Chapter Three
The next day, Bucky is staring at the ceiling, wide awake, when his alarm rings. He rubs his eyes tiredly and forces himself up. His entire body aches with the kind of bone-deep exhaustion that accompanies bad sleep. Stevie had slept through the night for once, and it would have been a blessing if Bucky had followed suit, but he had difficulty closing his eyes. He'd slept maybe three hours total the entire night.
And the morning routine begins again, with Bucky squeezing in a fast shower while Stevie's still quiet in his crib and avoiding his own reflection in the mirror as he pulls his work polo on over his head and slicks his wet hair back with his hand. He enters Stevie's room, woefully bare except for a soft rocking chair Bucky let himself splurge on and and dresser across from the crib, and leans into Stevie's crib to scoop him up. Stevie's strangely still as Bucky holds him to his chest, unnervingly so, and Bucky feels his own heart stop.
"Stevie?" He says and starts bouncing Stevie gently. "Steve?" No response. Bucky feels all at once as though he'd either scream or throw up and he frantically starts rubbing Stevie's back as best as he can. "Come on kid, open your eyes, come on." Nothing. Bucky runs Stevie into his bedroom and lays him down on the mattress and puts his ear to his little mouth. He hears a rattling and feels the softest exhale. "Stevie, come on, breathe for me now kid, come on!" Bucky cries, his voice escalating. He stands up straight and races out of the room at top speed, running into the hall and throwing open the closet door to find Stevie's nebulizer and medication, tears already beginning to spill down his cheeks. He runs the little machine back into the room and straps Stevie's face into the gas mask. It's medicine, a sort of inhaler, and Bucky prays it works, prays it brings his baby back. It has before.
Bucky doesn't hesitate any longer. Now that Stevie's strapped into the nebulizer, he slides the handle of the machine over his forearm and then scoops Stevie up, somewhat precariously, and goes as fast as he can out of the house. Bucky owns a tiny, ridiculously old car that's usually more trouble than it's worth, but now, Bucky couldn't be more grateful. He loads the baby into his carseat and races to the drivers seat and speeds Stevie to the hospital.
The rest is a blur. Everything moves fast and Bucky follows behind the doctors as long as he can until they take Stevie and stop him and he balls his hand into a fist and grinds his teeth together, but he's crying so hard that it's difficult to see and all he can hear as he's left in the dust behind closed doors is the echo of doctor's voices and the beeping of machines and he eventually finds himself collapsing into a chair in the waiting room and leaning over his knees and sobbing.
It's not that he hasn't been in this position before with Stevie. It's just that every time it happens, Bucky is devastated all over again and every time he's left in the waiting room, he's reminded that that might be the last time he sees his baby.
An hour or so later, Bucky has pulled himself together. He's holding his cellphone to his face and trying to blow hair out of his eyes at the same time and pacing.
"I'm sorry, I meant to call," he says. "I had to take my son to the hospital again; it was an emergency."
Fury on the other end responds and Bucky takes the phone away from his face for one second so he can rub his eyes. "What?" He says.
"Will he be alright?" Fury asks, showing uncharacteristic concern. Or maybe it's not concern, maybe it's just polite to ask. Bucky doesn't think he knows anymore.
He also realizes he doesn't know the answer to Fury's question and that makes him want to cry more, but instead, he tells a lie he hopes is the truth.
"Yeah, he'll be alright now. I mean, I think," he says quietly. There's a distinct lack of hope in his voice. Fury takes a second to respond.
"Take care of your kid, Barnes," he instructs. "We'll see you tomorrow and I expect a few late hours."
"Thank you," Bucky responds and Fury hangs up. What he doesn't say to Bucky is how unreliable Bucky is. How little Bucky gets done when he's actually there. Bucky suspects he only still has this job because the people at the office pity him.
Bucky snaps his phone closed and crams it into his pocket and uses his now free hand to try to rub out the stress headache from between his eyes.
"Mr Barnes?" He hears and he looks up to see Nurse Carter. "Steve is stable now. You can sit in with him." Bucky feels tears stinging at his eyes.
"Fine," he says. "He's fine."
"He'll live," Nurse Carter says. "He suffered a very, very bad asthma attack." Bucky nods and then moves to follow her through the doors and back into Stevie's room.
"You know how it is, Sharon," he mumbles to her because they've been through this before and she nods. They reach Stevie's room and Bucky's anxious to see him, but Nurse Carter stops him before she opens the door. She looks up at him and presses her mouth together. He sees sympathy in her eyes. He knows that look well. He gets it a lot after people notice his left arm.
Nurse Carter looks like she'll say something, but she stops. He knows what she's thinking. What will he do? What will Bucky Barnes do when he brings his son in yet again, only for them all to find out that that trip was the last one? What will he do.
"My aunt sure loves your boy," Nurse Carter finally says. She's referring to Mrs Carter, the babysitter, and Bucky just nods.
"He's hard not to love," he replies and his voice isn't as strong as he'd wanted it to be. Nurse Carter just lets out a breath and nods and then opens the door and lets Bucky in.
Stevie is tiny, too tiny to be one year and a few weeks old, but he is, and in his tiny hospital crib, he's hooked to miniature machines and tubes and Bucky collapses into a chair close to him and sticks his hand between the bars and wraps his fingers around Stevie's little balled fist.
Nurse Carter leaves Bucky alone to hold his son's hand and cry.
Doctors and nurses come and go, poking and prodding at Stevie, telling Bucky to move, administering new medicines, and at least Bucky can see Stevie's chest rise and fall again. He watches with red eyes.
His phone rings later in the day and Bucky pulls it out of his pocket, confused. No one calls him except for work and maybe the occasional telemarketer, and he's a little stunned to see the words 'Natalia R 3 (call me)' on his screen.
He's not sure what to do while his phone buzzes in his hand. Any other day and he'd answer the phone with vigor, but he's in a hospital room with Stevie and there's a doctor in the corner and Bucky's voice is still warbly and raspy from the tears and he's not sure he can muster up the energy to pretend he's okay.
The phone buzzes again and Bucky answers.
"Hello?" He says in Russian. One of the doctors looks at him curiously over his shoulder and Bucky turns away.
"I hope you'll excuse me for calling you so early," Natalia said. He can hear that smile in her voice, but it doesn't cheer him up. "I know I'm supposed to wait a few days, play hard to get." Is she flirting with him?
"Uh," Bucky says.
"But I thought that my New York tour guide and his adorable baby would like to show me a restaurant around here sometime tonight," Natalia continues, glossing over his blunder. Bucky swallows and he waits too long before responding. "This isn't a good time," Natalia said quietly in response to his silence.
"No, um," Bucky says, and then stops himself. "Yes. It's a really bad time."
"Bucky?" Natalia says. "Your… Are you alright? What's wrong?" Bucky glances down at Stevie with all those little tubes in him and looks away again quickly, threatened by a closing throat and watering eyes.
"I'm in the hospital right now," he admits. "Stevie… We had a bad morning." Natalia seems speechless on the other line.
"Something's wrong with Stevie?" She asks and he nods before remembering himself and saying, "Yes."
"Is there anything I can do?" Natalia asks breathlessly.
"Thank you, Natalia, but no," Bucky says. "He'll be okay, he'll live."
"What happened?" Natalia asks and Bucky's not sure he can say. It suddenly seems so complicated.
"Stevie has a lot of health problems," he finally says. "He had a bad asthma attack this morning and stopped breathing."
"Oh," Natalia says and she sounds like she did when Bucky had told her about his time spent in Russia. Shell-shocked. He can't blame her. "I'm so sorry," she says.
"Thanks," Bucky says.
"Are you sure you don't need any help?" Natalia continues. "You must be devastated. Surely there's something I can do to relieve the stress a little." Bucky almost scoffs, although her request is innocent. There's nothing she can do and she doesn't understand. There's nothing anyone can do.
He would make some sort of dark joke about that, but he's not sure he's ready to dump that on Natalia. After all, most people's lives aren't the trainwreck of tragedies that Bucky's is and most people don't have the weight of them all looming behind like some sort of demented shadow. Bucky would like to pretend with Natalia that he didn't either, at least for a while. He didn't want to scare her away.
"How about I show you somewhere to eat later in the week?" He offers weakly.
"Alright," Natalia replies quietly. Then, "I'm so sorry about your baby, really, Bucky." And she sounds genuine. Bucky swallows.
"I am, too," he replies before they both hang up and he puts his phone back into his pocket.