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Yelena received the alert that someone had gone up to the roof of the tower at 2 am. She groaned as she rolled over in her bed, looking at her phone and reading the notification: ‘Movement detected by roof door’. In all honesty, Yelena regretted offering to be the one to monitor the roof overnight, but it was absolutely needed due to the not-so-stellar mental health of everyone living in the tower.
Regardless of this, Yelena ignored the notification, putting her phone down and turning over to go back to sleep. It was probably someone going to get some fresh air after a nightmare, and she wasn’t going to go and invade their privacy when they needed space for whatever they were going through.
Yelena liked that everyone in the tower had mental health issues. Well, no, she didn’t like it, more that she appreciated that everyone had a silent understanding of what everyone else was going through. It made dealing with everything somewhat easier.
As she dwelled on this, sinking back into sleep, her phone buzzed with another alert. This time, the tower’s AI spoke up, its booming, robotic voice jolting her out of any chance she had of falling back asleep.
“Miss Belova, this is a security warning that Mr Reynolds is within two feet of the edge of the roof.” The voice spoke. Now, there was no way in hell Yelena would even try to sleep. She was out of bed immediately and darted out of her room without taking a moment to form a thought.
Yelena had never been more grateful that her bedroom was only one floor away from the roof. Normally, she complained that the lift journey up to her room took too long or that it was always freezing on her floor – which was true – but she had nothing to complain about now that she was so much closer to potentially saving Bob.
God, she hoped he wasn’t doing what she thought he might be.
She practically flew up the stairs and punched her keycard against the sensor before throwing the doors to the roof open. She spotted Bob instantly, sitting with his legs dangling over the edge of the tower. Despite Yelena’s raucous entrance, he didn’t appear to have noticed her. He was still in his absurdly baggy pajamas, but something about the way he was shivering like he was in a snowstorm in spite of the warm temperatures of New York summer seemed off. It worried Yelena deeply, and that was before she even caught a glimpse of the needles discarded at his side.
“Bob?”
He turned around so quickly that Yelena’s heart pounded with the fear of him falling off the tower. She damned Tony Stark for not building this tower with more safety railings.
“Y-Yelena!” Bob stood up quickly with a huge, somewhat manic smile on his face, maybe to distract from his feet, which gently nudged the used needles behind him and out of Yelena’s sight. “You– it’s late, right? I thought you’d be… I thought everyone would be asleep. Y’know, ‘cause p-people sleep at night?” He paused for a moment, trying to decipher the expression on Yelena’s face. “N-not me, though. I’ve been reading about owls, right? They’re nocturnal, a-and I thought owls were cool, so I– I thought I’d give it a try.” He’s rambling. They both know it. His face is flushed and he’s fidgeting so badly that Yelena is actively fighting back the urge to grab him and hold him still.
She fixed him with a stern glare. “What are you doing up here? You know I get alerts when people get close to the edge, don’t you?”
Bob took a few seconds to think, then his eyes widened and he laughed a little. He looked scared, like a child caught sneaking a cookie after bedtime. “Oh, right..! Makes sense. I mean I wasn’t…” He glanced over the edge of the building and his expression seemed to darken before turning back to Yelena. “I wasn’t gonna jump. You know that.”
“I don’t.” She countered instantly, folding her arms. “You shouldn’t be getting too close to the edge. Especially at night. Especially when you’re high.”
Bob was the stillest he’d been throughout the whole confrontation. He looked slowly up at Yelena, then back down again, as if fearing his pale, sweaty, red-eyed face would give him away, which it would have if the needles hadn’t already. “M’not high.”
“Don’t lie to me, Bob. You told me you were clean after Project Sentry..”
“I was!” He protested, tears suddenly filling his eyes. He balled up his fists and began to pace quickly around in a figure eight. “I didn’t– I–” He sniffled and the tears were suddenly flowing. “I thought I was! I wasn’t going through the withdrawal symptoms or anything s-since my body had been so long without it! B-but I… I…”
He choked back a sob, and Yelena dropped most of her serious, grave act in favour of comforting Bob. She reached for his arm and pulled him into her arms. Bob was much taller than her, but that didn’t stop her from enveloping his entire, trembling figure in a tight hug. That seemed to calm him down, and he pressed his forehead into her shoulder. He swallowed thickly, like he was swallowing his guilt.
“There was this guy… and he had such a good price for it. And I had cash. It was… umm…” Bob exhaled unevenly, biting down on his dry, cracking lips. “It was during my last episode..? When I was just feeling so useless. I wanted to feel like Sentry, b-but without the crazy god-complex. I just wanted to feel invincible again.”
Usually, Bob despised talking about the Sentry. He never wanted to be a hero, after all. Now, he still wasn’t a hero, but he had two all-powerful beings cooped up inside him, both of whom have tried to hurt his friends. He felt like a danger to them, and it didn’t help his imposter syndrome. Worse than that, Bob rarely mentioned his bipolar disorder either.
The team (mainly Bucky and Yelena) had coaxed him into attending weekly therapy a couple of months ago, but he never really opened up to his therapist. She was lovely and patient and definitely experienced, but Bob didn’t trust her anymore. Not after he opened up about his self-harm to her, only for her to then tell Bucky and Yelena because apparently he was a ‘danger to himself’. He shuddered at the memory.
Basically, Yelena was caught by surprise that Bob was talking to her about this. Not that she wasn’t happy about it. If anything, she was ecstatic, but she kept her cool. Bob definitely didn’t need her celebrating his ability to talk about his problems right now. That could come later, maybe in the form of a few quiet words of praise for how brave he was. Bob knew he wasn’t brave, but he enjoyed hearing it from Yelena nonetheless.
Yelena’s hand traced up and down Bob’s back. “Okay. Did you keep the contact information of this dealer?”
Bob shook his head.
“You promise?”
He nodded, and Yelena believed him. She could feel the guilt resonating off him, and she knew he hated himself for relapsing.
“That’s great, Bob. Do you have any more needles? Or any drugs?”
He paused for a long time before nodding once, so faintly Yelena only just registered it. “F-few more needles… in my room...” He murmured into her shoulder, which received a responding nod from Yelena.
“Okay. We can deal with that tomorrow, Bob. Do you wanna sleep in my room tonight?”
Bob nodded frantically, pulling away to meet Yelena’s eyes. “Please. Please, thank you.”
This wouldn’t be the first night Bob had slept in Yelena’s room. Not in that way. In the way that when the voices got too loud, Bob found that Yelena’s presence helped him block them out. She was the anchor that stopped him from drifting away into his own head, and he needed that.
Sensing the desperation in Bob’s reaction, Yelena smiled faintly and slid his larger, quivering hand into her still, warm one, guiding him away from the edge of the roof and taking a silent sigh of relief. According to his word, Bob had no intention of jumping, but in the state he was in, he may well have fallen off the roof or that feeling of invincibility he gets when he’s high could have driven him to try and jump off without ever meaning to. The thought makes Yelena grip Bob’s hand so tightly it must be hurting him a little. She doesn’t want to hurt him, but the vision of Bob suddenly turning around and leaping towards the edge scares her more. Her grip doesn’t falter.
Yelena and Bob slowly walked inside and descended the stairs that – only moments ago – Yelena had sprinted up to catch Bob before he did something dangerous. She’s so glad she hadn’t ignored that alert. She only wished she could have ran faster, or maybe gone up and investigated after the first notification. Then, she could’ve stopped Bob from taking the drugs and relapsing.
She tells herself that it’ll be okay. She and the team will monitor Bob for a while, just to make sure he wasn’t suffering because of the relapse, both mentally and physically. She also made a mental note to check in with Bob’s therapist. She doesn’t tell Bob this, though. She’s been getting the feeling that he’s struggling with therapy. He hated the fact that this stranger knows everything about his traumatic past. He hated that everyone in the damn building knows his traumatic past.
As soon as the pair reached Yelena’s bedroom, Yelena was pushing Bob gently down onto the bed and wrapping him in a soft blanket. He normally had plushies in his own bedroom, but Yelena wasn’t confident in the idea of leaving him alone long enough to go down to his bedroom and back up again just for his giant stuffed cat. It didn’t seem like Bob was preparing to sleep anyway. He simply sat on the edge of the bed, shoulders hunched, leg bouncing, eyes haunted. Maybe the anxiety from his first high in over a year was too much to allow him to sleep. Yelena allowed it. She simply sat beside him, allowing him to lean on her shoulder as he recovered from the hectic night.
As Bob closed his eyes to try and shut out the world, Yelena picked up her phone and swiftly altered the security settings of Bob’s keycard, no longer granting him access to the roof. She trusted that he wouldn’t get high up there again, but this had been the breaking point of a week-long build-up of concern for Bob’s mental state. His depression had only been getting worse and, regardless of whether or not it was his intention tonight, Yelena knew it was for the best to play it safe in case Bob ever committed to–
She stubbornly blocked the thought from her mind and put her phone down, looking back at Bob. She was about to open her mouth to speak to him when she was interrupted by the buzz of a phone. Bob’s phone. Bob picked up the device and looked at it with sleepy eyes, but his eyes widened in surprise and a little disappointment as he read the notification, looking up at Yelena with those heart-wrenching puppy eyes of his. “You… you took away my roof access?”
Shit. Yelena had forgotten he would be notified.
His expression had fallen in upset as he looked at her, hoping for an explanation. “Why? I– I wasn’t– d-do you not trust me?”
“Of course I trust you, Bob.” Yelena protested without thinking, but when she thought about it, she realised she didn’t trust him. At least, she didn’t trust him not to hurt himself. She knew that, in Bob’s head, he would be doing the world a favour by taking himself out of it. He’d never admit that, though, which only made it harder to explain to him that she was doing this for his safety. “Bob, you understand that I’m just worried about you, right?”
Bob shook his head stubbornly, tears appearing in the corners of his eyes again, which broke Yelena’s heart. “I’m not going to do that, Lena!” He exclaimed, almost like he was begging her. “I go up there to– to calm down after…” He didn’t finish his sentence, but Yelena knew. “You… you can’t take that away from me..!”
“If you need roof time to calm down, you come and get me. Even if it’s night.” Yelena conceded, but Bob didn’t seem to accept that.
“No! I shouldn’t have to bother you whenever I can’t handle my own stupid brain.” He complained, wiping his eyes with his sleeve. “You can’t just ban me from somewhere in the tower! You’re treating me like I can’t handle myself! You and the others always act like I’m some kind of delicate little kid!”
“You’re acting like a kid, right now.” Yelena almost snapped in response, but she knew that would only remind Bob of his father and exacerbate the situation. Instead, she took a deep breath and allowed Bob to continue arguing.
“I– I can be trusted!” Bob claimed, only succeeding in getting more upset and not budging Yelena’s decision. “I’m not some mentally ill–”
“Bob.” Yelena cut him off, taking a hold of his hand. “You are mentally ill. And that’s okay.” Bob’s sobs began escaping and he curled up into a ball as he always did when forced to confront his mental health. “We’re getting you all the help we can. If there’s something you want us to do for you, Bob, you just need to ask.”
He shook his head in rejection, biting down onto his knuckles. Yelena cringed a little and gently guided his hand out of his mouth.
“I know, Bob. Believe me, I know.” She whispered, rubbing his back gently, then reaching up to wipe his tears as he continued to sniffle. “It’s difficult to believe things are gonna get better, but they are. We’re all here for you, now.”
Bob let out a final choked, ugly cry before disappearing into the blanket Yelena had given him, lying down on the bed. Yelena continued to gently stroke his back, hoping it was bringing the same comfort it usually did. Bob didn’t say anything about it, but it was. It always was.
It took a few minutes of crying for Bob to speak again. “I-I’m sorry for being a mess.”
Yelena shook her head. “You’re a perfect mess, Bob. I wouldn’t want you any other way.”
He cried harder after that, only this time there were happy tears in the mix.