An Act of... Love? [An Avengers Polyamorous Fanfic]

Chapter 33

After Scott left, I found myself pulling out my phone to stare at James' message again. I had to admit, the more time that passed, the more it seemed to affect me. At first... I was just numb. But as the numbness wore off, in its place was the fear that had always been there, just covered up and hidden. I must've read over his message a hundred times before throwing the phone across the room with a frustrated scream.

He was right, in some ways. Beckett never was able to protect me from him, but did he ever really even try? I exhausted myself trying to go over Beckett's potential motives and psychological standing. James, I could understand. He was a psychopath and a sociopath who loved to torment me. He's never cared for another person in his life.

But Beckett? Beck was confusing. He always had a weird... fixation on me, but not in the way James did. James' fixation was based around torturing me and using me. Beckett rarely ever hurt me, physically, if James wasn't around. I reminded myself that even though he didn't have a fixation on physically abusing me, that he was still abusive. Just because he wasn't as bad as James, doesn't mean he was good... that was always a hard thing to remember. Just because James did worse things to me does not make the things Beckett, or anyone else had done to me alright.

I was exhausted but refused to close my eyes as I propped myself up on the couch. Sleep had been... hard recently. I kept reliving the past, or having brand-new nightmares.

I felt someone's emotions near my front door. I could tell they weren't sure what they should do, but they were concerned. I knew it was likely either Steve or Bucky and that they'd heard me scream when I threw my phone across the room. I pulled my blanket tightly around me, just wanting to cry. I didn't want to be pushing them away... I just didn't know how to let them in.

I delicately stood up from the couch after a few minutes of the person standing just on the other side of my door and walked over there. I went to open the door, but couldn't bring myself to even touch the knob. So instead I ended up just resting my hand on the door frame as their concern and uncertainty swirled within me. I let out a tired sigh as I leaned my forehead against the door.

I could tell by the slight changes in emotions that whatever super soldier stood on the other side of my door that they knew I was there. I could almost feel a hand on the other side of the door where mine was, which made a few tears slip down my face as I tried to keep control of my breathing.

It took me a few minutes of crying before I gave up all of my resolve and opened the door to Bucky standing on the other side. He didn't say anything, he just surged forward and wrapped me in his arms as I began to cry harder. He managed to close the door behind us as he guided me to sit down on the floor so I wouldn't fall over.

I don't know how long we stayed on the floor, his back up against the front door as he had his arms wrapped around me and my face was buried in his chest as I cried. He stroked my hair gently as I cried and he just let me feel my feelings without saying a word.