory, but worse memories have stuck to it.
“Fuck.” He says softly, to himself, to no one.
“Bucky? What are you doing?” You say, and Bucky snaps his head up, looking at you. You blink sleep out of your eyes, holding onto the bedroom door like it’s the only thing keeping you upright. You tilt your head to the side, eyes dropping to him huddled on the ground like an animal. He shoots upright.
“I was sittin’.” Bucky says, dumbly. One of your eyebrows raises up, your lower lip sucking in slightly as you bite it, trying to be discreet. So many of your little movements are when you’re trying to be secretive. Hiding from him.
“I can see that. Are you drunk?” You lean against the door, steadying yourself.
“No.”
“So, just sitting outside the room, on the floor. For no reason. Have all the chairs disappeared?”
“No. That would be weird.”
“Like this isn’t.”
“I can’t sit without being interrogated?”
“Oh, yeah. I’m the crazy one in this scenario. I should’ve totally expected you to be hunkered down by my door like a crazy person as I slept peacefully.” You scoff, crossing your arms over your chest.
He watches your fingers, waiting for the pinch that always comes.
“Peacefully?” He raises an eyebrow. You still, looking away. You always look away.
“Yeah.” You sigh, then glance back at him. His forehead, rather. “How’s your head?”
“The head wound you gave me? It’s doubled in size since the last time you asked about it. Worst injury I’ve every had.” He smirks, but regrets it when your eyes widen and you jut forward towards him, leaning up to see it again. He holds out his palms, steadying you without touching you. “I’m kidding, doll. I’m fine. I don’t even see it anymore.”
The look in your eyes could burn him as you lean back against your doorframe, scowling.
“Don’t joke about that.” You whisper.
You both fall silent. You stare past him, somewhere far beyond the cramped hallway. He only stares at you. Your shoulders are rigid, your breathing calculatingly even. Fingers gripping your arms but not hurting them. The sun has set, leaving you both in the dark hallway, barely existing under the cover of night. The only evidence you exist at all is one bar of moonlight from the window behind him, falling on your eye and descending down your chest. When you look back at him, he can hear his heartbeat. You’re steady. Calmer. Walled off but not locked away.
He wants to say something aloof. Dance along the edge of your fear with plaintive words and a sarcastic bite. Maybe back downstairs and guard from there, leaving you in your comfortable fear.
But the tired, hopeful look in your eyes makes his fingers tremble. You’re not panicking. Not even hurt. He knows what your fear looks like. Now you just look...resigned. A wounded gazelle waiting for the lazy leopard to finish the job.
“Want to go stargazing?” The words fall out of his mouth before he can hold them back.
“Now?” You bow your head a little, looking at him from under your eyelashes. “Isn’t it cold?”
“I’ll get you a blanket.”
You watch him, carefully, rubbing your arm where you hold it with your thumb. You’re going to say no. Bucky knows all the reasons for you to. Too cold, or in the open, or not wanting to be with him.
He can leave. Watch from inside as you look away from him, towards something bigger than yourself. Maybe you can find the same peace he did. It’s easier without him crowding around you like a rainstorm.
And yet, the idea of watching from inside makes his jaw tense, teeth locking together like they have many times before. The gun weighs heavy on his hip. He’ll have to watch over you from the porch.
When you finally speak, your eyes flick to his arms, crossed tightly over his chest, then slide down to his holster. Obvious and brutal. He shifts, pushing the gun out of your view.
“Will you be there?” You ask, your voice barely a murmur.
“I’ll be out there.”
“No, I mean, are you watching the stars with me? I don’t know any of the constellations out here.”
“Oh. Yeah, I’ll show you the ones I know.” He says. You give him that small smile of yours, the corners of your lips barely turning up, but your eyes crinkling at the edges. His heart soars and he stamps the dramatic thing down. Clearing his throat, he moves aside and bows his head, moving out of the way as you go downstairs.
By the time he comes out with the blankets, you’re sitting in the tall grass, hugging your knees to your chest. When you hear the sound of the screen door close, you look back at him with a small smile, resting your head on your knees. The moon shines down at you, and Bucky almost loses his footing.
He throws one blanket on the ground, spreading it out, and you shuffle onto it, taking the other blanket in his outstretched hand with a silent thank you. He hovers over you as you get situated, unsure what to do. He hesitates, still standing, uncertain. You save him the trouble by patting the space beside you.
He lays next to your crouching form with a grunt, crossing his hands under his head. High above, the stars twinkle in the inky void of the dark. Neither of you say a word, the crickets filling the silence. After a moment, you shift, laying down and playing with the edge of the blanket you’ve thrown over yourself with the hand next to him. He avoids looking at it.
“I don’t see how any one could see anything up there.” You break the silence. Bucky tilts his head, studying the same sky you do. The connections between the stars are almost real in his eyes. If he loosens the tight grip he has on his thoughts, he could almost see his mothers finger in the corner of his vision, pointing up at the void and drawing the constellations with a manicured nail. Just for him.
He points to one bright star in the distance.
“You see that one?” He murmurs and you nod, “That’s Vega. It’s the top corner of Lyra. It goes down and makes a diamond. Turning into the Lyre of Orpheus.”
He draws it, glancing at you. You squint, chewing the inside of your lip as you look up. The moon highlights the curve of your cheek, the soft spot between your neck and your jaw, the way your eyes glitter like a shard of quartz under a calm riverbed. Bucky quickly looks back to the sky, coughing. You seem alright.
“What’s the story?” You ask, breaking through the silence. He drops his hand, putting it safely back under his head.
“Orpheus’s lover died when she was running away from some asshole. Stepped on a snake. He was so distraught, he went to hell with a lyre, trying to bring her back. Hades, the king of the dead, said he could lead her out as long as he never looked behind him. He messed up, and did, and she had to wander the dead forever.”
“Wow. Thanks for nothing.” You scoff. Bucky chuckles, surprising himself, coughing to cover it.
“I guess he couldn’t help it. If your lover died and you weren’t sure you were actually bringing them back, you’d want to check, no?” He asks. You shrug one shoulder.
“I’d trust them to be there. If we’ve gotten to the point of me going to hell for them, I’d never want to look away from them again.” You murmur. Clouds cover the sky, the moon’s light hiding away. Bucky takes the chance to look at you fully, seeing only the whisper of your lips in the near-pitch black.
“You don’t trust easily, do you.” He says it without really meaning to. A statement more than a question, and as it slips out, he hopes you don’t take it as an insult. You stay silent long enough for his hands to start to twitch, wishing they could grab his words and choke them back down his throat.
“You don’t either.” You murmur. His turn to be silent as you turn your face to him. His breath hitches until he manually lets it out.
“I try to. When it comes to the right person.” He says. The blanket of the void is making him comfortable, settling around him in a way that feels like a trap. But he can’t help himself.
“Do you have that person?” You ask.
Silence.
“I don’t think they trust me.” He breathes out.
You’re chewing the inside of your lip again, sucking in your cheek as you study him. He tries to be an open book.
“Are you a trustworthy person?”
“I’m not a weapon.” He breathes out.
“And I am.”
“I know you’re not.”
You say nothing, turning your head back up to the sky. He sighs.
“The last time I looked at the stars, I was half-dead in a snowbank in the Alps. My arm was a bleeding stump and I couldn’t keep my eyes open. The last thing I heard was Steve screaming my name from a train I had no way to get back to. All I had left was the stars. Dizzying, never-ending, stars. But they kept me alive. Calm. Most of humanity have used them to navigate, tell time, tell stories. I don’t know what constellations they have in Austria. I made my own. I told those same stories to myself when I woke up, my arm twisted into a hunk of metal and my brain shocked into a husk of itself. All I had left were the stories.” The words fall out of his mouth easily, broken past the shitty dam he’s made himself build up, but as you look at him, he avoids your gaze.
“On bad missions, when I didn’t know who I was, or what I was doing, I would look at the sky and tell myself stories. About the world, about whoevers neck I was crushing, about myself. About how I was kind, something in the wrong place, wrong time. I didn’t see myself as human. Just a weapon with a poetic streak.”
He chuckles dryly.
You don’t.
He continues, “When Steve woke me up, when I lost my arm, when they replaced it in Wakanda, I still looked to the stars. I didn’t feel anything inside. Just felt myself lost in the sky. I still look up there, looking for myself. I think I’m more down to Earth now, but it’s still comforting. The stories I can see up there can be true, now. I kept looking to the stars. I didn’t feel anything inside, just felt myself lost in the sky. Still do, sometimes. Still looking for myself.” He sighs, rubbing his face with his metal hand and letting it drop to his side, weary.
“I don’t have to be a weapon. I can be a guide. Even if it’s just for myself. You can be, too.” He says, letting the air out of his lungs to lay there like a rock. The crickets are silent now, or at least Bucky can’t hear them with his heartbeat pressing against his eardrums. Worse, you’re quiet too, your gaze still burning a hole in his cheek. He flinches away, turning his head to look anywhere but to you.
When you touch his cold metal hand with your warm fingers, it takes all of him to not jump out of his skin, even as every crevice in his mind becomes alight in thoughts he can’t focus on. The only thing he can keep track of is your index, tracing lightly up his wrist, into his palm, pressing in as the rest of your hand comes with it and spreading his fingers apart as you nestle your hand there, gripping tightly. Your thumb starts rubbing slow circles on the back of his. His shoulders relax to a point they haven’t in years.
“You’re not a monster, Bucky. You never have been.” You whisper. He looks at you.
“And you’re not either.” He whispers back.
The way you look at him is criminal. Doe eyes underneath eyelashes, wet tears on the brink of falling out. He fights back the instinct to brush them away, to grip your shoulder and bring you against his chest, nestle your head safely under his jaw and keep you pressed to him in a promise. Instead, he just grips your hand, and you close your eyes.
“That french toast was great, by the way. Perfect amount of cinnamon.” He whispers, and a ghost of a smile plays against the corner of your lips.
“I wanted to say thank you.” You whisper back.
“For what?”
“For staying.”
“Why wouldn’t I?” His question goes painfully unanswered as your thumb continues to rub his hand.
“I thought you’d throw it away.” Your eyes flutter open, looking up at his, cautiously.
“Who would throw away french toast that tastes like that?” He scoffs, managing to thread a laugh out of you, like windchimes in a light breeze. His chest aches with something unbearably sweet.
“Will you eat it with me tomorrow?” He asks.
A beat, then you shrug, smile still on your tranquil face.
“Of course.”
His brain empties, and all that’s left is you.
A/N: I had a rough month which means that this chapter definitely had some emotions in it, lol. Rewrote it from scratch a few times. I guess if you want a mentally ill character, you need a mentally ill author? Idk. I hope you enjoyed it, and sorry for the wait. Also, I love the gif I chose for this one. It's EXACTLY the face he makes when he's looking at you, by the way.
If anyone has any ideas for a oneshot, PLEASE let me know, I think I can write it faster if I don't have to worry about Overarching Story Structures. My brain is pudding. Taglist below, let me know if you want to be added!
Summary: After a tense argument in the middle of the street, you go to drink your stresses and sorrows away, though they're never far. However, Bucky is never far either, as you come to find out.
Word count - 5,300.
Author's Note - I got in my head about this story and completely rewrote the outline and this chapter a bunch. Also decided to take it way more seriously. Hence, this long chapter. Thank you very much for the support on the last chapter, I appreciate all of you.
Chapter TW: Drinking, bombs.
The rain peppers the windows like gunshots, and the day outside is black as night.
The darker it gets, the more the walls close in on you, trapping you in a hall of mirrored windows reflecting a stranger. At home, you’ve already covered all of your windows with newspaper. You know Bucky finds it crazy, finds you crazy, always glancing over at the windows every time Sam drags him over for a “wellness visit”.
Anxious, your stomach turns. Some selfish part of you is glad for the visits. Often, it was the only time you’d speak to someone in days. But then, they led to you being stuck here, enmeshed with people you’re trying to protect with your distance.
“Damn. It’s really pouring.” Bucky says from across the living room, peeking through the blinds you just shut. You nod absentmindedly as you block off the kitchen windows, throwing dust up in the air.
“Where did you find this place? Has it been frozen since the Dust Bowl?” You cough, and its Bucky’s turn to ignore you as he continues looking outside. You start making a coffee while watching him from the corner of your eye, taking advantage of Bucky’s rare lack of attention on you.
You woke up in an empty bedroom this morning. The almost-untouched chair made last night seem like a dream. His apparent lack of interest in talking to you about it makes you think it was a nightmare. You don’t want to talk about it, but is that better than letting it hang in the air? It was something to talk about, no? You have things to say to him. You need to say you’re sorry, that you’ll be quiet in the future, that he doesn’t need to come in again, and that you appreciate the sentiment, but that you can handle yourself.
That you thank him, that you’re sorry you’re so pitiful and broken, that you’re sorry that he even has to be stuck in this damn house with you.
That, that, that. It’s not even a real word anymore. Shame swims up from your stomach and plants itself in your throat, choking you. Gripping the counters edge, you try to still your mind.
He’s not going to talk about it, you whisper in your mind, trying to calm down your racing thoughts.
Some small, tiny part of you says through the cacophony that it’s hurt. That it does hope last night happened, that he’s going to talk about it, and that he was genuine. That he wasn’t looking at you with pity, seeing how broken you are even in your sleep. You imagine yourself locking that little voice in a box and throwing it into the Pacific.
You look at him again. He’s still looking outside and now frowning slightly. You wonder if he likes the rain. Does it rust his arm? Does it make him cold to the bone, like it does to you? Maybe, if you went together, you could run, jumping in puddles and laughing together under a stormy sky. You quickly look back down at your coffee, and add more chains to the box.
Hope is the worst hurt of all.
“Are you gonna drink that, or just stare at it?” His voice right next to you makes you jump. You glance up at his face, avoiding his steel blue eyes before shrugging.
“Have it.” You move away from him, sitting on one of the shitty chairs in the living room and grabbing the remote. Turning it onto a random channel, you stare at the mindless infomercial as if it was the most interesting microwave known to man.
“How many of these things you have today?” He says from behind you, clattering around in the kitchen.
“Two.”
“It’s eight in the morning. No wonder you’re jumpy.” He snorts.
“I’m not jumpy.”
“Like a trampoline.”
“Trampolines aren’t inherently jumpy.”
“A pogo-stick.”
“No one uses those anymore.”
“A kangaroo.”
“Are you just going to name things that jump?”
“Spring.”
“You’re irritating.”
“Bungee cord.”
“Like a mosquito.”
“Rabbit.”
The old nickname hits you like a bucket of ice. You suck a breath in and dig your nails into the arm of the chair – he doesn’t know.
“Don’t call me that. Please.” You say after a moment.
“You’re more of a hare, anyway. Different.” He murmurs, and you look behind you. He’s sitting at the counter, his chin in his hand.
He’s looking at you again, and you can’t help but lock eyes with him. He looks so focused, though a ghost of a smile is tugging at the corner of his lips. He’s examining you like your forehead is printing out your thoughts word for word, and you quickly look away from him again as your cheeks burn.
The ice from the past and the heat of your present mixing together makes you light-headed.
"And what is that supposed to mean." You ask, suspicious. "What do you think it means?" He shrugs, and you narrow your eyes. “Being a hare is better than being a mosquito.” You mutter.
“Touchey.”
You roll your eyes, and switch channels aimlessly. You try to ignore him behind you, but his horrible gaze still burns in your radar. You hate him. You hate how he’s able to get under your skin so easily. How he’s infected the part of you that you don’t allow yourself to have. And how you can never have what you want.
He’s breached your defenses, and he doesn’t even want to be in them. It’s infuriating how little he wants of you, when a part of you is willing to give it all to him if you’d only let it. If he would want it to happen. You pinch your thigh discreetly, the small shock of pain trying to stop your runaway thoughts.
He’s here for a job, you’re here because of your lack of backbone. He’s here to get paid, and you’re here to wait him and Sam out until you can get away. He’s here for a short time, and so are you.
It’s better for you to remember that. It’s easier than the alternative of telling him what that little part of you wants, and being thrown away. Or even worse; he accepts, and you get a taste of life with him before the worst inevitably happens, and you have to live the rest of time with his scent on your pillow. You pinch yourself again.
He doesn’t want that anyway. He said it himself. You’re ‘different’. A weirdo, in other words.
“I’m taking a shower.” He says from behind you.
“Thank god.” You say.
“Don’t try to come in.”
“You don’t ever have to worry about me doing that.”
He says nothing back, and you wait to get up until you can hear the soft din of the shower from the bathroom above you. Going to the kitchen, you pause before getting a new mug. The cup of coffee you gave him is empty, but a new one is brewed, waiting at the edge of the counter. You sip it, and the warm drink makes your cheeks flush red again. The little voice calls from the bottom of the sea.
Fucker and his mixed messages.
-
You sit impatiently in the passenger seat of the car, watching the diner window like a hawk. Rain pelts the windshield, but you can still see Bucky inside, waiting at the counter in his bulky grey rain jacket. A sliver of his metal arm peeks from a small gap between his sleeve and his glove, shining the red light from the OPEN sign back at you.
You turn away from him to watch the sheets of rain falling down the windshield. Main Street in a small town means a diner, a general store, a park bench, and two bars. The street continues, stretching into the foreground until it’s lost to the grey, unlit evening. You glance back at the diner, where Bucky stays waiting. Judging by the turned-off beer sign in the corner of the brightly lit window, you’re pretty sure it’s three bars.
This is suffocating. All day you’ve been tormented with the constant sound of rain, of your reflection, of close contact with Bucky as he ignores you even while brushing past you in the cramped dusty house. The silent hours are heavy when there’s someone else in the house, especially when it’s him. His stares, glares, and scowls have felt like shocks to your core. Electric and dangerous. Every room you’ve been in has been getting smaller, every second that passes. The car is no exception.
The walls of the shitty little sedan have held onto all of the cigarettes its past owners have smoked in it. The more it rains, the more the humidity causes the smell of tobacco and tar to invade your lungs. Nicotine is such a cloying smell. It reminds you of sticky yellow gunk covering the walls of your life. The janitors closet of your high school, the crappy basement-turned-bedrooms of your college exes, the dingy walls of His bunker. How many times in your life have you scrubbed your hands raw after touching something sickly covered in the crap? Your chest gets tight, breathing becoming panting. You bring your hand to your face to rub your temples, but stop when you see your nails, suddenly as cracked and long and just as yellow as His, and you rip the car door open and step out into the pouring rain.
Slamming it closed, you pick a random direction, ignoring the blaring car alarm as you walk quickly down the street.
One two fo-
One thr-
You take a deep breath in.
One two three four five.
One, two, three, four, five.
You let your breath out, stopping at the end of the long sidewalk and looking down at a puddle in front of you. The evening is dark and you’re blinded by rain, but your reflection stares up at you all the same. The flickering streetlight above you gives you a halo for seconds before plunging you back into the grey world you live in. Going in and out, you feel caught in the middle of two dimensions. One where you’re okay, and the reality where you’re not.
Your Narcissus impression is broken by a tire driving into the puddle, splashing dirty water on your shoes. You look up and glare at Bucky, who’s leaned over the centre console and glaring right back at you. The window rolls down.
“What are you doing.” He says rather than asks, his tone clipped and measured.
“I need some air.”
“There is no air. It’s a torrential downpour. You’re drowning on land.”
“I can breathe fine.”
“You’re a fish now?”
"Blub, blub."
He sighs, closing his eyes for a second before glaring at you again.
“I have the food. Get in the car.”
You wrinkle your nose in disgust and shove your hands in your jacket pockets. You can still smell the cigarettes from the sidewalk.
“Don’t make that face, I showered this morning.” He scoffs.
“Not everything is about you, Bucky.” You sigh, checking your nails – neglected, but normal and not yellowed – before pinching the bridge of your nose.
“Did I say that?" He snorts. "I just want to go home and eat.” He says.
“That’s not home.”
“You know what I mean.”
You look back down at the puddle. Your face is cut off, and the mirror only shows your body.
“I just want to be left alone.” You say.
“I’m not going to leave you on the street in the middle of a storm. Get in the car.” His voice is so stern. So strict. Barking orders at you like- You close your eyes tight and pinch the bridge of your nose, digging your nails in until the sharp pain stills your thoughts. You spin on one heel and walk back down the street you just came from. Bucky honks behind you. When you don’t turn around, he spins the car around and drives up next to you, rolling down his window.
“Y’know, at some point this is going to get old.” He says.
“I’ve been through worse than a little rain.”
“I don’t mean the rain. I mean shutting everyone out.”
You stay silent. Glancing at him, you see him gripping the steering wheel, his gloves off. His hand shines so annoyingly bright in the moonlight. He scoffs before continuing.
“All you do is bite at others. At Sam for caring about you, at me for protecting you, at yourself for even daring to exist-” You can hear the thump of his metal thumb against the steering wheel at every point.
“I don’t bite.” You interrupt.
“You do bite. You bite so much that you think you’re just talking. But you’re not. You’re pushing away the people who care about you. And that will only get you killed. You’ve already almost died twice with some psycho stalking you, who again, has left bombs on your doorstep. Yet, you still act as if you’d rather be dead than safe. To hell with everyone else, right? I don’t get it at all.”
Now you are biting. Your mouth fills with the taste of blood as you tear apart your inner lip, the pain being the only thing keeping you from crying.
“You don’t have to get it.” You say each word carefully.
“From the moment I met you, you hated me. Every time I ever went to that shitty place you call a home, you acted as if I was an intruder. Sam begged me to come just so he could go find this guy for you. And I came, knowing you hate me. If I’m spending weeks of my life being gnawed on like a damn chew toy, I think I have the right to be irritated by it.”
“Fine. Then leave.”
“No.”
He brakes hard as you whirl around to face the car, stalking up to the door and stabbing a finger at him. His brow furrows if only slightly, but he doesn't back away from you.
“If you have such a big problem with it, leave. I didn’t want to be here. I told Sam to not put me here, to stay away from me for his own sake. That I had it handled. And you both interrupted that. Sam, a guy with too much heart, and you, who has none. You hate me too, remember? I remember. Every glare you’ve sent me across Sam’s living room parties, you standing in the corner of my apartment scowling like a bratty kid, and every time you’ve ignored me. And you’ve ignored me a lot, James,” He tenses at his name, and you internally flinch at the colloquialism too, “Even when you’re pleasant, you pull away. You’re nice then cold, going all silent and analytical. You’re like if a gargoyle was a bodyguard. All you do is scream ‘stay away from me’, and I’ve tried, Bucky.” Your voice cracks slightly, and you take a sharp inhale before continuing, “And I’m sorry that Sam also dragged you out here. But maybe now that we both know how horrible I am, you can agree it’s better for you to just leave, and let me take care of this alone.”
You pull back from the car, crossing your arms. The rain (or maybe tears) is now clouding your vision, but you can see he’s still staring at you, unblinking. He’s examining you again. Maybe a security camera would be a more accurate description. An emotionless, analytical, machine. The description makes your stomach turn.
“You want me to leave you here, alone, on the street in the rain, in the middle of the night in Nowheresville, U.S.A.” He finally says, slowly.
“Yes. I do. You don’t want to be bitten, and I don’t want to be pitied. I can take care of myself.” The words come out of your mouth faster than you can think them.
He looks you up and down and raises an eyebrow. Anger boils in your blood.
“You’re such an asshole.” You turn again, walking briskly down the sidewalk towards the diner-bar-whatever it is, away from him. Succeeding in not looking back, as you hear the car speed down the street, you let the tears fall as the sound of tires on asphalt grows quieter and quieter.
Good. Fine. You can be alone. It’s safer for everyone for you to be alone.
-
Being drunk is nice. Being gone is nice. Running a fingernail down the chipped wooden bar top is especially nice as you find a groove, sliding down it. This is the best. You’re warm, and you’re ignored, and you’re tipsy enough to not have to think about anything that’s too difficult.
Music is pouring from the blown-out speakers in the corners of the now-dimly lit diner, turning the dated, nostalgic interior into any other dive bar you’ve been in, or stared through the window at. Craning your neck to the middle of the room, you see tables pushed back to create a pseudo-dance floor. Coloured lights are dotted on the walls, illuminating a couple slow-dancing and a couple drunk farmers in the corner booth. The couple hold each other close, swaying together unsteadily, drunk in love and in liquor.
Watching them is easy. People get a sense when anyone is looking at them, like you do. But alcohol allows you a window to see people’s authentic selves. It gives them a bubble just for each other.
The next sip of your drink is bitter, or maybe it’s you, your good mood washing away as quickly as it came. He took a lot from you, including your ability to be normal. From being in the bubble of accepted society to being trapped outside of them, cursed to look in and fear ever bringing anyone into one with you.
There’s a tap on your shoulder. Looking over your shoulder, you’re met with loose grin of a local. His dirty trucker hat hides his face other than his jaw, covered in a sparse beard. The smell of beer rolls off of him and you quickly look back down at the bar in the hopes your disinterest will tell him to leave.
“Howdy. You’re new.” He says, sitting on the stool next to you with a grunt.
Oh, god.
“Just passing through.” You say, taking your glass and downing it. He snaps his fingers and orders another of your drink, and the bartender turns away to make it before you can say no. She’s the same woman that was helping Bucky before, and she’s been borderline ignoring you since you came in drenched a couple hours ago. She must’ve seen you storm out of the car earlier, Bucky running after you and the blaring car. You wonder what she must think. That you got rainwater everywhere for her to clean? That you’re hysterical and emotionally unstable? That you broke up with your boyfriend in the rain and came here to drink away the pain?
One of those things is not like the others, and you down half of your new drink as soon as she passes it to you in order to shut up your mind again.
“Hon?”
You snap back to attention. Hazier attention, but still. The guy isn’t gone. You’d think ignoring him would give him a hint, but they never get the hint.
“I’m not your hon, and I’m just passing through.” You say into your drink. He chuckles next to you.
“No one passes through here. There ain’t nothin’ to see. Until now, that is.”
“And what is there to see now?”
“Well, you. And you’re a sight and a half. Almost blinding.”
This is too cheesy, but his words still run like rain down your spine.
“You’d better get some sunglasses then.” You mutter, and he laughs again. It’s a high-pitched laugh, lilting up like a hyena on helium. It makes your head hurt, and you down the rest of your glass. The bartender takes it and replaces with a new one quickly, following the pattern you’ve set for the last few hours. Shit, you have been drinking for a while.
“You’re a funny girl. What’s your name?” He’s still here? Your head is swimming.
“Wouldn’t you like to know.”
“Well, that’s why I asked. Though, there’s other things about you I’d rather know.” Even when he drops an octave, a giggle is barely hiding behind his words.
“I’d rather not know you.” You say, clipping your tone as you take another sip and look towards the dance floor. The couple is gone, and the farmers have moved from their booth to mob the end of the bar, chatting at the bartender who’s focusing on polishing glasses and smiling politely at them. You wonder if they tip. You wonder if you can tip her off on how creepy this guy is next to you, and that you need a damn lifeline.
“Aww, come on, don’t be like that. I’m just being a friendly guy. Welcoming all who come crawling into this podunk town.”
“I am not crawling.”
“Well sorry pet, but you look like a drowned rat that the cat dragged in.”
“That’s what I am. A dirty, disgusting rat. I will bite and give you rabies and the fleas on my back will give you the bubonic plague. You’ll die a horrible death if you even come near me.”
He laughs again, the psycho.
“Feisty! That’s alright. I’ve never been one to shy away from a buckin’ horse.”
You glance at the stranger. He’s come closer, grinning like a mad-man just a few inches from your face. You can almost feel the bar close in. All you can see is his yellow teeth, years of tobacco turning them into shotgun shells wedged in his barrel of a mouth. You look back down at the bartender, psychically willing her to turn around and see you both, to tell him off, to throw a glass at his head, anything. She leans on the bar top towards the farmers, cutting you off from whatever saving grace you had a chance of having.
“I’d like to be left alone.” You say, leaning forward on the bar-top. Your head is out to sea, the alcohol and sudden cloying panic taking your limbs and leaving them both weightless and too heavy.
“We’d all like somethin’ darlin’. Sometimes, only some of us get what we want.” He says, setting his untouched bottle down on the bar with a thunk. Out of the corner of your eye, you see his face get closer to yours, until the sharp edges of his beard scratch against your ear. One arm slithers along the small of your back, hooking around your waist like a cuff. Your face and body feel hot, sweating, panicky, but you still freeze.
You always freeze, little rabbit.
“I think that’s enough.” A different voice this time, but one your body lurches to instinctively, away from the stranger, but his hand keeps it’s vice-grip on your belly.
“And you are?” His drawl is far too loud in your ear and you grimace.
“The guy telling you that you’re done.” Bucky’s voice is clipped, harsh. You glance up to see him standing above you, blocking the exit to the door with a wide stance in the narrow pathway. He’s looking at the stranger hunched over you with a stony glare that makes your mouth go dry. You wonder if that’s a natural glare, grown from a rough childhood, or whether it was trained into him. Sam had mentioned his time as the Winter Soldier, the sheer violent force of man and machine that he exhibited, but you had never seen his anger show on his face like it was now.
No wonder he was so effective. You wonder how it looks when his face softens, if it ever softens, and if that same hard exterior can melt away with it. You shake your head, getting your fuzzy thoughts out. Too many drinks.
“We were just talkin’.” The stranger says, chuckling again. His revolting laugh is so familiar, and the same tightness in your chest that you felt in the car is coming back full force.
You try to pull his arm away, but it’s no use. His lean arm is locked in, keeping you pinned to the stool and away from Bucky.
“Something tells me that she doesn’t want to talk to you anymore.”
“I think she can decide that for her-” You take the strangers pointer and middle finger in your fists, yanking them apart from each other until he yelps in pain, ripping his hand away. No longer being held up, you start to fall forward off the stool, alcohol stealing your sense of balance. Bucky quickly grabs your waist, bringing you back to your feet with his own iron grip, and this time only the flutter of butterflies invade your thoughts instead of a rush of panic. You look up to lock eyes with him, and you see another ghost of a smile on his lips.
“Hey! That hurt, you bitch!” The hyena behind you cries out. He must have moved towards you, because suddenly, Bucky lunges around you towards the stranger. You stumble back, gripping the bar behind you. A glint of light catches your eye, and you look to it to see it coming from the lights reflecting off of Bucky’s metal arm. His vibranium wrist is almost fully showing as he balls up the mans collar, hoisting him off of his stool with ease and holding him midair.
“Bucky...” You glance at the locals at the other end of the bar, who are watching in stunned silence. Maybe they’re too drunk to deal with all of this either.
Bucky glances at you from the corner of his eye, then follows your eyes to his wrist. Scowling, he pulls the man closer, whispering something indecipherable in his ear before throwing him back down towards his stool. The stranger falls to the ground with a clatter, trucker hat falling off. You only get a glimpse of his face before he covers it with his arm, cowering away from you. Or more probably, from Bucky.
“Let’s go.” Bucky says gruffly, putting a hand on the small of your back and pushing you towards the door. You almost fall but he quickly grabs your waist again and balancing you, sending more drunk butterflies into your stomach. As you walk past the gawping barroom audience, he pauses to toss a few bills from his moneyclip (so old-fashioned, maybe you should buy him a wallet for his birthday?) onto the counter, before pushing you out of the bar.
The cig-mobile is a welcome chariot, and he gentlemanly shoves you into the passenger seat before slamming the car door shut. You fumble with your seatbelt as he gets into the drivers seat, blind in the bright car interior. He clips himself in and sighs, looking at you.
“You drank that much?”
“I’m sensing judgment.” You say.
“At least you still have some of your senses. Stop that, here.” He waves away your hands and clips you in before driving away from the bar quickly. You turn to see the stranger outside of the bar now, the red eye of a cigarette winking brightly at you against his black silhouette.
-
The ride back to the safehouse is long and silent. You stare at Bucky’s reflection in the car window, studying him with drunk confidence.
He took his gloves off a few miles back, and now clutched the wheel in a white-knuckle grip. The tension followed up his arms to the rest of his body, his jaw clenched and posture stiff. When he seems lost in thought, his body clenches up, almost as if protecting him from attack even while his mind is gone. You know constant defense
“I’m sorry.” You say without thinking. You pinch yourself.
“For what?” Bucky says after a moment. His tone is even, not showing his rigidity.
“For the bar. And the street.” He stays quiet in response, turning down the dirt road back to the house. The rumbling beneath the wheels doesn’t help settle the nerves in your stomach. Or maybe that nauseous feeling is the alcohol, rearing its ugly head again.
You both sit in silence, staring ahead at the house, not bothering to unbuckle. The silence hangs in the air but you’re almost too drunk to care. Just his presence next to you is steadying now, if you ignore all of the voices in your head screaming at you to get away from him. Tired, you lay your head back on the seat, watching him fidget with the steering wheel cover. How cute. You bite the inside of your lip.
“I’m...sorry. For the street. I went too hard. Hangry or something, I dunno.” He says while he fidgets, running a hand through his hair and looking at the drivers side window. You think maybe, he’s watching you the same way you’re watching him. You look down at his hands.
“I’m not stupid. Some of this is my fault. I know you’ve dealt with some shit. I don’t know what it is, but - ” He speaks down at the wheel, barely leaving a pause for you even if you could answer him, “- at the end of the day you’re here. That shows enough strength. Shit, you showed it in the bar." He sighs, dropping his hands into his lap, looking down at them pensively before he continues.
"I’m sorry that I haven’t shown that I’m a shield rather than a bomb.” He flexes and relaxes his metal hand, and sparks run down your spine as you turn to look at him, in his full color.
You wonder if he would be fine with the fact that you are the bomb he’s trying not to be. Maybe that’s why you’re so magnetically drawn to him, even if you don’t want to admit it to yourself, least of all to anyone else. Hopefully he stops talking while you still have a chance to hate him, and a chance to make him hate you. The eventual goodbyes can still be easy.
“And, don’t be sorry for the bar. I would do that again for you in a heartbeat.” He says before smoothly getting out of the car, shutting the door behind him with a soft thunk.
The walls are closing in again, but you don’t even care as you watch him go to the door, taking one last look behind him at you in the car. In that moment, you curse yourself, and you curse him, but most of all you curse Him for taking you away from everything, and everyone, that you have had the chance to meet. In that moment, you want to throw yourself at Bucky and talk to him, tell him everything and hold him, be held by him, and your hope comes rushing into your head so fast that it makes you dizzy.
You don't move, and he enters the house without a word. When you finally make your way inside, he's sleeping on the couch he's made into his bed, worry etched into the lines on his face and blanket thrown to the ground. Silently, you take the blanket and cover him back up, allowing yourself only a second of staring as you go up the stairs to your own bed.
Your dreams are filled with blue eyes and yellow teeth.
I'm travelling this weekend and forgot chapter 4 of Friction on my old laptop so that will not be posted tomorrow like I was planning :(
I'll write up a oneshot and post it as recompence. If anyone has any requests or head canons for either Bucky, Loki or Stardew Valley, feel free to send them in!
hiya! i think you're veryyyyyy talented, youre an amazing writer!!!! im reading friction and i'm following through every bits of it. i cant lie that I feel her, the feelings, the longings, the panic attacks and all. but I love the story you're writing. how it's a slow burn and how the tension is built, the relationship is formed. I'm loving every bits of it <3
This is so sweet, thank you 😭 my coworkers are side-eyeing me as I grin at my phone, lol.
I'm glad (and sorry) that the reader resonates so much with you. I deal with C-PTSD myself and all of the fun emotions that accompany that. It has been cathartic but insanely difficult to write it down into a fic, but I felt like I had to. Add that to the fact that this has been the first time I've written anything in years, and I feel a lot of internal pressure to write the struggle right. I'm very grateful to see that people relate to Friction in a good way. I hope that I'm able to continue showcasing her healing in an effective way.
I'll say here that this will end well. There will be harder parts, but I think it's important to give the reader a happy ending. I want to be realistically positive. Anyone can heal, anyone can be loved. You're never too broken.
