Chapter 25: Just Nerves

The thought occurred to Bucky after they'd draped his neck and injected the local anesthetic. As they ran an ultrasound probe over the site to locate the targeted nerves, he started brainstorming ways to break the news to his parents—particularly his mother. He hadn't told them anything about the worsening phantom pain, much less the fact that he was probably having surgery for it within a month or so. His mom would completely flip her shit, especially now that they were far enough out from the cancer battle to finally start letting their guards down. Bucky felt a pinch as the second needle went in, but it barely registered. Maybe he could ask Steve to do it for him. Nevermind, he'd definitely make Bucky do it himself. He'd just have to make sure to avoid leading with the word "tumor" as Dr. Woo had. Mom would react to that even worse than Bucky had.

The instant the meds kicked in, he literally gasped in relief. "Is this what it's gonna feel like if it works?" he asked.

"Eventually, yes," Darkhölme said. "It will take a while for the nerves to heal, but this is the ultimate goal."

"And in the meantime? While they're still healing?"

Darkhölme gave it to him straight: "There will almost definitely be significant pain. But, the long-term goal is completely eliminating phantom pain. It's not an ideal trade-off, but hopefully one that will be worth it."

"Short term pain, long term gain?"

"Exactly."

"I can manage that."

"I'm sure you can."

In a mildly hilarious coincidence, his surgery was scheduled for March twenty-sixth—the ninth anniversary of his amputation. Bucky was actually excited to get this done. But in the meantime, he still had to break the news. Naturally, he asked Steve what to do.

"What do you mean? Just do it," Steve said.

"I don't want her to flip out."

"Stay calm about it. If you're calm, she'll be calm."

"That hasn't always proven true."

"Bucky, she'll be fine," he insisted.

"Okay, fine. Damn, I also have to tell Lamberg and the team. How long do you think I'll be out?"

"Dr. Darkhölme told you. Twelve weeks before full activity."

"Twelve? Why do I not remember this?"

"Maybe you blocked it out because you hate the idea so much. But yes, twelve weeks. If you do anything crazy before then, you could disrupt the healing of the nerves."

"Wait a minute, there's no way I can have a surgery with a twelve-week recovery anytime soon. That's three months and the Paralympics are this summer. I can't just take three months off training. We have to reschedule it."

"Reschedule for over five months from now? I don't know if that's a good idea."

"The tumor isn't malignant. It's not going to hurt me if I leave it there a little longer."

"What do you mean it's not going to hurt you? The whole reason we're doing this is because it's hurting you."

"I mean it's not threatening my life or anything like Ewing's was."

"But it's threatening your quality of life. Bucky, do you think you can even play your best when your phantom pain is this bad?"

Bucky sighed. Steve had a point. Of course he did. Playing through this level of pain for months would probably hinder his abilities almost as much as taking three months off. "Fine. But it's going to be a fucking miserable three months."

"You'll survive." Steve paused, as if waiting for him to keep talking. "Are you forgetting someone you need to talk to about this?"

"You want me to tell your parents too? I thought you would handle that?"

"No, you don't need to tell my parents. I'm talking about our friends. Don't you think they'd want to know?"

"You didn't tell them about every little operation you had after your transplant."

"Okay, first of all, that's not a fair comparison. This is not a 'little operation.' There's a big difference between having a busted wire removed and having multiple nerves snipped and relocated. And second of all, why are you hesitant to tell them? Do you not want them to know?"

"Maybe I don't," Bucky said reluctantly. Yes, they'd all met in a hospital, so their friendship was literally forged in sickness, but nowadays it had nothing to do with that. They didn't get together in the chemo clinic anymore, they got together at Bucky and Steve's house or Tony's Malibu mansion. He didn't want to force them back into the role of worrying about an ailing friend. Nor did he want all the pitying attention they were sure to rain down on him if they knew. It was cute when they were kids, but especially now Bucky prided himself on his independence more than anything else. He couldn't help that he was about to be stripped of some of it, but he could help how many people saw him knocked down.

"Bucky, why?" Steve asked sincerely.

He shrugged, thankful for the temporary nerve block. Shrugging always hurt, though no matter how many times he did it and regretted it he couldn't kill the reflexive urge to shrug in response to things. "Just don't want them to worry 'bout me."

"What if I tell them?"

"Why would you do that?"

"Maybe because I don't want to worry about you alone."

"Steve, you don't have to worry either. I'm gonna be fine."

"I know that, but I'm still worried. I can't help it. You should know how this feels by now."

"Yeah, I do," Bucky said. Nothing he said could make Steve not worry, because nothing Steve said ever made Bucky not worry when their roles were reversed. "I'll tell my parents and my team, you tell the Avengers?"

"Deal."

Bucky didn't waste any time, picking up his phone to call his mom while they were still on the road. This way he knew he'd have Steve right there as backup. And he couldn't get distracted by some other task at home and put it off. She clearly hadn't been expecting a call, and was very, very excited to have received one. "Bucky! How are you?"

"I'm okay, Mom," he said, mostly truthfully. This nerve block was a godsend. "But there's, um…this thing I have to tell you about."

"Is everything okay?" she asked, tone already laced thickly with concern. "Is Steve okay?"

"Yeah, Steve's doing great. But me…I'm, uh…" God, why couldn't he just spit it out? "I've been having some pretty bad phantom pain lately."

"As bad as it was at the beginning?"

"Yeah. But I'm actually on the way home from Gravesen right now and the doctors there figured out what's causing it and proposed a solution."

"What's causing it?"

"It's benign," he led with, making sure not to make the same mistake Dr. Woo did. "It's a benign tumor called a neuroma. The nerves that they cut when I had my amputation have been growing slowly into themselves ever since and it's causing the pain."

"But they can fix it?"

"Yeah, they can. I'm having surgery in a few weeks. On my stump-iversary actually. They're gonna bury the nerves in my chest muscle so they have something to grow into."

"Okay," she said. Bucky could hear that she was freaking out, but only a little bit. He sighed in relief, knowing he'd broken the news as calmly as possible. "Do you need me to come up and help take care of you?"

"You'd have to ask Steve. He's gonna be head nurse this time," Bucky said with a grin. He glanced over and saw Steve was smiling too. "It's just my stump, so I'll probably still be pretty functional."

"Okay. Thanks for letting me know. I love you. Call me the day before, please."

"Love you too. I will. Bye."

"Bye."

Steve shot him a glare. "Head nurse? Really?"

"You know as well as I do that's an honorable title."

~0~

Steve tried to get Bucky to start his leave from soccer now because he was in so much pain, but he refused. "Leave starts on surgery day. I've played this long, I can play until then," he insisted. Steve knew better than to come between Bucky and soccer. It would be hard enough for Steve to keep him off the field for the requisite twelve weeks after surgery, he wasn't going to waste his breathe encouraging him to rest now. Besides, he wasn't really at risk of injuring himself. Nothing he did on the field could make the neuroma worse, and he knew his own pain tolerance. So, life proceeded as normal for the next three weeks. The nerve block lasted a few hours after the appointment, and Steve hated watching Bucky's eyes harden once again as it wore off for good. He claimed the meds Dr. Woo had prescribed were helping, but clearly not enough to offer him full relief. Both of them were counting down the minutes until surgery day.

Steve informed each of their friends of the imminent procedure. It took a long time—Steve had never until now wished that maybe they didn't have so many friends—but he crossed off every name on his list and ended the evening with half a dozen offers to bring them dinner and more well wishes than he could count. "Bucky, our friends love you!" he called to the other room.

Bucky emerged from the kitchen with a red, white, and blue popsicle in his mouth. Ever since he bought them as a joke during Steve's last cleanout, he'd become borderline addicted to them. At least once a week he snuck into the freezer for one. Steve found this endlessly amusing. Bucky grabbed the stick and pulled it out of his mouth with a slurp. "Why?" he asked.

"What do you mean why?"

"Why do our friends love me?"

Steve turned his phone off and tossed it aside. "Beats me," he said flippantly.

Bucky rolled his eyes and sat down on the sofa beside him. "I know why our friends love you," he said.

"And why is that?"

"'Cause you've got it."

"Got what?"

Bucky poked him in the chest. "The 'ol Rogers Razzle Dazzle."

Steve snorted. "That's Rogers-Barnes Razzle Dazzle to you."

"What are you talking about? We didn't hyphenate our names. And if we did, it would be Barnes-Rogers."

"Why do you get to go first?"

"Alphabetical order," Bucky claimed. "Plus, it just sounds better."

"But I was born first."

He bit the last chunk of popsicle off the stick and let it melt in his mouth. "When you get assigned seats in a classroom, is it alphabetically or by birthday?"

"Touché."

~0~

Bucky had his pre-op physical done a week before surgery day. He came out of the appointment to find a text from Parker asking if he and Tony could come up on Sunday to wish him luck in person.

"Sure," he replied. He knew that he'd be nervous to the point of losing his mind the day before surgery, and having company seemed like an ideal way to redirect his attention to anything other than the prospect of having his chest flayed open. Parker sent him a smiley face emoticon; not the yellow one, but the colon followed by a right parenthesis.

"Parker and Tony are coming up on Sunday," he informed Steve when he got home.

"Okay. Do you want to invite anyone else? Make it a bit of a celebration?"

"What are we celebrating?"

"It's your stump-iversary."

"And my last day of not being miserable?"

"Yeah, I guess it's that too. But aren't you already miserable?" he asked sincerely.

Bucky shrugged, and, as always, regretted it. "Sometimes I think I've gotten used to the phantom pain and it's not so bad, and then other times…" he trailed off, not entirely sure how to describe it in words. Steve had seen it at its worst; he didn't need an explanation.

"Okay. So, do you want to ask anyone else to come up?"

Bucky thought about it for a moment, and shook his head. Parker and Tony had offered, but he didn't want anyone to feel obligated to visit him just because of the impending surgery. Most of his friends had already acknowledged it, and he knew they'd continue wish him luck and "get well soons" as the day approached. He liked knowing they cared, but the amount of attention made him uncomfortable.

His dreadful anticipation amassed even more over the course of the week. On Friday, the team gave him a loving sendoff that, though well-intentioned, made him feel like he was going away forever instead of only twelve weeks. Lemar promised to work twice as hard since, "I'll be working for the both of us." Bucky admired his drive, but that only strengthened the feeling that he might never return. He knew that wasn't the case, but just as with scanxiety, rationality paid little role in his feelings on the matter.

~0~

Steve hated how on edge Bucky acted in the days leading up to the surgery. No matter how hard he tried to be reassuring, nothing seemed to help. He only hoped that Parker and Tony's visit would lift his spirits. They arrived just after one o'clock on Sunday afternoon, bearing food and gifts.

"Thank you so much," Bucky and Steve both said. "You didn't have to do all this," Bucky continued.

"We wanted to help make this week easier, however possible," Parker replied. He followed Steve into the kitchen and helped him put away what was easily three or four meals' worth of food for the both of them. Everything was labeled with cooking or reheating instructions. As usual, Parker's thoughtfulness exceeded all expectations.

"Seriously, thank you so much," Steve reiterated. He didn't know how quickly Bucky would bounce back, but he was expecting at least a week or two of being completely on his own for household chores. They normally split them pretty evenly, so having one thing already taken care of was an immense weight off his shoulders.

"You're welcome. It's the least I can do." Parker lowered his voice to a whisper. "How is he?"

Steve replied in equally hushed tones. "Really nervous, and already in a lot of pain. I think he's just eager to get it over with."

"Understandable. I hope all goes well. I'll be thinking of you guys all day tomorrow."

"Thanks. We really appreciate it."

The two of them walked into the living room, where Bucky and Tony were already seated and chatting away.

"I think it could be ready for the first human trials within two or three years," Tony explained.

"Who would be willing to have an experimental medical device implanted like that?" Bucky questioned. Steve assumed they were discussing the novel VAD and power source design Tony had been honing for the past few years.

"Me."

"You?"

"Yeah. What better way to announce to the world that I have complete faith in my invention?"

"I guess there isn't one."

"Exactly. Besides, this thing's only got a few more years of life left in her." He gestured to his VAD backpack.

"What if a donor heart becomes available before your new design is ready for human testing?" Steve asked.

Tony's posture shifted instantly from relaxed to tense and fearful. Steve didn't expect the inquiry to catch him so off guard. "I, um…would let it go to the next eligible candidate," he said slowly.

"What?"

"Yeah." If possible, Tony looked even more hesitant as he delivered his next words. "As you know…the life expectancy of donated organs isn't all that long, and I know that what I'm working on will be even better than a donor heart. I took myself off the list."

Evidently, this was just as much news to Parker and Bucky as it was to Steve. Parker's eyebrows shot into his hairline. "Are you crazy?" he questioned. "How long has it been since you did this?"

"A few months."

"And you didn't tell any of us sooner?"

"No, I didn't."

"Why not?" Steve asked. "That's a huge decision, which I'm sure you didn't make easily."

"What if it doesn't work?" Parker questioned. "What if your device doesn't work and you gave up your chance of survival?" Steve stepped closer to him and placed a hand on his back, since he was clearly on the brink of a panic attack. This was supposed to be a stress reliever for Bucky, but instead here they were losing their minds anyway. At least it wasn't Bucky's health they were freaking out about.

"Parker, it's going to work. I designed it."

"I know you're a genius or whatever, but that's an awful lot of confidence for such a delicate matter," Bucky remarked.

"Look, I know it's a risk," Tony explained. "But it's a calculated one. Believe me, I thought about this long and hard, and this is the best course of action. This way, someone else will get a donor heart. Someone who really needs it. And when this one works in me, we're well on our way to getting them to every terminal heart failure patient so they don't need transplants either. I'm fixing the donor heart shortage on the demand side in every way I can."

Steve was all for minimizing the number of people who had to go through transplant. That shit was not easy, and he was among the lucky ones who avoided serious complications. Regardless, he wanted this conversation to end, and soon. "Tony, I respect your decision," he said. "Your body, your choice, and I'm sure that your confidence in your own ingenuity is well-placed."

Tony looked like Steve had just smacked him in the face. Clearly, he expected more resistance from him, not acceptance. "Uh…thank you."

"Bucky, can we see what's in the boxes?" he asked, forcefully changing the subject.

"Sure." Bucky picked up the larger of the two and unwrapped it. Inside was a large bell. He burst out laughing.

Steve crossed his arms. "Whose idea was this?"

"Mine," Tony told him through a wry grin.

"I won't answer to that," Steve insisted. Bucky gave it an inaugural ring. "Won't answer to it. This house isn't all that big; you can use your words. I'll hear you."

"Fine," Bucky grumbled.

"It was more of a gag gift than anything," Parker said. "But the other one is more serious. I hope it cheers you up."

Bucky tore open the packaging and a stack of waterproof stickers fell out, the kind that could be placed on a laptop or a water bottle. Steve was too far away to read them, but Bucky chuckled as he read each one. When he reached the last one in the stack, that chuckle turned into deep laughter.

"What does it say?" Steve asked. Bucky held out the sticker for him to read: "How do you get a one-armed man out of a tree? Wave to him." Steve's eyes widened in shock. For anybody else, the joke would come across as offensive and ableist, but if anyone was allowed to enjoy such comedy, it was Bucky. By now, his laughter had reached such a peak that involuntary tears seeped from the inner corners of his eyes. While he worked on composing himself, Steve looked through the rest of the stickers.

"Are these custom?" he asked.

"Some of them," Parker said. "Others I just saw on the website and thought he might like."

There were a few soccer-related ones: "No grass stains, no glory," and "It's good to have goals," superimposed on an image of a soccer net. There was one of the bisexual pride flag, a gold ribbon, the little face that lit up inside CT scanners to indicate when you should hold your breath, and one that simply read, "I suck at pattycake." That one made Steve snort through his nose.

"These are amazing," Bucky said, when he finally stopped laughing enough to produce a coherent sentence. "Thank you."

"You're welcome."

"My personal favorite is the pattycake one," Tony said.

"It's true. Pattycake is unfortunately not one of my many talents," Bucky quipped.

"Where are you going to stick them?" Steve asked.

"I'm not sure yet. I'll probably put the grass stains one on my water bottle. The guys will get a kick out of it."

"Was that a soccer pun?" Tony asked.

"No."

"It was totally a soccer pun," Parker insisted.

"Fine. Whatever. How's MJ?"

"She's good. She just had an investigative piece published."

"That's awesome. Congrats," Steve said.

"Thanks. She's been working really hard. Speaking of which, how much time did you take off, Steve?"

"I took the whole week. I'm lucky that my boss is really forgiving about taking leave."

"One of the perks of being your own boss," Tony remarked, tapping his temple with an index finger.

"Not everybody inherits a multi-billion-dollar company the instant they come of age," Bucky noted.

"And not everybody inherits rich natural talent and the drive to excel in a sport," he retorted.

"That's fair."

"How long until you can go back to soccer?" Parker asked.

Bucky scowled. "Twelve weeks. Apparently nerve connections are really fragile and slow to heal."

"I can imagine. I'm sorry it's so long. Do you have any idea how you're going to keep busy?"

"Not yet. At this point I can't really think much beyond tomorrow." Steve noticed a slight quaver in his voice that hadn't been there the minute before.

"You've got this," Tony said.

"Yeah," Parker agreed. "You're like, the toughest person I know."

Bucky smiled weakly. "Considering we share many of the same friends, including Steve and Tony here, I doubt that's entirely true."

"Don't sell yourself short," Steve said. "But it's not a contest. If it was, we all know Parker would win by a landslide."

Parker's face froze in an expression of pure shock before cracking into a sheepish smile.

"What time do you have to be at the hospital?" Tony asked.

"Ass o'clock in the morning," Bucky grumbled.

Steve rolled his eyes. He'd always been more of a morning person than his husband, but years of having to squeeze in thirty-minute vest treatments before school had given him no choice. "Seven A.M.," he answered. They'd have to leave well before five to get there on time in spite of weekday New York City traffic. Bucky was not looking forward to getting up early.

Tony and Parker stayed well into the afternoon. Once they'd gotten their questions out of the way, they avoided the topic of Bucky's surgery. Steve could actually see him relaxing as the hours ticked by. Unfortunately, that serenity drained away after they left for the night. He pushed back their usual dinner time by an hour and a half, since Bucky wouldn't be able to eat in the morning. He was quiet all through the meal and as they got ready for bed.

"What's on your mind?" Steve asked as Bucky climbed into bed beside him.

"How few hours I have to sleep before we have to get up and go," he sighed. He was lying on his right side, so Steve turned onto his left to face him.

Steve reached out and entwined his fingers with Bucky's. "That all?"

"Just nerves."

"It's totally okay to be nervous, but it's all going to be fine."

"I know it will, but that doesn't help."

"Is there anything I can do that will?"

His offer earned him half a smile which quickly dissipated. "Be there when I wake up?"

Steve leaned in to plant a kiss on his forehead. "Of course. There's nowhere I'd rather be."