The Blunt Knife
Trauma is such a blunt word for something that rips through you as well as any knife. Perhaps it's because, on the outside, you look like you've been beaten down repeatedly, with shadowed eyes, hunched shoulders, and that protective curve to your body that screams vulnerability. Really, it's inside where the worst damage is done, when trauma's ragged edge leaves you torn up into uneven shards that grate against each other like tectonic plates beneath your skin, moving around and changing you as time rattles on by. James Barnes is a perfect example of this – seventy years' worth of beatings bestow a defensive stance on him, fatigue dragging his limbs down and bruising the skin around his eyes; that's what everyone sees. They don't see the pieces he's been ripped into. Bucky. Winter Soldier. James. Friend. War hero. Killer. Clint does, and not just because he's there when the pieces clash together.
By contrast, Clint Barton does not, in fact, show all the blunt signs of trauma. It's easy to blame darkened eyes on jet lag and insomnia. He stands tall, smirks and grins with teeth, laughs too loudly at Stark's expense. Then at night, when the curved sceptre sinks into his chest, that's when he stands on the precipices of who he is, feels it yank and cut at his memories until he's split into child, criminal, hero and traitor – and oh, how sharp that last one is, like ice broken from a glacier (an eternal winter), chilling him to his very core night after night. Just because he doesn't look beaten doesn't mean it never happens. There's always only one person as witness.
"Deep breaths, Clint. You're alright."
If he could think clearly, Clint would probably laugh at the irony of this situation, at how the most notoriously traumatised member of S.H.I.E.L.D. is currently on one knee in front of him, a hand (warm) on his shoulder, trying to help him through his own issues. Part of him knows Barnes only does it out of obligatory reciprocation – Clint helps him glue himself back together, he helps Clint melt the ice – but another insignificant fragment tells him it's out of concern. Because James cares. Because he's the one there when the jagged plates cause earthquakes. Because he alone knows how to deal with Clint when he's pressed up against a wardrobe on the floor, shaking and unseeing, teetering on the edge of wakefulness and sleep.
"It's just you and me. We're safe, I promise." James uses soft touches, warm touches. Brings him back slowly and gently. Keeps the metal arm away if necessary. Waits until Clint's eyes close and his head tips back before leaning in to kiss his forehead, whispering platitudes into his hair as his arms curl around James' waist, head pressed against his chest. They don't move until Clint's shaking has reduced to a trembling, and he has the energy to stand on his own two feet and seek out coffee and bad TV.
"You've been unmade, right?" he asks in low tones.
"Yeah."
"How do you remake yourself?"
"I don't." James smiles. "You do."
The agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. may worry for James Barnes' sanity, but Clint Barton does not; and if just one agent worries about his sanity, he figures that's all he needs.
AN: Prompt: "Clint knows what it's like to be unmade too; but with the Winter Soldier in the mix, people tend to focus on his mental state. So what if Clint is the one teetering on the edge (of no return, a flashback, a panic attack, ANYTHING)?"