We are,
we're trying to belong,
pick up the pieces left of us.
- Circles, Greta Svabo Bech
The room was quiet as the last person shuffled out, leaving Wanda Maximoff alone at last. Her eyes sparkled with unshed tears. Just breathe. In, out. In, out. She was tired of crying. Tired of emotions. Would it be so terrible if she didn't have them?
The anniversary of her brother's passing a year ago was today. The grief felt like it would overwhelm her. Her eyes fixed on the blank wall and she thought about her brother. Pietro had been the light of her life. Through the deaths of their parents and through Hydra's painful experiments, knowing that she had her brother with her had gotten her through.
Now that he was gone, how was she supposed to feel?
Everyone thought that she had moved on. And she had. But losing him had been like losing part of her soul and that was something that no one could ever completely recover from.
The Avengers had accepted her into their family readily as she had known that they would. They were all good people, no matter what they had done in their past.
Wanda took one more deep breath. All right, time to get up.
She rose from her slumped position on the leather couch in the living room of Avengers Tower. Her foot had fallen asleep from sitting so long in one position and she stood still for a moment to collect herself.
It was still hard to accept that she lived in this amazing place, with its seemingly never ending food supply and luxurious plush furniture. If Pietro were here, he would be dashing to and fro, touching this and that and talking a mile a minute.
It was her fault, Wanda had decided a long time ago. If she had been faster, she could have saved him. Could have stopped the bullets from piercing his body. She had felt every one of them as if the bullets were hitting her instead of him. Her telepathy was a curse. Wanda had experienced every emotion that Pietro had before he finally collapsed on that cold ground.
As she walked towards the door, Wanda thought over the events of the day and decided that Pietro would have approved of his memorial dinner. It had been a quiet affair, with just the Avengers. That included their newest recruit, James(or Bucky as Steve called him)Barnes.
He had sat silently in the corner, observing everyone from a safe distance. Wanda was just grateful that he had come to show his support to her even though they had yet to say more than two words to each other.
On the way to her spacious room, Wanda ran her hand along the wall, feeling the bumps in it and recalling that she and Pietro used to do the same thing at their old house. But that was before everything went wrong. Before Hydra, before the Battle of Sokovia, before…..
Wanda opened her door and tried to clear her head of such thoughts. Pietro wouldn't want her to be so melancholy on his account.
Sighing, Wanda leaned against the doorpost. She wanted, no needed to be around another human being. She was tired of being alone. Mentally, she ran through the list of people that she could talk with.
Natasha and Clint were likely sparring in the training room like they always did on Thursday afternoons when they weren't on a mission.
Thor had gone to visit Jane right after the memorial dinner had ended and likely wouldn't be back until late tonight.
That left Bruce, Tony, Steve, and Bucky.
Wanda made her way down the lab where she was sure that Tony and Bruce were doing some scientific experiment. The telltale sounds of lab equipment clinking together told Wanda what she had already expected.
She stood in the hallway outside the door, listening to their animated voices for a few moments before moving on.
She wandered around for a few more minutes(because there was quite a lot of room to wander in Avengers Tower) and eventually came upon Steve. He was in one of the training rooms with his back facing the door.
He had his boxing gloves on, but he was leaning against the punching bag, eyes closed. Wanda felt sorry for him. He was in pain; not physical pain, but emotional.
She knew that Steve always tried to be so strong for everyone else, but inside the man was broken. Wanda shook her head. Sometimes she wished that she couldn't sense what other people were feeling.
Sounds of Natasha and Clint sparring filtered in from the other room, but Steve gave no sign that he heard them.
Wanda couldn't help herself and peeked in the other training room.
Natasha's red hair was tied back and she had a look of fierce concentration on her face. Clint's face was equally intense and his short blond hair was soaked with sweat.
Natasha faked right, changed directions and punched towards Clint with the speed of a snake. A lesser fighter would have been knocked down by the force of her punch, but Clint's reflexes were too quick.
He grabbed Natasha's wrist and twisted her so her back was against his chest and he had her in a seemingly inescapable hold.
To Wanda's surprise, Natasha made no attempt to get out; she merely grinned up at Clint. "Not bad." She praised, which was rare for Natasha.
Clint smiled back at her and as they stayed that way for several seconds, Wanda got the feeling that maybe she shouldn't be watching this private moment between the two of them.
As Wanda turned to go, she heard Natasha flip Clint on his back and he let out a loud 'oof'.
"You let your guard down." Natasha reprimanded him unnecessarily.
"Yeah, yeah." Clint responded, but there was a smile in his voice.
Wanda couldn't help but smile a little too as she left. She wouldn't mind a relationship like theirs. No one was sure exactly just what their relationship was, but Wanda could tell that they cared very much for each other.
She was so lost in her thoughts that she almost didn't see the light in the living room. Wanda looked around the doorway and saw Bucky watching TV. Well if you could call it watching. He was actually just staring at it, with glazed over eyes.
She stepped back to leave him alone, but she must have made some noise, because Bucky's head snapped up and he met her eyes.
Of course someone who had been trained to be an assassin would hear even the smallest sound. Standing there in the doorway, Wanda felt a little awkward so she finally went in and plopped down on her favorite chair, a deep blue chair that was the comfiest out of all of them.
She pulled her legs up beneath her and wrapped her arms around her knees. Silence permeated the room and Wanda quickly searched her mind for something to say.
Clearing her throat, Wanda nervously adjusted her position on the chair once more, setting her feet on the ground, before attempting to start a conversation.
"So, what are you watching?" She began, almost timidly. His eyes met hers again.
"I'm not sure." He finally said.
From her chair, Wanda wasn't in a good position to see the TV so she just nodded and fell silent.
After a bit, Bucky spoke again. "Would you like to watch something else?"
His politeness surprised Wanda. Never had she thought that he was a monster, even despite all that she had heard about him. But after all the years he had been with Hydra, she wasn't exactly expecting him to have good manners.
Suddenly, she realized that it had been a long time since he had asked his question. "Oh, um, sure that would be nice."
She moved from her chair to the other side of the couch that he was sitting on and picked up the remote. He was watching her curiously and Wanda wondered if he was aware that he was staring. She supposed that assessing the people and surroundings around him had once been his job, so she shouldn't think his behavior was too strange.
After flipping through various channels, she finally settled on a movie called 'Ever After.'
The movie was enjoyable and she found herself smiling along with the characters. Wanda glanced at Bucky to see if he was still watching. His eyes were still on the screen, but his mind seemed a hundred miles away.
Wanda almost broke her code of honor and used her telepathy to see what he was thinking, but at the last minute, she stopped herself. It just wasn't right. Maybe she could try the direct approach.
"Are you all right?" She asked.
His face remained blank and he didn't answer.
"Mr. Barnes?" Wanda said a little louder.
He started and blinked several times as if clearing himself from a daze. "Bucky."
"Excuse me?" She asked, not quite sure that she had heard right.
"You can call me Bucky." Bucky said, meeting her gaze. She was surprised at how blue his eyes were. Wanda felt unexpected sympathy well up. Those eyes hid decades of pain behind them.
Bucky didn't break their eye contact. He tilted his head, as if considering something. "Are you reading my mind?"
Wanda was slightly offended. "I wouldn't do that without someone's permission."
He nodded faintly and looked like he was trying to decide if she was telling the truth.
Wanda realized that he hadn't had a lot of people to trust in the past. For most of his life up until now, he had lived among enemies and men who lied to get him to do what they wanted.
"I promised myself that I would never do that." Wanda added gently, trying to show him with her eyes that she was sincere. "I don't much like seeing people's innermost thoughts and memories anyway." She admitted quietly.
"Some memories are best left unseen." Bucky said, and his face tightened a fraction of an inch. He stood abruptly. "I need to talk to Steve. Excuse me."
"Oh, of course." Wanda watched as he left the room and hoped that she hadn't made him upset.
He was so hard to read because he always had that mask of indifference in place. Wanda stared after him for a second longer and it registered that that conversation was the most words they had ever exchanged.
She switched off the TV and lay down on the couch, not ready to go back to her room just yet. The nightmares that she had had directly after Pietro's death had been happening again lately.
Wanda had almost fallen asleep when she heard someone near the doorway. She sleepily cracked her eyes open and peered through the darkness that had fallen. "Who's there?"
Steve stepped into her line of vision, looking like he had come directly from the training room. "Hey, Wanda. Sorry, I didn't see you in here at first."
Smoothing her hair down, Wanda sat up and tried to contain the yawn that threatened to escape.
Steve's blue eyes lit up with amusement. "Tired?" He asked, folding his arms across his chest and grinning at her.
There was no trace of the pain from earlier and Wanda admired his ability to place his emotions aside for a while.
"Yes." Wanda agreed, not willing to tell him why she was really there. But Steve didn't ask anything else. He merely sat on the couch next to her and turned the TV back on.
"Will it bother you if I watch TV?" Steve raised an eyebrow inquiringly in her direction.
Wanda smiled and shook her head. "No, it won't." She told him, grateful to no longer be alone.
They both settled in to watch some strange show where four people were forced to make a meal from a basket of odd ingredients and do well or face being eliminated.
It didn't take long for her to fall back asleep, with Steve sitting next to her, acting as a guard from her nightmares. Maybe tonight, her sleep would be peaceful.
….
Bucky paced up and down the floor in his room, trying to quiet his growing anxiety. His mind wasn't his own these days. The memories of what the Winter Soldier – of what he'd - done to those people flashed in his mind.
Every day and every night the images haunted him. The screaming tortured his already fragile mind. He couldn't stop thinking about how they had died, the cruelty that he had inflicted.
Steve had told Bucky that it wasn't him, that he hadn't been in control of his own body. But he had still done it, still committed those awful acts.
He collapsed onto the bed and thought of the Scarlet Witch, or Wanda. She had looked so small and vulnerable sitting next to him on the couch, her brown eyes full of sadness. What if he hurt her too? He couldn't trust himself because he didn't even know his own mind.
On the pretense of talking to Steve, he had left her there, looking confused, and gone to the punching bag. But punching it had given him no relief. Nothing did.
Was he a monster? Did he even belong here with the Avengers? He appreciated their kindness and their protection from the government, but he almost wanted to turn himself in. Whatever they did to him, he was sure that he deserved it.
With a deep sigh, he lay down on the bed. Knowing that sleep was impossible, he stayed there, looking up at his ceiling and waiting for the dawn.
A.n. Hello everyone! If you've decided to read my story, thank you! Reviews are the best thing ever; they seriously make my day! I will try to update once a week, but if I don't, it's only because I'm working extra hard on the chapter for you guys :D I hope you all enjoy taking this journey with me, because I'm definitely having fun writing this story.
Until next time, 1stBatgirl