Part 7

                                    

                                          


   His metal arm flashed in the new sunlight that streamed through the window as he held up the stack of waffles she'd given him. "Here, I'm not going to eat these. Sorry."
   She took them from him, placing the majority on the plate on her lap and nibbling at the edge of one. "Did you eat before I got up?"
  "Mmmh," he made a sound somewhere between a grunt and a groan, head shifting uder the blanket. Bucky sounded so drained and hollow. 
   Feeling numb, Yelena put the plate on the coffee table with a soft clink. She had forgotten she even had it. 
   "There's nothing I can do, is there?"
   The blanket shifted again as he shook his head.  
   "Tell me what happened, Bucky." Yelena didn't want to face that complicated pain of his. But she didn't want to see him cry more than he had to. 
   He needed this. Keeping it to himself might damage him even more deeply. Drag him farther down into his past. "Bucky, you've always tried to be honest with me, even when it's hard. You wouldn't have told me about this if you didn't want me to talk to you about it, so I'm gonna talk to you."
   She moved closer, and his right hand twitched. 
  "Bu -"
   "Mrow," A little white cat poked her head around the side of the couch, eyed Yelena, and leaped up onto Bucky's lap. His fingers instantly started to stroke her fur gently, and she let out a long purr. 
   Yelena reached up and touched the side of where his face was. It was unusual for her, and his hands stilled. The blanket felt soft and warm under her fingers. She wasn't really touching him, but she felt like she'd crossed a barrier, and a tingle ran up her arm. 
   She opened her mouth to speak and to pull away, but his hand covered her's, metal on skin. He gave it a squeese, and let go. 
   Taking a deep breath, she dug her fingers into the fuzzy cloth and pulled, hard. The blanket fell away to reveal...
   Yelena's heart dropped. 
   His face was a portal to the past, back when his eyes brimmed with stress and fear. Back when there was no hope, and that look was enough to break her heart. That look was out of place, hovering above a black T-shirt, jeans, and a cat inside a house crafted with love. 
   Suddenly, pulled by that look in his eyes, Yelena was a child again. She cuddled up next to him and tapped his nose so that he would meet her eyes. "Talk to me, when did it happen?"
   Bucky blinked, his eyes all puffy and drained-looking. His eyelids wavered slowly, as if he would fall asleep just like that. 
   She had to know what happened when she was in her room. What he'd had to face alone. 
   "M - midnight to ... four, I think." He said, his voice rough and gravelly. 
   "So four hours. Shit. Why didn't you not wake me up? I could've helped... somehow." 
   "You're right," he replied, "but I couldn't wake you. I saw how tired you were last night. You needed your sleep."
   "O - oh." Yelena felt touched and furious that he'd decided not to wake her. The fact that he stayed out here all alone so she could sleep in a couple extra hours just proved that hee shouldn't have had to. "You never deserved any of this, you know that, right?"
   He didn't. It showed bluntly in his eyes. She knew some part of him had to understand that, but the other parts, the lost ones, overpowered clarity. 
   Yelena accepted that she wouldn't get any reply from him, and took another huge bite of waffle. It tasted wrong now. She hoped it was just the mood that was ruining the taste. 
   She leaned back, sinking into the cuchions beside him and taking a deep breath... but regretted it. Her shoulder no longer touched his. "How do you feel?"
   Bucky lowered his head, as if in defeat. Stray hairs fell over his shadowed face. Yelena placed a hand on her shoulder, her thumb stroking it almost unnoticably. 
   "Yelena... It's - it's so hard," he lowered his face into his hands, shoulders shaking. 
   Now that she was here he was facing it all again. She wasn't sure what to do. Yelena didn't know his pain, and she probably never would. It was like nothing else she'd ever seen.
   You really are one of a kind, Bucky. You must be feeling like crap. 
   Bucky frowned, running a hand down his face. This was a whole other kind of grieving, and she understood now that he wasn't just mourning his family. He was also mourning himself, that was why he looked that way when she pulled the blanket away from him. 
   There were pieces of him that he'd never get back. 
   "Bucky... Do you have people to talk to about this kind of thing?"
   "Yeah... but it's hard to... way harder than when I'm with you," he mumbled softly. 
   Yelena closed her eyes and matched his stance, her head next to his. She felt her head brush his. She leaned closer to him, lips millimeters from his ear, whispered, "Why me?"
   "Because... now that we're here, you'd never leave me. And I've always found it difficult, the thought of being... dishonest with you. When I show you pieces of me, you try to help... I know you'd never willingly hurt me. It's always been so easy to talk to you." He whispered back. 
   And he was right about it. It had never been hard to talk to him, but challenging to lie, not that she ever had. For Yelena, lying or just saying anthing was smooth and effortless - it had to be, in her line of work. But he saw through it pretty well, and she trusted him with her life. 
   Only now she realized just how many things Bucky was to her, and how much he mattered. He was her hero, role model, friend, and one of the only people who loved her during some of the worst times in her life. 
   Of course she didn't want to lie to him. He was like hope in the darkness, even when he was part of the darkness. Every time he went through shit, he inspired her. 
   That night when he'd pressed a paper into her hands and told her to run, to burn the paper, to never stray from its words, had had an impression on her life that she'd never really talked about. But it affected everything. 
   If this man ever stopped trusting her, she wasn't sure she could trust herself. 
   She pressed a kiss on his head, and Bucky turned to look at her.
   And then he smiled. 



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