Arabella woke up to the sun rising as usual. It was 5 30 in the morning and ply a few hours ago Rose had woken her up with cries.
Bucky had disappeared when she came back from putting the baby to sleep. It was as if he had never existed. She was wondering half of the night whether he had been real or a part of a dream. She had had a real nightmare however, of him towering over her with his blue eyes watching her own.
Scratching her head as she rose from the bed she glanced over at the time again and groaned. She decided a nice shower would suffice her tiredness and the fact she had let a stranger into her home last night.
The warm water splashed onto her face and it warmed her entire body up. She noticed that one of her favourite body washes was empty. It was lavender scented. Frowning, she decided to go to the supermarket after work. Luckily her hours were only from 8 to 3 on Tuesdays and Tess had her sport day at highschool on these days, so she only missed out on three classes the whole day.
When Arabella stepped out of the shower she wrapped herself in a towel and tried to figure out what to wear. Going through her drawers she decided to wear a beige and black polka dot button-up blouse with black jeans and silver flats. She chose a silver butterfly necklace and a filigree bracelet.
Studying herself in the mirror she noticed she had dark circles under her eyes. Nowhere near as bad as Bucky's had been but they were getting there. She applied some ivory concealer and then powdered her skin with a translucent powder foundation.
In high school her skin had been terrible but after going on a 6 month course with new drugs, it had cleared up magnificently and she had decided that she could deal with the aftermath of having bad skin and soon enough the scars were practically unnoticeable.
She grabbed her mascara and applied it to her lashes, groaning as it smudges the side of her face. Her green eyes were highlighted by the darkness of her mascara. Bella frowned at the natural blush that had adorned on her cheeks since she was 15.
Looking at her hair she saw that it was similar to a birds nest. Her thin blonde strands that usually fell to her shoulders now were stuck out in odd places. Once she ran a flat iron through it all, it came out nice and straight.
She decided to read for a few hours to put her mind at ease.
Rose was still sleeping soundly in her darkened room. Her small nose made soft noises as she slept. Tiptoeing quietly from the door, Bella headed towards the door having heard Tess walking up the stairs to her door.
She could see her silhouette against the new harsh sun and she could already tell her hair was up I a ponytail. Opening the door she have a smile.
"Hey Tess."
"You look gorgeous today, Bella! Oh, I picked you up a sand which from that new cafe in town for morning tea, since you barely ever eat as much as you should." Tess rambled, her high pitched voice going even higher as she strained of it in everything she had to say.
They both stepped in and sat on the sofas as it was their Tuesday morning ritual.
"So, who was that blue eyed mysterious man you had over last night,eh? He... at first he seemed a little... Intimidating. I can tell though, his just mysterious and all that heartbreaking crap. His eyes are beautiful though, don't you think? You've always been a sucker for dark haired, blue eyed men." Tess murmured, speculating her older friend with a look of curiosity and suspiciousness.
Bella felt herself blushing at her friends's words and chewed her lip absently. She recalled the blue eyes that had haunted her dream last night and her heart began to flutter. Either out of fright or something else. Curiosity had gotten the better of her and now questions ran through her mind freely about the man, especially since he had been brought up.
"He was just a new friend, Tess. Honestly, just met him yesterday."
"And he's already sleeping over? A tad quick, don't you think?" Tess said with a suppressed smile.
Groaning, Bella shrugged and stood up, yawning and stretching.
"Well, he is practically a stranger. So stop thinking about things that are never going to happen for me. I'm off to work now, byeee!" Arabella said, quickly grabbing her small white handbag and phone.
Before Tess could make any other comment she was out the door. The sun was shining as brightly as ever. She welcomed its kisses with ease. She only had a fifteen minute walk ahead of her so she decided to skip out on the music and instead just listen to some silence for once. She could feel her lethargy already creeping up on her. Her eyes were dry and her mouth tasted stale.
She truly needed a good hours sleep but that was never going to happen, not until Rose's mother...she cringed at the thought of her and instead focused on the ground.
At least she knew she wouldn't trip over a man on the ground in daylight. This time she was prepared for that. She couldn't wait to get into the bookstore, everything was stacked and stocked. She had always loved books ever since she was younger and her collection had grown increasingly large until one day a friend had suggested she just go ahead and make a bookstore. Jokingly, of course, but the idea grew and grew until she decided she would.
When she arrived, she could smell the bakery next door cooking something delicious. Despite her stomach grumbling, she couldn't bare to waste time and buy anything, she had customers to serve and errands to run later. She realised she had forgotten her sandwich from Tess on the kitchen table and sighed. Always remembering. No wonder she was a blonde.
The day was beginning to become boring. There had only been two customers and only one bought anything. She was beginning to wonder whether she should shut down early at 1 when she had an idea to go to the cafe a few blocks away. She hadn't been out for lunch in so long and perhaps it would be a change from either skipping out on lunch or eating it inside the bookstore.
Arabella placed a "will be back in 30 minutes" sign on the door and locked it. As she walked, her tiredness came per her and twice she was almost run over from not looking properly. When she arrived, she could smell the coffee and tea and almost cried with delight.
She suddenly heard the sound of rustling plastic and rubbish behind the corner in the alleyway. She prayed there wasn't a rat or mouse in there. Slowly, she tip-toed towards the alley and peered over the brick wall's side.
"I know you're there." A soft, gruff voice sounded from behind the corner of the dumpster. A familiar, soft gruff voice.
Bucky.
Bucky was raiding through the trash trying to scrounge something to eat.
Hesitantly, she walked over and suddenly he stood up. They were a few metres away and she could tell his attire had not changed since the day before apart from strings of old lettuce.
She had assumed he wasn't exactly Bill Gates, but she hadn't know he was homeless. A sadness took a hold of her as he stared at her. A dark shadow of stubble had made it's way onto his chin. His blue eyes were swirling like thousands of ocean waves as they stared into her green ones.
"Oh." Was all she heard from him.
She hadn't noticed his lips move at all but it sounded muffled, so he had probably said it under his breathe. Recognition laced the word and she couldn't tell if it was good or not.
"Bucky. Are you okay?"
"I'm fine." She almost rolled her eyes at that and took a few steps forward towards him.
Folding her arms across her chest she pursed her lips at the man.
"It's fine. I'm fine. Do you ever say anything else?" It was a rhetorical question all the same but as he leaned his head down and strands of dark hair covered his whole face, a ghost of a small smile shadowed his face.
Arabella received no reply from him and he simply stood still, just like a soldier.
"EXCUSE ME! What are you doing?!" A man shouted loudly from behind Arabella.
She froze for a moment before the anxiety left her and she spun around on her heel about to explain things.
"Oh sir..."
"No. What is that...filth doing? Searching around in a garbage bin? Pfft." The man was rather short, only about an inch higher than herself and yet he seemed to tower over her when ah spooked at him.
"You oughta' keep better company, missy. Ain't no reason you should speak to someone like him." The obvious manager of the joint said and she all but slapped him across his pink face.
He was glaring at her as if it were her fault for something horrible. She began to walk back a little, not liking where this was going. Bella could feel Bucky's presence behind her and she didn't want to get him in anymore trouble.
"Very well, sir. I was going to actually eat in the cafe since it was so highly recommended but now I don't think I have an appetite. Come on, Bucky." Bella brusquely said and began to walk away hiding the giggle of joy from doing something she hadn't done in a long time, standing up for herself.
She could hear Bucky's steps behind her quicken and soon enough they were in the central part of town. It was a large open field with a swing set and bench seats.
"Well, bucky I don't know about you but that was fun. Why are you scouring through garbage bins though?" She questioned as she made her way to the bench and sat down, rolling her eyes at the schoolgirls and boys that had carved on their names with hearts. She remembered when she had done that with one of her boyfriends a long time ago when she thought she'd been in love.
She glanced at him as he sat opposite her, his back hunched over a little. His black strands covered half of his cheeks and his blue eyes pierced out from above the dark circles underneath them. They conveyed her with little emotion and nothing else on his face gave anything away. Arabella looked at the growing stubble on his face and blushed.
"So, where did you go last night?" Bella asked, gazing at him with curiosity. The sun was making her green eyes rather squinty. She put a hand above them to hade her from the sun and he glanced at the hand lazily.
"I left."
It took all she could not to growl or yell at him. She managed an eye roll however and stared at him more. His clothes were beginning to look grimy and she wondered how long he'd gone without changing or washing them.
Scrutinisingly looking at him, she was curious to see just how dangerous he was. He had said he wasn't into all the drug groups... But how did she know he wasn't lying?
She glanced at her watch and bit her lips pensively. It was time to go back to work. She wanted to stay and question this man, she felt he had nothing but the clothes he wore.
"I... I have to go back to work." She said hoping he would understand he invitation.
Bella received no answer except a faint flicker of emotion and then went back to nothing but coldness. His chest was moving as he breathed and she shook her head.
"Bucky, do you want to come with me? I work at a bookstore. You can read or, something. If you don't have...plans." She asked quietly. She doubted very much that this man had any other plans, considering he had been looking in a dumpster about half an hour ago but she chose to ask anyway.
Bella stood, waiting for an answer and he answered by nodding slowly and standing up with her.
They walked side by side in silence until they arrived to the bookstore. Bella unlocked and opened the door and allowed herself in looking intently at her books to make sure no one had somehow disrupted them. She could hear the soft sounds of Bucky's shoes on the carpet. She walked behind the counter and sat down for a moment, checking that she'd put all the stock out.
She peered over the counter to see Bucky standing there as stiff as a board watching her. Blushing, she tucked strands of her hair behind her ears and looked away. The desk suddenly became highly fascinating.
After at least a minute she heard him move past the desk and into the room where she had just put a sign up saying 'History'. Hmmm, so he is a history geek like me, eh? She thought to herself.
A customer came in requesting a copy of Of Mice And Men for a school essay and she showed him the various different physical versions and he opted with the most popular looking one.
Afterwards, she was left with Bucky and her empty stomach, she had 2 hours left.
Bella ventured quietly towards the history room and saw him sitting on the floor with a book in his hands. It was on World War 2. A brief image of Captain America floated to her mind before she pushed it down.
"There's other books on World War 2 if you wanted to read them after this one." Bella said to him, noticing he was more then three quarters into it already.
His face was shadowed behind his hair and when he looked up she could tell he had been crying. The skin around his eyes was red and his blue eyes were glassy and even more blue than before. Quickly, she knelt down beside him and forgot about personal bubbles. He froze for a second before glancing at her warily once more.
"What's wrong? Did you have a... Grandparent or someone that was in the war?" Arabella asked softly, taking the book from him and glancing at the page.
On the left side it was classic World War Two information on Germany. On the right it showed a picture of Captain America and a small paragraph on him. What had he been crying about? As far as she could tell there wasn't much that could be related to a relative who had fought in world war 2.
A sarcastic and hopeless laughter came from Bucky and it was so loud it shocked her.
"Yeah. Something like that. I'm going." He said and abruptedly stood up and strode out of the store.
She was left on the floor in shock until she heard a customer walk in. Hopefully she'd run into him again to see if she had offended him or something. She wasn't used to seeing men cry. Sometimes she thought they didn't really have emotions at all and were some weird alien form.
It was 2 45 when she decided to close up the shop. She went for her rounds around the store and entered the history section, picking up the open book she'd left on the floor. The one that Bucky had been reading. She sighed and looked at the page again. It was the same as before. Curiously she flipped it over and her entire body froze. Chills ran down her spine as she looked at it.
"James "Bucky" Buchanan Barnes. Closest friend of Steve Rogers, A.K.A, Captain America."
A photograph of the same man she had just been speaking to was inside the book. His black hair was short and combed back, his chin free of stubble and his blue eyes piercing out from clear, pale skin.
Thank you all so much for reviews and follows. Next chapter is underway as we read/speak? Please review and let me know what you thought of this one.