A/N: Fill for a prompt at capkink on livejournal.
It's said it takes seven years
to grow completely new skin cells.
To think, this year I will grow
into a body you never will
have touched.
- "December 21st, 2002," by Brett Elizabeth Jenkins
Steve shifted in miniscule amounts in his oversized bed, fighting the nonexistent squeak of the springs that he still wasn't used to after all this time. The sheets were soft, the room was dark, but there was something missing…always something missing.
He was keenly aware of what day it was without even opening his eyes. It was the anniversary of the day when the most important person in his life was taken from him.
The warmth. That's what was gone. Steve would take the unforgiving ground in the dead of winter if it meant having Bucky back beside him. None of his men had ever said anything as he curled up to the Sargent every night they bunked down somewhere. They said nothing as they caught little shows of their affection, like the soft brush of their hands together as they walked side by side, leading the group onto whatever their next mission was. They ignored the fact that when they were back in allied territory and had nice cots, and sometimes beds, though never as comfortable as the one in which Steve currently resided, Bucky still found his way into laying down next to him, or vice versa.
Everyone knew, and nobody cared, because that was Captain America, the man who would win them the war, and his very best friend, Bucky Barnes, the sharpest shot in the whole of the allied forces. They were inseparable, and yet here he was, trying to feign sleep in his oversized, over-extravagant, over-everything room that Tony Stark provided him, living, if it could be called that, without his partner. Every morning he did this, hanging onto the dreams, as horrid as they often were, because it was the only way he got to see Bucky. Pictures weren't the same, his drawings were never right, and as much as his dreams made it seem otherwise, Steve knew he'd never see him in person again.
There was another dream he had; something he was so certain would happen. Bringing the Valkyrie into the ocean, he knew he'd see Bucky again in heaven, because as much as they skipped out on church, he had to believe they were both going there when they died. The alternative was too grim. He knew he was going to die, he was at peace with it. Hell, he even wanted it. He just had the misfortune of waking up.
Opening his eyes, he knew that Bucky's Steve was long gone. There was no trace of him left on this enhanced body of his. This shell of a man that he'd become would never know the warmth of a touch on his skin from someone who lit up his insides in all the right ways. Nothing was empty then, and he couldn't feel any of it anymore. Every touch from a stranger was hollow. Maybe it was all in his mind, or maybe not. Somewhere in there, he knew this: his soul had left him, fallen from a train with the man who made up the other half of it.
