Chapter Text
When Bucky opens his eyes he’s alone. A damp chill has settled into his body, and he’s stiff and aching all over. For a second he thinks he’s just woken up from cryo, but when he looks around he realizes he’s outside lying in the snow. At least he thinks it’s snow, but it’s bright red like the cherry snow cones he and Steve would get at Coney Island. He hears the sound of rushing water, but sees no river. There’s a taste of copper in his mouth and a gurgling sound every time he takes a breath, feels it in his throat like he’s choking on it. His skull is pounding, there’s a ringing in his ears and he’s having a hard time focusing his vision. Pain comes in violent waves, wracking his whole body. He tries to move his arms and legs. God, everything hurts so fucking much. He manages to wiggle his toes, and the fingers of his right arm; his left feels like lead.
He glances down and, to his horror, sees a bloody stump where his arm should be; it’s been torn off just above the elbow. Strips of shredded skin and muscle hang limply, and the protruding bone is broken like a snapped tree branch. He tries to scream but nothing comes out. His vision grows fuzzy, everything keeps shifting in and out of focus, and there’s a darkness creeping in around the edges. Then everything goes black.
The next time he comes to, Bucky finds himself no longer in the snow but inside. It's musty and dark, and smells faintly of mildew. There’s a steady dripping sound coming from somewhere: tap...tap...tap. The room is frigid and it makes his teeth chatter uncontrollably, he can’t stop shivering. He’s strapped to a table and the cold metal is freezing against his bare back. The room is dimly lit and Bucky sees that he’s actually in a VFW hall where he used to go dancing. Everywhere he looks, he sees remnants of a party: colorful streamers, balloons, glitter in the corners, a half-eaten cake. Tin foil stars are suspended from the ceiling, twisting and turning from a mysterious breeze, and strings of twinkle lights are suspended from the rafters. It should be a cheerful sight but there’s something ominous about it, lurking in the outskirts.
Bucky glances down and sees his mangled arm, blood running freely off the table and onto the floor: tap...tap...tap. He tries calling out to Steve but he’s shaking so hard he can barely get the words out.
“Steve,” he croaks, after several attempts.
Steve will come, he always comes. That’s what they do, Steve and Bucky; they look out for each other.
Somewhere music begins to play, the kind you’d hear coming from a music box, and Bucky recognizes it as the opening number from the Stark Expo. Several nurses enter but they’re done up like pin-up girls, like the ones Bucky used to see in the dirty magazines he and Steve would steal from his pop: heavy make-up, low-cut uniforms, little nurses’ caps balanced daintily on their pinned-up hair. One of them he recognizes as Dolores, Dot, a pretty redhead he’d once won a stuffed bear for at a carnival. Hadn’t she been a secretary or typist or something like that?
A surgeon comes into his view, but where his head should be there’s a dusty old TV set instead. The screen switches on and Arnim Zola’s face slides into view, the picture grainy and tinted green.
“Is the asset prepped?” comes Zola’s voice from the TV, sounding tinny and digitized.
“No!” Bucky cries out, but it comes out choked. He tastes blood in his mouth and feels it dribbling down his chin. He struggles against the straps holding him down, and two nurses tighten the restraints. He recognizes them, but he can’t think from where. One is shoving a bite guard in his mouth when he remembers: the two girls he and Steve doubled with at the Stark Expo. What were their names? They had rhymed; he’d teased them about it that night, made them laugh. One of them (was it Connie?) switches on an overhead operating lamp and Bucky’s eyes burn with the sudden brightness, colorful spots filling his vision. The light allows Bucky to see the room in its entirety and he sees that the streamers are actually faded and torn, the sagging balloons are covered in cobwebs and the string lights flicker eerily. Over on the dessert table the cake has turned black and moldy, and roaches scatter into the dark recesses of the room.
Zola approaches, pushing a table of cruel-looking instruments in front of him. They flash in the bright light, throwing flecks of light across the walls like stars. Bucky goes whale-eyed as he watches Zola’s fingers dance across each tool, like he’s playing the piano, until they settle on a large bone saw. His heart beats painfully against his ribs and he’s breathing so heavily it feels like his lungs might burst. He feels like a rabbit caught in a snare and his fear, hot and sour, soaks his fatigues and pools beneath him.
“Oh James,” Zola tsks, “you do always make such a mess of things, don’t you?” Then louder to the room, “We’ll need to remove the shoulder to situate the prosthetic correctly. I shall begin now.”
There is no anesthesia, and Bucky feels everything as the serrated blade cuts into his flesh. Zola braces himself against the table as he hacks at Bucky’s shoulder, violent and brutal. Beads of sweat run down his TV Land face; Dot daintily dabs the screen with a lace handkerchief. There’s blood everywhere and the sharp metallic smell of it fills the room. Bucky starts screaming against the bite guard, screaming until his throat feels like he’s swallowed razor blades. Hot tears leak out of the corners of his eyes, and he starts choking as bile and blood bubble up around the bite guard. The whole table rocks with Zola’s effort to slice into the tough muscle and tendons in his shoulder, the sound of tearing tissue nearly drowning out the forties tune. The pain is indescribable and Bucky prays he will either pass out or die. Another nurse, whom Bucky hadn’t noticed before, tightly grips the stump of his arm and begins yanking, blood spraying across her breasts and white uniform. Zola keeps cutting while the nurse pulls, trying to literally rip the humerus bone out of Bucky’s shoulder socket.
'I’m with you ‘til the end of the line, pal.’
“Oh but Sergeant Barnes, this is the end of the line.”
Bucky wakes with a shout, eyes wild. He’s on the floor, in his apartment, tangled in his bedding. A cold front had blown in during the night and an open window in his tiny living room had brought the temperature of his apartment down several degrees. He glances at the TV where a woman is selling a fifty-piece Tupperware set for four easy payments of $25.99. The low volume is meant to act as white noise but the woman’s voice still comes across as shrill, he shuts it off. The clock on the microwave reads 3:27 am. He hopes he hadn’t been yelling for long.
God, my neighbors must hate me.
Bucky hauls himself off the floor, massaging his left pec where flesh meets metal; his bionic shoulder aches with phantom limb pains. He shuffles into the bathroom for some water, giving his arm a quick rotation to recalibrate it. The sound of its mechanics is grating in the early morning hours and sets his teeth on edge.
Splashing cold water on his face and neck, Bucky stares at his reflection in the mirror. Jesus Christ, he looks like death warmed over. It had been months and the nightmares weren’t getting any better. Even with Raynor switching tactics, and focusing more on managing his PTSD and anxiety, he still wakes up almost every night in a blind panic. He’ll take his deep breaths, focus on his five senses and do all the other grounding bullshit Raynor suggested, but all that does is help with the after effects. It’s a real shame that over-the-counter drugs and alcohol do nothing for him. He’s even tried marijuana, but all that did was make his dreams even more vivid. God, he‘s tired. Just. So. Tired.
Fuck. Is this my life? Is this what I have to look forward to for the next sixty years?
His mind goes back to Steve, just like it always does when he’s feeling low. Steve got out, he left to go be with the love of his life. And Bucky let him. Told him he’d be just fine. A fucking lie, of course, but what was he supposed to say? ‘Steve don’t go to the woman you love. I'm your best buddy, please pick me instead.’ But Steve didn't pick him.
‘I’m with you ‘til the end of the line.’
It may have been the end of the line for Steve, but for Bucky, it was only the beginning. Now he’s stuck here...existing, acclimating, concealing. He keeps to himself, makes his therapy appointments, has adapted to the technology, the lingo, the clothes. Hell, he even got himself a kicky new haircut, because isn’t that what you do when you're trying to start over? (It was cathartic but he immediately regretted it; he kinda liked the long hair.)
Sometimes Bucky wonders what it was like in Steve’s new life. Did he ever think of the people he left behind? Was Bucky still under Hydra’s control in that world, being twisted and tortured into the Winter Soldier? Did Steve ever try to save him? Bucky guesses not as that would violate the rule of time travel or whatever bullshit Banner had been rambling about right before he sent Steve back with the Stones. Occasionally he gets the urge to call him but nixes the thought almost as quickly as it appears. Besides, what would he even say?
‘Hey Steve, remember me? Your old pal, Bucky Barnes. How’s it going? How’s the wife? Me? Oh, I’m just swell. I moved back to a city I don’t recognize, where I rent a shitty apartment and see a shitty therapist. Some days I’m so lonely and depressed that I wish I never came back from the Snap.’
Steve Fucking Rogers got to go live his life and leave his baggage behind. Lucky guy. Maybe that’s all Bucky is, a discarded old suitcase full of problems no one wants to deal with. It’s certainly how he felt when Steve told him he was leaving, to get a do-over with Peggy.
Bucky had tried to be happy for him, at Tony’s. He congratulated Steve on getting the life he always wanted, told him he wished him well and not to worry about him. But the smile he plastered on felt cracked and brittle and it crumbled the minute Bucky walked away. That was the last thing Bucky had said to Steve, and it was a lie.
Bucky shakes his head and throws more water on his face, trying to clear his head. It never did him any good, thinking about all that stuff. All it ever resulted in was him getting angrier and even more depressed. Steve’s gone, and he’s never coming back, that’s all that mattered.
There’s a fire escape outside of his living room window that Bucky likes to sit out on, sometimes. It reminds him of the old tenement apartments he and Steve had lived in as kids, overcrowded and dingy with tiny gangways where they’d hang out and spy on their neighbors.
Grabbing a blanket, Bucky climbs out and takes a seat looking skyward. Unfortunately, you can’t see the stars here, too much light pollution. Of course, you couldn’t really see them back in the thirties either, too much air pollution.
He thinks back to the few days he’d spent in Delacroix, where the stars were so bright that he and Sam had sat on the boat and Bucky pointed out constellations (of course he’d found Lupus right away). He remembers thinking how bright Sam’s eyes had looked that night, like there were stars in them as well. The memory makes Bucky shiver, and he pulls the blanket tighter around his bare shoulders.
On a rare good night, he’ll dream that he’s still back in Delacroix, standing on the Wilsons’ dock next to Sam and looking out onto the water. In those dreams, Bucky has a feeling like he’s waiting for something important but he can never remember what.
Bucky jumps when his cell rings; he didn’t go back to sleep after the nightmare and he's more on edge than usual this morning. Glancing at his phone and noting Sam on the screen (not really a surprise, no one else ever calls him), he answers on the second ring. He always answers Sam’s calls now (and most of his texts).
See Doc? I can ‘foster relationships.’
“Hey man, what are you up to, ya good?” comes Sam’s standard greeting, but he doesn’t give Bucky a chance to reply. “Are you busy? I need you to come look at something with me.”
Bucky perks up at that. “Wait...are you in New York?”
“Nope, still down here with Sarah and the kids. Feel like taking a trip?”
Bucky thinks for a moment, taking a sip of his shitty instant coffee. He can’t exactly say he’s busy. Once the Flag Smashers had been neutralized, Walker got off the crazy train, and Zemo was back in custody, things had quieted down. Sam went back to Delacroix and Bucky to Brooklyn, to spend his days shuffling around his empty apartment. He occasionally goes out and gets take-out (never Izzy’s anymore - not since his disastrous date with Leah, and coming clean to Yori). He’s also managed to get back into weekly appointments with Dr. Raynor, but he’s requested that they focus more on addressing Bucky’s trauma and managing his severe PTSD than all that “making amends” bullshit. He didn’t find it helpful anyway, and his conversation with Sam had convinced him to try a different route. Sam knew his shit, after all. Unfortunately, none of this gives him much opportunity to leave his house and he’s slowly been descending into hermitdom.
The reality is that he’s bored out of his scrambled, fucked-up mind. He has no job, no family, no contacts other than Sam and his therapist (‘Sad,’ Raynor would say), so he sits in his apartment, on the floor - because he doesn’t even own furniture - watches shit TV and wallows in guilt and self-loathing. The high he’d been riding while staying in Louisiana plummeted as soon as he came back to Brooklyn, leaving him with nothing but an emotional hangover and three days of indigestion (Cajun seasoning was no fucking joke).
And since he’s working on being more honest, with himself at least, he misses Sam. Their relationship changed over the course of the Flag Smasher mission, though Bucky couldn’t exactly pinpoint when. Maybe when he listened to Sam talk sense into those senators (who was Bucky kidding, the man was fucking mesmerizing), but honestly it may have been even before that. There had always been...something...about Sam.
Acknowledging Sam’s good looks had been the easy part; Bucky was aware of that as soon as he got his head on straight(ish), and he was no stranger to secretly admiring a beautiful man. But understanding Sam, figuring out what makes him tick has been a whole other beast to contend with. Sam, who barely knew him as anything other than a mindless murderer, threw away everything to help Steve bring Bucky back. Bucky couldn’t understand the guy’s motivations, so it’s easier to just act like a prick because he’s a total mess at interpreting his feelings. No one gets under his skin like Sam; this is all new territory for him. So now here he is, one hundred and six years old and wondering how a good-lookin’ fella had managed to get him completely twisted into knots.
“Yo dude, you there? Are you doing that staring thing again?”
Bucky drags himself back to the phone call, slightly flustered. He tries to cover it up by sounding annoyed because God forbid he makes it easy for Sam. “What do you need to show me that I gotta go all the way to Louisiana for? Can’t you just text me?”
“Well, first of all, it’s kind of a big deal and I'd like your thoughts now, not in like two weeks when you finally decide to respond.”
Bucky clicks his tongue in actual annoyance. “Hey, fuck you, I text back now.”
“You left me hangin’ yesterday!”
“You were literally bitching about the price of chai whatevers at Starbucks. Not exactly fascinating conversation material.”
Sam huffs out a laugh. “Whatever man, you gonna come down or what?”
It’s been a few months since they parted ways and even though they maintain regular communication (because Sam feels the need to text him about literally everything) it just isn’t the same. Bucky had gotten so used to the guy’s constant presence, constant yapping, constant ribbing. Sam Wilson, pain in the ass that he was, had worked his way into Bucky’s very tiny orbit and taken up a permanent residency. Or maybe it was the other way around: Sam being the massive, glowing sun that he was, managed to catch Bucky in his gravitational pull. Now he was gone and Bucky found his fragile little world to be severely missing Sam’s warmth.
“Alright,” he sighs, “but I’m taking the Honda; it’s a pain in the ass for me to get through airport security. I always get flagged and then it’s a whole thing while they double-check my record, search me...”
It’s really not an excuse; Bucky hates flying Commercial for that very reason. Despite being pardoned, he’s still got some sort of permanent red flag tied to his ID that always goes off and leads to him getting yanked into a small room while several TSA officers pat him down and dig through his pockets, inspect the arm. The last time it happened it triggered a particularly unpleasant memory and Bucky had to deal with some especially horrendous nightmares for a week. He’s not good with strangers touching him.
“Buck, it’s like a three-day drive versus a three-hour flight!”
“It’s about twenty hours, and I’ll gain an hour with the time zone shift. I’ll leave tomorrow morning and be there by Wednesday, easily. The other option is you could fly up here and get me yourself.”
Sam snorts in response, muttering something about “heavy-ass super soldiers.”
“Bike it is. Besides...the drive might do me some good, help clear my head,” Bucky finishes quietly. This seems to convince Sam.
“Alright, alright. But...do you even have a current license, man?”
Bucky bites back a retort and hangs up on him.
How’s that for personal growth, Doc?
Bucky leaves that night.
He had tried sleeping but was just too wired. He doesn’t get much sleep on good days, and the anticipation of seeing Sam again made it even harder to wind down.
I’m sure Raynor would love to unpack that more . Write all about it in her fucking notebook.
Bucky sends a quick text to Dr. Raynor letting her know he’s going out of town and wouldn't be able to do their next session in person. She offers virtual sessions; Bucky will make a point to set one of those up with her. He grabs a duffle, throws in a few days’ worth of clothes, along with some toiletries, and leaves.
Brooklyn is dead quiet at this time of night. There’s still a damp chill in the air, despite the time of year, but Bucky doesn’t mind. It makes for good riding weather.
He makes pretty decent time, only taking a few short pit stops to piss, grab gas, and give his ass a break (he may be chemically enhanced but even he’s got limits). He does have to pull into a roadside motel when he hits a storm cell in Tennessee, which allows him to get a few hours of shut-eye.
The weather changes as he gets further south; the temperature rises, as does the humidity, and Bucky begins to sweat in his leather jacket. Fortunately, he isn’t too far out from Sarah’s place. It’s about 7:00 pm, local time when he rolls into Delacroix and the bayou town seems busy for a Tuesday evening: people heading home to their families, heading out for dinner, unloading the day's catch from boats. Neighbors wave at one another and ask after kids and spouses. It’s vibrant and alive, but without the cacophony and claustrophobia of New York. It actually reminds him a little of Wakanda.
Bucky finds Sarah’s house and pulls down the long gravel driveway, recognizing Sam’s truck out back. He parks the bike and shrugs out of his jacket, the lining sticking a little to the skin of his right arm. He’s both excited and nervous, which is ridiculous because he’s been here before. Sarah and the boys aren’t strangers and the community knows him, likes him even.
It’s this...this thing he’s got with Sam though. The two of them had gotten close during his last visit, real close, the change taking Bucky by surprise to be honest. It left him with some very confusing and complicated feelings to bring back to Brooklyn, where he decided the best course of action would be to completely ignore them.
How hard can it be? Spend a few days with Sam and his family, let him drag you to whatever he wants you to see, make polite conversation. Couple days of keeping your shit together and then you can go back to being lonely and miserable in peace. No problem.
He’s about to knock when his enhanced hearing picks up voices somewhere towards the back, as well as the clanking of dishes. Great, he’s interrupting their dinner, fan-fucking-tastic. Bucky realizes he hadn’t really thought this through, showing up early and all. Sam doesn’t know he’s in town yet, isn’t expecting him until tomorrow. Bucky hadn’t booked a hotel, and has no idea how long he’ll be staying. Last time Sam had insisted Bucky stay with them, but that had just been one night.
He gives a few short raps, wondering when he’d become such a disaster.
Probably all the electroshock...
It takes a few seconds but the door opens and he’s greeted by a shocked face that immediately splits into a big smile.