Bucky Barnes (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
onlyapassenger) wrote2012-08-01 07:58 pm
onlyapassenger) wrote2012-08-01 07:58 pm
Entry tags:
[for Various]
It comes back in flashes, fragments. Colors run together behind closed eyes. Reds and blues and grays. The racing pulse of a heart turns into the burst of sniper fire. Bodies, bodies, so many bodies, bleeding and mangled and dead. Heads facing the wrong direction. Bullet holes between their brows. Machinery and white coats, murmured Russian and the soft hands of a lover. A glimpse of red hair and the heavy perfume of scented oil. Cold. Alone. Death, then life, then death again. Never my own, not since the first time.
Not since the first time.
There will be others.
It's dark when he awakes, tangled in his sheets. The moonlight filtering in through the slatted windows paints his room in the same shades of his memories, muted blues and grays, shadows twisting his modest furniture into carnival versions of reality. He forces air down his lungs in gulps, his face wet from tears he shed in sleep. He presses his hands to his cheeks, fingers framing his bones until he manages some measure of calm. He's lived through this experience before, he knows -- and there's a strange feeling, knowing after weeks of not -- but it's different this time. There's no Cosmic Cube and no purpose behind it, not the loss of his memories or regaining them.
He wants to sob. He wants to scream. He wants to rip this island to pieces until he finds some fucking answers, but he settles for destroying his room instead, senselessly tearing through his bedding until he's on his feet and there's a chair in his hands. The wood makes a satisfying crack as it snaps against the sturdier dresser, clothes spilling out onto the ground as one of the drawers gives, fabric and bamboo splinters pooling around his feet.
He doesn't know how long he stands there, wooden shards poised to inflict more damage on an enemy that isn't -- and may never be -- there, but his breaths have leveled by the time he moves again, numb from remembering. He keeps one in hand as a makeshift weapon as he exits his room, tucking it under one arm as he pulls open the pantry door to fetch one of the bottles of Chechnya Vodka freed from Rapture he keeps hidden behind a loose panel at the back. He doesn't bother with a glass, padding his way outside to the porch and lowering himself onto one of the steps.
Dimly aware that Jason's not home and that Virginia is asleep in her stall, he unstops the bottle and takes the first of what's sure to be many pulls, his eyes peeled on the pinkening horizon.
Not since the first time.
There will be others.
It's dark when he awakes, tangled in his sheets. The moonlight filtering in through the slatted windows paints his room in the same shades of his memories, muted blues and grays, shadows twisting his modest furniture into carnival versions of reality. He forces air down his lungs in gulps, his face wet from tears he shed in sleep. He presses his hands to his cheeks, fingers framing his bones until he manages some measure of calm. He's lived through this experience before, he knows -- and there's a strange feeling, knowing after weeks of not -- but it's different this time. There's no Cosmic Cube and no purpose behind it, not the loss of his memories or regaining them.
He wants to sob. He wants to scream. He wants to rip this island to pieces until he finds some fucking answers, but he settles for destroying his room instead, senselessly tearing through his bedding until he's on his feet and there's a chair in his hands. The wood makes a satisfying crack as it snaps against the sturdier dresser, clothes spilling out onto the ground as one of the drawers gives, fabric and bamboo splinters pooling around his feet.
He doesn't know how long he stands there, wooden shards poised to inflict more damage on an enemy that isn't -- and may never be -- there, but his breaths have leveled by the time he moves again, numb from remembering. He keeps one in hand as a makeshift weapon as he exits his room, tucking it under one arm as he pulls open the pantry door to fetch one of the bottles of Chechnya Vodka freed from Rapture he keeps hidden behind a loose panel at the back. He doesn't bother with a glass, padding his way outside to the porch and lowering himself onto one of the steps.
Dimly aware that Jason's not home and that Virginia is asleep in her stall, he unstops the bottle and takes the first of what's sure to be many pulls, his eyes peeled on the pinkening horizon.
no subject
The silence is oppressive, as uncomfortable as any words they could hope to exchange. Though Bucky stares ahead, he's acutely aware of Steve at his side, his profile dark in the corner of his eye. His fingers itch to pick up the bottle again, but he keeps his hands where Steve can see them. After everything they've done to him -- punched, stabbed, strangled -- Bucky figures he owes him that courtesy.
no subject
I keep my eyes on my hands or on the trees across the clearing, listening to the nearby sound of the brook and shifting rustle of the canopy, and it stays that way when, eventually, I find my voice.
"In my darkest moments, over the years," I say slowly, unable to plan the words before I say them, having no choice but to let them fall steadily out of me or dam them up entirely, "I would blame you. I would get so mad at you. For jumping when I told you not to."
If we weren't sitting side by side, I doubt he'd be able to hear me.
"And everything that happened with the Winter Soldier- everything that's happened... I blamed myself. Entirely, but... What good is it?" I run my hand briefly over the lower half of my face before dropping it and looking over at him. Allotting blame isn't enough. It never is. I think if I had stayed back home, or... woken up there again, maybe I would have learned the same lesson with Tony. Maybe not. I may be completely off base, but I should have learned by now. Answering the question of blame never actually fixes anything.
"I forgive you, Bucky," I tell him quietly, because for the first time it's occurring to me that he might not know.
"For all of it."
no subject
He forgives me.
He... forgives me. After everything I've done, all the lives I've taken, all the suffering I caused, to him and those around him, and still he has it in him to wipe it all away.
The question is if I can let him... Because I sure as hell can't forgive myself.
The silence returns once Steve's finishes, Bucky unable to find the words to respond. His throat seems to grow thick, the simple task of breathing a challenge in the face of such an undeserved kindness... And yet he doesn't dare look Steve's way for fear of it being rescinded. So for the moment he doesn't say another word, vision starting to blur from tears he won't let fall.
no subject
The universe has been hell bent and making sure our friendship isn't easy. I have the scars still to prove it. At the end of it all, though, it sits heavier with Bucky than anyone else. He's the one who carries it, and I'll be damned if I'm the one that lets it bury him.
no subject
He scrubs his face with the back of his flesh and blood hand when he realizes his cheeks are wet, sniffing once to reign back in the worst of the emotion. Crying about it's a waste of time, and while his body might demand for the release, he doesn't want to give in, doesn't want another loss of control, however minor in comparison.
"I'm sorry," he says eventually, because he has to say it. Steve has to know. "For... everything."
no subject
"I know. I forgive you." It can't hurt to say it again.
no subject
"I remember everything... And I still don't have the first idea how we got to this point."