Chapter Text
It strikes Bob one day— unable to move past the threshold of the training room doors— how useless he is.
It’s not Valentine’s constant prodding at him for some sort of special training, or the public’s never-ending disappointment in their makeshift team, that brings this about. No.
It’s the realization that, as he watches his friends wrap their knuckles and get into stances, they all know what they’re doing here. They slot in perfectly on the training mats against one another, and they fight like they know why.
While they’re getting stronger and faster and better, Bob just thinks that he would rather be doing anything else than watch them throw punches at each other. He always drifts away from the door. Back up the stairs. Watch TV, take a nap, do the dishes. Anything else.
It’s pathetic.
———
It starts at the entrance of the training room, a couple weeks after they moved in.
“I found it while on journey around tower.” Alexei explains in broad words and grand gestures, grin bright enough to light up the room the team was huddled in, “We must use it for training!”
Alexei had, apparently, been poking around all the room in the tower before he found one that looked like a gym. For some reason, he declared it was a training room, and came running to the team with the new discovery like he’d just struck gold.
“Training.” Bucky drawls, looking unimpressed. Or maybe he looks interested. Bob’s not sure how to read the man at all at this point, and he doesn’t really try to. “That could be useful.”
“Yes!” Alexei responds, “We must test our strength in great training-room battle!”
He very un-subtly stares at Bucky’s metal arm.
“Sparring, you mean.” Ava says thoughtfully, “Not a bad idea.”
Ava very un-subtly stares at Bucky's metal arm.
“I haven’t sparred properly in a long time.” Yelena nods sagely, “I could go for a few rounds.”
Yelena very un-subtly stares at Bucky’s metal arm.
“Yeah,” John says, then declares, “I wanna spar with Bucky.”
Everyone immediately erupts into protests and arguments, to which Bucky looks confused. Or amused. Again, Bob’s not sure. But their bickering about who gets to test Bucky’s arm gets Bob chuckling, and John ends up winning pretty quickly by saying he “called it first” which— he did. The childish declaration seemed to sober everyone up, though, and they decided that was moment to pretend to be adults by ‘letting John have it since he wants it so bad.’
Bucky rolls his eyes, but Bob’s almost sure he sees a ghost of a grin, there. Almost.
It’s fun, and lighthearted, and silly, and yet, the moment everyone goes to the training room and passes over the threshold, Bob stops.
He sees the place where the hallways ends and the training room begins, and he’s suddenly struck with the realization of what sparring really entails.
He imagines fighting stances and throwing punches, and even from where he’d be watching on the sidelines, he would see where each fist connected. He imagines the split second of panic his friends would feel when a fist comes flying— the options of where to dodge or how to take it flying across their mind— before they finally move out of the way. Or, he imagines the punches landing. He imagines the pain that would strike them, and most of all, he imagines the bruises they’d leave behind.
“Bob?” Yelena asks. He looks up at her, and the others watching him. Waiting for him to enter.
Bob swallows. He tries to say he’s coming, or that he needs a minute, or that he’s fucking terrified, but instead, he just says, “I think I’d rather watch TV, actually.”
The others take it easily. They don’t give Bob any trouble for it, and that’s nice, but he feels off-kilter as he turns and walks away from the training room. There’s an uneasiness in his gut. He feels like he just lost against something he didn’t even know he was fighting.
In the end, he convinces himself it doesn’t matter. He has no reason to train. He's not a spy, or a soldier, or a— whatever Ava is. He’s just some… guy. He’s cool with that. He lets them do their thing, and he stays up in the shared living room.
He flips on a movie. He sorts the shelves. He does the dishes. Eventually, the rest come back up to join him, looking a little exhausted, and Bob pretends he doesn’t notice the tissues shoved up Yelena’s nose, or the blood drying over her lip. He does the same dish in his hand three times just to wash away the image.
Eventually, he loses himself in the movie and convinces himself it doesn’t matter.
————
But those excuses all disappear when he recovers his memories of the Void, and what he did that day to New York.
It’s a messy thing. Bob nearly causes another world-ending threat trying to avoid exactly that, but it doesn’t happen, because the others help him down. Like they did before. Like they always do.
They’re always helping him.
And it’s such a bizarre thing— to have people who will help. Bob remembers the days where he’d pray to whatever would listen for someone to help him. For someone to look his way and notice what was happening, what he needed. One day, he stopped wishing. He hadn’t even noticed he’d decided that help was a miracle he’d never get.
Having them is a miracle. Bucky is a rock against Bob’s river. Ava is like the free wind, John the sturdy earth. Alexei is every alive thing around them, and Yelena. Yelena is the warmest sun. She’s… she’s…
Too much.
It’s too much.
Bob has everything he’s ever wanted, and some days, it feels like he’s soaring, like he’s living a long and beautiful dream.
On the other days, it feels like he’s walking on the edge of some precarious cliff. Any moment, he’s going to fall, and he's going the wake up, and the beautiful dream gets replaced by cold, hard reality.
He doesn’t want to think like that. He wants to see Yelena smile at him and be as relieved as he feels. Instead, he hears a small voice in the back of his head that tells him it’s only a matter of time.
He gets restless. He starts moving backwards.
Only a few days ago, Bob was curled up next to Bucky on a pile of blankets after his near-Void meltdown, and he felt safe. He watched Bucky’s chest rise and fall quietly, and Bob even thought that he could move closer. He could probably even drape an arm over Bucky, and nothing bad would happen to him. It wouldn’t hurt. It would just feel warm.
But, now, he finds himself pacing in his room, something gnawing at his chest, as he tries to convince himself he deserves to go to the kitchen for food.
It’s such an old, habitual thought that his whole world feels distorted just by thinking it. Like the room looks off-color, all of a sudden, hazy and wrong and oddly familiar in a way that makes his stomach clench. Eventually, he moves on that cursed habit and opens his closet. He finds a box under piles of clothes, and shakily, he opens it.
There’s nothing in it.
Because, of course there isn’t. Bob hasn’t had a reason to hoarde his food in his closet since he was sixteen, and he doesn’t know why the hell he was looking for it here. In this tower. With this team, who only kept him safe and never expected anything in return. They were his friends, his people, his—
He drops the box back into the closet with trembling hands, shuts the closet door so hard it shakes, and buries himself under his sheets.
He tries not to think of the fact that he’s still hungry. He tries not to think of the training room doorways and his inability to go through. He tries not to think of how, while everyone around him is moving forward, he only ever seems to take steps back.
—————
Yelena is moving forward.
She has to be. While he’s pacing back and forth between the hall and the training room doors, hearing the laughter and banter behind the door taunt him, Yelena is doing… something.
Okay, so. He’s not actually sure what she’s doing these days, but— in his defense, it’s confusing.
One day, he catches her in the kitchen, arms covered in white flour all the way up to her elbows. She grins at him with mysterious dough smudged across her cheeks and nose and says she’s baking.
Another day, he finds her stabbing a needle into a piece of cloth repeatedly, like it’s a dagger. There’s yarn all over the ground and Velcro stuck in her hair. She greets him before he’s even fully in the room, sounding terse, so he leaves her to it.
A different day, he barely dodges out of the way of a dummy arrow when he enters the common room, and finds Yelena in the center of the living room. It’s covered from head to toe in newspapers and other coverings, and Bob sees why when he sees the paint splattered everywhere— all over the ground, the walls, and Ava in the center, looking a little bit pissed and a little bit amused.
Bob barely wonders what’s going on before Yelena aims and shoots an arrow into the middle of his chest, and he watches dumbfoundedly as the painted end leaves a large blob of blue on his shirt.
She laughs so hard she falls over, and Bob forgets everything he was going to ask.
That was all last week. He doesn’t know what’s happening, but he sees the way Yelena smiles these days, and it’s brighter every time. She talks a little faster, moves a little livelier. She’s happier.
That’s why Bob knows Yelena is moving forward. She’s getting better. And it terrifies him.
He has to keep up.
“Bob?” A voice snaps Bob from his thoughts, and he glances up from where he’d been staring at the floor, slowing his pacing.
Bucky stands at the opening of the training room, breathing harder than usual and looking more than a little confused. Bob sees the slight sheen of sweat on his forehead, the way his tank sticks to his chest, and of course, the metal arm, in full view, and knows they’ve probably been sparring for an hour at least.
“Have you been out here this whole time?” Bucky asks, brows furrowing, and Bob’s ears turn red as he realizes the last time Bucky had seen him was right here, at the entrance, before Bob had made yet another excuse about food or something to avoid going in. No way. He can’t have been pacing for an hour that was— that was insane.
“No.” Bob says quickly. Too quickly, from the way Bucky’s face flashes with momentary surprise and then goes carefully neutral, the way it does when he’s realized something he doesn’t want anyone else to know. It makes Bob want to curl up and disappear, “I just came back down to, uh.”
Shoot. What would he come down here for?
Bucky raises a brow slowly at the stretching silence, “To…?”
Bob opens his mouth and closes it, feeling the itch under his skin grow with his heart rate. He tries to grasp for some sort of viable excuse that wouldn’t make him look as pathetic as he is, but all he finds is blank emptiness because, for some reason, he’s forgotten how to speak English all of a sudden and—
“Bob!” Alexei's voice booms from behind Bucky, and then the man is poking his head out of the door frame as well, grinning widely, “You came!”
Bucky, mercifully, turns away from Bob to glance at Alexei. The Russian man is also sweating, a joyful glint in his eye that lights up his entire face. Bob tries not to let his relief at Alexei’s appearance show too obviously on his face.
“Yeah.” Bob says, shifting on his foot, “I just got here. Just now. Yeah.”
Nice.
“Good,” Alexei nods, stepping back with a grin, “Now you will join us, yes?”
Not nice.
“I— uh. Well. Uh.” Bob starts, intelligently, floundering for yet another excuse. But, that wouldn’t make sense. Why would he make an excuse to leave and then come back, just to make another excuse? Dammit.
“Come on, Alexei. Bob doesn’t want to see us old men get sweaty and gross.” Bucky says light heartedly as he brings up a hand to push Alexei back in. It’s a joke, Bob knows, but it’s also an out. Like Bucky knows that Bob needs an out. Like Bucky knows Bob can’t go in.
Like Bucky has any idea what Bob’s been struggling with for the past weeks, even when Bob has been doing his very best to keep it hidden from everyone else.
For some reason, a burst of indignation flares in Bob’s chest. Bucky doesn’t get it, because there is no ‘it.’
“No.” Bob says, a little more firmly. He only hesitates slightly when both Bucky and Alexei pause, turning back to him. But he steels his nerves, looks Bucky dead in the eye, “I came back to… join you guys.”
Bucky looks surprised for real, this time, letting go of Alexei as the latter throws his hands up and cheers, “Yes! Another super soldier will join the fray!”
Bucky is more hesitant, which just serves to frustrate Bob more, “Kid…”
“I’m not a kid.” Bob mutters, tersely, then flicks his gaze to the training room, and back to Bucky, “I want to join.”
“Come, John is inside!” Alexei says excitedly before slipping back into the training room. The moment he disappears, a little bit of Bob’s confidence disappears. Whatever flickers on Bob’s face, Bucky catches immediately, because of course he does.
“You know,” Bucky begins, and Bob knows he’s about to be painfully blunt like he always is— because if Bob can count on Bucky for one thing, it’s that he always calls out bullshit when he sees it— so Bob just steps forward.
“Can you move?” Bob says. He tries to make it come out like a demand, but it just sounds like a shaky request.
Bucky stares at Bob for a moment longer, before he sighs, shrugs, and leans back against the door, “Whatever you say.”
Bob moves forward to the opening. His confidence depletes by at least fifty percent, but the feeling of Bucky’s eyes drilling into the back of his head is enough to increase his spite proportionally. Bob doesn’t look up at where the others must be waiting. He just looks at his feet at the threshold of the doorway, thinks of Yelena’s stupid paintballs and bakery goods, and steps through.
It— doesn’t feel any different on the inside. He doesn’t know why he expects it to. It’s not even Bob’s first time in the training room, but the last time he’d been there, it was dark and there was nobody else. It’s bright in here, when the lights are on, and the walls get washed in a pristine white color that would be oddly off putting, if it weren’t for the momentary breaks in color where rock climbing walls were stuck on, or the corner for punching bags.
Bob’s eyes wander over it all as Bucky steps in behind him. He nearly jumps out of his skin when Bucky’s hand lands on his shoulder, jerking his head to the man with wide eyes.
That earns another confused, slightly concerned look, as Bucky retracts his hand as he says, “You can sit at the edge of the training mats. If you want.”
The spite returns. Bob frowns, “I’ll go where you’re going.”
“… Okay.”
“Okay.”
They stare at each other for a beat, before Bucky jerkily moves to walk towards the center of the training mats, where John and Alexei are chatting. Bob trails behind, hands wringing together as they get closer.
John spots Bob and lights up, “Hey, you came!”
Bob is a little surprised about how excited John sounds at the idea of Bob being here. Alexei seems rather giddy, as well, but Alexei always seems excited when Bob joins them in whatever activities they’re doing, for some reason.
(It never fails to make Bob feel warm, being wanted like that.)
But, John? Bob can’t help but feel a little sense of foreboding, despite the fact that he and John had seemed much better recently. John might even like Bob now, even though the concept seems so foreign. Bob knows he likes John. When John’s prickliness isn’t directed at him, he’s actually pretty funny.
“Hi.” Bob says, giving an awkward half-wave to them as Bucky joins the other three.
“Man,” John says, “We were wondering when you’d decide to joi— ow!” He cuts off as Bucky flicks his ear with his metal fingers. John’s arm goes to his head, turning an affronted face at the soldier.
“Go chalk up,” Bucky tells him in response, “We’re climbing.”
Bob’s hands stop wringing as he tilts his head. Climbing?
John grumbles something unintelligible, but he turns to follow the order nonetheless. Alexei grind and turns as well, corralling John with him. Before they can go, though, Bob finds his voice.
“Climbing?” He questions, and cringes when they all turn to him.
Bucky looks off at the wall to their left and crosses his arms, “Just right there,” he jerks his chin to the different variety of colorful stones for gripping and climbing, “There’s also one upstairs, but this one has the tallest—“
“Weren’t you sparring?” Bob blurts, and even though Bucky looks at him, not seeming all-too peeved at being cut off, Bob adds, “Sorry.”
Bucky opens his mouth, but John speaks, “We were. For like, ages.”
“So much sparring.” Alexei nods.
Bucky shrugs, “We’re climbing, now.” He eyes Bob, “Assuming you want to climb?”
He’s asking what Bob wants?
Bob sputters, caught off-guard, “No, I—“
“We also have treads, swimming, weights,” Bucky continues.
“—thought I’d be sparring.” Bob finishes.
He’s met with a variety of perplexed expressions.
“Wait.” John scrunches his brows, “You want to spar?”
“John.” Bucky starts, cutting him a sharp glance. John looks peeved, but just raises his palms and backs off. And—
That’s weird. That’s weird, right? Bob suddenly has a sense he’s missing a big part of this conversation.
He looks between them, tensing a little, “What?” He looks at Bucky, who’s sighing, now, “Why’s that so surprising?”
“Kid,” Bucky starts, but Bob clenches his hands at the hem of his shirt.
“I’m not a kid.” He then turns to Alexei, because he knows if anyone will spill, it’s him. The Red Guardian's eyes go wide, and he looks away quickly, “What’s going on?”
“Uhh,” Alexei begins, “We did not think you would want to spar?”
“Why not?”
“Because you are scared.” Alexei begins, but is cut off with a sharp jab in the gut by John. Alexei shrugs and mouths ‘what?’ But it’s too late.
Bob suddenly gets it.
They’d all discussed this before.
It wasn’t just Bucky that was giving him an out, it was all three of them. They knew Bob was too weak, too scared, so they’d come together and— and decided they’d do— climbing? Swimming?
Oh god. How long had they known? Were they just watching him pace outside the doors like a freak? For weeks? Bob feels a flare of betrayal, at all of them convening over him without saying anything. Frustration, that he hadn’t been nearly as subtle as he thought. And most of all, shame.
They knew. They knew how pathetic he was.
Did Yelena know?
“We just thought we’d start with something small,” John begins, “Like rock climbing. You know, arm strength is pretty important when—“
“I want to spar.” Bob cuts in, surprised by how level his voice sounds despite the turmoil in his gut. All three of the others shift, different levels of protest on their tongue.
Bucky shakes his head, “Look—“
“I said,” Bob repeats, more forcefully, “I want to spar.”
“Uh, no you don’t. You aren’t trained,” John finds his voice, face pinched and mildly frustrated. He looks four types of constipated, “We aren’t gonna fight someone who can’t dish it like it's given.”
“I’m a super soldier, too, remember?” Bob counters, fingers twisting harshly against one another, “You said this was a super-soldier only thing— so. Let me in.”
“No.” Bucky says firmly, “Having strength and knowing how to use it are two very different things.”
“Right.” John agrees, and if it were any situation, Bob might’ve marveled at the miracle of Bucky and John agreeing like this. But it wasn’t any other situation, and there was just this dark, twisting feeling in his chest that wasn’t leaving any room for hope or humor.
Each rejection felt like pushing a needle slowly into his chest. Bob had to prove he was— had to prove—
“It is not safe.” Alexei agrees, and Bob lets out a short breath between his teeth.
“I can do it.” Bob says under his breath, and he’s not even sure if he’s talking to them or himself. He wrings his hands again, “I won against you all before.”
“Hey,” John’s face scrunches a bit, looking mildly offended. Mild. Mild, like any of this is casual, or lighthearted, or anything but the crushing weight of looming failure awaiting Bob. “That didn’t count.”
Bob turns his head away sharply, gnawing on his lip. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Bucky’s arms uncross.
“Besides, it isn’t just about raw strength. You won on shock factor last time.” John shrugs.
“Alright.” Bucky begins, but John’s not done. Bob hunches his shoulders.
“To spar, you need to know the dance. The back and forth,” John continues, and even Alexei is oddly quiet as Bob starts feeling himself rapidly unraveling right there, “It’s not just about punching, yeah? You gotta know how to take a hit.”
Bob stops wringing his hands, shoulders tense. Something dark pools in his gut. It always comes down to that.
“I can take a hit.” Bob mutters, “Trust me. I can.”
The temperature in the room drops. Bob doesn’t look up from where he’s burning a hole in the carpet, but he doesn’t need to see their expressions to hear the tenseness in their silence.
They know, a voice whispers in his head, you can’t do anything about it, now.
Bob feels the frustration, shame, everything else, bleed out of him all at once, left with an empty sort of disappointment. He’s always left with that, when it comes to himself.
Bob just swallows, shifting a foot back, “Whatever. Forget I said anything.”
“Hold on.” Bucky begins, “Let’s talk about this.”
“Yeah, wait.” John takes a step forward, but Bob just shakes his head.
He turns and leaves.
———
Bob shuts the door to his room and lets the time slip through his fingers. He doesn’t think about spars. He doesn’t think about the progress he’d made, unraveled so quickly and so efficiently. He doesn’t think about how they all probably knew about how he was the only one still standing in place, never getting better. He must be—
“—fuckin’ insane.” That familiar, dark, slightly slurred voice cuts through Bob’s thoughts. “You a fuckin’ psycho or somethin’, Bobby?”
He couldn’t handle a single thing by himself. He was spiraling, again, and he’d drive himself into another corner until one of the others had to come find him and make sure he didn’t swallow another city or cause someone else irreparable trauma. He was trying. He was trying so hard to be good.
“You’re just making it worse.” His mother’s voice whispers along the edges of his mind, “You always make it worse.”
He doesn’t. Does he? Yelena says she’s happy to see him. Bucky says he’s a good kid. John says he does well. Alexei says he’s funny. Ava says he’s smarter than he looks. They’re all… they’re his…
“Family?” Two pairs of cold eyes look straight at him. “What are you talking about?”
“School.” He responds, voice small, eyes turned down, “It’s— uh. Family night.”
Silence. A soft chuckle.
“Wow.” His father mutters, nudging his mother, who flinches at the casual touch. His father doesn’t notice, or he doesn’t care. He laughs, and everything goes down with him, “Who taught him that word?”
And that’s just it. He knows, deep down, they care about him. He knows that, surely, they weren’t laughing behind his back or wishing he’d hurry up and become better or good or whatever. They weren’t thinking like that because they were good.
If they didn’t leave him in the dust, he would drag them back down. There was no good way out of this. Nothing. And yet, he still selfishly held onto their kindness, like he might feel some semblance of relief with them. He just wanted to slow down. He just wanted to breathe.
He just wanted to belong.
—
And like it always does, the sun comes out with Yelena.