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❝ i think people would be happier if they admitted things more often. in a sense we are all prisoners of some memory, or fear, or disappointment / we are all defined by something we can't change. ❞
⎯ simon van booy, illusion of separateness
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THE HARDEST QUESTIONto answer about death is what it feels like.
For James Buchanan Barnes, death wasn't so much a feeling as a realization. It started in the pit of his stomach, a lurch that worked its way through his body until it reached his mind. Like a thousand wasps with poisoned stingers buzzing through his head. It was the lurching that made him realize something was wrong. It was the panic that made him realize it was something serious. It was the dust that made the realization turn to reality; he was about to die.
An aching thought, a blossoming despair.
It forced him to watch as he slowly slipped away. The man who'd thought he'd died countless times before knew this was the end. The real end, and he could do nothing but walk, nothing but wander back to them, knowing it was too late.
The realization was this: he would not be able to say goodbye.
Tears were flecked in his eyes as the dust overcame him, as he watched his oldest friend's eyes turn dark. And the last words on his lips before death overtook him was her name. Her beautiful, lovely name. Marina.
He should have known that it was the last time he'd ever see her, his wife, his lifeline, his whole world. Death came for him relentlessly, and he knew no peace, not when he disappeared, not in the abyss of oblivion, and not when he came back.
