No death-threats for you but how about some Barnes headcanons?🤗
𝘚𝘌𝘙𝘎𝘌𝘈𝘕𝘛 𝘉𝘈𝘙𝘕𝘌𝘚 𝘏𝘌𝘈𝘋𝘊𝘈𝘕𝘖𝘕𝘚
ty for my first ask <3
Headcanons before a relationship; ・Barnes has a quietly obsessive personality. Whatever he wants, he'll exert himself to possess. That is, until it comes to you. You're not an inanimate object he can simply pick up and claim, and despite his raging, seemingly dominating demeanour, if he scared you off he knows he mightn't get a second chance. Instead, he steps carefully around you, like a jaguar waiting for the right time to strike and claim it's prey, not wanting to jump in too soon and ruin the hunt. He has to be patient.
・Like an automatic upgrade to his field of vision, as soon as he begins thinking of you, you are suddenly so much more present around the base. He watches you while in conversation with other people, walking to and fro, entering and leaving the medics' tent. He takes note of when it is you go to sleep, when you wake up, what you eat from the small selection available, if you smoke; what brand of cigarettes you smoke.
・His expression of love languages are hard to decipher from his typical behaviour, because of his inexpressive nature. His favourite one is close proximity, probably because it's the easiest to achieve when you're in the vicinity of each other almost daily. An example of this would be him walking towards you on a path and intentionally hitting off your shoulder. You'd wince, maybe vocalise some sort of annoyance, turn back to him, but he'd keep on walking, playing a one-sided game of cat and mouse with you where he's toying with the mouse while planning on how to catch it.
・Following up to his obsession with close proximity, his fixation on you builds up inside him like a wildfire. Barnes is afraid of eye-contact never, and oh boy if you didn't know that before you sure know it now. Too many times to count a shiver will run down your spine; like an animal being spooked by something in the dark only they can sense. Once you look around, you realise Barnes had been staring at your for who knows how long. He doesn't shy from your gaze after being caught either, like a criminal caught red-handed too nonchalant to feel a speck of humility nor shame.
・Your first proper interaction with him would probably be out of necessity. You meet for the first time formally while he's being patched up by you in the medics' den. Even though he's very capable of beginning conversation, he prefers to stare at you while you're so close to him.
・Barnes has pushed any glimmer of hope into the back of his mind when it comes to you loving him. He is unavoidably, evidently, wholly corruptive in his own opinion of himself. Anything he touches turns to dust, to ashes, to ruin. He has blood on his hands, fresh and haunting. Barnes believes if he ever obtained you, as if you were a trophy, he would destroy you too, even unintentionally. You are too good for him, but maybe that's why he also contradictorily wants you. He wants to be a dog at your heel, he wants to own you, he wants you to acknowledge his passion; his fervent and sickly devotion.
・Barnes didn't make it through several tours of Vietnam and rise to the rank of Sergeant without learning the language of manipulation. His game plan is to make you think you want him, or more so you need him. He's not noble enough to be wanted, but he's violent enough to be needed.
・He orchestrates situations to save you from. Tells you to fetch something just beyond the edge of the jungle, and while accompanying you leads you past a rock he knows a snake rests under, which he heroically shields you from. The longer you go without him believing you reciprocate any feelings, the deeper he sinks into deception. He'll leave a venomous critter; either a snake, tarantula or large insect of some kind loose in your tent, and be conveniently close by when you discover your uninvited roommate to perform pest control for you.
・Although I don't think he would talk often about you to anyone in the platoon, the rare occasions someone brave and friendly enough with him decides to question him about his visible attraction to one of the nurses, he'll adopt the mindset that instead of ignoring or scolding them he'll plant a piece of information, an opinion, a piece of his mind, and let them come up with an opinion about it. The worst they can do is try wing-man for him; no one was dumb enough to compete against Barnes.
・Outside during one of the late-summer nights, Barnes confessed to you while drunk. There was some sort of celebration going on in the camp; maybe a birthday or milestone. It was just the two of you, the cool breeze escaping from the east horizon brought relief to your overheated body in the warm early night. Barnes evaluated you; knees pressed together, sat on a fallen log opposite him, leaning in to hear what he had to say whilst simultaneously trying to drown out the hum of sound coming from the celebration happening a couple yards away. Even while inebriated, Barnes wasn't sloppy. His eyes may have glazed over and his words may have slowed down, but the intoxication that crept through your nervous system didn't solely come from your cider in hand. Between pausing to wait for your reaction, he inched closer until his nose was almost touching yours. He pressed a warm kiss on your lips, one calloused hand trying to caress your shoulder ever so gently, as if you would take off like a startled fawn if his touch was too invasive.
Headcanons during a relationship; ・Gloatful, unavoidant about his behaviour. He's the hunter who's got his prised trophy catch in his grasp and doesn't plan on letting you go.
・Possessive. Even before you're officially together by any means, word spreads around base-camp, and with the information you're suddenly unavailable also comes with it the information Barnes decided so; an uncompromising force.
・Within the polyester-sheet-thick privacy of your tent, one of Robert's favourite things to do is lay his head on your lap. In what little spare time you have, one of your favourite pass times is to read. He enjoys listening to you reading out loud whatever book you're reading for him to listen to.
・Lighting your cigarettes for you, the rest of the platoon think you must of cast a spell on him.
・Giving out to him for his mannish untidiness/etiquette like lying in bed with his boots on, hawking up phlegm whenever he feels like it and endangering everyone in close proximity with a loogie, or shouting while listening to sports on the radio.
・He keeps a piece of you with him where ever he goes. Not a photograph, but rather a lock of you hair, a small trinket like a coin with the year of your birth on it, a lighter with both your initials engraved on it, etc. He might plan on getting your name or something about you tattooed on him, but only after the war is over. As he puts it, he doesn't want "one of those jack-asses with stick and poke" privates in the platoon to permanently mark his body.
・Likes pulling your hair. Both in intimate moments and casually. If he wants your attention, he might stand directly behind you, waiting to see how long it takes before you notice. If he thinks you're taking too long to acknowledge him, he'll tug at the end of your hair without saying a word to let his presence be known.
・With being Barnes' partner comes the burden of the radio. He's not a musical person, and so nine times out of ten the channel playing on his or your radio is a sports game, news, or briefly the weather channel. "Nuh uh, no way." He'll say with crossed arms when you go to turn the tuner on the radio. The hidden truth about Barnes is that he doesn't have many soft spots, but you doting on him and amorously giving him attention can change his mind. After several pleases and kisses on his cheek he'll sigh and surrender the radio to you.
・Trying to make him smile, kissing him and doting on him til he cringes enough that he breaks a smiles.
・He's silently proud you've admitted your attracted to his Southern accent, but anything else about him and the South easily ticks him off. If you ask him to say Howdy or Yeehaw or any sort of quote from a western cowboy film he'll be uncooperative. Barnes doesn't have a funny bone in his body.
・When lying on a bed or hammock together, he takes up most of the room unapologetically. He spreads out his form, leaving you to find a comfortable way to curl around him, usually ending up very close together, exactly his plan.
・ Singing to him while he rests his head on your chest, staring at the light a lantern on your bedside table illuminates on the wall of your tent.
・He sees you somewhat like a possession; a priceless ornament he wants to place on a shelf away from the world, as if to preserve you from every poison and bad experience out there.
・When asking Barnes what his plans are after the war, he realises his previous plan to die here would mean someone else could marry you after the war.