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The thing he hates most about his scars is that he can't even remember how he got most of them.
The ones he does remember aren't much better.
His knees have little scrapes on them from falling down on concrete as a child. There's a weird, red blotch on the inside of his right elbow, that he sort of remembers getting from HYDRA experimentation in Azzano. The nasty welts where his skin meets metal on his left side were from the metal arm being forced into his flesh. Behind his ear on the left side, there's a two inch line of scar tissue made from a scalpel from an experiment HYDRA had done to him.
The ones he doesn't remember include, but are not limited to: a large burn scar across his back. Claw marks against his flesh bicep, looking like they came from an animal. A cut all around the circumference of his left ankle.
Sam is nice about his scars. He kisses them gently after nightmares, traces along the edges of them with his fingers. He tells Bucky his scars are good, that they show how strong he is.
He doesn't feel strong. Never has.
His therapist had asked about his scars. She's said the same thing Sam's had. Scars are healthy, they show how far we've gone, what we've been through, what we survived.
He doesn't believe any of it. He can't look in a mirror for fear of having a panic attack over all the lines and blotches and welts. Nobody besides Sam has even seen him shirtless.
He's not okay with his body. He's not okay with the way no inch of his skin, aside from his face, is completely free of scar tissue. And he's definitely not okay with people (with the exclusion of Sam) seeing his scars.
But he has to act like he's fine. Put on a smile, not argue when Sam gives his lectures on scars. Not tell his therapist about how he really feels about everything.
They all think he's getting better. If he tells them about this, they'll realize he's still as broken as the day he broke free.
He can't let them know, so he hides.
~~~~~~~~~
Until he can't.
There's a mission. A solo one. Sam is in Europe for various meetings with the UN, and Bucky is tasked to go alone into an abandoned HYDRA base just outside of Las Vegas to search for files or intel.
Well, he'd been told it was abandoned, which was completely incorrect.
Like the general cliche, the building looked abandoned from the outside, but on the inside it hosted a plethora of agents affiliated with Zemo's new anti-superhero uprising group.
And he's gone in solo.
He only comes back out without being captured because Sharon was waiting close by to jump in if he encountered any trouble.
Like usual, she was his savior, dragging his ass out of the base and into the quinjet set up for extraction.
Because of her, he left the scene largely unscathed.
Well, unscathed except for a bullet wound in his arm.
But he's fine. He already pulled out the bullet, so the only thing he has to worry about is the bleeding, and he's got that under control. He stole a scarf from one of the agents and is pressing it on the wound, and it must be working well enough because he's not lightheaded yet.
"First thing when we get back to base, you're going to medical." Sharon states once they're safely in the quinjet.
Bucky just stares at her.
"Don't look at me like that. Sam's not here and there's no way you can stitch that wound up yourself considering its position on your upper arm." She says as she begins to take off her weapons harness and pulls her hair out of the high ponytail she'd put it in for battle.
He shifts uncomfortably from his spot on the bench in the main cabin area.
He's never had anybody tend to his wounds since he came back except for Sam. Because the wound is in his arm, he'd have to take his jacket off so the medics could reach the appropriate area with no fabric restricting their view. He's never had anybody but Shuri, Steve, and Sam see his arm unobstructed. In the summertime, when he's forced to wear long sleeves that cause the scars on his flesh arm to be visible, he wraps them in bandages. It's not ideal, as it's obvious that he's hiding something, but it's better than everybody being able to see every scarred inch of skin.
He's also not big on the concept of even being in medical. His therapist had identified his aversion to it as being a result of the medical trauma he suffered at the hands of HYDRA.
But Sharon isn't letting up on this- his only chance to get out of it is if Sam miraculously flies home two days early and shows up at the base before he's corralled into medical, or if he somehow escapes.
As the quinjet lands, the blood loss actually does start to set in. His head feels a little floaty, and his limbs feel limp.
He lets Sharon lead him into the base and into medical. The weight of his injury sets in and despite his fears and insecurities, he needs professional medical attention.
He lays down on the hospital-style bed he's led to, exhausted out of his mind. He can't stop the tears from leaking out from his eyes. His emotions are swirling in an incomprehensible way, and he doesn't know what's even happening until he feels a strong hand on his left shoulder, trying to anchor him.
He opens his eyes. He's not sure when he closed them.
Sharon is standing in his immediate field of vision, and he realizes it's her hand on his shoulder.
"Barnes. You okay?" She asks, gentle, caring.
"Y-yeah." He responds, voice shaky. His tongue feels too heavy in his mouth.
"Whatever you're scared about, it's going to be okay. I've called in the best doctor in this base, she's going to stitch you up and give you a quick transfusion. I've also called Sam, he's out of meetings and available to video chat, if you'd like." Sharon keeps her hand on his shoulder, grounding him to the present. "I can stay too, or I can leave."
"Stay." He spits out immediately. Even if he's going to have Sam here on a screen, it's better if he has both people he trusts rather than just the one.
Sharon nods. "I'll get Sam on a chat and get the doctor in here."
She leaves the room for a moment, which Bucky takes to sit up from the bed slightly and unzip his leather jacket. He shrugs out of the sleeve, careful to not brush against his wound too much. He's wearing a black tank top as an undershirt, so at least the worst of his scars aren't showing. It's just the arm.
Sharon comes back with a tablet and a woman with dark brown hair wearing a pristine white lab coat.
Bucky's throat goes dry at the sight, flashbacks just inching in on his consciousness.
"Barnes?" Sharon is at his side immediately, placing her hand on his shoulder yet again. "Are you Okay?"
"Can...can uh...can she take off the lab coat?" He stutters out, slightly embarrassed that something so minor can set him off. He gestures vaguely towards his head, hoping Sharon understands what he's implying.
Sharon looks back at the doctor, and she nods, shedding the coat and placing it on the hook in the halfway, out of Bucky's vision.
"Okay?" She asks again.
Bucky nods. "Okay."
Sharon sits down on a chair on his left side and starts up the video chat on the tablet, holding it between her and Bucky so they both are visible in the shot.
Sam answers right away.
"Hey Buck. Hey Shar." He gives a little wave to the camera. He looks to be in a hotel room, with lavish art decorating the wall behind him and a king sized bed visible in the camera's view.
"Hey Sammy." Bucky greets as he feels a cold swab clean the area around his wound. He cringes at the sensation.
Sharon notices his discomfort, and so does Sam, who proceeds to ramble on about his day as a way to distract Bucky completely.
"...anyway. Paris is a lot less fun solo." He finishes up a story Bucky was only half paying attention to. He was mostly just focusing on how Sam's voice sounded, the soothing rhythm and tune Bucky loved to hear go on and on.
"Maybe one day I can join you." Bucky comments as he feels the doctor begin to stitch.
"Oh, you'd love it here. Everybody's just as annoying as you are." Sam replied with a smirk.
"From my experience, people in Paris are quite nice." Sharon cut in.
"Yea, not the government officials." Sam sighs."I say one word about being Captain America and I'm the bad guy."
"To be completely fair, if a guy came in here and started calling himself Commander France you'd be pissed too." Bucky pointed out, and he heard the doctor snort out a laugh.
"I am a mature adult, I would not be pissed." Sam defended.
"Yeah, you're a mature adult who ate ice cream for breakfast last week and cried watching Titanic at midnight while I was asleep." Bucky quipped.
"In my defense, it was strawberry ice cream and it is an excellent movie!"
"You two exhaust me mentally, physically, and emotionally." Sharon shook her head with a smile, betraying the cold tone of her words.
They made other various jabs at one another, talked about random topics until the doctor had finished patching him up and giving him the blood transfusion.
Sharon had to go to debrief, while Bucky was left alone in the medical room to recover. Sharon had handed off the tablet to Bucky to talk to Sam some more before he had to go to sleep.
"You still feeling okay?" Sam asked, concern clearly evident in his demeanor and tone.
"Yeah. All stitched up." Bucky nodded, gently patting the bandage that had been put over the stitches.
"I mean mentally, Buck."
He thought about that for a moment.
He's still a little panicked about the scars on his arm being visible, and about being in medical, but it's died down now to a manageable level. It's unpleasant, but he can deal with it.
"Okay. I... got a little freaked out before, but I'm fine now."
"Sharon said you had a panic attack."
Bucky bit his lip.
"...a little one, I guess." He shrugged. "I'm fine."
"Was it about being in medical? Or was it about your scars?" Sam questioned.
Of course he knew exactly what he'd panicked about. Sam's been able to read him like an open book since they started their relationship.
"...a bit of both." He let out a long sigh after answering.
There was a pause from Sam, before his boyfriend spoke again.
"I have an idea, to help with the scars. When I get back we'll see if it works." Sam said with a familiar glint in his eye. It was the look he got when he had a plan.
Bucky wasn't sure if he was fearful or excited for what Sam had in store.
~~~~~~~~~
"Hold still."
"You're drawing on me with a marker, Wilson, I can't be still."
Sam just continued with his work of art upon Bucky's skin.
Sam's wonderful idea to help Bucky be more confident with his scars was to take body-safe pens and draw on them. Right now, Sam was working on the scar behind his ear.
Bucky tried to focus on the sensation to try and determine what was being drawn before it was drawn. It was some sort of shape being repeated down the length of the scar, with dotted lines connecting the shapes.
"Done." Sam announced, clicking the pen cap back on before grabbing his phone to snap a picture of his work.
"Here, look at this." Sam handed Bucky the phone with the picture open.
Sam had drawn pink stars along the line of scar tissue, with little dotted star trails in between them. Bucky had to admit that it was cute.
And maybe it made him feel just a little bit better about his scars.
At that moment, an idea of his own popped into his head.
He snatched the pen out of Sam's hand and threw his phone back on the mattress of their bed, where they were currently sitting in a mess of blankets and pillows.
"Take your shirt off." Bucky said in voice that was half commanding, half a request.
Sam smirked. "Geez, Barnes. Not even gonna treat me to dinner before asking that?"
Bucky rolled his eyes. "I've treated you to dinner plenty of times. Now c'mon, it's your turn." Bucky spun the pen around on his finger as Sam complied to his previous request.
Sam turned around once his shirt was off, so his back was facing Bucky, which is exactly what he wanted.
Sam had four linear scars that were diagonal across the expanse of his back. It was from an injury he'd sustained in pararescue, a miscalculated extraction point had led to a piece of debris falling on him and making the marks that are still there today.
Bucky stuck his tongue out of his mouth as he concentrated on his drawing. Sam looked over his shoulder at him and laughed when he saw the face Bucky was making, eyebrows furrowed and tongue hanging slightly out of his mouth.
Once he was finished, he took a picture just as Sam had done for him, and gave it to Sam.
His boyfriend lit up in a smile.
Bucky had connected the four lines by making them mimic comet trails, with a squiggly circle at the bottom of them to be the actual comets. It wasn't the best drawing, but it was kinda cute.
"What, are we going with a space theme?" Sam raised his eyebrows at his boyfriend, who just shrugged.
"I got inspired by the stars behind my ear."
At the mention of that scar, Sam's hand flew to cup Bucky's face, gently brushing his finger against his ear and the scar.
Bucky smiled, grabbing Sam's wrist in his own.
It was a tender, sweet moment, which was soon ruined by the sound of Sam's phone ringing, calling them in for a mission.
They didn't get the time to wash the pen off of their skin until their post-mission shower, and by then Bucky had gotten accustomed to the idea of stars behind his ear.
As they lay in bed that night, fingers intertwined, Bucky said, "Do you think it would be weird it I got a tattoo of stars behind my ear, where the scar is?"
There was a few beats of silence, before Sam spoke again.
"I think it's a great idea. Maybe I'll get one of the comets tattooed." Sam seemed to be bouncing the idea around in his head.
The pen activity might have been crafted up to help Bucky, but in the end, it helped Sam too.
They both went to bed that night next to each other, each one less insecure about their scars.