Work Text:
"Um, excuse me, are you busy right now? I mean, of course you're busy—you're at work. Working. But, if you're not too busy right now, I was hoping that maybe you'd want to talk to me?"
Sam Wilson blinked at the young woman a few times, mostly to parse through the anxious word-barrage that'd just hit him. She couldn't've been older than mid-twenties, with tortoiseshell glasses and long blonde hair in a ponytail and big silver earrings and pretty blue eyes. She was beautiful, but not particularly memorable—at least not until she opened her mouth. Well, the dress under her expensive coat was pretty memorable too. It was bright pink, and the kind of impractical office chic that probably cost more than every single shirt he owned combined.
She definitely didn't look like a veteran. She did look like she could be some kind of superspy like Natasha, except Sam doubted it. Natasha dressed for her missions. And if she'd been going to, say, infiltrate a Veteran's Administration building, she wouldn't dress like she'd just come out of a board meeting. Or a tech conference, according to the lanyard-plus-name card thing still hanging around her neck.
And if he were being honest, Sam was getting a little tired of distrusting people. He'd put a stop to the months long, useless search for Bucky when Steve basically stopped sleeping and Sam realized he'd been more relaxed in a war zone. Steve hadn't wanted to call it quits, but he hadn't refused. Sam figured that in the end he'd been too exhausted to argue.
Sam felt awful for Steve, but he was done with being afraid. So if Hydra suddenly decided that he was enough of a threat to send an unremarkably lovely but charmingly nervous assassin to get him, then fuck it. There were worse ways.
So he just gave her a big smile and stood up from his desk chair and stuck out his hand. "Sam Wilson," he said, still smiling. "And you're lucky—you managed to catch me being not too busy. How can I help you?"
"Oh, good," the young woman gushed in relief. "Felicity Smoak," she said, though of course it was on her lanyard. "And I really need to talk to someone who talks to veterans." She made a face. "Not that you're a veteran-whisperer, or anything. They're not horses. Or dogs." Now she looked horrified. "Not dogs! I'm not calling veterans dogs. I wouldn't do that, because that's really rude. Unless they're sniffer dogs! I know there are, um, actually dog veterans. But I mean, people-veterans. Not, um, animal veterans. But…you talk to them, right? You help them figure out…veteran…stuff?"
She was blushing so badly that if they were outside in the cold she'd probably be steaming. Sam just made his grin wider and more welcoming—Ms. Smoak was absolutely not a veteran, and she reminded him of Tony Stark without the arrogance and even less of a brain-to-mouth filter. It was kind of adorable, actually. But pretty much everyone was anxious when they walked through the V.A. doors the first time, and he knew how to deal with that.
He nodded, still smiling as he pulled back his hand. "I do help former members of the military work though some of the more difficult parts of coming home, yeah." He took a small gamble and added, "Are you here about your spouse?"
Ms. Smoak blinked. "No!" she said, a little too quickly. "No, he's not my boyfriend. I mean, yes. He almost was my boyfriend, but he…kind of…veered away. From it. A lot. Several times. Several times last week." She covered her eyes. "I'm not usually this terrible at…speaking. Everything. I tend to run off at the mouth when I'm nervous. But I'm stopping right now. Right…"—she took a deep breath—"Now." She moved her hands and clasped them demurely in front of her. Then looked at Sam expectantly.
Sam gave her another second in case she was going to start talking again, but when she managed to stay quiet he gestured at the loveseat and armchairs. "Have a seat."
She took the loveseat—everyone did—and he sat in the armchair. Ms. Smoak settled with prim anxiety with her knees together and her ankles crossed. She didn't take off her coat. She also held her hands clutched together in her lap, as if she was worried about what her fingers might do if she didn't cage them. She looked like a fidgeter; it'd certainly go with the way she spun out her thoughts. She probably chewed pens.
"So, Ms. Smoak, what's on your mind?"
Ms. Smoak blinked. "Please call me Felicity. I thought my mom was in the room for a second." She bit her lip, looking anxious again. "My…not-boyfriend, he…" She grimaced. "It's complicated."
"Take your time." It was late and Sam wanted to go home, but he'd sat through too many stumbling, disjointed narratives to get impatient now. And Felicity really was charming—Sam found himself wanting to know what she was going to say.
She gave him a tiny smile in thanks, then looked at her hands. "He's not actually a veteran," Felicity said at last, then looked up, worried. "But what happened to him…he was a prisoner of war. He'd tell you that's not true, but, from what little he's told me…yeah." She rubbed her nose, then re-clasped her hands and lowered her eyes. "And he was tortured," she went on softly. "For a long time. They trained him to fight. Made him…made him do things." She bit her lip. "Awful, terrible things that no one should do to anybody. But he did. And it…it changes you. When you have to do that."
Sam cleared his throat. "Yes it does." His voice creaked anyway, but it was a little hard to speak normally when his heart was suddenly going like he'd been trying to lap Steve Rogers. "This friend of yours," he went on, trying not to sound eager. "What's his name?"
Felicity looked up sharply. "I can't tell you that," she said. "I'm sorry. It's just that, almost no one knows who he is." She tilted her head. "Well, a lot of people do, actually. Probably too many." She seemed to do a mental headcount. "Definitely too many. But that's not the point. Or, it is. That is the point. Too many people know who he is already."
"Right." Sam nodded. He wanted to ask where this mystery man lived, since it probably wasn't D.C. if she was here for a conference. But he really doubted Felicity would tell him. He licked his lips. "Was he in Russia?"
He was sure she was going to say no. She couldn't be talking about Bucky. There was no way—
She gaped at him. "How did you know that?"
Holy fuck.
Sam smiled as warmly as he could. "Just a guess. Russia's been known to be a little less than friendly to their prisoners."
"Oh. Well. Good guess, then." She nodded, though she still looked suspicious. She was loyal, which was something Sam admired. And she definitely wasn't stupid. "He was in Russia, for part of it."
For part of it. And Sam would bet his brand-new, shiny, Stark tech wings that the other part was with Hydra.
He held up his hand. "You don't have to tell me anything else about where he was." The last thing he wanted to do was scare Felicity off, not least because she still needed help. Hell, if her 'not-boyfriend' was who he sounded like, she needed a ton of it. "But I do need to know—did he hurt you?"
For a second Felicity blinked at him like he'd stopped speaking English. Then, "No!" she blurted, with too much genuine horror to be faking it. She shook her head fast enough to make her ponytail swing. "No. No, no. Never. He has never, ever hurt me." She looked at Sam with her blue eyes big and earnest. "He wouldn't do that. Even with everything that happened to him, he wouldn't do that."
"Okay. Good." Sam nodded, smiling again. Thank God, he thought. Bucky Barnes would've never hurt a woman who wasn't shooting at him, but Sam had no idea how much of Bucky might be left. "So, you've told me what happened to him. At least what you can. What's he doing now? How's he dealing with it? Or not dealing with it?"
Felicity swallowed. "He told me that after he came back from…from where he'd been, he could only see people as targets, or threats. I was the first person who he saw as one. I mean, who he saw as a person."
Sam nodded, thinking of Natasha, who gave out trust so sparingly. And Steve, who tried so hard to still see the best in everyone. And himself, worried about young women in glasses because their outfits didn't match his expectations. "That's common. But it doesn't make it any easier."
She shook her head. "That was on our first and last date, as it happens." She unlatched her hands so she could reach under her glasses and wipe her eyes. "He decided about two minutes later that we couldn't be together. Because he can't be who he is and who he wants to be at the same time."
The idea of this awkwardly charming young woman on a date with the Winter Soldier was mind-boggling. But if Bucky were capable of that kind of social interaction, maybe there was as much hope for him as Steve seemed to think. "Who does he want to be?" Sam asked.
"Someone good," Felicity said. "Someone happy." And it was all Sam could do to keep himself from rocketing out of his chair and gaping at her. Or begging her to tell him where this 'not-boyfriend' of hers was.
Because he had to be Bucky Barnes.
How many other young men out there could've been taken prisoner by supposed allies and forced to become weapons? Everything she'd told him sounded exactly like how Steve had talked about Bucky, during all those sad, late-night conversations when Steve managed to share every bit of his fear and frustration and sorrow without actually saying anything.
And the Bucky Steve described was someone who was trying to figure out who the hell he was now, after he'd escaped what'd been done to him. Someone who maybe couldn't reconcile the man he'd become with the man he wanted to be.
"He doesn't think he's good?" It would kill Steve to know that. But if Bucky were opening up to someone, then maybe he really was remembering, just like Steve said. Everything Felicity said described a man aware of his past. Sam just wished it wasn't such a terrible one. No one deserved what Bucky had gone through. He really wished Bucky didn't think he had deal with it on his own.
She shook her head. She licked her candy-pink lips. "He doesn't think he deserves it. To be happy, I mean. Maybe to be good, either. Because of everything he's done. It's funny." She looked up. "Funny strange, not funny-funny. Nothing's funny about this."
"I got it. Don't worry."
"Okay, good. But, it's funny. The man he is—the man he thinks he is—all he does is help people. Well, sometimes he lies to them and makes decisions for them and won't ever ask for help unless he's dying…." She cleared her throat. "But, he helps people. When he's not actively alienating them supposedly for their own good."
"He pushes you away?" Sam was honestly amazed that Bucky had made a connection with another person at all, let alone one that was obviously a deep and lasting relationship, no matter how fraught it sounded.
She rolled her eyes. "Like a bulldozer. You know." She raised her hands and pushed her palms towards him. "With the…pushing. And I may have some residual anger about that. He says it's to protect us. But I'm pretty sure it's because he doesn't think he deserves to be happy."
Us? Well, that went with too many people knowing her not-boyfriend's identity. "That's also common, unfortunately. Especially if your friend's having difficulty believing that the things he was forced to do aren't his fault."
Felicity snorted. "Oh, believe me—he thinks everything's his fault. He loves taking the blame. If taking the blame was a superpower, we wouldn't need the Avengers. Or the Flash."
"It sounds like the best way to help your friend would be some kind of professional counselling," Sam said. "Is there any way you could bring him here? We have group sessions, or one-on-one, like this." And Steve could at least know Bucky was alive.
"I wish." Felicity let out a groan and sagged against the back of the loveseat, looking at the ceiling as if appealing to the heavens. "He won't talk to anyone. He definitely wouldn't talk to a professional." She lifted her head. "No offence."
"None taken."
Satisfied, she dropped her head again. "Part of it's the whole secret identity thing. But mostly he just…won't. He doesn't let any of us in. Ever. Even that Russia thing was a major revelation."
That wasn't surprising. Disappointing, but not a surprise. "Then I'm afraid I'm a little stumped as to what you think I can do," Sam said gently.
"I don't know!" Felicity lifted her arms then let them flop back to the cushions. She sat up. "I don't know," she repeated quietly. "I love him. And he's…he's a hero. He's a hero, but he doesn't see it. Can't. And I'm sick and tired of always being pushed away, but. He's dying, inside." She moved her fingers like she was mimicking rain. "He keeps losing little pieces of himself, all the time. And eventually there'll just be nothing." She looked at Sam with her blue eyes liquid and beseeching behind the tortoiseshell frames. "Can you just…tell me what to do? I don't know what to do."
Sam took a breath, ran his palm over his hair. "I wish I could give you the magic words, Felicity," he said. "The ones that would make him hear, instead of just listen. But I don't know them any more than you do." He leaned forward in his chair, clasping his hands with his elbows on his thighs. "But I'd start with reminding him that there are people out there who love him—who always have and always will. Who need him to come home because they can't even breathe right unless they know he's safe and sound. That his friends won't give up on him, even when he's given up on himself. And that nothing anyone made him do could ever change that. But he needs to come home."
There. He'd tried.
It felt like he just spat out a mouthful of clichés, that he let her and Bucky down. But clichés existed for a reason, and Felicity was nodding slowly and looking at him with wet gratitude in her eyes.
"Sometimes people just got to be reminded they're loved," Sam said. He spread his hands. "That might make a difference, for him to hear it one more time."
He hoped so. It was worth a shot.
"Thank you," Felicity said, gravelly and heartfelt. She stood quickly, yanking her coat around her. Sam stood as well because that was polite. "I'll tell him that." Felicity pulled her gloves out of her pockets and tugged them on like gauntlets as she stalked to the door. "And maybe it'll make a dent in his stupid, thick, dumb-blond skull—"
"Wait," Sam said.
Felicity stopped at the door, turned around. "What?"
He licked his lips, thinking quickly. Didn't want to scare her, but she'd said 'blond'. She'd definitely said 'blond'. And a color didn't mean anything, not a damn thing at all. No reason Bucky couldn't've dyed his hair. But.
But.
"What?" she asked again, when Sam hadn't actually spoken.
Sam gave his head a quick shake. "Nothing. Never mind. It's not important. Oh, just a sec." He swiped one of his cards off his desk and gave it to her. "Please let me know how it goes with your friend. And you can call me anytime, if you have questions or just need to talk."
"Oh." Felicity looked at the card like it might hold a secret message or maybe burst into flame. "Thank you." She tucked it into a pocket of her expensive coat.
Sam held out his hand again. "It was a pleasure meeting you, Felicity."
"Thanks. You too." She shook his hand politely and he walked her out so he could lock the door behind her.
He didn't, though. Not at first. He stood just outside the front entrance to the V.A., and watched Ms. Felicity Smoak walk down the street with her neat ponytail swaying, and her high-heeled boots clacking assertively on the sidewalk, and her breath misting the icy night air. He watched her walking away and wondered where she was going and who she might be going back to. She looked like any other nighttime commuter who'd come from a late meeting. But she was clearly more than that.
He kept wondering who the hell this blond was who wasn't a veteran but had been a prisoner of war; who'd been kept in Russia and made into a weapon. But who wasn't Bucky Barnes.
He watched until Felicity was out of sight, and then he went back to his office to finish the paperwork he'd put aside when she came in.
Sam hoped she'd call sometime. He'd like to know if she was all right.
The man who might've been Bucky crouched on the roof of the V.A. building in his new (familiar) blue coat and watched Felicity Smoak walk away.
He liked the V.A. building. Sam Wilson was there. Bucky (Steve called him that; it felt like it could be his name) enjoyed listening to him speak to the veterans. He had a good voice, and Sam always talked about how things would get better. All they needed was patience and time.
Bucky knew patience—he'd been tracking Hydra remnants for weeks: everyone who'd ever hurt him or made him hurt someone else—and other than the box and the mission materiel Steve had given him, the only thing Bucky had was time. So maybe things would get better for him too.
He hadn't intended to listen to Felicity Smoak and Sam Wilson's conversation. Listening in on the Group Sessions was fine, because there were always other people and it was okay if you didn't talk. But One-On-One was private. Bucky remembered liking privacy, once. He knew he should've let Felicity keep hers. But then she'd started talking and everything she said was about him.
At first he thought that maybe she knew him, like Steve did, and he just didn't remember her. But the more she talked the more he realized that no, she couldn't really mean him. Felicity loved this other man, but her friend wouldn't let her.
Steve had written I love you at the bottom of the last note he'd left on the windowsill. Bucky wasn't sure what 'love' was. He recognized the word, but all it made him think of was folded paper with red shapes that were supposed to be hearts. He remembered giving one to his mother. In his memory his hands were very small, but Bucky didn't know what the paper had been for. He did remember that she smiled when she took it and hugged him. And he remembered that he was happy to give the paper to her, and that her hug made him happy too.
Love was a good thing, Bucky knew that. It was good and important and made you happy.
Bucky hadn't made Steve happy; he'd tried to kill him. But Steve had written I love you. Maybe Bucky made Steve happy when he was small? Like when he gave the paper to his mother? Except the only thing Bucky could remember giving Steve was bullet wounds and broken bones.
He put his hands over his face, clenching his jaw until his teeth hurt. He hated how much he didn't understand. He hated it. He was so sick of being adrift in a world that other people could navigate without effort. He knew hundreds of different ways to kill but he had no idea why Steve would say he loved him. Bucky could barely recall what the word even meant.
This other man, with the same past and Felicity who loved him—he could remember. Right then Bucky envied him so much he ached.
There are people out there who love him, Sam had said, about the man Felicity knew. People who worried about him, who needed him to come home. People who wouldn't give up on him, even when he'd given up on himself.
Steve worried about Bucky. Steve never gave up on him. Steve loved him.
Steve needed him to come home.
Bucky dropped his hands and stood. He went to the edge of the roof and stepped off, using the lid of the dumpster behind the building to break his fall again. Bucky jumped lightly to the pavement, then exited the alley to the street and started walking.
He couldn't go back to New York. Not yet. He wasn't finished his mission. There were still Hydra cells to take down, before they had a chance to hurt anyone else. There was still so much he needed to remember.
But he would, afterwards. As soon as he was done, he'd go home.
Steve was waiting for him.
END