They Say I'm Fine, But I Feel Synthetic

Chapter 1- The Wet World Aches For A Beat Of A Drum

Bucky groans as he turns over in his bed, head throbbing from whatever the hell had happened the night before. Haunting shadows flash behind his eyes as he tries not to look directly at the obnoxious sliver of sunlight streaming through the miniscule slit in the curtain. Realising it's a bad decision, Bucky turns the other way again, only to be faced with the photo frame he's so desperately trying to avoid.

He doesn't know why he keeps it around, maybe as a memento to the glory days, the times when a cocky smile would spread across his face, crinkling his eyes. He looks at the two people in the picture, laughing and looking at each other with such hopeless longing in their eyes and he hates them. He hates everything about them.

He hates how they can only see each other, even though there's plenty going on around them.

He hates how their eyes are glistening in the sun, dangerous and too much but yet not enough at the same time.

And, most of all, he hates how he can't bring himself to get rid of it.

So, every morning, Bucky's eyes snap open (or flutter, depending on what happened the night before) and the fading demons of his nightmares would crawl back into their holes while the daylight hours provided Bucky with some temporary solace from the dark corners of his mind. Then they would rear their ugly heads just for a second as his eyes latch onto those people, those fucking happy people with their perfect lives and their perfect other half. Because that's what they are, each other's other half. If Bucky were to cover one of them with his hand, the other would somehow look faded and weak, like a smudged lipstick stain on a mirror. Take his hand away though, and you get the full shape of the lips, clear and purposeful.

And that's where the truth dies and the lies begin anew, at least for another day of pretending.

Bucky's routine is an extremely simple one.

He drags himself out of bed.

Brushes his teeth.

Showers.

Climbs back into bed.

And that's on a good day.

The bad days arrive when he gets unannounced visitors, like Natasha or Clint who seem to be acutely aware of his desires to be left alone yet ignore them completely. Clint sneaks in through his bedroom window, Natasha at least has the grace to break in via the front door. Sometimes, they come together. Like today's attempt at being a normal, functioning human being and not a lifeless heart devoid of a beat.

This time, Clint drags Natasha in his way, the window.

Bucky slaps the pillow over his head as a car horn starts honking incessantly outside on the street. Gritting his teeth, he tries to block it out, the noise piercing his brain like a bullet, worsening his already throbbing headache.

The window shuts and Bucky can faintly hear Clint hissing something at Natasha.

A heavy weight crashes onto his mattress.

"Fuck off, Clint," he murmurs, not even having to think twice. He can hear Clint's obnoxious way of clamping his teeth down on his chewing gum and he wants to die. Natasha flicks the light on and Bucky realises he has no choice but to uncover himself and face the cruel world around him. Okay, so maybe the cruel world doesn't seem so cruel in the light of his friends, but after they leave it's up to him to navigate life.

Whenever they come around, they make Bucky swear that once they leave he won't go back to bed. He'll have to manoeuvre his way around his emotions and find a way to be at peace with his aching heart. There's nothing that he can actually, physically do besides distract himself with alcohol or yoga, never both. Usually he just has to wait out the storm, until the thick tendrils of lightning won't hit him and he can breathe again. Then again, Bucky hasn't been able to breathe since he left. And he doesn't think he'll be able to again.

"Rise and shine, Sleeping Beauty," Clint crows as Bucky removes the pillow from his face. "Or…not beauty," he adds, remarking at Bucky's appearance. He knows he looks like trash, the sheer amount of whiskey and vodka the night before should have told him that already. He doesn't need Clint to tell him that.

"It's two in the afternoon, James," Nat adds. Bucky winces. She holds her hands up. "Sorry. Bucky."

He can't stand being called James. That's what Steve used to call him. Before he fucked everything up. Not even the sound of it sends him in a spiral. It's missing Steve's regular inflection, but the word is still there, the syllables rolling from Nat's tongue in the same way it used to Steve's. And still, everything is too much.

"This is early for me," Bucky comments hoarsely. He hates hearing himself speak on a morning, well afternoon, like this. He hasn't spoken for at least twenty-four hours. He ordered pizza via the website, nobody came to visit him, he's just been alone. Though now he's being forced to socialise, to pretend like his entire world isn't caving in around him and hasn't been for the past five months. The walls are closing in on him and he's wondering how he's not been crushed senseless by the force of them. It's a minor miracle. Though there are days that Bucky wonders if the world would be improved if the walls would simply compress him into a mush, better that than spending each day hurting, living with the pain of the past and the pain of what would never be again.

"True, but that's not necessarily a good thing, Buck," Clint replies, smirking. He doesn't mind when Clint calls him Buck. The only other person who does is his sister, Rebecca and she hasn't visited since Steve left. Not that Bucky has been much of a person to be around since that happened. He doesn't blame her, if he's honest. He doesn't know exactly why she stopped hanging around like she used to, but…let's face it, he's lying and he knows the exact reason she stopped hanging around like she used to.

Bucky became a sullen, moody little shit who barely got out of bed most days.

And who wants to spend their time around someone like that? Bucky doesn't think anybody does, which is why he just wants to tell his friends to leave so he can slip the pillow over his head once more and spend his day curling up into the comfortable silence of his sequestering emotions.

"I know that," Bucky mutters, wanting nothing more than for them to be wrong so that he can get on with his lying down. "But it's just the way it is."

Natasha sighs once more. "But it shouldn't be. You don't need to spend your entire life holed up in your bedroom because you're afraid of what the outside is going to bring. Life is about navigating the world as best you can, because there's no other choice."

"Clearly there is," Clint smirks, "but it's not preferable. This is no way to live, Bucky, and we're honestly getting tired of seeing you like this."

Bucky hears these words and shrugs. "Well, that isn't my problem." And it really isn't. If they don't want to see him like this, then why do they come over? Why do they insist on coming and disturbing him for no other reason. He says as much. "If you don't want to see me like this, stop coming over unannounced when I really don't want you to."

"We're just trying to help you, Bucky," Natasha argues gently. "This isn't an easy situation for anyone involved. And…"

"Nat, don't," Clint warns. "Not now. Not while he's still drunk and snappy."

"So that pretty much rules out every day and night."

Bucky rolls his eyes as they talk about him as though he's not even there. "If you've got something to say, just say it. No point beating around the bush, is there?"

Clint shrugs and Natasha breathes deeply.

And then Bucky hears two words he deeply regrets asking to hear.

"Steve called."

A black haze washes over his eyes and he grips the bedsheets below him, mouth tightening reflexively.

Behind his eyes, he's in the dream. The dream he always has when he thinks about Steve last thing at night. He can see the surroundings perfectly.

The dark woods, trees looming all around him. The wind blowing in his ears, shadows flickering around the world. Bucky walks on, feeling like he has to. There's a force from behind him, pushing him on, telling him to go forth and explore. He looks around, searching for something to recognise, something familiar to tether him to a reality, something that makes sense. But nothing does, because this is Bucky's fantasy life, where everything is perfect and he's right where he wants to be: in the pit of his own feelings. The feelings that he manifested for himself by pushing…Steve…away. He has nobody else to blame, so he keeps on walking even when he could turn back. He knows that Steve is somewhere down the path, he can just feel it. Their connection is…was…that strong. But he can never find the man he loves. Because he doesn't deserve to. This is his punishment, the twigs and sticks cutting harshly at his feet. The bleeding doesn't bother him, it's easier than dealing with his feelings.

His feelings are harder to acknowledge.

Bucky recognising his own faults is easy enough, but when they directly affect someone else, that's when it's more difficult. That's when things to start to blur in his mind and his palms start to sweat. The fact that his inconsistencies and mistakes hurt Steve is beyond thinking about for too long. The more his mind lingers on the fuck ups, the second chances, the regrettable actions he made, the more he becomes a recluse; retreating into the annexes of his heart, a place where such sweet sorrow becomes natural, easier to handle.

"That's nice," he finally croaks out, beads of sweat dripping from his head. He wipes it lazily with the back of his hand and feels himself stiffen. Natasha notices this and sighs.

"You can't keep crawling back into yourself at the mention of his name. That's not what progress is about."

Bucky shivers against his will. "If that's what progress is, I don't want it."

"Bucky," Clint interjects, "you need to hear us out."

Bucky's head snaps up. "This sounds serious."

"He wants to speak with you," Natasha posits gently. "You two never really talked after what happened between you."

For whatever internal reasons, Bucky feels a spike of anger shoot up his spine. "And now he wants to talk? That's wonderful news." He spits, not bothering to hide his disdain.

"You have to realise that it was a different circumstance for him back then. He didn't know what to say or how to say it."

"And now he's figured that out, he suddenly wants to talk? No fucking thank you. I called him so many times trying to apologise and he rejected every single one. I clogged up his voicemail with apology after apology and pleas for him to hear me out. Not once did he acknowledge that. But now that he's ready, I'm just expected to hear him out? How is that fair?"

Clint blinks, surprised. This was more words than he'd heard Bucky speak in a long time. "You hurt him, Buck. Badly. He needed time to come to terms with what had happened. Personally, I don't think you're entirely to blame, but he needed to do that. He needed someone to blame, just so he didn't blame himself."

Bucky shakes his head. "I didn't want that. Of course I didn't want that. That's not how it was supposed to have happened."

Natasha blinks. "You've got to see it from his perspective. It happened, he left and now he wants to talk about it, something that didn't get to happen in the moment."

"You mean because I didn't let him talk about it."

Natasha holds her hands up. "I didn't say that. It's just something to think about."

Bucky nods. "I guess that's fair."

Clint rubs his hands together. "Well, we'll leave you to it. Whatever 'it' might be. Just try and do something productive today, Buck. For us?"

Bucky cradles the pillow to his chest and shrugs. "I'll try."

As Natasha follows Clint out of the window, she turns to Bucky with a smile. "So can I tell him to call and set up a meeting?"

Bucky sucks in a breath through his clenched teeth and visibly deflates as he turns his head to the photo frame.

Steve is smiling back at him, looking the happiest a person could ever be. Who is Bucky if he doesn't keep that smile around? Who is Bucky to deny that? He doesn't quite know who he is, but he knows that the one thing he cares most about in the entire world is Steve Rogers and no matter how much he tries to protest, he will always cave and he will always give in to anything that Steve might want, even after all this time and everything that happened between them.

Bucky nods.

"Yes."