Chapter Text
Sam Wilson has been witness to a lot of things he wishes he could unsee. Parts of the human anatomy that should never see the light of day. Civilian families shot dead in their cars because of miscommunications at checkpoints. Riley’s body spiralling to the ground in a smoke-plumed plummet. His own face in his bathroom mirror after waking up hung-over as hell at two in the afternoon, the day after the anniversary of Riley’s death, year after year after year.
And now, in an abandoned bunker on the outskirts of Boston, a seemingly unremarkable manila folder at the bottom of a filing cabinet.
Crouching before the drawer, he flips the folder open, expecting to find little more than what they’d already been discovering in abandoned HYDRA bases all across the eastern seaboard – mission reports, research notes, old video footage, manuals on handling the Winter Soldier.
They’re all disturbing in their own way, but somehow the latter always seem to get to Sam the most, even more than some of the more graphic material. The complete lack of humanity with which HYDRA viewed Bucky is just made so brutally, horrifyingly clear in the language used in those handbooks – words like ‘upkeep’ and ‘maintenance’ and ‘malfunction’ more suited for a piece of equipment than a human being. ‘It’ instead of ‘he.’ If Sam hadn’t known any better, he would have thought they were instructions for a weapon or tool of some sort.
The file he’s holding in his hands right now, however, contains a very different story.
It contains photos. Well over a dozen of them, all of Bucky, and in them he looks all too human.
Tears. Blood. Fear. Confusion. Pain.
Sam is ashamed of how taken aback he is by this evidence of humanity. He didn’t know Bucky Barnes – his only experience with the man was with the ruthless machine that HYDRA had forced him to become, so to have such emotion so clearly, agonisingly apparent on a face on which Sam has only ever seen fatal focus and deadly precision is more than a little jarring.
He barely has the chance to register the full horror of the actual content of the photos before Steve’s voice rings out from the other room.
“Sam?”
“Shit,” Sam mutters under his breath, unceremoniously stuffing the folder into his bag just as Steve comes to join him.
He looks the way he always does once they’ve finished clearing out a base. Jaw grimly set, eyes haunted, his entire being radiating tension as if it’s taking the full strength of every muscle in his body to keep him from literally falling apart.
(Sam is just grateful that this safehouse had been untouched when they’d reached it, because every now and then, they would find one that had clearly already been visited and subsequently ransacked, presumably by Bucky himself, and those are some of the most difficult days, when Steve shuts down completely and Sam can practically see him beating himself up in his head for once again being too late.)
“Done in here?” Steve asks Sam. His voice is clipped, curt.
Sam swallows hard. “Yeah. Yeah, let’s bounce.”
He follows Steve out of the bunker. The featherlight folder feels like an anvil in his bag.
They do the eight hour car ride back to D.C. in a single mostly silent sitting, stopping halfway through to switch drivers. The journey home is always more difficult than the one there, the air suffocatingly heavy with whatever latest discovery they’d just unearthed, and today is certainly no different, except for the part where it’s a hundred times worse.
Sam spends his time in the passenger seat wondering what the fuck to do about what he’d found. He hadn’t even had the time to do more than scan the first couple of photos, but what he’d seen remains seared into his brain like a terrible, burdensome brand.
Bucky drooling helplessly around a ball gag, his hair and lashes sticky with come; his ass cheeks being spread apart so the camera can zoom in on how torn and fucked open he is; Bucky with his face shoved into the floor, the person behind him hoisting him up at the hips with a bruising grip in order to get even more leverage.
Sam feels stupid and naive for it now, but the truth is that this is something he hadn’t even considered when it came to Bucky’s treatment in HYDRA’s hands. He’d prepared himself for evidence of all kinds of cruelty, and thanks to his occupation and past personal experiences, he’d say he had a better idea than most of the horrible things people were capable of doing to each other, but this? He’d never imagined this, and he doubts Steve would have either.
It’s going to destroy him.
The past two and a half weeks have already taken a horrific toll on Steve. He would never admit it, of course, but at this point, he doesn’t even have to; it’s a fact that makes itself known all on its own. It’s in the ever-darkening circles beneath his eyes, the shortness of his temper, his dogged denial that anything is wrong. He is a powder keg, a pinless hand grenade, and it’s only a matter of time before everything blows up in their faces, but Sam doesn’t push him. He knows he can’t force anything to happen, can only try to contain the explosion whenever it does occur, then hope to survive the aftermath.
By the time Steve has dropped him off at his house, Sam still hasn’t mustered up the guts to say anything about the photos. Hell, he still hasn’t even decided whether he has the right to – even just reading some of the reports they’d uncovered had already felt so unsettlingly voyeuristic, like an intensely intimate betrayal, despite their impersonal tone and clinical language. Sam feels guilty enough for having seen the photos himself, and he’d only caught a glimpse; telling someone else about their existence seems out of the question.
He lays the folder on his coffee table and stares at it for a long time, feeling crushed by its weight as he sits there hunched forward with his elbows on his knees and his hands steepled beneath his chin.
He’s so out of his depth here it’s not even funny.
He has no precedent for this, no past experience from which he could possibly draw guidance. He tries to think of other occasions where he’s had to decide between someone’s safety or their trust. He knows he’s always telling veterans and their families that they should never promise to keep it a secret when someone else reveals to them that they are having thoughts of harming themselves or others, emphasising that their wellbeing is more important than their privacy in such times, but he’s not sure if this is really the same thing.
He doesn’t know what exactly he’d be accomplishing by telling Steve about the photographs, since Bucky isn’t necessarily in danger right now. Hell, they don’t even know where he is, and the only way Sam could imagine it being helpful for Steve to know about this is so that they will have a better idea of what they’re up against when helping Bucky through his recovery, but if Bucky isn’t here then it’s all kind of a moot point, isn’t it?
Sam hates how relieved he feels once he comes to this conclusion. He’s trying to tell himself that it’s the most rational course of action to be taking, but even if it is, he knows that his main motive behind choosing it is avoidance. This is not something he wants to have to deal with, isn’t something he thinks he can deal with.
So he decides he won’t. Not just yet. Not until he has to.
Given how elusive Bucky has been, he figures that won’t be for a while. He’ll have some time to think it through, maybe get some advice on how to handle the situation.
But then Steve is calling him at seven a.m. the next morning, his voice breathy and oddly-pitched as he says, over and over again, like he still can’t quite believe it’s true, “Sam. He’s back. He’s back. He’s here.”
Bucky looks better than Sam expected.
Well, he’s not quite sure what he’d expected exactly, but it probably wasn’t this clean-shaven, trim-haired young man who is currently sitting at Steve’s kitchen table, calmly sipping at a cup of coffee as if he was simply going about his daily morning routine.
“Sam,” Steve says, nodding at him. “Bucky. Bucky, Sam.”
“Uh,” Sam says, standing awkwardly in the middle of the room, admittedly reluctant to come any closer and not quite sure what the social etiquette is when it comes to being introduced to someone who has recently tried to kill you. “Hi.”
“Sorry about the wings,” is the first thing Bucky says, his voice an easygoing blend of smirking wryness and self-deprecating sincerity.
It’s only then that Sam realises this is the first time he’s actually heard Bucky speak. Again, he feels guilty for how much it catches him offguard that Bucky sounds so... normal... though this time he’s not sure if that surprise comes from the previous image of Bucky he’d had in his head or from what he now knows about him.
“Don’t mention it,” Sam replies, still kind of overwhelmed by the entire situation. “It’s not like it was one-of-a-kind specialised military equipment or anything.”
Bucky laughs, then looks at Steve and says, “I like this guy. Where’d you find him?”
Steve chuckles and starts to recount the story of how they’d met on the Mall. He’s practically fucking beaming, the lines of tension finally gone from his face, and all at once Sam’s heart drops to the pit of his stomach because he realises that Steve really has absolutely no idea. Sam tries to tell himself that that’s to be expected, since it’s been less than forty eight hours since Bucky’s returned, but he can’t help the sinking suspicion that time has nothing to do with it.
“Betcha never would’ve guessed that the great Captain America was such a little shit, huh?” Bucky says to Sam.
“The history books kinda neglected to mention that part,” Sam admits as he takes a seat at the table next to Steve.
Steve rolls his eyes, but Sam can tell he’s basking in the familiarity of Bucky’s words, because they mean that Bucky really does remember him, that Bucky still knows him better than anyone else on the planet.
Sam eyes Bucky warily, wondering what else he remembers. According to some of HYDRA’s documents, the efficiency of the mind wipes had steadily decreased throughout the years, to the point where their effect was starting to wear off after as little as a week. Bucky has now been free for nearly three, and it’s clear that he remembers both himself and Steve pretty well, which corroborates the notes that said he tended to regain his long-term memory first, but how much does he recall of more recent times?
It suddenly occurs to Sam that even Bucky might not be aware of the photographs and the circumstances behind them. And god, does that ever open up a whole new can of worms, because it would mean Sam now has to try and figure out not only how to tell Steve, but also Bucky himself about what happened to him – that is, if he even decides to say anything at all. Sam knows better than anyone that people react to trauma in a myriad of different, unpredictable ways, but supposing that Bucky really is as okay as he seems right now – does Sam let him keep walking around with that ticking time bomb inside of him, hoping that it remains dormant, or does he bring Bucky’s world crashing down on him to prevent this horrible thing from growing and festering?
Ultimately, Sam resolves to hold his tongue until he has more information. He can’t gauge how well Bucky is coping from a mere ten minutes in the same room with him, nor should he worry about having to tell Bucky anything until he knows for sure how much Bucky remembers.
He watches Bucky carefully, searching for anything at all that might give him a clue as to just how deep this goes, and he hates how he’s almost hoping to find some kind of indication that something is wrong, because then at least he’ll have one less secret to harbour.
He just wishes he’d somehow known Bucky before all this. That would maybe make it easier for him to detect any anomalies in his behaviour, to spot any possible red flags. Yesterday on the phone he’d asked Steve how Bucky seemed, and though Steve only had positive things to report, Sam’s not sure if he can really trust his perception. Steve has always been a Fake It Til You Make It kind of guy, except there’s a thin line between that and willful blindness, and Sam can’t help but to think that if Steve is desperate enough to believe that Bucky is okay, then he’ll find a way to convince himself of it.
“Sam?”
Sam realises he'd been zoning out and immediately snaps himself back to the present. Both Steve and Bucky are fixing him with looks of slight concern.
“Sorry,” Sam says quickly. “This is all just... kind of a lot to be taking in right now.”
Steve snorts softly. “You can say that again.”
There’s a brief silence, then Bucky says, “I really am sorry, Sam.”
This time there’s none of the previous snark in his tone. His voice is quiet and solemn and he doesn’t seem to be able to look Sam in the eye, which makes Sam feel a little sick for some reason.
“Hey man,” he says, trying to sound breezy, “It’s really no biggie. It wasn’t your fault.”
Bucky’s eyes darken. It’s clear that he doesn’t agree, that he still blames himself for these things that were completely out of his control, and Sam fears that this is how he’ll view his abuse as well.
Sam tries a different approach.
“It’s not your fault,” he repeats, “But I forgive you.”
Steve nods and murmurs, “It wasn’t you, Buck.”
He reaches out to lay a hand on Bucky’s flesh arm and Sam just barely keeps himself from trying to signal to him not to touch Bucky, even though he’s not fully sure how he would have conveyed the message subtly – perhaps through a combination of minute gestures and his now-patented Don’t even think about it, Rogers facial expression.
When Bucky does not flinch, Sam lets out the breath he didn’t realise he’d been holding, prompting Steve to give him a bit of a questioning look.
“So!” Sam says brightly, not giving Steve a chance to ask him about his seemingly odd reaction. “You got your pal back, what’s next on the list? You get around to watching Rocky II yet?”
“Uh, actually,” says Steve, “We – Bucky and me, that is – we were thinking about heading out again.”
“Wait, you mean back on the Great American Road Trip Of Revenge? Dude. We just got back.”
“We barely covered the east coast,” Steve points out.
“No rest for the wicked,” Bucky says with a grim grin.
“In 1945 I made a promise not to stop until every member of HYDRA was dead or captured,” Steve adds. He laughs, a little bitterly, but it’s still more genuine than Sam’s heard from him in a while. “Turns out I missed a few.”
Sam notices that Steve still hasn’t removed his hand from Bucky’s forearm and he can’t tell if Bucky’s shoulders are beginning to hunch over with tension or if he’s reading too much into things.
“Steve, can I talk to you a minute?” he says abruptly.
Steve frowns. “Alone?”
“If it’s okay,” Sam says, shooting an apologetic look in Bucky’s direction.
Bucky just gives a good-natured nod. Steve sighs and stands up, following Sam into the bedroom and closing the door behind them.
“Are you really sure this is a good idea?” Sam asks, keeping the volume of his voice as low as possible because he doesn’t know how good Bucky’s hearing is. “Just... jumping back into everything? Not giving him a chance to readjust?”
“He needs this, Sam,” Steve says resolutely. “Besides, it’s what he’s been doing this whole time anyway, isn’t it? The only difference is that he won’t be alone anymore.”
“I understand. And I’m not arguing that this might be what he needs. But I just... It’s a bit more complicated than that. You have no idea what he’s been through.”
Steve’s eyes flash with anger at this and Sam realises he probably could have phrased himself a little more tactfully.
“I read all the documents we found,” Steve hisses. “I have just as good an idea as you.”
You really reaaalllly don’t, Sam thinks miserably, but all he says is, “I’m just saying, maybe we should try to avoid potentially... volatile... situations until we have a better idea of how he’s doing. There are a shitload of issues at play here, Cap. Just because he isn’t a total mess doesn’t necessarily mean he’s coping.”
“He’s holding up,” Steve insists. “Look, you weren’t here when we talked yesterday, so you didn’t see how much he... Sam, he’s himself again.”
That’s what Sam is worried about. No longer safeguarded by his programming, Bucky is now left vulnerable and unprotected against the full impact of the horrors he went through.
It also worries Sam that Bucky is seemingly so similar to his 'old' self because he knows there’s no way that anyone could have emerged from such an ordeal unscathed, so it does not seem unreasonable to conclude that Bucky is trying very hard to be who he thinks Steve wants him to be. And from the looks of things, he’s got it down pat.
“How much does he remember?” Sam asks, hoping, pleading, praying—
“He said he remembers everything.”
“Everything meaning...?”
“His past. Himself. ...Me. It was incredible, actually. We just talked for hours as if we were two old friends catching up. Which, I suppose we were. Are. God, it’s still weird to be talking about him in the present tense.”
The sunshine smile that is back on Steve's face almost makes Sam unwilling to pose his next question, but he knows it has to be done:
“Did he tell you what he remembers about... being with HYDRA?”
The smile vanishes and Steve’s face closes off into a blank wall. “He... Yeah. Pretty much everything of that, too. Everything we read about.”
“But nothing that we... didn’t read about?”
Sam worries he’s pushed too hard when Steve gives him a funny look, but all he says is, “Well, I mean, some details, I guess, but none of it exactly came as a surprise.”
“Oh,” Sam murmurs, his stomach tying itself into knots.
The facts are now this: Steve does not know. Bucky either does not know, or is lying to Steve about it. Sam suspects it’s the latter, but regardless of which one it is, it still leaves Sam bearing this unimaginable burden in silence.
“I think everything’s going to be okay, Sam,” Steve says after a moment, voice soft. “For the first time in... fuck, I don’t even know how long— I think everything’s going to be okay. I mean, yeah, Bucky’s obviously got a lot of shit to deal with, but I know how strong he is.”
“Well,” Sam sighs, feigning long-suffering exasperation, “Guess if you guys are absolutely set on Revenge Road Trip, Redux, then I’m coming along too. Someone has to make sure the two of you don’t go off and get yourselves killed, and besides, Natasha would have my head if I let you guys do anything stupid.”
Steve laughs for the third time today, which is definitely a new record, and serves to confirm the thought that had motivated Sam’s decision to tag along on this latest fool’s errand: he can’t let either of them face this alone.
In a civilian setting, hyperarousal is, at best, a terrible nuisance. In a warzone? Zombie apocalypse? Great. It’ll keep you alive. In your bed trying to fall asleep at night? Ninety nine percent of the time, not so useful.
Then again, joke’s on whoever wasn’t prepared for whatever happens in the remaining one percent.
When Sam hears the creak of the living room floorboards that night, his system instantly kicks into overdrive in a way that hasn’t happened to him in months. He practically lunges out from beneath the covers, automatically reaching for the Glock stashed under the bed – it’s a testament to how far he’s come that he doesn’t insist on keeping it loaded anymore, but as he fumbles for the ammo in his nightstand drawer, he’s kind of cursing himself for it.
He ducks out of his bedroom and rounds the corner into the living room, heart pounding, gun ready, and he finds himself staring at—
“Bucky?!”
The black-clad figure in the corner of his living room freezes and slowly turns to face Sam. He is wild-eyed and almost feral-looking, nearly unrecognisable as the cool, composed young man that Sam had met earlier that day.
“Fucking Christ on a cracker!” Sam groans, starting to feel shaky all over as the adrenaline tide in his body begins to recede. “Bucky? What are you even doing here?”
He lowers the gun but doesn’t put it down completely, still wary of the situation. Bucky may not be dangerous in the same calculated, deadly way as he was when he was the Winter Soldier, but there’s no telling what he might do in the seemingly unstable state he’s in right now.
“Where are they?” Bucky asks, staring straight at Sam. His voice is rough, hoarse, nothing like before.
“Dude, I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Sam says, except he does, and in the dozens of possible scenarios that he’d conjured up in his head when it came to how shit would eventually hit the fan, this – Bucky breaking into his house in the dead of night – was admittedly not one that had crossed his mind.
Bucky doesn’t reply at first, merely eyes Sam suspiciously for long enough that Sam starts to hope this has all just been a big misunderstanding, but then Bucky shakes his head as if to clear some sort of fog there and he says, “No, I know you know. That’s why you talked to Steve today. I... I heard some of what you were saying. I heard you ask about what he knew.”
Sam blinks, stunned that Bucky had been able to come to this conclusion from what little information he had. He supposes he’d vastly underestimated the level of vigilance with which Bucky must have been observing him and Steve. As Sam was scanning Bucky for clues as to how much Bucky knew, Bucky must have been doing the same with him, and with an almost paranoid efficiency that has clearly made itself worth it in the end.
“But Steve didn’t know,” Bucky continues, “Which means it was you. So. Where are they?”
Sam’s shoulders slump in resignation. There’s no use pretending anymore, but he doesn’t quite know how to proceed from here.
All he knows is that he has a lot of questions.
“How do you even know about... them...?” he asks curiously.
Bucky’s nostrils flare and he swallows several times before spitting out, “Some HYDRA son of a bitch I’d captured was tryin’ to get to me. Said there were some old... mementos... that I might want to make sure no one else got their hands on. Gave me a couple locations. I– I just thought he was fucking with me until I got to one of the places on his list, and... and... After that, I went to all of them. The one in Boston was the last one...”
He trails off, but Sam thinks he’s starting to get a better idea of how they reached this point. Bucky must have seen that the base in Boston had already been cleared out, and oh god, how horrified must he have been at the thought of someone else having discovered those photos before he did...
“Is that why you came back?” Sam asks softly, finally unloading the gun and laying it down on the end table by the couch, hoping that the less threatening he appears, the more comfortable Bucky will feel talking to him. “To make sure the photos weren’t—”
“Yes,” Bucky cuts in brusquely, looking like he would rather be absolutely anywhere else on Earth than in this room having this conversation.
Sam’s chest spasms with sorrow at the realisation that this whole time he and Steve had assumed Bucky was out there merely taking his pound of flesh, he had actually been on this grim scavenger hunt. What they’d believed to be a matter of simple retribution was likely more of a fear-driven scramble to make sure those private horrors didn’t become public along with everything else that the world has already found out.
“They’re safe, Bucky,” Sam says in as gentle and genuine a tone as he can manage. “No one’s seen them except me.”
A flicker of relief manages to make its way past the steel blankness of Bucky's expression, though his cheeks also flush with humiliation.
“Where are they?” he asks again, this time not looking Sam in the eye.
“The folder is in my room. On the nightstand.”
Bucky gives a curt nod and strides briskly past Sam into the bedroom, emerging a moment later with the folder in question gripped tightly in both hands, held against his chest as if he’s trying to keep it out of sight. As if Sam hadn’t already seen what was in it. Bucky’s shame hangs thick in the air, and Sam can’t help but to avert his gaze, as if that would afford Bucky any measure of dignity.
For a moment, nobody seems to know what to do. Sam hasn’t moved from where he’s standing by the couch, while Bucky has made his way towards the back door but for some reason is hesitating to open it.
He stares at the doorknob for a long time before he says Sam’s name. It’s only a single syllable, but his tone is so definitive and imposing that Sam immediately snaps to attention.
Once more, the person in front of him bears little resemblance to any of the previous incarnations of Bucky Barnes that Sam has witnessed thusfar, and he wonders just how many masks Bucky has carefully constructed for himself; if he remembers who he really is under all of them. Then again, Sam knows that it’s a little more complicated than just something hidden beneath a bunch of protective layers. That implies that there lies some kind of untainted, unaffected ‘true’ self at the core, which Sam has come to learn isn’t quite the case, and if you go about thinking of it in that way, you risk peeling away all the layers only to find out that some of them were a part of your real self all along.
Bucky says, “Steve can’t know.”
It’s not a statement so much as it’s a command.
“Bucky...” Sam says helplessly.
“Steve. Can’t. Know,” Bucky repeats, aggression beginning to sharpen his words.
Everything about his stance now screams hostility, from the straightening of his spine to the way his once-fretful gaze has hardened into a stone-still glare. Sam feels his nerves starting to buzz to life again but he doesn’t back down because he knows Bucky has no intention of hurting anyone. He’s simply trying to hide a very real fear in the growl of his voice and the squaring of his shoulders – and he might’ve gotten away with it, too, if it weren’t for the fact that Sam knows exactly where to look because he’s tried to stash bad feelings away in many of those same places.
“Bucky,” he says carefully, “Please, hear me out on this.”
“There’s nothing to be said,” Bucky snaps.
“I– I understand that this is something extremely, intensely personal, and I’m not saying you have to tell Steve, but please, tell someone.”
“I’m telling you,” Bucky mumbles, suddenly seeming very small.
“You know what I mean.”
“What, you want me to lie down on some head-shrinker’s couch and talk about my feelings?” Bucky snarls. The ferocity is back in his voice, bitter and biting. “Fuck that. No point in sitting around stewing in it. It happened. I’ll get over it.”
With that, Bucky storms out of the house, slamming the door hard enough that it rattles the walls.
Sam stands there for another minute or two, trying to process what the fuck just happened, before it occurs to him that he has no idea where Bucky is headed right now. He wouldn’t be surprised if Bucky just took off on his own again now that he’s made sure his secret has been kept. That would certainly be the easiest way to keep Steve from finding out, assuming that he trusted Sam not to tell.
This of course brings Sam to that ever-deepening question of what to do with Steve, not only when it comes to the big picture, but even just with this immediate issue of Bucky possibly skipping town again. Sam desperately wants to call Steve to find out if Bucky returned home, but it’s two a.m. so he can’t exactly contact Steve right now without it looking like an emergency.
There’s not much else to do but wait until morning.
Once he wakes up, Sam texts Steve with a hopefully casual-sounding so how was the third night back with bucky?
Steve replies five minutes later.
He stayed out late. Said he wanted some alone time to clear his head. He seems fine though.
After a minute, another message: Btw we’re about to go for a jog if you want to be lapped by not only one, but TWO people, followed, inexplicably, by the poop emoji.
Sam isn’t sure what to do now. He’d like to be able to go check up on how Bucky is doing, but everything that just happened is still so fresh and raw that he has a feeling it would likely be a spectacularly unproductive if not straight-up disastrous attempt. Plus, Steve would be there.
(Sam can’t help but to get an image in his head of Steve asking Bucky if it was okay to invite him on the jog with them and Bucky forcing that careless smile and saying of course when Sam is probably the last person he wants to see right now.)
Sam takes a deep breath.
meet you by the lincoln memorial in 45.
Bucky looks... better than Sam expected.
Both he and Steve are dressed in a simple hoodie and pair of sweat pants. Bucky also has a baseball cap tugged low over his eyes, but when Sam approaches, he raises his head to meet Sam’s gaze, holding it defiantly, as if daring him to act anything but normal.
“’Morning,” Sam says with a halfhearted wave, suddenly not feeling up to running, and if this charade is already so exhausting for him, he doesn’t even want to imagine how drained Bucky must feel.
Steve and Bucky humour Sam for the first two miles or so, restricting their pace in order to let Sam keep up, but after about fifteen minutes Sam can tell Steve is getting antsy. Sam can’t blame the guy; if he had a body like that, he’d want to work it at maximum capacity, too.
“I appreciate you looking out for my pride, Cap,” Sam huffs, “But don’t feel like you gotta hold back for my sake. Go on ahead if you want, I’ll probably just end up seeing you again in ten minutes anyway.”
Steve grins at him. “Maybe Bucky will keep you company if you ask nice.”
“Yeah, hang back with me for a little, will ya, Bucky?” Sam asks, feeling guilty for pushing Bucky like this but not knowing when else he’d get a similar opportunity to catch Bucky alone.
Bucky shoots Steve a Look that probably only Sam interprets at murderous but nevertheless he stays behind as Steve speeds off.
“You still planning on hitting the road again?” Sam asks once Steve is out of earshot.
“Uh huh,” Bucky grunts unenthusiastically.
“I’m just curious... Why? I mean, I guess I know why, but I mean, why agree to go with Steve if you don’t... if you don’t want him to know?”
“’Cause I know how Steve works,” Bucky replies tersely. “If he says he wants all of HYDRA dead or captured, then he’s gonna keep going until he either accomplishes that or gets himself killed in the process.”
Bucky’s obvious drive to keep Steve safe, even after everything, makes Sam’s heart simultaneously clench and bloom. It occurs to him that perhaps one of the reasons Bucky is so intent on keeping everything a secret is not too dissimilar from one of Sam’s own motives – to protect Steve.
“Steve is an idiot,” Sam readily agrees, “But if that’s your only reason for staying... Well, I know I’m no super soldier, but you know I’d never let anything happen to him. You don’t have to put yourself through this for his sake, if you’re not really ready to be back here just yet.”
“I was always planning on coming back,” Bucky counters. “Had hoped to be a bit more... put together... when I did, but I guess circumstances kinda pushed the timetable up a bit.”
There’s a long pause, then Bucky adds, so quietly that Sam almost has to ask him to repeat himself, “I also gotta make sure he doesn’t... find anything else in those HYDRA bases.”
Oh, Sam thinks, and he supposes Bucky isn’t being all that unreasonable. Who knows how much other terrible evidence is out there, lying at the bottom of filing cabinet drawers, just waiting to be discovered by the wrong person. Knowing Steve won’t be abandoning the hunt any time soon, Bucky probably figures it’s safest to tag along and make sure he gets his hands on it first.
“Bucky, you can’t keep this hidden from him forever,” Sam says.
The assassin’s gleam is back in Bucky’s eyes when he looks over at Sam and hisses, “Just watch me.”
He increases his pace, and to his credit, he doesn’t completely leave Sam eating his dust, just makes sure that he’s keeping a good few metres ahead. Beyond talking range.
Sam struggles to wrestle down the frustration that’s bubbling up in his chest at the wild fluctuations in Bucky’s behaviour. One moment he’s opening up to Sam in ways that Sam honestly wouldn’t have expected, the next he’s lashing out or viciously keeping his distance. It’s the fleeting moments of vulnerability that have Sam suspecting there’s a part of Bucky that desperately does not want to keep all this locked away inside him. The truth sneaks out in rushes and ruptures before some deep-rooted self-preservation instinct kicks in and reseals the bursted seams, but if he keeps this up for much longer he’s going to be ripped apart, and Sam can’t let that happen.
At the same time, however, Sam’s not sure if it’s in his place to intervene. After all, if this is how Bucky is choosing to cope with the unimaginable horrors that were done to him, then what right does Sam have to deny him of that? It’s obviously not exactly the healthiest way to handle things, but it just feels so wrong to try to sway the decisions of someone who’d been stripped of all autonomy for seventy years.
Sam abruptly stumbles to a halt, suddenly feeling too sick to keep running. He hasn’t been this consumed by helplessness in a long time, and with that helplessness comes a bizarre, unfamiliar longing for his military days, when all the decisions were made for him. Sure, having to take orders all the time was a huge pain in the ass, and rationally he knows he doesn’t ever want to return to a place of such subordination, but a part of him can’t help but to wish there was someone around right now to tell him exactly how to proceed, because he sure as hell doesn’t know what to do.
Sam is about to settle in for a mindless night of eating ice cream right out of the container in front of old episodes of the Adam West Batman series when there is a knock at his front door. He initially has half a mind not to answer it, figuring that anyone he actually wants to see would have texted or called first, but for some reason his thoughts drift back to that unassuming afternoon when Steve and Natasha had appeared on his doorstep completely unannounced and he can’t bring himself to ignore whatever potential life-changer has shown up on his front porch this time.
It’s Bucky.
Sam feels like he should be more surprised about this than he actually is.
“I appreciate you knocking this time,” he says dryly as he steps aside to let Bucky in.
The smile that Bucky shoots him is nervous, almost bashful, and seems horribly out of place somehow. Sam has observed Bucky adopting several different personas, but this kind of expression doesn’t appear to fit with any of the ones he’s seen so far. It’s too docile to be a threat, not genuine enough to be feigned cheerfulness, and he wouldn’t be emoting at all if he was in master assassin mode.
“Sooo,” Sam says expectantly when Bucky fails to initiate a conversation, despite being the one who’d sought Sam out in the first place.
Bucky’s head is ducked low but he’s looking up at Sam through his eyelashes as he says, “I have a... I’ve got... something to ask of you.”
Sam blinks a couple of times, taken aback by the seemingly sudden request. Bucky’s unusually meek body language is making him a little uneasy for reasons that he can’t quite put his finger on, but he dares to hope that perhaps it’s because Bucky has finally decided to open up, and this is how he looks when he’s allowing himself to be vulnerable.
“Of course, Bucky,” Sam says gently, leading Bucky into the living room where he sits down on the couch and gestures for Bucky to join him. “Anything you want.”
Bucky takes a seat inexplicably close to Sam, leaning his upper body slightly in towards him but still not raising his head to meet Sam square in the eye.
Sam coughs uncomfortably and scoots a few inches away. “So you, uh, you wanted to talk?”
“I never said talk,” Bucky murmurs in an oddly husky voice as he reaches out with his flesh hand to cup Sam’s knee.
“Whoaaaa, h-h-hey,” Sam gasps as he jerks away like he's been jolted with an electric shock, but he soon feels guilty for having reacted so extremely because the last thing he wants is to scare Bucky off.
...No, scratch that. That’s the second last thing he wants. What he wants even less than that is for this scenario to continue playing out in the direction in which he’s started to think it’s heading, though he’s still wishing there’s any way he could be wrong.
“Thank you for not telling Steve,” Bucky whispers, still in that unsettlingly low and breathy voice. “I can make it worth your while. And– and not even just right now. Any time you want. As long as you continue to keep quiet.”
Sam stares at him, agape and horrified, frozen in place with shock.
He realises with a sick lurch in his gut that things are even worse than he’d initially thought. So much worse. The revelation of the sexual abuse Bucky had suffered had been horrific enough on its own that Sam hadn’t even stopped to consider the possibility of it running even deeper than ‘just’ a few run-of-the-mill assaults. But now, it’s become distressingly clear that they were not just random acts of violence committed by a few overeager perverts who couldn’t keep it in their pants – they were a deliberate, calculated tactic used to break Bucky completely, to further drive home the idea that he existed only to serve.
Bucky’s actions right now are not the ones of someone who just woke up this morning and came to the rational, independent conclusion that this was the optimal way to go about getting what he wants. No, this is behaviour that was trained into him, the devastating product of years and years of abuse and manipulation that taught him that this was the best – and perhaps only – thing he has to offer. The most effective means of avoiding pain.
Sam doesn’t even want to try to imagine the kinds of things that had to happen to Bucky in order for this message to be instilled; how brutal and habitual the lessons must have been for this script to have entrenched itself so deeply into Bucky’s brain that he still turns to it even now.
Sam is also appalled by the fact that Bucky clearly believed this was something that Sam would react positively to – just what kind of guy does Bucky think Sam is, anyway? Except of course Sam knows that it really has absolutely nothing to do with Bucky’s interpretation of Sam’s character, and everything to do with the fact that Bucky knows no other kind of person aside from ones who want to use him, so of course he’s going to think Sam is the same as all the rest of them. It’s been so ingrained in his mind that this is all anyone will ever want from him that now he just automatically assumes it of everyone he meets.
Except Steve.
A small mercy, that Bucky is able to remember the one part of his life that didn’t hurt. Sam wonders if that has anything to do with why Bucky is so relentlessly determined to keep all of this hidden from Steve – Steve is his one last hope to prove that he isn’t ruined beyond repair. If he can slip his way back into Steve’s life, be the person that Steve wants him to be, then maybe, just maybe, he has a chance.
The sensation of Bucky’s palm sliding up his thigh jolts Sam out of his increasingly troubled thoughts.
“It’s a pretty good deal,” Bucky’s saying, and by this point, the fake honey velvet tone of his voice is literally making Sam feel nauseous. “You don’t tell Steve, and you can have me any time you want me.”
“Bucky,” Sam finally manages. The two syllables sound like they’ve gotten tangled in his throat. “Bucky, please stop touching me like that.”
To Sam’s utter relief, Bucky withdraws his hand, but he looks wounded and bewildered, like he doesn’t understand why this isn’t working out the way it usually does.
Then, the confusion gives way to a grim understanding and he says, “It’s okay, I get it. The STRIKE guys never wanted me to touch them either. So just... tell me how you want me and I’ll let you d—”
“Bucky, no, that’s not what I meant,” Sam cuts in frantically, struggling to keep his reactions in check.
He somehow needs to convey how wrong the situation is without making Bucky feel like Sam is disgusted with him. It’s a delicate balance that Sam has come to hone quite well in his years with the VA, where he learned to never look too shocked or disturbed upon hearing about someone’s feelings or thoughts or experiences, lest you make them feel even more alienated than they likely already do.
“I’m really good,” Bucky insists after a moment, as if the only reason Sam isn’t accepting his proposition is because he harbours doubts about Bucky’s capabilities.
“That’s not what this is about,” Sam says.
“Is it... Is it because of what you saw in the pictures?”
“What? Oh my god, no, no, of course n—”
“I know no one really wants sloppy seconds – or sloppy twenty seconds,” Bucky says desperately, “But I heal so well that I might as well still be untouched. And it’s been a long time. You won’t even be able to tell.”
Sam really does think he might throw up. He tries to speak but it’s as if all the words he knows have gone on strike and only a strangled noise comes out.
“Or is it because of how I look in them?” Bucky asks, seeming to become more and more distressed the longer that Sam avoids accepting his offer. “Because those pictures are old. I mean, I think so, anyway. I– I’m better at it now, I swear. I won’t make those dumb faces, and I don’t cry anymore. Unless you want me to—”
“God, no, I don’t!” Sam bursts out, completely unable to rein in his emotions anymore. “I don’t want you to. I don’t want you to do any of this!”
Bucky lowers his head even further, but this time there’s no trace of the previous coyness, he just looks crushed and cowed, and Sam’s afraid that he’s really fucked this one up.
“I’m not angry with you, Bucky,” he says quickly, hating how he can’t seem to keep his tone from getting all delicate; he doesn’t want Bucky to feel as though Sam is talking down to him. “I’m just... concerned. Why are you doing this?”
He’s trying to gauge Bucky’s understanding of the situation at hand, to know where they’re at in terms of just how deeply embedded these beliefs and behaviours are. Maybe Bucky is somewhat able to distinguish between what his handlers wanted and what ordinary people expect from him, or maybe he has absolutely no idea. Either way, Sam thinks it might help to know as much as possible before he goes about trying to set things straight.
Bucky’s eyes narrow suspiciously. “I already told you why.”
“To guarantee my silence about the pictures,” Sam guesses.
A slow nod is the only response he gets from Bucky.
“I guess I meant more along the lines of... why would you think this specifically was a good way to get me to do what you wanted,” Sam clarifies, hoping he’s not pushing too hard.
For the first time, Bucky looks deeply embarrassed, which could mean that he acknowledges that his actions were perhaps unsuited for the given circumstances, or it could simply be his humiliation at what he views as his own failure to satisfy Sam.
“That’s just how it works,” Bucky finally replies.
“I understand that that’s how things might have been done with HYDRA,” Sam says, fumbling to get his point across, “But... What HYDRA did to you, what they made you do, it’s... It was wrong.”
“They didn’t make me do anything,” Bucky says bitterly, folding his arms across his chest and looking away.
Sam opens his mouth to counter that but ultimately decides that perhaps that’s a battle better suited for another time, so he just says, “Well, either way, things aren’t like that anymore. You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do. You have choices now, Bucky. You can say no.”
“I fucking know that,” Bucky scowls, his voice suddenly harsh and impatient, and it’s dizzying how quickly he seems to be able to switch out of one mask and into another.
“Then why did you touch me like that earlier?”
Bucky starts compulsively clenching and unclenching his fists, a muscle in his jaw working almost in rhythm with them as he struggles to come up with an answer.
All he ends up saying is a dully repeated, “That’s just how it works.”
Sam takes a deep breath, trying to stave off the ever-thickening cloud of frustrated helplessness that’s gathering in his brain. He’s so fucking out of his depth here – hell, he could very well be doing more harm than good right now – but at the same time he’s not about to let Bucky walk out of his house without at least trying to teach him that his body is not a commodity.
“I understand you wanted something from me,” Sam begins hesitantly. “And that’s good; it was good for you to express your needs and ask for what you want. But it’s... umm, god, how do I put this... It doesn’t cost anything... if that makes any sense. You don’t owe anybody anything just for asking for something you need, or even for getting it.”
Bucky is staring at Sam like he’s grown another head and is speaking backwards. The sheer confusion and total lack of comprehension in his expression is really breaking Sam’s heart.
“I don’t understand,” Bucky finally confesses in a cracking whisper.
Things feel oddly surreal to Sam right now. Everything from Bucky’s voice to his expression to his body language just doesn’t fit, feels wrong somehow, impossible to reconcile with the person that Bucky Barnes is – or at least, the idea of him that Sam has formulated from what he’s both heard of and observed firsthand. He has become more or less accustomed to the way that Bucky cycles through countless different façades depending on the situation, how he can go from zero to sixty in less than the time it takes to blink, but regardless of what front he was putting up, they always still felt like they were facets of a single, relatively cohesive whole.
Except for this one.
The person sitting across from Sam on the couch seems like a completely separate, incompatible entity.
How can this painfully submissive creature with absolutely no concept of bodily autonomy possibly be the same person as the wryly charming young man that Sam had met at Steve’s, or the terrifyingly competent soldier who’d single-handedly taken down at least half a dozen HYDRA bases, or even the prickly, volatile individual who had no problem shutting the conversation down when he felt a boundary had been crossed?
Sam is in so fucking over his head. This isn’t the kind of thing he knows how to handle, isn’t what he was trained in, isn’t something that he has any experience with whatsoever. He knows for a fact that a couple of his regulars at the VA are survivors of military sexual assault, but there’s a whole separate group for that, led by counsellors who specialise in the area, and Sam admittedly doesn’t cross paths with them much so he has very little to work with here.
“It’s okay if you don’t understand it right away,” he tries. “I realise I’m not— I’m not exactly the best person to be trying to explain this, but... Well, I guess the bottom line is: your, um... proposition... from earlier? You don’t need to make those kinds of offers to anyone, ever again. You are allowed to ask for and receive things without having to earn it with, uh, with sexual favours. And you’re allowed to make mistakes without having to make up for them in that way, too. Basically, you never have to do anything with another person that you don’t want to do.”
“You just don’t fucking get it,” Bucky shouts, startling Sam, who’d been expecting to be met with more of the same passivity as before.
Instead, Bucky’s body has lost all of its loose pliancy and is now as tightly wound as a jack-in-the-box getting ready to pop, every inch of him radiating a bristling tension.
Sam thinks he’s getting whiplash from these goddamn mood swings.
“Then help me understand,” Sam suggests.
Bucky lets out a derisive chuckle.
“You almost got me there,” he says with a nasty, self-depreciating grin that’s more of a bared-teeth snort than a smile.
Sam has no idea what he’s talking about until Bucky taps his own temple and says, “In there. I gotta give it to you, Wilson. You’re good. Took me a long time to realise what you were trying to do.”
“I wasn’t trying to get in your head, Bucky,” Sam insists. “I was trying to... HYDRA taught you a lot of things that are wrong and damaging. It’s not your fault that you have certain beliefs or react in certain ways to some things, but it... it’s just not healthy, dude.”
“See, that’s the thing about being a super soldier,” Bucky replies, fixing Sam with a leering glare, “You’re always healthy.”
“Not what I meant,” Sam grumbles.
“Just forget it, Wilson,” Bucky says decisively. “Your little head games aren’t for everyone, and besides, I’m fine. But I can’t be fine if you keep trying to make me into some helpless traumatised wreck because that’s how you think I should be acting. You need to learn to leave well enough alone.”
He gets up and leaves the house without another word.
Guy sure has a flare for dramatic exits, Sam thinks stupidly to himself. Dramatic entrances, too, he realises, remembering the Winter Soldier’s penchant for dropping in out of the sky or announcing his arrival with an explosion or two.
Sam feels ashamed for the surge of negative emotion that crackles through his system when he realises he’s angry with Bucky for putting him in this impossible position. It’s not Bucky’s fault, of course, and Sam can’t even begin to fathom how difficult things must be for Bucky himself right now, but from an outsider’s perspective it is just so fucking frustrating that Bucky continues to be so adamantly adverse to taking measures that are so clearly for the best in the long run.
Then again, if there’s anything Sam has learned not only from himself but also from the people he works with, it’s that these matters aren’t nearly as self-evident when you’re the one standing in the thick of it all. From afar, the storm is painfully obvious, sure, but not so much when you’re tucked away in the eye of the tornado, the winds sucking up whatever rational voices are trying to get through their blustery walls.
Sam just doesn’t know how much longer he can keep this a secret from Steve. He might have almost believed that Bucky was handling things as well as he claimed if it weren't for tonight’s encounter completely, absolutely, irreparably shattering that illusion.
This is too big for Sam to carry on his own anymore. At the same time, though, the thought of betraying Bucky’s trust – even if Sam hadn’t explicitly made any promises – makes Sam’s stomach turn.
He goes back to what Bucky had snapped at him right before he’d left, about how he can’t be okay if Sam keeps rubbing it in that he’s not. Sam won’t deny that there is a time and place for such persistence – that sometimes the only option is to keep sloughing forward because the only way out is through – but he can’t help the feeling that this is very much not one of those times. Bucky is pushing himself too hard; sooner or later he is going to meet his breaking point.
And if that happens, if this whole thing blows up in their faces in a way that seems almost inevitable now, how will Steve react when he finds out that Sam had knowledge of the impending explosion but had chosen not to say anything?
Sam wonders if Steve finding out would change the way Bucky is dealing with things, since so much of Bucky’s refusal to admit to anything being wrong seems rooted in his fear of how Steve might react to the truth. If Steve knows, maybe Bucky wouldn’t have such an impetus to hide anymore, and then there would be a chance that he could be convinced to get help.
Of course, this is all just hypothetical. Maybe Steve knowing would only motivate Bucky to work harder at seeming okay. Can Sam really justify a betrayal of Bucky’s privacy with only a possibility of it having a positive impact?
He sinks down in his seat on the couch with a groan of defeat. The last time he had this many questions stacked up against so few answers was when he watched fucking Mulholland Drive, and now even that total mindfuck seems like it makes more sense than this.
how’s bucky doing? Sam texts Steve the following morning after a restless, mostly sleepless night.
If Steve thinks it’s weird that Sam is going all mother hen on his best friend who Sam barely even knows, he doesn’t say anything about it, just responds with Good. He’s eager to hit the road again.
Sam’s heart sinks, but he’s not all that surprised. With the admittedly less-than-stellar way that he’d handled yesterday’s incident, he didn’t really expect that Bucky would have had an overnight change of heart and decided to come clean to Steve.
Then again, maybe Steve was right when he said that this is what Bucky needs. Maybe it’s a crucial first step that needs to be taken in order for Bucky to truly be able to start paving his own path. It makes a certain amount of sense, that he might want to destroy all evidence of who he was and start over with a clean slate. Trigger a big bang and rewrite the entire universe from scratch, shedding the cumbersome meteor belts of history.
It’s a drive that Sam understands all too well. The desire to fully sever yourself from who you used to be, as if your past were a ball and chain that not only held you down, but that was also visible for the rest of the world to see and pass judgment on – a badge of shame, a scarlet letter of weakness.
Once Sam had recovered to the point where he’d successfully reintegrated himself into the normal world, he’d spent a considerable amount of time and energy trying to pretend that he only existed from this moment forward, and that everything that had come before hadn’t happened. He left New York for D.C. in hopes of being able to set up a new life for himself, if not an entirely new identity – one that wasn’t tainted by the horrors he'd seen, the atrocities he’d taken part in, the violence he’d committed not only against others, but also against himself. He kept his past extremely private, rarely talking about his previous occupation, let alone what it had cost him. Basically, he just went around with a smile on his face as if he’d been this harmless and healthy way all along.
(Nobody needed to know that just a few months ago he was doing crazy person shit like buying hundreds of dollars worth of canned food and bottled water so that he could stay in his basement for days at a time because it was the only place in the house that was safe.)
Now, he’s not sure why it had been so important to him to put on that act. Maybe it was shame. Fear of what other people might think of him if they knew. He would no longer be Sam Wilson: All Around Nice Guy, Master Breakfast Chef, always says thank you to the driver when he exits a bus; no, he’d simply be Sam Wilson: That Crazy Dude, and he didn’t want that being the only thing people saw him as.
His reluctance to acknowledge his past struggles could also have had something to do with his own skewed idea of recovery at the time. He'd gotten it into his head that the goal was to be able to go back to the life you had before, that success was dictated by how much of your 'old' self you'd managed to reacquire, and if there was any part of you that was still affected by your trauma, then you were a failure.
It took a long time and a lot of hard work, but Sam eventually came to recognise how unrealistic and frankly quite damaging that type of thinking was. He slowly learned how to reconcile all the different parts of himself, including those jagged, painful ones he’d once been so desperate to bury, acknowledging their impact while not allowing them to be the only thing that defined him. Instead of viewing his past as something awful that would always be weighing him down, he now sees it as more of a flexible tether – something he is forever bound to, that has provided his roots, but that does not necessarily prevent him from continuing to grow.
He wonders if this is something that Bucky could come to learn to do, instead of going for the scorched ground tactic of burning down everything you leave behind. He realises that Bucky’s trauma differs greatly from his own, that it is likely tangled much more inextricably into his sense of self and self-worth, so it’s understandable that Bucky would want to try and eliminate it from his life completely, but Sam just can’t shake the feeling that that’s not something that is going to work out so well in the long term.
Still, he’s determined to do what he can in the short term.
when do we leave? he texts Steve.
This time, there’s no quick reply. This isn’t unusual coming from Steve, so Sam doesn’t take it personally, but then his phone rings forty five minutes later and he knows shit is probably about to get pretty real if it’s an issue that can’t be resolved in 140 characters or less.
“Hey Cap,” Sam says, trying to mask his trepidation with an amiable tone, “What’s up?”
Sam can practically hear Steve squirming on the other end of the line when he says, “Well, uh, here’s the thing... I think... I was thinking... Maybe it might be best if, um, if it’s just me and Bucky on this one.”
“...Oh.”
“It’s not that I don’t appreciate your help,” Steve rushes to say, “Because I do. You’ve been absolutely invaluable these past few weeks, from keeping me sane to, oh, I don’t know, saving the world. But this whole thing with Buck, it’s just so personal, you know? Plus, you’ve gone your own life here, I wouldn’t want to—”
“Is it because Bucky doesn’t want me to come?” Sam asks bluntly. It comes out sounding a bit harsher than he’d intended, but he’s just so fucking exhausted from dancing so precariously around the issue that quite frankly he’d almost rather topple headfirst into it.
There’s a bit of a stunned silence before Steve stammers, “No! Well, I mean, uh, not... not exactly...”
“He came to my place yesterday,” Sam hears himself say before he can stop himself, and before he’s figured out how he’s going to follow up, which could end up being a problem.
“Oh?” Steve sounds puzzled but not surprised.
“Yeah. He wanted to... talk.”
“Great! I mean, that– that’s a good thing, isn’t it?”
“Well, it’s more like he came to tell me to stop trying to get him to talk,” Sam says glumly.
There’s a brief pause, then Steve says, “That could be a good thing too, though, right? He doesn’t want to talk because he doesn’t need to.”
“I– I’m not sure that’s the case...”
“Look, I know you’re just trying to help,” Steve says earnestly, “Because that’s the kind of person you are – the kind of person I wish there were more of – you see someone in pain and your instinct is to do what you can to alleviate it.”
Sam feels an odd heat rise to his cheeks for reasons that he can’t quite explain. This isn’t the first time Steve has said kind things about him, and while he doesn’t think the novelty of being told you’re a good guy by Captain America himself will ever wear off, he’s not sure why this is affecting him more deeply than usual right now. He supposes it could very well be because he’s been feeling extra fragile lately, and after that disastrous encounter with Bucky yesterday night and all the negative emotions that it had triggered in Sam, Sam is desperate to be reassured that he isn’t a terrible person for not having been able to handle the situation.
“But what I’m thinking,” Steve continues, “– And don’t take this the wrong way – but I’m thinking maybe right now you’re seeing pain where there isn't any. Because that’s what you’re used to seeing, hell, it’s your job to look out for it, plus I know it seems impossible that anyone could survive going through what Bucky went through. This is probably true of the average person. But Bucky’s not your average person. And I don’t mean just because of the serum.”
“Yeah, well, it’s pretty obvious that the serum doesn’t exactly guarantee a sound mind considering it runs through your veins, too,” Sam points out – fondly, not maliciously, “And yet that still didn’t stop you from wanting to crash a plane into a large body of water on two separate occasions.”
“Hmph, I suppose you have a point,” Steve concedes, but with a good-natured chuckle, the kind that comes after you’ve made it out alive from something you had been quite certain would kill you, and you’ve put enough distance between you and the memory to be able to look back at it and laugh in the face of everything that had tried to bring you down but couldn’t.
It’s a rare kind of laughter, and the kind that Sam treasures the most. This is perhaps the very first time he’s ever heard it coming from Steve, and he can’t bear the thought of having to take that away from him, but at the same time, the longer Steve is allowed to buy into this fantasy, the more devastating the truth will be when he finally figures it out.
And Sam has decided that by now it’s definitely a matter of when, not if. He simply can’t keep this from him any longer, even though he has absolutely no fucking idea how he’s going to talk about it.
“I know you’re worried about him,” Steve says softly after a moment. “And it really means a lot to me that you care so much, even after everything he's done. And I’m not saying that I don’t worry about him either, but... I don’t know, I guess I’m just trying not to look the gift horse in the mouth, you know?”
“He may seem okay on the outside, Steve, but he’s not,” Sam tells him. “You of all people should know what that’s like.”
It’s a low blow and they both know it.
“I don’t know what point you’re trying to make,” Steve says, annoyance and frustration finally beginning to seep into his tone. “I know you’re the expert— ” there’s sarcastic venom in the word, and Sam thinks, Yeah, I deserved that one, “—but he’s my best friend. I know him in ways that no certificate or degree or special training could ever teach someone.”
At the mention of the words best friend, Sam’s mind flickers, instinctively, involuntarily, to Riley, and not for the first time he wonders what things might have been like if they had both come home. On the more selfish side of things, Sam wonders if his transition back into the normal world could have been any easier had Riley survived. Sure, he would probably still have more issues than TIME magazine, but at least survivor’s guilt wouldn’t have been one of them.
In the beginning, Sam’s thoughts on having been the one to survive operated on the polar opposite ends of a spectrum. At the top of the scale was how he wished he’d gotten hit so that Riley could have gone on to live the healthy, fulfilling life that he deserved. Down on the other end was a more selfish, morbid desire - not so much survivor’s guilt as survivor’s regret: Sam wished he’d been the one to fall because, right now, he didn’t find much use in being alive.
He hates to admit it, but during some of his worst lows, right after he’d returned home, Sam often used to think that Riley had been the luckier of the two of them.
Riley got a hero’s send-off in a flag-draped coffin, punctuated by a three volley salute and framed by fighter jets performing a missing man formation in the sky above.
Meanwhile, Sam got more graves to visit on Veterans Day, shitty financial and medical support, a total lack of employment opportunities, and miles of red tape to wade through in order to obtain disability compensation.
Another factor contributing to Sam’s sometime-belief that Riley got the better end of the deal was the knowledge that at least Riley was spared the hell of trying to rejoin the normal world after serving. Then again, Sam knows that this is probably mostly him projecting, because who’s to say that Riley would have had as tough a time as Sam did? (And who knows, maybe if Riley had made it back, Sam wouldn’t have had as tough a time either. They might have both turned out okay.)
Sam likes to think that Riley would have been fine coming back home. That he would have re-adapted well to civilian life, found happiness in the simplest of pleasures, maybe started a family or pursued his passion for painting.
But of course, Sam will never know.
It’s the could have been’s that are the most cruel of any scenario.
“I’m sorry,” Sam tells Steve quietly. “That was a shitty thing for me to say. It’s just... I’m worried you’re only seeing what you want to see, you know?”
“I... No, I don’t know...? You’ve seen him, too, Sam. We’ve seen the same things.” There’s a loaded silence on the other end of the line, then Steve says slowly, “Unless... you’ve seen something that I haven’t.”
Sam winces, cursing himself in his head. Too much. He’s said too much. And yet, at the same time, not nearly enough.
“He was... different... when he came over,” Sam says cautiously. “Tense. Jumpy. ...Overdefensive.”
“Of course he’s gonna have some off days,” Steve points out, but again, there’s a beat before something else seems to occur to him. “Why did he go see you anyway?”
There is the faintest trace of betrayal in Steve’s voice, which Sam doesn’t blame him for. Of course it’s got to sting when your closest friend has seemingly turned to a near-stranger for help over you. Sam understands this, though, and he thinks Steve does, too, even if he doesn’t realise it at this particular moment.
It’s about the protection afforded by that expanse of impersonal distance, the security of knowing that you’re not letting someone down in the same crushing way that you would be if you were to confide in someone who cared more deeply about you.
(Of course, Steve kind of takes this concept to the extreme in that he seems to regard the entire world as someone he does not want to let down, hence his tendency to internalise the shit out of everything he feels.)
“There are some things that are harder to talk about with the people closest to you,” Sam explains. “He’ll open up to you when he’s ready.”
Sam wonders if the lie comes out sounding as spectacularly obvious as he feels it is. Bucky is likely never going to be ready. The only way the truth could come to light is through a betrayal of privacy on Sam’s part or a total breakdown on Bucky’s, and neither one of these options are particularly ideal.
There is perhaps a third option of Steve somehow discovering material similar to what Sam had found in Boston, but Sam has a feeling that Bucky is going to move hell and high water to make sure he’s the first one to get his hands on any possible evidence.
Which brings them full circle back to the matter of Bucky not wanting Sam to come along.
Truth be told, Sam isn’t exactly clamouring to play third wheel, either. A third wheel with a tenuous-at-best relationship with one of the wheels and a screamingly terrible secret he’s keeping from the other.
Sam is terrified of the prospect of living in close quarters with the two of them throughout what will undoubtedly be some rather hairy encounters and disturbing discoveries.
Even more frightening, though, is the thought of Steve and Bucky out there trying to navigate these perilous waters alone, oblivious and blind to the horrors that surround them. On one side, a six-headed sea monster, on the other, a voracious whirlpool. The only way out is through. Staying stationary is not an option, not if you hope to make it out with at least a fraction of yourself still in tact.
“Did Bucky specifically tell you why he didn’t want me to come?” Sam asks.
There’s an uncomfortable hesitation on the other side of the line before Steve says, “He says you keep – and these are his words, not mine, but I wouldn’t take them personally either way – um, he says you keep trying to... fix him.”
Sam tries his best not to feel mildly affronted at the crude and simplified interpretation of what he had been trying to accomplish with Bucky. He’d hoped that he’d spoken to Bucky in a way that didn’t make it sound like Sam thought there was something wrong with him, but considering how skewed Bucky’s self-perception is, he likely read any expressed negative emotion as directed towards him, not the circumstances, and any attempts to help were construed as either flagrantly unnecessary meddling or flat-out manipulation.
“I’d hardly say that’s what I was doing,” Sam sniffs, and it’s not even a lie. Barely anything he’d said to Bucky that night could have been considered ‘helpful,’ and while Sam had been fully intending to give Bucky a list of names and numbers of counsellors and support groups, the man had thundered out of the house before Sam even had the chance to write any of them down.
He has them now, though.
All very discreet, just names, numbers and addresses, with no mention of the areas they specialise in.
“I do have something I’d like to pass on to Bucky,” Sam says after a moment.
“What is it?”
“Just, you know... Some places he could look into.”
“Sam, I’m not sure that’s really necess—”
“He doesn’t have to do anything right away,” Sam interrupts. “But I still think it would be a good idea to at least have these resources at hand.”
Steve thinks about this for a moment before replying, “Okay, yeah, you’re probably right. You wanna message them to me or something and I can pass them on to him?”
“Actually, if it’s okay, I’d like to give them to Bucky directly.”
“Oh, okay. Yeah. Sure. Of course. You could, um, come by our place any time.”
‘Our’ place, Sam registers vaguely. Their place. Steve’s and Bucky’s place. Not even a week back and apparently they’ve already reconnected enough for Steve to have started thinking of them as a unit.
Sam feels even more third wheel-y than ever.
And yet he still isn’t quite comfortable with the thought of Steve and Bucky going off someplace without him.
He’s not so naive that he can’t recognise how ridiculous that is, though. As if he alone could keep anything disastrous from happening. If anything, Sam being there would only be adding fuel to the fire in terms of sending Bucky of the rails.
Then again, maybe that’s what needs to happen.
Sam is pretty sure that the only way the truth is going to come out without his direct involvement is if Bucky reaches a breaking point and can no longer maintain the meticulously crafted act he’s been putting on for Steve ever since he came back. Maybe, even if Sam wasn’t necessarily pushing Bucky to open up, his mere presence would be enough to put pressure on Bucky to come clean. He hates himself for even so much as entertaining this as a possibility, but he’s desperate and worried and time is running out.
“Hey, is Bucky around right now?” Sam asks suddenly. “It might be too awkward if I came by; maybe I could just talk to him now?”
“Um, yeah, just a sec, I’ll get him.”
There’s a rustling sound, some muffled, indistinguishable words, then a breath and Bucky’s very quiet voice saying, “What do you want?”
Sam’s throat constricts. What would have been but a simple introductory statement a few days ago is now a painful reminder of everything that Bucky has been through - of course Bucky would assume Sam is only talking to him because he wants something from him.
“Just want to talk,” Sam says.
Steve must still be within hearing distance because instead of the sarcastic jab at modern psychology that Sam had been expecting, Bucky just says, “About what?”
“Why don’t you want me to come with you and Steve?”
“Are you kidding me?” Bucky says incredulously. There’s no trace of docility left in his tone and for probably the hundredth time now, Sam is again struck by just how rapid and unpredictable this ever-changing game of charades is. “I thought it was pretty obvious.”
“What if we make a little compromise?” Sam suggests, realising only after he hears Bucky’s sudden shaky intake of breath that the term probably has very different connotations for him, and Sam could punch himself in the face for being that careless with his words.
“I mean,” he says swiftly, “Steve told me that you didn’t quite appreciate my inner therapist making an admittedly uncouth appearance yesterday night, and I get it; I wouldn’t want to be stuck on a road trip with someone who I knew was gonna psychoanalyse everything I did or said either. So how about this: how would you feel if I came along with you and Steve, but for purely tactical reasons? Backup support, a lookout, someone to go on coffee runs, an extra driver, whatever. I’ll do anything. But I’d just be there for the mission. Meaning I wouldn’t try to talk about anything with you unless you explicitly say there’s something you want to discuss.”
The ensuing silence on the other end of the line stretches on for long enough that Sam thinks he’s been disconnected so he tentatively says, “Bucky?”
“Sorry,” Bucky says, voice thick with confusion. “I... I guess I just don’t really get what kind of a bargain this is if you’re not even getting anything out of it.”
Sam frowns. If anything, he’s the one getting the better end of the deal here, which is why he hadn’t allowed himself to be too optimistic about his chances. Surely Bucky would be dissatisfied with having drawn the short straw, But now here he is saying he doesn’t understand the bargain because he thinks Sam is the one not benefiting from it?
That’s when the explanation hits him like a bag of bricks: Bucky thinks Sam isn’t getting anything out of this because no part of the deal involves Bucky providing him with sexual favours.
Sam damn near has to bite his tongue to keep from going off on another disorganised rant about how Bucky deserves more than to treat his body as mere bargaining chips or cheap currency, but he remembers what he’d just said literally five seconds ago about how he won’t try to pull any of his counsellor’s cards on Bucky, and if Bucky is going to trust him, then Sam is going to have to make damn sure he keeps his word right off the bat.
“I am benefiting from this,” he explains patiently. “You allowing me to accompany you and Steve is how I benefit from this.”
“That’s it?” Bucky asks dubiously.
“That’s it.”
“And... and what I get out of it is that you don’t... talk...? To anyone?”
It’s so obvious who Bucky is referring to when he said anyone that he might damn well just have said Steve.
“We’re in this together, Bucky,” Sam says, judiciously avoiding answering Bucky’s question directly. “I just want to be able to keep Steve safe.”
It must have been the right thing to say, though, because there’s a tiny tinkle of surprisingly pleasant laughter from Bucky when he agrees, “That makes two of us.”