Chapter Fifteen
The next day at five before Bucky can leave from work, Fury calls him into his office and all his coworkers are avoiding his eyes and Bucky feels a sinking feeling.
He's just gonna slap your wrist once or twice for missing some of this week, Bucky tries to convince himself. Give you a lecture. Or maybe it's not even bad. Maybe he's gonna give you a raise.
But Bucky can't lie to himself very well and he still feels ill.
He doesn't say it in words in his head, but he's feeling it in his heart.
Fury's going to fire you.
Inside Fury's office, Bucky sits gingerly on one of the chairs in front of his desk and tries to make himself small. Fury's pacing with his hands clasped behind his back. Bucky looks away and instead stares intently at the back of a photo frame on the desk.
"You know what I'm going to tell you, Barnes," Fury says quietly and Bucky wants to jump up and run out of the office before he can say anymore. Run out of the building and then possibly in front of a car.
He wishes he could think of something to respond to Fury with, but his mind is blank.
"Um," he says quietly and Fury looks at him, forcing Bucky to look up sheepishly and Fury lets out a breath.
"No one here wants to let you go," he admits. Cause I'm pitiable, Bucky thinks and as much as he usually hates this fact, he wishes now that it would save him. It's kept him in a job longer than it probably should. Couldn't it give him a little more time? "We wanted to give you some notice, so you don't have to be gone until next Wednesday, but after then, consider your position an open one."
Bucky hates to do it, but he's going to resort to begging.
"My son…," he tries pitifully. "My baby, what am I going to do? How will I feed him?"
"I'm sure there's someone in New York who can give you a position more suited to your skills," Fury says. Bucky can tell he's trying to be as gentle as he possibly can. He's never seen Fury dance so lightly around the words 'you're fired'.
"I gotta pay mortgage, and bills," Bucky says quietly. "Food, hospital expenses, medicine."
"Like I said, no one here wanted to take you off the payroll," Fury says. Bucky feels as though a hole has been punched through his chest. He's not sure how he's still breathing. Then, he realizes something else.
He stares down at his lap.
"My prosthetic," he says out loud. "I won't be able to pay for that now."
This hasn't entirely sunk in for him. He stares at the floor. He's in shock. A second realization comes.
"And child services, they'll hear about it if I'm unemployed. They could try to take Stevie," he breathes. He looks up at Fury and now his eyes are stinging with tears. They could take Stevie. "Please, I need this job. To keep my son, please."
Fury avoids his face.
"I'm sorry, Barnes," he says.
"I don't even care about the arm, the house, the food. I'll starve if I have to, but my son… My baby," he pleads, as though Fury is the one personally taking Stevie away from him.
Fury turns around so all Bucky can see is his back.
"I'll see you at the office tomorrow and the next day, but by Wednesday, I want your desk cleared," he says.
Bucky leaves the office in a daze and he accidentally misses the bus he usually takes home and he has to take the second one fifteen minutes later.
He sits on the bus and stares ahead and in his head, his life spirals out of control.
When he reaches home, Mrs Carter seems to sense that something is the matter and she leaves quickly. Bucky picks Stevie up from his crib and takes him to the rocking chair and curls up with him there and presses his face into the cushion. Stevie squirms weakly and yells at him, but he only squeezes tighter.
"Bu-bu-buh!" Stevie yells his name, angry with being held down, and Bucky looks at him with red eyes.
"Oh, Stevie," he says and his voice cracks. "I can't lose you, buddy. I just can't."
Later, he calls Natalia.
"I lost my job," he says and it seems like Natalia takes a second to take this in, letting out a long breath into the phone.
"No," she says.
"Yeah," he replies. "I get my last check Wednesday and then I'm officially unemployed." Natalia takes a long time to respond.
"What are you going to do," she breathes.
"I'm gonna put Stevie to bed and go buy all the beer I can afford and drink myself to death," he says bitterly.
"Don't do that," Natalia says weakly.
"Thanks for the advice," Bucky replies and he doesn't mean to be so biting towards her, but his anger is building. He doesn't know what he's going to do! He has no idea and it's scaring him and he thinks the real implications of this might be sinking in for Natalia, the consequences about Stevie, and Bucky hangs up.
When Natalia shows up an hour later, Bucky is, true to his word, absolutely hammered. Stevie's in his crib, surely not asleep but at least quiet, and Bucky is downing bottle after bottle of cheap alcohol on the kitchen floor, feeling sicker by the minute and rubbing his tears away with a dishcloth. When Natalia rings the doorbell, he stumbles to the door and opens it. When he sees that it's her, he presses his forehead to the front of the door and curses fouly.
"Who said you could come here," he slurs and Natalia lets herself in and tears the glass bottle out of his hand, shutting the door behind her.
"You look like hell," she replies. He's seeing everything through an alcohol-induced blur, but he thinks she sounds angry.
"I feel like hell," he replies. "My life is hell."
"Go lay down," Natalia orders. He watches her, following dizzily, as she walks into the kitchen and takes in the mess. "This is disgusting," she mutters under her breath. He can't seem to think up a good retort and suddenly the world turns and he ends up on the floor.
"Um," he says at the ceiling and then Natalia's grabbing his elbow and hauling him up with strength he didn't know she had.
"Where's the baby?" She asks.
"Sleep," Bucky replies. His words seem to run together. He doesn't know why. Why is Natalia here again? "He's asleep."
"And what was your plan?" Natalia asks. Her fingers are still bone-crushingly tight on his forearm and she gestures with her free hand to the mess he's made of the kitchen. "When you finished drinking yourself into a stupor?"
"I told you," Bucky says. "I thought alcohol poisoning sounded like a really good idea."
"Are you seriously joking with me right now?" She asks and Bucky shrugs.
"I dunno," he says and Natalia drags him back to his bedroom, a room he can't remember whether or not she's been in yet. It's filthy in here, too, he thinks. Suddenly, he thinks his entire house must be trashed. "I swear this place was clean ten minutes ago," he says. "Daaaaaaamn."
"Lay down," Natalia says and sits him on the mattress. "I'm going to go check on Stevie."
"Tell him I love him," Bucky says and Natalia glares.
"Yeah, this display really proves that," she says angrily and Bucky collapses on the bed and stares at the ceiling. He can hear Natalia shuffling about this house, and then Bucky feels bile rise in the back of his throat.
"Oh, no," he manages to mumble before rolling over and vomiting all over the carpet. He does this twice before shakily wiping his mouth on his sleeve and collapsing on the pillow. He hears Natalia enter the room and blanch.
"Bucky," she gasps and he groans. When she returns, she has cleaning supplies and disinfectant and she looks very angry.
"Bet I don't look so hot now," Bucky hears himself saying. "This is actually not sexy."
"I'm not going to dignify that with a response," Natalia says.
"Sorry," Bucky says.
"Please just sleep this off," Natalia replies, her voice a plea. He can hear her starting to scrub the carpet.
"I swear," Bucky says. "Two more bottles and I'll be dead in the morning. Maybe three. It'll be great."
"Stop talking about death," Natalia cries.
"Sorry," Bucky says again. Then, he lifts his head off the pillow and looks at her. She's got her hair pulled back and she's covering her nose and mouth with one hand and scrubbing fiercely at the carpet with the other hand. "Sorry," he repeats himself until she looks up. "I'm sorry."
"Tell me that again when you're sober," she says.
"Think I'll remember any of this tomorrow?" Bucky says. "I hate not remembering things."
Natalia's quiet. She's still scrubbing, acting like she's not listening. He looks at her.
"Once, I didn't remember things for seven whole years. Did I ever tell you about that?" He says and she glances up at him.
"What?" She says.
"Seven whole years and I was like," Bucky collapses back on his bed and looks at his ceiling. "What's my name? And they were like," he makes a face. "You don't have a name!"
Natalia stares at him for a long time.
"I feel like I wasn't supposed to tell you that, but I can't remember," Bucky says and then he laughs loudly. "I can't remember! That seems to happen to me a lot, Natalia."
"Shut up," Natalia replies. "Just, please, just shut up."
Bucky falls silent.
"I'm sorry," he says again and she stands up and leaves his room with a haste and the mess on the carpet is only half gone.