Author's note: I hope you all enjoyed your happy chapter, because now we're going back into the dark. (For those of you who really loved the last chapter... um... sorry? :D)
In the darkened living room, Bucky is making a low, quiet whining sound, like a wounded animal. He's grateful that no one else is home to hear him.
He wants to push the laptop away - to throw it across the room really- but he can't stop staring at the screen.
This was a mistake. He should not have gone digging through the past.
He thought he was ready to see it.
He wasn't.
"Mrs. Winifred Barnes copes with yet another tragedy in a long line of misfortune" The headline reads. A photograph of a worn-faced woman with thick dark hair, tinged grey, fills the top of the page. She looks tired and resigned. He almost recognizes her. She's older than he expected, but then he was away from her a full 2 years before he 'died'...
A lot changes in a few years.
"Mrs. Barnes today accepted two American flags in honor of America's fallen heroes: her son James Buchanan 'Bucky' Barnes, (age 28) and family friend, Steven Grant Rogers, (age 27, also known as Captain America). Both young men were killed in service to their country overseas this past year.
Mr. George Barnes, (father of James Barnes and late husband of Mrs. Barnes) and the couple's eldest son, Sgt. Timothy Barnes, were both also killed in action in 1939 and 1930, respectively.
Captain Rogers has no known surviving family members, but Mrs. Barnes says he was often a fixture of the small Brooklyn, NY apartment where she raised her two sons. She considers him one of her own. Mrs. Barnes displayed remarkable courage and insight when we visited her family home earlier this week.
"The boys were inseparable from the day they met." Mrs. Barnes tells us, over coffee. Her home is neat and comfortable, and filled with little mementos of her family. She shows us a photograph of her son and Rogers as children. The bond between them is already evident.
"Steven's parents were hard up from the beginning, and his dad passed away young, poor thing. He was over here all the time with my James - just the sweetest little boy I ever met. He was so polite. Steven was always sick, I remember, but he never let it slow him down, even when it was bad. I barely recognized him when he grew up all of a sudden, but he still had that same sweet face. He was always that kind little boy underneath, I think." She says with utter conviction.
"And my James… he was such a good boy. He looked after the house, worked so hard and helped me anyway he could. He was working 3 jobs putting food on the table after his father passed, but he never complained. He was just everybody's guardian angel…"
She pauses here, overcome with emotion.
"I... I just… I can't believe they're both gone." She tells us, holding a framed photograph of her son to her heart.
The two photos appear just below. One is a miniature version of himself, arm slung around a scarecrow wearing Steve's face. They're both beaming. The other is his service photo; the same one kept in HYDRA's Winter Soldier file. He keeps scrolling, feeling sick.
"The only thing that makes it easier for me, " Mrs. Barnes tells us, "is that they went together. That's just how they've always done things. For one of those boys to have to come back… to live without the other… I just can't imagine it."
He closes the article window and stares blankly at the empty browser. He isn't sure what to do with himself now. It would almost be better if he'd died that day, for good and all. At least it would have meant something.
There's more to the article, something about a memorial service, and posthumous medals, but Bucky doesn't care about any of that. His throat is thick and tight, and he needs a moment to breathe.
Later that evening, when Steve gets home, Bucky meets him at the door, and pulls him tightly into a silent hug. He doesn't say a word; just stands there with his head on Steve's shoulder.
"You… ok?" Steve shifts to push the door behind him closed with his foot.
"No." Bucky says quietly.
"You want to talk about it?"
"No." -into his shoulder.
"Ok."
He stands there, leaning against the door, arms around Bucky's shoulders, Bucky's face buried in his shoulder, for he doesn't know how long. The sun sinks over the city skyline outside and long shadows drift over the floor. Once or twice he thinks he feels moisture through his shirt sleeve, but he says nothing.
Later, he looks at the browser history on his laptop. He knows it's a bit of an invasion of privacy, but he feels justified for Bucky's own sake. Then he understands.
There aren't really words for this to begin with, much less ones that Bucky would still remember. He understands a little too well, when he too feels the grief in his throat and has to close the computer and look away.
Sometimes the past is better left in the past.
Author's note: … I made myself sad.
