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Of all the petty arguments they had after moving into the tower, who was responsible for washing the dishes came up the most.
Ava was generally the only one who knew whose responsibility it actually was. Yelena continuously claimed that she “did them yesterday,” regardless of whether she did or not. Alexei tried to diffuse the arguments by suggesting they just leave them to rot overnight. John yelled at everyone while never offering to do them himself.
(Bob never involved himself in the arguments. Something about the subject was too familiar and even though half the time he was fine, the other half he felt like he was going to be beat or someone else was going to be beat, so he found it easier to excuse himself rather than embarrass himself by having a panic attack in front of everyone over the fucking dishes.)
More often than not, the arguments ended with Bucky attempting to mediate only to give up and do the dishes by himself. Then, one day, tired of the arguments and tired of always doing the dishes, he proposed a solution: a schedule. Everyone would be responsible for doing the dishes on one day of the week. It was a simple answer to a simple problem that worked for everyone.
Except Bob.
The dishes were a big thing for Bob.
It wasn’t that he didn’t want to help or that he was an inherently messy person. He was actually pretty tidy or at least he wanted to be. It was just that sometimes he couldn’t find the motivation to clean. And that “sometimes” was “most of the time” and if left unchecked, he would probably accept his laundry as a carpet and wear the same sweatshirt for the rest of his life.
Every Tuesday, Bob told himself that he was going to do the dishes. And every Tuesday, he did not do the dishes. Sometimes the others found it annoying. Sometimes they found it funny just like when Alexei’s turn rolled around and he inevitably left a pan half covered in grease. Bob forced a smile, but every laugh was a reminder that his efforts always failed.
There was never one reason why he skipped his turn, it was just a million little excuses. His feet were cold so he couldn’t leave his blanket yet. His book was getting interesting, and he had to see what happened next. It didn’t matter what it was, just that it always led to the same result: wasting time until he could use his ultimate excuse that it was too late and he needed to go to bed.
The next day, he would say that he forgot. Week after week after week. It was a miracle they didn’t kick him out, honestly. His dad had given him black eyes for far less.
“Hey.” Bob was a light sleeper, but it took more than a single word and a squeeze of his shoulder to fully rouse him. “Hey, Bob. Bob.”
He startled and hit his elbow on the arm of his chair. Someone stood over him but between the blurriness of his vision and the messiness of his hair, he couldn’t tell who. He blinked several times and shoved his bangs back with his palms. John’s expression was one of mild annoyance mixed with something that Bob couldn’t quite read.
“Go to bed, Bob,” said John. He set something down on the table beside Bob’s chair and it took him a second to realize it was the book he’d been reading when he fell asleep. “You’ll get a stiff neck.”
“The— The dishes.” The weekly guilt hit him as he rubbed the sleep from his eyes. That was probably why John seemed annoyed. Bob would be too, if someone let him down for the umpteenth time. He pushed himself upright and tried to find the motivation to stand. “I forgot to do the dishes.”
“Okay. Go to bed.”
“But I didn’t do the dishes.”
“You don’t—”
“I can go do them now.”
The moment he started to stand, John held out a hand to stop him. “It’s two-thirty in the morning. Nobody is expecting you to do the dishes right now.”
Bob opened his mouth to speak but stopped. He didn’t know how to verbalize his feelings, and he didn’t want to say them to John anyway. They didn’t expect him to do the dishes at two-thirty in the morning because they expected him to do the dishes after dinner. They expected them to be finished when they woke up, but they wouldn’t be because no one took longer to get out of bed than Bob.
He didn’t know who exactly did the dishes when he didn’t, just that they were always finished when he got up. His best guess was that it was Bucky but for all he knew, they had a second schedule for who would do the dishes when Bob inevitably dropped the ball. A failsafe because he couldn’t be trusted with the simplest of chores.
They said that he was important to them, that he was a valuable member of their team, and he knew it was all a joke. They were a team of badasses—Avengers—and he couldn’t even do the fucking dishes. They probably laughed about him every time he left the room.
“Get out of your head.” It was more commanding than compassionate. Bob tried to meet John’s gaze but found himself unable to fully lift his head. He was weighed down by the shame of the predicament, the guilt of disappointing his friends again. “They’re just dishes, Bob. They’re not more important than you getting a good night’s sleep. Come on.”
“Okay.”
A healthier person might have interpreted John’s words as concern. They might have been touched by the way he walked Bob to his room and made sure that he got into his bed. Bob was smart enough to realize that but self-loathing enough to feel more guilty instead. John was mad at him for not doing the dishes, for falling asleep in an unhealthy position. He walked him to his room not to make sure he slept but to ground him like a child.
Bob told himself that he would wake up early and do the dishes. It took him three hours to fall asleep and by the time he got up, the dishes were both washed and put away.
The Rubik’s cube was Bob’s favorite fidget toy.
It was something that he used before he ever heard of a fidget toy, something he continued to use when he was intrigued but ashamed by how obvious he felt the toys made his anxiety. A Rubik’s cube was easy to write off as a puzzle, an interest, or any other number of excuses. It was also easy to use as an excuse to get out of doing things. So, it was pretty universally useful, excuse-wise.
He sat under a sink full of dishes. Not even at the table, just on the cold tile, directly beneath the small mountain of unwashed porcelain and glass. Bob would do the dishes. Really. But he was close to solving his Rubik’s cube and if he didn’t solve it first, it would distract him the entire time he tried to work. So, it was better to finish it first. Even if it took him an hour. Or two. Or three.
“No. No, we are not watching that movie again, Alexei.” Yelena’s raised voice carried into the kitchen, her tone more amused than genuinely irritated. “Give me the remote!”
Bob smiled to himself. It was funny when they argued over what to watch on TV. They acted like it was so serious but when the decision was made, regardless of what was chosen, they all had a good time. Bob wanted to be in there, to join in, to joke about his own terrible taste in movies and recommend something starring a has-been from the nineties.
He spun the Rubik’s cube three times. Green side solved.
“The Breakfast Club?!” The sheer volume of Alexei’s voice was hilarious on its own. “What kind of name is that? What do they do, make blinis?”
Bob liked that movie. It was hard for him to watch sometimes but he still would have defended it. He would defend it. As soon as he finished his Rubik’s cube, he would wash the dishes and get back to the couch with the others.
He spun the Rubik’s cube five times. White side solved. Green side ruined.
“The Princess Bride?!” Of course, it was John whose masculinity was tested. “I’m not watching anything with ‘princess’ in the title.”
Bob wished he was in the room with them. They probably felt the opposite. It was a relief not to have him in there with them, making stupid jokes and defending outdated movies. In fact, they probably thought it was funny that he was still in the kitchen. That he still hadn’t finished the dishes. That he was supposed to be the strongest hero ever and he was still that fucking pathetic.
“I think they’re looking for something you’ll like,” said Ava. She didn’t sound as loud as Yelena or Alexei, but her words were just as clear.
Bob wondered who she was talking about. Maybe Bucky? He was the only one who usually stayed out of the arguments over what to watch. Maybe he was working on a schedule for that, too. Bob would be better at picking a movie than doing the dishes. Well, actually, he had too much anxiety to decide on something for the whole group, but at least he could pretend.
He spun the Rubik’s cube four times. White side ruined.
“Bob.”
His name didn’t quite register. He spun the Rubik’s cube again and again, his gaze focused on the colors as he made it increasingly difficult to solve. He knew how to solve a Rubik’s cube. He’d done it an embarrassing number of times. Why did he keep making it worse? Why did he keep solving individual sides when he knew it wouldn’t help?
“Bob.” Ava set her right hand on top of Bob’s left. He looked up quickly but the moment he met her gaze, he dropped his head back down, his bangs half blocking his view of his Rubik’s cube. “Did you hear me?”
“You were talking to me?” His brow furrowed. He shook his head slightly as he twisted the cube with no clear direction in mind. “You think— You think they’re looking for something I want to watch?”
“Yeah. They’re looking at the kind of films you like. The old feel-good, romance-y things you watch in your room. I think they’re trying to draw you out.”
It was hard enough to wrap his mind around the fact that someone would want to choose a movie specifically to spend time with him. “Draw me out?” He chuckled awkwardly. Twisted the cube three times. “I’m not hiding. I was just going to do the dishes.”
“You’ve been in here for an hour, Bob.” Something about Ava’s tone sounded almost worried. Bob hadn’t realized how much time passed until she said it.
He shrugged as nonchalantly as he could. “I wanted to solve this first.”
“You don’t look like you’re close.”
“I am.” He wasn’t. There was a tiny part of him that knew he was self-sabotaging, intentionally stalling, but he didn’t care to acknowledge it. “It’s just— it’s a different way of doing it.”
Ava didn’t respond. She sat cross-legged in front of him, watched for several seconds as he continued to twist the cube. Only to make a point, Bob spun it in a way to solve one side again. It was impossible to solve any others without disturbing it but that didn’t matter. Unless Ava secretly knew everything about how to solve a Rubik’s cube.
“You should just go in there,” said Ava, after a long moment of silence. “You can work on solving that on the couch while you watch a film.”
“I need to do the dishes first,” Bob mumbled. He picked at a peeling corner on one square of the cube. It didn’t satisfy the urge he had to tear open his own skin.
“They can wait.”
“No, it’s my turn. I don’t want to—” Give up. Fail. Disappoint everyone. “—I don’t want to forget again.”
“Okay.” Ava sighed. “How about just this once, I take care of them for you? Then you can go watch the film and you don’t have to worry about them not being finished yet.”
“I can do it.”
“I know you can, I just want to do this for you. Plus, the sooner you get in there and help them choose, the sooner they’ll stop yelling. Right?”
The way she phrased it made his anxiety ease just the tiniest bit. Bob nodded as Ava stood up. She offered him a hand, and he took it, still clinging to his Rubik’s cube as he rose to his feet.
“We can just swap, okay?” Bob almost met her gaze. Almost. There was an invisible wall between them but he almost, almost saw past it. “I’ll wash them on Friday.”
“That sounds perfect.”
So, Bob joined the others and Ava stayed in the kitchen. They chose a terrible movie, and he laughed two whole times. With no looming goal, he solved the Rubik’s cube four times before the movie ended.
The anxiety didn’t come back until Friday. The dishes were finished before he could find the motivation to get out of his chair.
Sometimes, Bob did actually manage to get things started. He gathered clothes from his floor, put them into a laundry basket, and even ran them through the washer and the dryer. The problem was that he started the task, but he couldn’t finish it.
Bob stared at the laundry basket, filled with fresh, fluffy clothing. All he had to do was start folding and he would have clean clothes to wear again. All he had to do was take one sweatshirt out and exchange it for the one he’d had on for three days straight.
Instead, he leaned back against his bed, cross-legged, staring at the basket as if his laundry could fold and store itself.
There couldn’t be that much to fold. Bob’s wardrobe was limited, even with the additions that the others slipped in there. If he had to guess, there were maybe around sixteen total articles of clothing in the basket, not counting underwear that he could just stuff in a drawer. It probably wouldn’t take more than fifteen minutes to fold if he could remember how to move his arms.
“Bob.” Alexei knocked on the door before he cracked it open, a friendly smile on his face. Bob felt bad that he rarely wore Alexei’s gifts, but the flashy tracksuits and branded hoodies just weren’t his style. “It’s Tuesday. Your turn for the dishes, eh?”
The dishes. Right. It all started because of the dishes. Bob convinced himself that if he managed to do a load of laundry, he would be able to wash the dishes. It seemed like a great idea two hours ago and suddenly felt like a giant, looming, impossible task.
How ironic that he’d squandered his only chance at finishing the dishes by thinking he was capable enough to do something else. He should have known he wasn’t. He should have known he was just as useless as he’d always been. Alexei knew it; that was why he tried to get Bob to do the dishes when it was obvious that he wouldn’t. To make a point. To make him beat himself up more.
“Right,” said Bob. He looked up at Alexei just long enough to force a smile before he turned back to the laundry basket. “I’ll come do them just as soon as I finish folding my laundry.”
“Good plan.” Alexei took a step back but stopped just short of closing the door. He poked his head back into the room and stared at Bob for several awkward seconds before he stepped inside. “Sometimes I make big mess, and it feels like too much to clean it up all at once.”
Bob nodded silently. He knew the feeling except the longer he lived, the smaller the messes, and yet they somehow became more daunting. He tugged at a loose thread on the wrist of his sweatshirt, only glanced at Alexei as he approached the laundry basket and knelt beside it.
“Instead of cleaning all my mess at once,” started Alexei, stretching out the Ls in ‘all’ for an unnecessarily long time, “I choose one thing. I tell Yelena to do same. Just one thing at a time.”
Alexei reached into the laundry basket and pulled out a black sweatshirt. Bob was pretty sure it was one of the ones Bucky gave him, but he couldn’t quite remember. He was so reluctant to accept their gifts, most ended up being sneaked into his closet while he was asleep. Alexei slid back to an open carpet space and set it on the floor.
It was surprising how gently he folded the sweatshirt. When he finished, he held it up for Bob to see. Then he took it over to Bob’s closet and set it on the shelf with the few clean sweatshirts he had left (AKA the ones that were too flashy or too scratchy but made him feel too guilty when he tried to purge them). Alexei turned around and smiled.
“Just one,” he said. He nodded toward the basket. “Now your turn.”
Bob hesitated. The basket still felt like too much, but he wasn’t doing the entire basket, just one item. Just one. He could do one. Bob glanced at Alexei as he leaned forward. He took one sweatshirt out of the basket. Yelena had gotten him that one. He was sure because no one else bought him ones that were so ridiculously soft.
He laid the sweatshirt on the carpet, and it was wrinkled. He tried to fold in the sleeves, and they bulged out wrong. Alexei took a dramatically deep breath and Bob almost smiled as he forced himself to follow. Bob walked back the steps, refolded the sweatshirt, and within a minute, it was folded.
Alexei nodded toward the closet and Bob shakily rose to his feet, the sweatshirt in one hand. He’d been sitting there for too long; his legs were half asleep. Somehow, he managed to make it to his closet without falling over. He set the sweatshirt on top of the one that Alexei had folded and jumped at the sudden sound of applause.
“You did it!” Alexei’s level of enthusiasm was better suited for an awards ceremony than the completion of a task a first grader could do. “Now, you are finished. You give yourself pat on the back and a treat.”
“I still have to do the rest of the basket,” said Bob, unconvinced.
“But you finished the hardest part—you started.” He dropped his hand on Bob’s shoulder and squeezed it reassuringly. Bob understood why Yelena considered him her real dad. His would have pushed him down the stairs and called him a lazy sack of shit. “I will have Lena do your dishes for you.”
Bob followed Alexei to the doorway. “I can do them, really. I just—”
“You need to finish your clothes. Plus, your closet must be reorganized. You’ve accidentally buried my tracksuits!”
Alexei closed the door before Bob could argue, apologize, or at least ask if he was actually offended. He turned back to the laundry basket, two items lighter but somehow just as full as before. All he had to do was one piece at a time. Just one. He could do another one.
Bob sat down beside the basket. It took him an hour to fold his next sweatshirt, and it never made it to the shelf inside his closet.
It took him some time, but Bob managed to apply Alexei’s philosophy somewhat reliably. Yes, it took him an hour to make his bed, but he did it. One blanket at a time. It took him a week to fold his laundry, but it all made it to the closet. Bob was mastering chores, in his own way, and he felt sure that it was time for him to take on the most challenging of all.
All he had to do was clean one plate.
With that knowledge in mind, Bob managed to not only stand up at the sink but turn the water on. A short, internal pep talk later, he put his hands beneath it and picked up a sponge. One at a time, he reminded himself as he squeezed out the soap. Just one at a time, he repeated under his breath, and he picked up the first plate.
Slowly, intentionally, Bob washed that plate. He brushed the sponge over its surface, rinsed it off beneath the water, and set it in the drying rack to his right. Finally, for the first time since he’d moved into the tower, he did it. He washed a dish.
And his brain decided that was enough.
Bob stared at the water as it continued to run. It burned his hands a little when he stopped moving but he knew it couldn’t hurt him, not really, so he didn’t turn the heat down. He didn’t reach for the next dish. He just stared at the water, at the bubbles, at his fingers as they slowly turned bright red.
“You all right, Bob?”
He just needed to pick up the next plate. Just one plate. Just one more. It didn’t matter how many times he repeated the same thought. His body would not follow the directions.
“Bob?”
There was water on his face, but he couldn’t quite tell whether it splashed there or if he was as pathetic outside as in. He wanted to brush it away, but his hands would still not move.
“Bob, what are you doing?”
He only really heard Bucky when the water turned off. When the glue holding him in place was suddenly gone and his hands were able to move, to grip the warm edge of the sink.
“I washed a plate.”
It sounded just as stupid as he felt. He washed one plate. So what? Everyone else washed all the plates. Every night. And the glasses and the bowls and the silverware. He was a failure. He knew it. They all secretly hated him. They only kept him around because they didn’t want his powers on the loose. Bob squeezed his eyes shut, waited for Bucky to laugh at him, to tell him to finish the job already.
“That’s good,” said Bucky. It should have been sarcastic, but it wasn’t. He should have rolled his eyes, but he smiled. “That’s good, kid. I’m proud of you.”
“I can’t wash another.”
It was almost like Bob wanted Bucky to yell at him. Like the compassion was confusing to the point that it became overwhelming. What did Bucky mean, he was proud? Bob failed at the dishes every week. He failed at the dishes again. Why did they even leave him on the rotation? Why didn’t they just kick him out when he knew that was what they really wanted? Surely there was someone else who could supervise him and his stupid powers.
“That’s okay.” No, it wasn’t. It was a chore that children did every day, and he couldn’t even finish it once. Bucky placed his hand on the counter, tried to meet Bob’s downcast, blurry gaze. He couldn’t stop himself from bracing for a hit. “You washed a plate. I know it doesn’t feel like enough to you but it’s progress. You did good, Bob.”
Progress? So, Bucky knew that he wasn’t just forgetful or conniving, he knew that there was something fundamentally wrong with the way Bob’s brain approached the task. Bob didn’t know whether to find that embarrassing or reassuring. His mind decided that it meant Bucky saw him as completely useless and was just relieved he was able to do something.
“I’m sorry,” said Bob, quieter than he’d intended. His eyes were wet, but he was pretty sure he wasn’t crying. It was just irritation from the soap that splashed on his face earlier. “I— I want to do my part, I want to pull my weight, but I just— I can’t. I can’t.”
“You’re doing fine. You don’t need to do anything else right now.”
“Why don’t you just take me off the schedule? Or find someone else to watch me?”
Bucky hesitated before he shifted his hand to Bob’s forearm. The pressure was almost reassuring but his inability to trust made it stiff. “Because you’re our friend, and we know that you’re trying, and we want to give you a chance to do that.”
We.
Bob pulled back and shoved his palms over his eyes without regard for the water or soap left on them. “We” meant everyone. “We” meant they had talked about him, about his failures, about how he consistently, repeatedly let them all down. Probably at the same time they discussed how much they hated babysitting him, how they would have preferred it if Valentina’s kill switch worked and he died. His heart pounded as shame flooded his psyche without regard for the rest of what Bucky had said.
“Hey. Hey, look at me. Look.” Bob reluctantly turned his head toward Bucky, followed his finger when he pointed to the single dish in the drying rack. “You washed a dish. You did that.”
“I let everyone down,” Bob whispered.
“Nobody is disappointed in you.” Bucky grabbed a hand towel from the drying rack and offered it to Bob. He took it reluctantly, the fabric rough on his wrinkled hands. “Just take a deep breath. You’re doing great, kid.”
Bob only shook his head as he set the towel down and walked away.
Bucky could say whatever words he felt necessary, but Bob knew the truth. They only kept him around because they hadn’t found somewhere else to keep him yet. They couldn’t just lock him up or kill him, so they pretended to be his friends. They lied to keep him there willingly so they wouldn’t have to admit they were afraid that if left alone, he might destroy New York all over again.
He sat down in his chair and stared out the window, his book left forgotten on the table beside him. Part of Bob loved the view and how he could see the best parts of the city. Part of him hated how it made him wonder if his powers would stop him if he tried to jump.
After his conversation with Bucky, Bob became determined to prove everyone else wrong. They didn’t think that he could do the dishes, but he could. Every Tuesday he tried, and even on most Sundays when no one was scheduled. Sometimes he cleaned one dish, sometimes two, but he always did something, even if he never felt accomplished afterward.
He knew logically that the void had convinced him that Bucky was lying. Bucky was a good person, and he wouldn’t lie to Bob like that, even if it felt like he would. So, he tried to accept Bucky’s praise and reminded himself every time that one or two dishes were progress. It rarely worked.
Then, one Tuesday, he woke up with a feeling: it was his day.
And maybe that was just because everyone else had plans and they wouldn’t be there for dinner so there would be a few less dishes to wash. But Bob liked to believe that he had a sudden rush of motivation that would have struck either way.
Bob went into the kitchen once everyone else was gone. When he knew that he was alone and he could take as embarrassingly long as he wanted. He took a deep breath, allowed himself to take breaks, and didn’t rush himself when he felt stuck. Somehow, for once, he managed to clean almost half the plates without giving up.
He felt good. Excited. Proud, even. Then he reached for a glass and his hand was too slippery and he dropped it on the edge of the sink and it shattered and he shattered.
Maybe it was because his dad had broken more glasses than Bob could count when he was in a rage. Maybe it was because he finally felt good about himself for once just to make another stupid mistake. Maybe it was because the palm of his left hand was bleeding from the glass and his skin should have been bulletproof and it wasn’t which meant he let it cut him which meant he wanted to hurt.
Whatever the reason, Bob barely found the willpower to turn off the faucet before he slid down against the cabinet, his knees up to his chest, and let himself break.
“Bob? Bob, what happened?” He had no idea how long he’d been sitting there when Yelena knelt in front of him and pulled him into the world’s gentlest hug. “What happened, Bob?”
His chest hurt as his heart pounded, his lungs struggling to form a steady breath. His tears soaked into Yelena’s shoulder, his hands shaking as he gripped the sleeves of his own sweatshirt. All he wanted was to be useful, to do the absolute bare fucking minimum for the team, and he couldn’t even manage that.
“I knew I should not have left you alone, Bob.” Bob didn’t know whether to be touched or humiliated. His anxiety decided on the latter. “I should have been here, I— What happened to your hand?”
“I broke a glass,” said Bob, his voice thick. Yelena leaned back far enough to take his hand into hers without pushing Bob off her shoulder. He could taste his own tears when he opened his mouth again, as salty as they were pathetic. “I was doing the dishes, and I broke— I broke a glass.”
“Oh. That’s okay.”
“I’m sorry.”
She carefully held his hand in hers, his bloodied palm upright. Her other hand curled around the back of his neck, holding him gently, tenderly. “It’s okay. It was just an accident.”
“I’m sorry.”
“We have lots of glasses, Bob.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Bob. Bob, look at me.” Yelena slid back suddenly, created space between her and Bob. She set her hands on the sides of his face and tried to meet his gaze, but he dodged it. He didn’t want to see the disappointment in hers. “I’m not mad at you. Okay?”
It took him several seconds to nod. “Okay.”
“Okay.”
The senseless guilt and anxiety were too hard to ignore. He knew that she wasn’t mad, but he felt like she had to be. “But I didn’t finish the dishes.”
“But you tried,” said Yelena. He tried but he failed. Again. “I’m proud of you for that.”
“Why?”
Bob pulled away from Yelena. He set his hands in his lap and stared at the blood that soaked into the edge of his sleeve. Nothing he did was worthy of praise. He was a grown-ass adult with what were supposedly the world’s strongest powers and instead of saving anybody, he was crying on the kitchen floor because he was so fucking frustrated with himself.
“Because I know that it is hard for you.” Yelena slid back, respecting his decision to create distance between them. She leaned against the counter opposite the sink, her legs crossed and her back straight. “I know that you are trying your best. We don’t expect you to finish all the dishes, Bob.”
“Right, because I’m a lazy sack of shit.”
“No. Because it’s harder for you than it is for most people and that’s okay.”
“You don’t have to lie to me,” mumbled Bob, resisting the urge to pick at the open wound on the palm of his hand. Old habits died hard.
“Alexei could not clean his apartment.” Her tone was firm, informative. Bob didn’t understand her point. “I could not throw away my bottles. Ava could not get herself a haircut. Walker could not tend to his own child. You are not the only one who finds little things to be so overwhelming.”
Bob dropped his head into his hands, no regard for the blood still on them. He took a deep, shuddering breath as he processed what Yelena said. She was right. All of them, at some point, had gotten hung up on something that should have been a simple part of life. He wasn’t alone. He knew that he wasn’t alone, but he felt like he was.
And he couldn’t explain that without being honest.
“I get a lot of paranoia,” he said, his gaze fixed on the floor. He paused for a long moment and Yelena did not push him to finish. “I don’t know if it’s from the— from the meth or… everything else? I— I think both, probably. But my parents, they always told me—” He stopped abruptly and shook his head. “It doesn’t matter. But my paranoia, it— it manifests in a way that makes me project those feelings on to you guys. And I believe it.”
It was clear from what he’d said before what he skipped over. “We don’t think that you’re worthless.”
“And logically, I know that, but it doesn’t change the fact that I believe that you do.”
Yelena fell silent. For a moment, Bob thought she was going to walk away, to say he was crazy and give up on him. Then she looked at him and he knew just from her gaze that she understood what he was trying to say; that he didn’t need her to convince him he was wrong, he just needed her to understand why he felt the way that he did.
“Can I give you a hug, Bob?” she asked softly.
Bob nodded, and for the brief minute they were connected, the paranoia, guilt, and anxiety all seemed to wash away.
It took him weeks of unsteady progress.
Sometimes Bob did half the dishes. Sometimes he did one. Sometimes he turned on the sink and didn’t wash a thing. And sometimes, Yelena clued into his paranoia when he was having a bad day and she did the dishes before he had a chance. The part of him that didn’t like it was overshadowed by the relief he felt at not having to stare at them for two hours on a day he knew they wouldn’t get done.
(According to Yelena, there was also one Tuesday that fell during a week in which he apparently had a manic episode and ironically went on a massive cleaning spree but still failed to do the dishes because he forgot there were dishes because he forgot to eat. For four days. But he couldn’t remember it so it didn’t count.)
“Bob, are you coming?” called John, patience clearly wearing thin.
“Yeah, just a minute!” Bob folded the sponge in half and spun it around the ring of the last glass. “I’m almost finished.”
It took him two hours to get started but once he did, he didn’t stop. He washed each plate, each knife, each fork. He soaked the pans and scrubbed the glasses. Within half an hour, every dish moved from the dirty side of the counter to the drying rack. Finally, finally there were no more dishes to wash.
Bob turned off the sink and grabbed a towel to dry his hands. He didn’t really know what to do next. He hadn’t made it to that part of the process in years. Before everything that happened, he’d fully switched to disposable dishes to bypass the issue. Sometimes he just drank water straight out of the tap.
He set the towel on its rack and stepped out to join the others. They had been waiting for a while and Bob had to keep reminding himself that it was because they wanted to. They wanted to wait for Bob. They wanted to spend time with Bob. They didn’t resent him for holding them up, and they weren’t counting the minutes to berate him later.
(Okay, maybe John was, but he was an asshole, so it didn’t really count. And he was just joking. Probably.)
“Sorry,” said Bob as he approached the group, still waiting around on the couch like they had all night. “I was just finishing the dishes.”
Bucky’s smile was almost unnoticeable. “You finished the dishes?”
“Yeah, so we can go now. Sorry about the wait.”
“Would you stop apologizing for everything?” Ava groaned, and Bob reminded himself that she meant it from a place of love, not resentment.
“Right, take your time,” said Alexei. “Better to stay in than leave without our Bob.”
The voice in the back of Bob’s head told him to argue. To deny that he was worth their time; to insist they were better off without him. But it wasn’t stronger than the feeling of accomplishment he had for finally finishing the dishes.
So, for once, Bob allowed himself to accept the sentiment, no questions asked.