Leave Me Behind [Winter Soldier] III

Living [Chapter 8]

"Some old wounds never truly heal, and bleed again at the slightest word."

George R.R. Martin

Bucky stood with his hands crossed over his broad chest. The sun glimmered down over them, and he was almost too warm in that forested backdrop of the destroyed Avengers facility. A smile was faintly placed on his lips – a smile that suggest peace. Though he lost his best friend, he felt peace knowing Steve had it. Knowing that the man who helped keep balance in the world, who helped save it time and time again, got what he deserved, it brought Bucky a sense of calm.

When Steve didn't come back through the portal, that sense of calm was solidified. While Bruce and Sam frantically panicked that Steve missed the return location and time, Bucky already knew. He knew Steve's decision, though the others didn't. Turning around, looking at the lake behind them, Bucky let the rays of the spring sunshine splash down on him, making his skin glow warm. He had his whole life ahead of him, and though he felt calm, he also felt empty. Perhaps they were one in the same, for when you had nothing left to lose, you could not worry.

But when his life had Ophelia in it, he had felt full of everything good in this world. He worried about her, he worried every day that they were together, but he had felt something that not everyone gets the chance to really feel. Not everyone experienced that kind of love, that kind of human connection.

Thrusting his hands into his jacket pockets, Bucky inhaled deeply. He had air in his lungs, he had no obligations in the world except to live on, and hopefully live a nicer, kinder life. Where it would take him, he wasn't certain, but for now he knew his path was Wakanda. He knew T'Challa was waiting for him to finish up here, and then he could go back to the simple life.

He heard Sam shout, "Well get him back!"

"I'm trying!" Bruce replied.

"Get him the hell back!" Sam shouted. "Look, there!"

Bucky frowned and furrowed his brows -did Steve change his mind and return through the portal? Did Peggy turn him down, unable to understand how there could be two of him, unable to accept that this was not the Steve she knew? Bucky had questions, and worries, and when he turned around he saw the portal had a person on it.

They were knelt on the portal, hands before them, but Bucky immediately knew it was not Steve. Too short, too small, the figure was definitely feminine. Right off the bat, Bucky wondered if Steve brought back Natasha -somehow went to another time where she hadn't sacrificed herself for the soul stone, and brought her back.

Bucky glanced at Bruce, wondering if this was his thought as well. Bruce was much closer to the portal than Bucky was, and could get a clearer look at who was there. Who was standing where no one should have been in that moment.

The person pushed a button and the visor retracted, then they pulled off the helmet. Brown hair cascaded over her shoulders, her big green eyes were wide and searching, grasping for something to recognize. They landed on Bucky, where they widened even more, and her hands went to her mouth, covering it.

"Bucky?" she said, unbelieving.

Bucky replicated her movement, covering his mouth as he took a step towards her. But he stumbled, unable to cope with what he was seeing. His step turned into a tumble as his feet and legs refused to support him. He fell to the grass on his knees, tears in his eyes as he stared at the love of his life, in the flesh.

After eight years, five of which he too was blissfully gone, but three of which he longed to see her one more time.

"Is that..." Sam began, but tapered off.

Bucky forced himself to his feet and though he was disoriented, he made it to the portal where Ophelia was climbing down the steps. They met somewhere in the middle, and Bucky threw his arms around her, ensuring that she was real and not some evil trick of the mind. Her solid, petite body was there against him, his body a shell around her. Her scent made his brain light up, scent-memory being the strongest of the human mind, proving to him that this was real.

"Tell me you're real, please, O, tell me this is real," he begged, his voice muffled by her hair and neck where he had buried himself.

"It's real." Her voice was choked. "I'm real."

Bucky was so overwhelmed, he wanted to hold onto Ophelia forever, but he wanted to step back and ensure that she was real, that this wasn't part of his head, that Thanos wasn't somehow still in there. He told himself over and over that Thanos was gone, he no longer existed in this timeline or in any other- but what if what the stone did to him was still in there? He couldn't trust his own mind in many aspects, and he wondered if his mind was cruel enough to fabricate Ophelia.

"He did it," Bruce said.

Bucky finally released his hold on Ophelia, shaking hands moving to her cheeks. He felt her smile, the way her cheekbones lifted and filled his hands. Her light was the light of his life – there was a subtle torment telling him that he didn't try hard enough to keep her alive, a torment accusing him of accepting her death after Shuri had given him the pills to address her as she haunted his dreams. Maybe he should never have done that, he should have clung onto that Ophelia for as long as life allowed him.

He should have asked Steve for this, and it hadn't even crossed his mind.

Before he could think any more gruelling thoughts, Ophelia brought her lips to his. Everything melted- his guilt, his remorse, his worries. Every single thing he felt in that moment from the joy to the self-loathing, it disappeared around him. She had more power over him than Thanos did -she could make everything vanish with only a touch, a simple contact of skin on skin. She needed not any powers, nor infinity stones -all she needed was that smile, and the love that she had for him.

"Ophelia..." Sam said quietly, clearly torn between not wanting to disrupt this reunion and being worried about Steve. "Where's Steve?"

"Living," she replied. Her hand was on Bucky's cheek, and she was looking right in his eyes as she said it. The word had so much more meaning than what she said -it wasn't about Steve getting the second chance top be with the woman he loved, it was about Ophelia getting a second chance at living, and Bucky getting a second chance to keep her safe.

But what if he couldn't?