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Just a song we shared, I'll hear
Brings memories back when you were here
Of your smile, your easy laughter
Of your kiss, those moments after
The Winter Soldier and Black Widow were a phenomenon amongst mortals.
Bucky and Nat, on the other hand, were a phenomenon amongst themselves. And from every bone in his body, with every beat of his heart, he felt her absence, an ever growing cocoon around him.
It ate him alive. But the chunks the grief used to take had since healed. These days, they were more like nibbles, just whenever she crossed over his mind.
I think of you
And think of you
And think of you
But she does cross his mind. And nibbles, no matter how insignificant, still leave scars.
They add up. They fucking hurt. They're more painful than anything he had endured before.
If he had to explain it, had to write it down (though he’d never dream of that, his mind is scrambled eggs), he’d tell his diary about the hole in his chest.
Of the dreams we dreamt together
Of the love we vowed would never
Melt like snowflakes in the sun
My days now end as they began
Sometimes it lessens. When there's more vital things to worry about, it's temporarily filled by violence, bloodshed and the smell of fear. But it mostly just grows.
Grows and festers inside him into something unfillable. The thought of a regular life comes to him in a sickening flurry of thoughts, and for the first time since boyhood, he wants to cry.
With thoughts of you
And I think of you
And think of you
No, he wants to do as he was programmed to do; he wants to kill. The thirst for blood overwhelms him, and he makes a few calls, and a few terrible mistakes later he's outside. The tears of today are a yesterday sort of thing.
Down the streets I walked with you
Seeing others doing things we do
And while he's outside, waiting for god knows who, he sees her.
A beautiful, red-haired ballerina.
The life he always dreamed of comes rushing back to him.
There's these children now, and they're named something so painfully American that he can't even comprehend the fact he agreed with it, but they're so stupidly happy that he's home. They're both yelling for mommy to come and see.
She comes through, dressed in a white sundress with flowers tangled in her hair. Natasha’s smile is radiant, and she's embracing those kids. Bucky hears none of what she's saying, because those flowers are wilting before his very eyes, that dress is turning into a funeral gown, and his kids are shattering into tiny pieces inside of her arms.
He wished he paid attention.
Now these thoughts are haunting me
Of how complete I used to be
And in these times that we're apart
I'll hear this song that breaks my heart
The ballerina is gone, having never being real in the first place, he realized. But she was never Nat. She never could be. But he, for the sweetest of moments, used his imagination.
“Bucky?”
Oh fuck, it's whoever he called. He doesn't remember nor care anymore.
“Forget it,” Bucky mumbled.
He went to the store. Instead of playing his role as the killing machine they wanted him to be, he pretended to simply be a man buying groceries. Someone asked him something. He's sure he mentioned something about the white sundress in his hands being for his wife.
He bought that sundress. It had a permanent place inside of his dresser, tucked underneath all the clothes he owned.
He also bought a mirror. It actually stayed in his hands while he sat on the couch, his weight crushing the pathetic leather.
And for a long, intense moment, he stared at his reflection.
He felt so vulnerable that he wept.
And think of you
And I think of you
And think of you
And think of you
And I do