you never fight alone. @tmpestuous - Tumblr Blog

Dec 5, 2025

moth to a flame - thirteen

summary: an unexpected encounter is always bittersweet.

pairing: college!bucky x reader

warnings: angst, mentions of abuse, guilt/shame, anxiety

word count: 4.8k

a/n: long overdue return. my life has turned very hectic and busy in the past few months and the lack of energy forced me to hit a huge block. but we persevered! i hope you enjoy (:

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Bucky was certain that if you stared at him any harder, your eyeballs would pop out of their sockets.

His hair was damp from the rain outside; he was gripping hard onto the handles of his crutches since he hadn’t learned how to use them properly yet and didn’t want to lose his balance. It didn’t help that it was more difficult with the prosthetic.

The reason for his appearance was lost on him. It was more impulse than logic, something he had decided in less than a minute while laying in bed. There wasn’t a single thought to tell Steve or Nat he was heading out, and most definitely not his family either. A reckless moment, but one he wasn’t starting to regret as he stood in front of you for the first time in over a week.

A frazzled stare was on your face, your attire fitting for the weather. You were wearing your shoes inside, letting him assume you must’ve just arrived or were about to head out. Maybe you were in a rush.

Bucky was almost frozen, words lingering on his tongue as his brain was processing this moment — being alone with you. The last time he saw you, you weren’t yourself. He wasn’t himself either, but uncertainty could be deciphered all throughout your body language. When you walked away, it felt like his chest got stomped on.

Hearing your voice over the phone hadn’t been enough, and a few text messages back and forth were even worse. Bucky knew he needed to see you, talk to you, even if it were for less than an hour. It was the only thing that would stop him from driving himself insane.

There wasn’t a script that could cover all he wanted to tell you, a plan nowhere to be found. It’d find him eventually. What dawned on him and occupied his brain at the time was your presence. At that time, it felt like nothing else mattered anymore.

Interrupting his train of thought, you moved. Stepping to the side without responding to his initial greeting, you let him walk into your apartment and shut the front door as soon as he was inside. Once you locked it, you looked at him again as he slowly but surely made his way to the couch.

“I don’t wanna get your couch wet,” Bucky spoke hesitantly, looking at you from over his shoulder.

You shook your head, very obviously in frustration as you made your way over to him, helping him sit down. The silence was insanely loud, albeit expected.

“Not gonna say a word, are you?” Bucky spoke up again once he was settled on the couch.

You focused on elevating his leg, though he assured you it was fine until you gave him a glare. Then, you grabbed his crutches and leaned them together on the outer side of the couch’s arm rest.

“Will you please talk to me?”

“What are you doing here?” You asked incredulously. “How did you get here? It’s 7 in the morning and it’s raining and you’re injured—”

“I’m fine,” Bucky cut you off. “I ordered an Uber like any other person.”

“All the way from Brooklyn? Why? Why would you do that?”

“Because I needed to see you,” he answered immediately. “This distance you’re giving is killing me, I couldn’t take it any longer.”

“And what do you think it’s doing to me?” You pushed back, hating that your voice immediately cracked and the tears started to well in your eyes.

Bucky cursed himself inwardly.

“We don’t have to do this,” he tried to reason, hating seeing you upset. “We don’t have to ignore each other or stay away from one another.”

“But we should,” you deferred once more, wiping your eyes.

Bucky stared at you with pain in his eyes, but you couldn’t even bring yourself to look at him. You looked like you were about to suffocate and pass out.

“Hey,” he said softly. “Come here. Please.”

You sniffled, still not looking at him.

“I should call Steve,” you decided while pulling your phone out until Bucky said your name harshly, making you look his way.

“Don’t do that, can we just talk?” He pleaded once more. “That’s all I want.”

Taking a deep breath, you closed your eyes momentarily. Once you opened them, you sat on the coffee table in front of the couch since Bucky’s leg was taking up the space. He knew you were thinking you didn’t want to hurt him any further. Once you sat down, you stared at him like you needed to take a better look at him.

He watched as you scanned him in the dim light, reminders of how you’d tell him that his eyes always looked more gray when it was cloudy, the usual cerulean a bit faded. The expression on his face was pensive, as he was trying to formulate the best string of words for a sentence.

“I’m sorry,” was all he managed to let out.

“What do you have to be sorry for?”

“I didn’t give you a choice in all of this,” Bucky started, starting to adjust his seated position to face you slightly more. You stopped him once his leg was moving. He shrugged it off.

“You really don’t have to say that.”

“I do,” he emphasized. “I convinced you that all of this was the right thing to do, the only thing to do. But I never heard you out, never gave you an in, never gave you a choice. My mind was set and I roped you into it and expected you to give in. That’s not right.”

“It’s not like I pushed back much anyways,” you deflected, looking away.

“Because I didn’t let you. I told you what was going to happen and that was it. It was a bad decision on my part and look where it landed us,” he explained further. “I forced you into this situation. It makes me no better than him.”

Your eyes immediately diverted back to his face.

“Why would you say that?” You questioned, shaking your head. “You’re nothing like him, Bucky.”

“But in a way, I am,” he said, his tone still calm, like he had made peace with the thought. “Yeah, I wasn’t doing it to have control over you, I would never do that. But this was about you, and I should’ve listened to you. I should’ve let you decide what you wanted to do, what you wanted to happen. And I’m sorry.”

At a loss for words, you nodded. “Okay.”

Bucky paused. “Okay.”

“You came all the way here to tell me that in person?” You asked softly, not in an accusatory tone.

“I meant it when I said I needed to see you,” Bucky ran his right hand through his hair. “Face to face, and talk. Not over the phone, not through text. It’s not the same.”

“I’m not avoiding you,” you admitted, looking down at your hands in your lap. “I think about you all the time, every single day. I just still feel so guilty about everything and I— it’s eating me alive. I need to work through it and I don’t know if or how I can do that if I’m around you. I want to be there, I want to see you, but then I do see you and you’re injured and it feels like it’s all my fault.”

“It isn’t—”

“You saying that doesn’t make the feeling go away,” you looked at him once again, eyes glossed over.

“But I can help you mend it,” Bucky tried to reason.

As you were about to respond, your phone rang. Upon seeing Steve’s contact on the screen, you looked at Bucky, who silently pleaded with you not to answer.

He observed you ponder it, hoping you’d give him the space he wanted with you in it and having a conversation. Doing otherwise would only be putting off the inevitable — Bucky wasn’t one to take no for an answer. He had a lot of persistence, even though it had lessened in the last week since the incident.

Staring at you with sorrow in his eyes, a huff escaped him as he watched you decide to pick up the phone, putting it on speaker.

“Hey,” you said softly.

“Hey, have you heard from Bucky at all?” Steve asked frantically over the phone. “He’s not at home and his location is off and the rest of us are here, so I only assumed—”

“He’s here with me, no worries,” you said. “He’s safe and unharmed.”

“Okay, good,” Steve said with a sigh of relief. “I can head over and pick him up—”

“That’s okay, you don’t have to get him,” you cut him off, making Bucky raise a brow. “I can drop him off before going back to my parents’ place.”

“Are you sure? Don’t your parents live downtown?”

“Yeah, but it’s okay,” you reassured him. “I promise.”

“Alright, I’ll see you then.”

Once you hung up the phone, you looked back at a confused Bucky.

“What’d you do that for?” He questioned.

“I thought you wanted to stay?”

“I do,” he assured. “Just wasn’t expecting it is all.”

With a shrug, you looked back outside. Bucky’s stare was burning into the side of your face, and he knew you could feel it. You tended to hide things more, either unprocessed thoughts or ones that were nothing but a rant of self-deprecation.

He couldn’t help but notice your slouched posture, how you were naturally curling into yourself. Your body language was so much more guarded, yet uncertain. You fidgeted with your fingers subconsciously, trying to soothe yourself in any way to avoid asking anyone else to help out.

“I can’t lie to you,” you spoke softly, still not looking in Bucky’s direction. “It’s impossible for me to be around you and pretend like everything’s fine or that it’ll all be okay.”

“It will be okay,” Bucky answered immediately. “He’s gonna get what he deserves, and we’re gonna get through this.”

“This isn’t just some petty argument to move on from, Bucky,” you spit a bit harshly, looking at him with tears in your eyes once again. “You provoked him because of me. He did what he did because of me. I’m the only common denominator in this situation and look at how we’ve ended up. How you ended up. I have to take responsibility for it.”

“And you have,” he cut you off, a crack in his voice. “You’ve not only apologized more than once, but you’re punishing yourself on my behalf. You have been for months, even before any of this happened to me. At what point is it enough? At what point do you stop making yourself suffer on purpose?”

A few tears slipped down your face as you stayed silent. Bucky had never seen you beat yourself up at this level, nor for this long. You had the tendency to hate when you made mistakes, punish yourself when a task wasn’t complete, and ultimately try and solve your problems on your own.

All of those habits had just snowballed into an avalanche of self-inflicted shame, and you couldn’t pull yourself out of it alone. So you stayed in it. It was evident to everyone around you, and they could only avoid the intervention for so long.

Bucky wasn’t one to let you wallow. He could never find it in himself to make you brave the storm by yourself, especially knowing you’d do the same for him.

“Come here,” Bucky said while shifting to rest his leg on the coffee table beside you. You shook your head, trying to stop him. “Hey, I’m okay.”

“The couch is better than the table,” you argued.

“Not when you have to sit so far because of it,” he countered back. “Please.”

Sighing profusely, you wiped your tears before moving next to his right side, sitting down slowly to avoid shifting him any more. Bucky instinctively wrapped his arms around you, ignoring the voices in his head wondering if you could feel the metal and if it was uncomfortable. Watching your face as you didn’t seem to mind, you rested your head against his chest, the tears starting to fall again.

Bucky felt horrible as you started apologizing repeatedly, shushing you as he rubbed your back with his right arm.

“It’s okay,” he assured. “We’re gonna be okay.”

“I want that to be true,” you whispered, but he heard it loud and clear.

“It will be.”

You moved your head so your gaze met his. Your pupils were a bit smaller to adjust to the light, but your eyes were just as beautiful as he remembered them, even when they were filled with sadness. He’d do anything to fill them with light again.

“We can’t be together,” you said in a hushed tone.

Bucky nodded, ignoring the pang in his chest.

He felt it coming. The final boundary. But he would be lying if he didn’t feel the same. There were things you both needed to address together — the string that tied you to one another, drawing you both right back to the spot you felt was home. The work that was left to be done individually, however, wouldn’t allow it to be dealt with properly.

It was what was best. Bucky knew that.

“I know,” he responded, his voice just as quiet.

“I should finish packing and then we can head out,” you changed the topic.

Not wanting to push his luck, Bucky nodded once more.

“Sounds good.”

You moved to give him one last hug, with a soft squeeze and a peck on the cheek before pulling away and retreating to your room. Bucky sighed before staring at the ceiling.

It was his first moment of silence in days that didn’t consist of his mind spiraling while laying in bed. Sleep hadn’t found him since the hospital, several failed attempts of finding a comfortable position that wasn’t on his back prevented any real rest. Lying on his back made him feel like he was back in the hospital, which made him feel like he was 2 seconds from being on his death bed.

His anxiety had gotten worse, and it wasn’t like deep sleep would grant him any rest either. The nightmares were inevitable, the phantom pain in his arm was unbearable, and his shoulder got cramps often; he also was limited with the cast around his leg that made him feel even more trapped than he already did.

Bucky did his best to focus on the sound of your movements as you ruffled through drawers and packed things in another bag. He heard your sniffles every now and then, wishing he could just tell you to stop and take a moment. Spending a day with you would solve all of his problems for a bit, but he knew the pain that would come after.

It was also impossible to ignore the hurt you were experiencing just by looking at him. Bucky would give anything to be able to read your mind and calm your racing thoughts. Reassurance was something he was usually good at, but he was at a loss. You never shut him out the way you have for the past few months, and he felt more distant than even when he first met you.

The girl in front of him was different. She wasn’t the confrontational, bright, go-getter he was so used to. Atlas ruined you in ways he couldn’t even imagine, and yet, you were here thinking Bucky got the worst of it all.

He still had his life, his friends, his family. Yes, his mental state was in the gutter, especially after losing a limb. He felt like shit most of the day now, not even wanting to get out of bed and face anyone. He hated talking, hated moving, and even hated being touched most of the time.

He was dealing with a battle most would never see, but at least there were ways to deal with it. You were fighting one that was impossible to view, and the worst part was you were trying to fight it alone. Bucky wasn’t sure how your friends had even let it get this bad, but he knew you better than all of them. It was painful to watch.

Bucky’s thoughts were stifled by you walking back into the living room. Your eyes were puffy and red now; he hadn’t even known how much time had passed.

“Um,” you started speaking, your voice trembling as you fought more tears. “We can go now if you’re ready.”

If you’re ready.

Of course he wasn’t ready. There was so much left to unpack, to debrief. But he could see why you begged him to stay away for so long. Part of him wanted to fight your demons for you and tell you that he was here, and he wasn’t going anywhere. But the other part of him knew you weren’t just protecting your own peace, but his as well. He couldn’t fight that.

All he could do was nod.

The drive to Bucky’s home was fairly silent between the two of you, save for the sound of the rain against the windows. No radio, no conversation. The tension was thick but neither of you attempted to slice through it.

Bucky already felt bad about detouring you from your day plans. He didn’t regret coming to see you, but as you helped him settle into your car, he only felt like an inconvenience. You assured him it was fine, but the tone of your voice and look on your face said otherwise.

Deciding to break the silence, Bucky cleared his throat.

“How was your Thanksgiving?”

You looked at him quickly before looking back at the road. It felt weird being the one in the passenger seat while you drove, Bucky imagining you might’ve felt the same way.

“It was fine,” you responded curtly. There’s that word again. Fine.

“Just fine?” Bucky asked subconsciously. “Sorry, not trying to pry.”

“Yeah, just fine,” you said with a nod. “I told them how I felt and we made a plan. Nothing crazy.”

Based on how short your sentences were, Bucky assumed you weren’t up for talking anymore. Another thing that was very unlike you, at least when it came to him.

It was awkward. Bucky never felt awkward with you. Slowly, the guilt of coming to your place unannounced crept up his neck. Another stupid decision for him to overthink for weeks.

“How was yours?” You asked, almost like you heard how loud he was thinking.

Bucky shifted his gaze to the side of your face. You were focused on the city traffic ahead of you, brows furrowed as the drivers were as reckless as usual.

“It was okay,” he breathed out. “Different.”

“Because everyone was there?” You inquired.

“Yeah,” Bucky answered honestly. “I wish you could’ve been there.”

He didn’t miss how you chewed on your lip anxiously, then sucking your teeth as a driver cut you off.

You were about 10 minutes out from Bucky’s place, but the traffic extended it for another 20. It wasn’t unexpected for the day after a holiday, but the weather wasn’t making it any better.

“I wish I could’ve been there too,” you finally responded.

Deciding against testing the waters, Bucky looked back out the window. He thought it best to help you navigate the traffic somehow, and you spent the next 25 minutes maneuvering in and out of lanes and between cars to finally make it down the block from Bucky’s family home.

The dread of having to face his parents’ inescapable disappointment exacerbated as you turned on his street. Bucky hadn’t thought much of anyone’s feelings about his actions other than his own, which wasn’t an act he took part in often. He always took everyone into consideration, and lately, his judgment had been clouded.

“Can we just pull over for a second?”

“Is everything okay?” You questioned right away, honoring his request by pulling into a double parked position and turning your hazard lights on.

“Yeah, I just—” Stopping himself to take a few breaths with his eyes closed, Bucky eased his nerves slightly. “I just need a second.”

You nodded in acknowledgment, understanding his overwhelm.

“What’s on your mind?” You asked softly. “We don’t have to talk if you don’t want to.”

“It feels wrong to complain about anything.”

“You’re not complaining, just venting,” you assured him. You gave him an inviting half-smile.

He knew you were trying, as much as the sadness in your eyes overtook every other part of your expression.

“My parents are suffocating,” Bucky said with a prolonged exhale at the end. “I get that they’re worried about me but I’m not a fragile piece of art who needs to be saved or monitored. Everyone’s looking at me like I’ll break in two if I sit wrong or take a bit long to move.”

There was a pained look on your face. Bucky only hoped you weren’t kicking yourself mentally.

“I came to you because I hoped you wouldn’t look at me that way,” he admitted. “You’ve always seen me as something more, and given me more reasons to view myself in a better way. And I ruined that for you. You view me in a worse way, blaming yourself for all of this. I did that to you. I’m sorry.”

You shook your head, wiping a tear away.

“I have a lot of things that I need to work on and my parents mentioned going back to therapy which is a no-brainer, but I think we both didn’t expect all of this,” you took a deep breath. “I knew it’d be bad but— your arm and you being in surgery and the uncertainty of everything just… made me freeze.”

Bucky watched as you combed through your thoughts, not wanting to interrupt you as you let more out.

“I still don’t know how to process everything because it all just happened so fast, and I have to process my own shit and I’m just really fucking tired,” you rambled. “I still view you as something more. You’ve always been more than what everyone else thinks about you. But I need to fix how I feel about myself before I can be me again.”

“I just want you to stop blaming yourself.”

“I don’t know if I will,” you shrugged. “But that’s what I need to work on. And your parents— they love you. The shock they must’ve felt isn’t something any of us could imagine describing. But I know how it must feel to have someone be overconcerned, or offering all the wrong solutions. It’s why I didn’t say anything to my parents. They care about you, just tell them how you feel.”

“Thanks,” Bucky said softly. “I needed that.”

“Of course,” you half-smiled again before pulling out of your parking position.

Once you stopped in front of Bucky’s house, Steve was watching from the window. He shoved his coat on and zoomed out while you helped Bucky out of the car, moving quickly to assist you.

“I’m fine,” Bucky assured, not needing a show for the neighbors to watch.

He peered past Steve’s shoulder to see his mother rushing out, and the pit in his stomach grew larger as she shouted his full name while walking in his direction.

“Are you out of your mind?” Winnifred lectured harshly. Bucky did his best to shield you behind him.

Winnifred wasn’t one to hold grudges, but she’d taken on the habit in the past 48 hours.

She’d gotten uncomfortable when Sarah Rogers, Steve’s mom, brought you up at Thanksgiving dinner. The subject had quickly changed, but the tension remained. She was irritated when Bucky kept asking for you in the hospital. She wasn’t happy when Rebecca spoke to you the night Bucky woke up.

It was clear she blamed you more than Bucky did. He hated it, being ignored despite his best efforts to absolve you of taking the majority of the responsibility for something he chose to do himself. He didn’t want her shoving it in your face.

“I’m very much in my mind, Ma,” Bucky responded monotonously.

“Leaving in the middle of the night without telling anyone? By yourself? That’s you in your right mind?”

“I’m fine, I was safe,” Bucky pushed back.

Winnifred shook her head.

“You’re never doing that again,” she demanded as she moved closer. “Especially not to go see—”

Bucky saw her staring right at you as she cut herself off. He didn’t move in time to stop it, and he could see you cower away from his peripheral vision.

“Ma—”

“It’s okay,” you cut in. “I have to go.”

Bucky called your name as you walked around the car back to the driver’s side, begging you to wait but you kept going. He tried moving forward to catch your attention in a way you couldn’t ignore, but he was too slow. You had already driven off with the most urgency in the world, leaving him behind again.

He couldn’t fault you. You’d just bared your thoughts to him on not having the means of managing your feelings, and he couldn’t prevent it being thrown your way once more. You’d had so many self-inflicted moments of shame, but nobody had directly blamed you for it. It was only your own criticism, minus Bucky admitting he had his own brief moment of doing so as well. This time only confirmed what you had been telling yourself for so long.

“Let’s go inside,” Winnifred said, her tone a lot less harsh. Bucky stared at her incredulously. “It’s cold, James. Let’s go.”

“You seriously don’t see what was wrong with that?” He asked, his heart pounding in his ears. “With how you obviously made her feel?”

“Do you really expect me to hold any sympathy for that girl?” She spit back. “What she went through is awful, but it doesn’t compare to—”

“What she went through is just as bad as what happened to me,” he interrupted, not raising his voice but with as much anger as if he did. “It might even be worse, Ma. He might not get any punishment for what he did to her.”

“She consented to it.”

Bucky scoffed. “Wow.”

“She could have asked for help instead of turning to you to save her,” she continued. “You risked your life for her when she has plenty of resources at her disposal. She has wealth, her parents can get her a lawyer. We’re sitting here and trying to figure out how to pay for your medical bills.”

Bucky could only look at her. It’s been the same conversation for the past 48 hours — she’s rich, we’re not. There were no rebuttals to the fact that your family was well off, and the Barnes’ weren’t exactly poor, but your parents could buy them if they wanted to. You never flaunted it, never made him (or any of your friends) feel less valuable, or even made it known you had money to begin with.

It was a conversation the two of you have had plenty of times. You were raised to earn your keep, never depending on your parents to bail you out. Bucky first thought of it when you moved out, how helpless it must’ve made you feel to ask them for help.

Feeling like you were from different worlds wasn’t in the picture. You rarely went home because the penthouse felt too large. You liked how small and cozy your apartment was. Bucky sometimes wondered if it felt smaller when everyone slept over. He knew it didn’t bother you.

The intensity of valuing resources came mostly from your parents, never you. Bucky felt you weren’t much different from him.

“You know this isn’t her fault but you’re looking for someone to blame with good reason,” Bucky responded, his tone eerily calm. “It’s not working.”

“What consequences does she reap from all of this exactly?”

“What consequences doesn’t she reap?” Bucky sucked his teeth. “Her entire life has been uprooted. She doesn’t trust anyone like she used to. She moves through every situation alone because she feels like a burden to all the people who care about her. Not to mention she didn’t say anything to protect us, to protect me. She ruined her own sanity to try and keep me safe.”

Winnifred could only stare at her son. Speechless for the first time in days.

“She let him blackmail her and abuse her to try and protect me. Yeah, I was really fucking reckless and did something stupid for her, but I also didn’t really give her a choice,” Bucky ranted as his eyes watered. “I got what I asked for, but she didn’t. She’s alone and feels like it has to stay that way. We did that to her too. It’s not right. So the least you could do is give her some grace when I ruined her peace and she still made the effort to look out for me and made sure I got here safely.”

Winnifred sighed, crossing her arms. She still hadn’t said a word, but Bucky wouldn’t hear it if she did. He walked inside, slowly but surely, frustration manifesting as heat throughout his body.

Never being the one to lash out on his parents, he felt shitty. But once he laid on his bed and you consumed his thoughts once more, he wished he could rewind the clock a few months.

As he always did.

#bucky x reader #bucky barnes fic #bucky fanfic #bucky barnes #bucky barnes x female reader #bucky barnes x y/n #update #sebastian stan #bucky angst #bucky barnes x reader

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