Chapter Text
“So. I’m glad you decided to come back.”
Dr Raynor is in her chair, uncrossing and crossing her legs, her hands folded into her lap, the ill fated ring-binded notebook balancing carefully on her knee as she studies him with those small, icy looking eyes. God, he certainly hadn’t missed this.
Bucky shuffles his feet against the carpet just to have some movement flowing through his body before he does something crazy like bolt out of here. Or combust, either or.
His nerves feel fried already and they haven’t even started yet.
“Yeah well. It’s supposed to help, right?” He asks, itching the side of his nose with his finger. Again, another nervous habit. He wants to run, but he knows that’s not an option. He tries to ground himself by curling his hand into a loose fist against his leg.
Raynor seems pretty observant today.
“You’re nervous,” she calls him out. “Why? We don’t have to start over again, if that’s what you’re worried about.”
Bucky blows out a huff of laughter, it whistling past his lips. He vividly remembers those first few sessions, plonked down on this very sofa, feeling the stuffy suffocation of perfume and air freshener choking him alongside the anxiety that was clawing up out of his throat like some hellbent demon that’d been dormant inside of him for far too long.
Small talk, introductions, awkward handshakes.
It was a cocktail of everything Bucky had hated, and Raynor just that in a nice, polished little bottle with a pretty little label on it. He hadn’t hated her, per say . He had just really hated those first sessions… and then maybe every session after that.
“Well that’s good,” he comments with a tilt of his head. “I don’t think you could forget about me Doc, not if you wanted to.”
It earns him an actual smile, something warm which, to Bucky’s surprise, thought was impossible of the woman. He smiles back too.
That is until she starts fiddling with her notebook.
“So,” she clasps her hands together. “I take it you want to work on where we left off?” She asks, a quirk of her brows.
And where they’d left off was… maybe not such a good place. Amendments, avenging, re venging. Last he’d seen of Raynor was back in that Baltimore police interrogation room, the heavy tension left behind that impromptu session thick in the air when he’d walked out with his tail tucked between his legs with a sulk and a bad feeling in the pit of his gut.
He swallows it down, like a bad pill, trying to forget the memory, yet it stays wedged in his throat, unmoving.
A lot had happened since then. A whole lot.
He clears his throat, shaking his head, his fist becomes a little tighter.
“Well, not really,” he croaks. “I… I moved past the whole list thing,” he tells her, his voice softens a little. “I think I’m… I’m done with that now.”
Raynor studies him for a moment, before her expressions soften, the lines around her eyes are permanent but they fade a little as she relaxes.
“Okay,” she nods slowly. “That’s okay.”
Then, she’s reaching for her bag, tucked up against the leg of her chair, she’s rifling through it for a moment before she’s pulling something out.
“I appreciate the sentiment,” she chuckles as she waves the little leather book in her grasp. “And whilst I’m sure I could make a pretty penny off selling the Steve Rogers’ property–” she stops to chuck the book at Bucky, effortlessly catching it with one hand. “I think it belongs to you.”
Bucky looks down at the book, twisting it over and over in his hand. The edges are rough and worn from time. The cover is a little bent up, probably from where Bucky had held it maybe a little too tightly at times.
And if he pried it open and was to filter through the pages he would find the scribblings of the man it once belonged to. Along with his drawings, doodles, notes. All the perfect ingredients for a recipe to living a normal life again. And at the back, in Bucky’s own chicken scratch would be the list he crossed off already.
He isn’t sure what to say. He just looks at Raynor, and nods.
She nods back in understanding.
“So aside from… that,” she says with a pointed nod to the book in his hold. “I think we can move onto what we were working on before.”
Bucky shifts as he slips the book into his jacket pocket.
“The nightmares,” Raynor prompts after a moment of silence. “Are you still having them?”
Bucky’s knee jerk reaction is to say no. That he isn’t and he never was, and that’s he fine. In moments like these he feels like an armadillo; rolled up on the defence, waiting to be kicked around for a bit before he’s left by himself again to skimper into whatever tall grass he can hide himself in.
But Sam’s voice is present in his head, tallying around on the inside of his skull, reminding him of why he’s doing this. He can’t expect to get help when he’s refusing to budge still.
He takes a breath. His fist tightens and he can already feel the blunt edges of his nails embedding themselves into his palm.
“I… yes,” he speaks quietly, almost hoping she won’t hear him.
She does.
“Okay,” she nods. “Care to elaborate?”
No I do not, is what Bucky wishes he could say. If Sam was here and could read his thoughts he’d probably be scolding him right now.
He swallows thickly, eyes falling from Raynor's hard stare to the floor where it’s easier to win a staring competition with a patch of carpet that isn’t going to do it’s very best to pick apart every little thing you say or do. God, maybe he really is crazy.
“I just…” he starts before he stops again. He lets out a frustrated huff of air. “I thought that the list would help?” He says looking at her again. “Maybe not entirely, I knew it wasn’t a magical ending to it all but… it still is with me. Those dreams. Those memories. I dunno.” He shrugs. He feels all… choppy like a rough sea in the middle of a storm. Like nothing he’s saying is making sense.
He releases his fist to run his fingers through his hair.
Raynor is chewing the inside of her cheek as she watches him.
“Alright,” she says, in that easy cool tone she manages to pull off flawlessly. “We don’t have to go into detail of those nightmares. Not for now anyways.”
Bucky nods. He’s okay with that. He can make that deal with her, even if he comes to regret it again in the future. He’s perfectly fine not to talk about the gruesome, gritty details of the movie like memories that play behind his eyelids every night.
He feels sick just thinking about it.
“But I do want to talk about what might help you,” she adds. She uncrosses her legs again. “Have you tried any of the exercises I suggested before?”
Bucky gives a noncommittal shrug. Raynor tuts.
“Fine,” he gives in way too easily. “The uh, the tea. It’s helped.”
He meets her gaze just in time to see a rather impressed look flash across her. It makes him squirm.
“The chamomile tea?” She presses. Bucky fingers work over the bottom of his jacket, playing with the zipper when he nods. “That’s good. I’m glad.”
Bucky swallows again.
“Yeah well, Sarah, she’s got lots of that stuff. All kinds. It was actually kinda overwhelming at first like… it’s just
tea
, why does it have to have so many flavours and types…” he trails off with another shrug, ignoring Raynor’s rather inquisitive look.
She leans forward in her chair by just an inch. “Sarah?” She asks.
Bucky bites the inside of his cheek.
“Uh. Yeah. Sarah. She’s Sam’s sister,” he tells her, flattening his palm against his thigh to give it a slow, easy rub - it helps.
Raynor nods, mulling it over for a moment before she speaks. “And this Sarah, I’m assuming by Sam you mean--”
“Captain America, yes siree,” Bucky is quick to butt in. Raynor’s smile is fleeting.
“Are you close then?” She continues. Bucky can see it now, she’s danging a shoe by the laces, already dropped that first one, and now he was holding his breath for the second.
Bucky lets a few seconds pass before he speaks, shuffling his feet against the carpet again, his boots making a heavy imprint on the plush rug. He chews his bottom lip as his thoughts bounce around his head.
“Well, yeah,” he says with a heavy sigh. “They-- Sam and his family, they did a lot for me. They’re good people. Obviously. They’re. Yeah, they’re good.”
Raynor once again looks impressed. She looks… Bucky isn’t sure. He’s not sure how she’d really respond if he accused her of looking genuinely taken aback that he was actually putting in effort to nurturing friendships as she liked to call it, even if it was Sam shouldering most of that effort. What can he say? He’s a man of few words and Sam was the world’s chirpiest chatter box on legs.
“You like staying with them then?” Raynor asks. “It helps with the nightmares?”
And there it is, the second shoe. Bucky had momentarily forgotten that the point of therapy was to work through his problems and not just gush about Sam Wilson. If that was the case he’d probably pass with flying colours (if therapy was in fact something he could pass, because he really needs to get that whole idea out of his head before Raynor picks up on it and starts calling him out about it). He sighs, dropping his head down.
Raynor says nothing, letting him be the one to speak first. Which Bucky is not a fan of.
He blows out through his lips, and after a few more seconds when it becomes apparent that that wasn’t enough of an answer for her, he’s dragging his hand over his face with a sigh.
“Yes,” he says, maybe a little clipped. “Maybe. Okay? Sleeping in a house full of people that’s warm and… and has furniture, for a start, and with all those little crickets outside? It’s been… it helps, okay?”
Alongside the other exercises, tidbits and tricks Raynor spent a whole lot of the sessions reminding him about Bucky can agree that being around people might have been the next best thing beside knocking himself out with his vibranium fist every night for a real good night’s sleep.
He tried the other things, like the tea. ASMR? Not such a fun idea when you’re already traumatised from whispery voices in your head. Breathing exercises? That was just a panic attack waiting to happen. Sleeping pills? Yeah right, the serum would nuke that out of his system faster than he could say boo. She’d even suggested marajuana but again… damn Hydra ruined that too.
So it’s glowing right in his face like a firework that maybe Sam is the best suggestion. He
is
the best suggestion.
His throat feels tight and Raynor’s eyes on him make him feel like an ant beneath a magnifying glass, already squirming to get away. He looks down again, his fist tight again, his legs feeling as jittery as ever.
Raynor hums. “That’s good to hear,” she says softly. “It seems you’re happy there.”
Bucky’s throat bobs. “I am.”
A beat.
“So why are you in New York?” She’s blunt, quick, unforgiving. In a weird and twisted way, Bucky supposes she’d have made an excelled Winter Soldier. Hydra would have been wetting themselves out of pure
ecstasy
over a soldier as harsh and as persise as Christina Raynor. She did say so herself: she was an excellent soldier, and from what he’s gathered from her, if her methods out on the field are anything like what she’s like inside here, she’s damn near rutheless. What a world that would have been.
He realises he’s been stalling when Raynor is watching him carefully, clearly expecting a real answer, not just a shrug or a huff or a sigh. He’s finds himself backed up into a corner.
“I… I don’t know,” he tells her. And it’s an honest answer because what the hell
is
he doing back here? “Brooklyn is home,” is what he says next, maybe the only real excuse he has, but even that feels flimsy as hell, and Raynor must realise that too, because her brows furrow and she’s giving him a sharp look.
“Really?” She presses. Bucky shifts in his seat.
He really doesn’t know what to say, so he shrugs in desperate hope it’ll be enough for her.
And surprise, surprise, it never is.
“I want you to think about it,” she’s telling him. “I want you to genuinely think about why it is you came back to New York.”
Bucky frowns. “What if I can’t think of a genuine answer?” He asks.
Raynor is giving him one of those rare, nice smiles that he actually kind of likes. It’s a good look on her; a change from the often expasterated expression she’s wearing when he says something stupid.
“Then I want you to come up with a reason not to go back to the Wilsons,” she says, as easily like that, like she hadn’t just dropped a damn nuke on his head.
And yeah. That’s gonna be tough, Bucky thinks, because even as he quickly rattles his brain to say something quick and sarcastic, he comes up short. He genuinely doesn’t know what to say because what was his excuse really? What was his excuse to not go back? And when he thinks about it, like really thinks about it, he only comes up with one reason, and if he were ever to open his mouth and tell Raynor she’d laugh in his face and say something like:
James, that if anything, is a reason to go back to him.
He knows it, she knows it. Maybe even Sam knows it. And to that, all he can think of is:
Well
shit
.