It didn't feel right.
I thought I was making a good decision. Logical. Rational. Objective. I was a scientist, after all. I knew that much even when I had no memories.
It still made sense to me to break things off with Bucky. There was mathematics to it. And everything else, every emotion I was feeling about him, was muddled and confusing and completely overwhelming. When I thought about him, it was like untangling a basket of yarn. When I tried to make sense of one memory at a time, I'd pull at the thread until I reached a point where it was knotted up with another ball of yarn entirely.
I clung to what I knew for sure.
I knew that my mother was dead. I knew that I was feeling something like grief every time a memory of her resurfaced. I knew that my friends were uncomplicated, and that Tony hadn't hurt me as much as he thought he had, and that my initial impressions were wrong. I'd thought everything else was confusing, and that Bucky was making things simple. I didn't believe that anymore.
I hadn't seen Bucky for a couple of days. I wasn't sure where he was, and I was afraid to ask anyone. I didn't want to know if he was avoiding me or if he'd left completely, because I wasn't sure which one of those options would be worse.
It was a Saturday morning. I was in the sitting area of the residential floor, waiting for Nat to meet me. We were supposed to have coffee together—that is, we had made plans to sit around sulking together, not addressing our problems. As I waited, I was trying to make my way through the list of books Bucky had written for me, but I felt guilty using it, and as I stared down at the familiar pages of Jane Eyre, the words kept becoming blurry and unreadable from tears.
"Hi," Steve said awkwardly, lowering himself cautiously onto the couch beside me. I looked up from my book. If I hadn't already remembered that we'd sat right here and talked about Bucky once before, I would've had serious deja vu.
"What, did you two make a deal?" I asked. "Did you send Bucky to talk to Nat? That's not gonna go well. Sam would probably be a better wingman."
"No," he said. "Bucky is—wait, Nat told you what's going on? What did she say?"
"I don't break that easy, Rogers. You're gonna have to trade me one of those monkey head eraser caps if you want the real gossip."
"What?"
"Like in elementary school? The monkey head eraser caps?"
"Grace, I went to school in the 1920's."
"You didn't have monkey head eraser caps?"
"No."
"Bummer. I just remembered them this morning. They were pretty cool."
He sighed. "Don't change the subject."
"What's the subject again? I wasn't even deflecting. I was just excited."
"Bucky."
"Oh."
"I think you're making a mistake, frankly. And I think you would want one of us to tell you that."
"You think 'I' would want that?" I asked slowly. "What are you saying—you think I'm not me? Just because I don't want to date your friend?"
"I'm not saying you're not yourself."
"You're implying it."
"What I'm saying is that the last time I saw you before everything happened, before HYDRA, you were happy. You were happy because of Buck, and you were fussing over him, and you were worried about him going on a mission. You would never have done this, the last time I saw you before. That's all I'm saying."
"Did he tell you why I did it? I had reasons."
"Yeah, he did. He told me everything. Which really speaks to how much better he's gotten about communicating since you met him, by the way. It was a big deal for him, letting you in."
"I didn't fix him," I said defensively.
"No, but I think you made him want to work on certain things so he could be with you the way you deserve. And I think opening up to you a lot helped him open up to everybody else a little bit more."
I wasn't sure if it was guilt or regret that shot through me at the idea. "Why are you telling me this? It's already done. I ended it."
Steve took a long pause, like he was trying to come up with the perfect words to change my mind. He thought, and then he visibly gave up. "You're breaking his heart, Grace."
"He broke my heart too! All of that feels fresh to me right now."
"No one's saying he didn't. I was the one telling him he messed up all those times. That's why I'm telling you this time."
I swallowed. "Is he...okay?"
"He'll manage. He's good at scraping by in one piece. I'm not sure how he does it."
"Where is he? Is he...here?"
"He hasn't come out of his apartment for a while. But he's leaving on a solo mission today," Steve said. "Could be gone for a while. I wasn't sure whether I should talk him out of it or not."
"Should I...make sure he's okay?"
His eyebrows shot up. "Yes. By all means. But don't go over there unless you plan on taking him back. Is that what you mean?"
"Oh. No, that's not what I mean. I think it's best if I don't make things worse, then," I said timidly.
As Steve stood up, my stomach sank. I knew he was disappointed in me.
"Do you want me to talk to Nat for you?" I asked.
"Normally, I'd say yes," he said cautiously.
"But...?" I sensed a 'bit.'
"I'm not sure how to phrase this," he said, choosing his words carefully. "I don't think you're in a good place right now. I'm not sure if you're quite...yourself."
"You don't trust me not to make things worse," I gathered.
"No offense," he said regretfully. "I'm still your friend, Grace. I'm here if you need me."
"Thanks," I said, not quite believing him.
When Steve was gone, I almost wanted to go cry in the storage closet again. But I stayed there, eyes scanning over words without taking in their meaning, not understanding anything. Even when Nat came and we moved to the kitchen table, I could barely pay attention to her words all morning.
Nat and I were mid conversation and halfway through our coffees when Bucky came in. He was apparently about to leave on that mission Steve had mentioned, with a leather jacket covering tactical gear. There was a black notebook in his hand, and it was bending in at the edge where he clutched it tightly.
"Can I have a second, Grace?" he asked tiredly. "I mean it; it'll just be a second."
Nat started slipping out of the room before he could even finish, but he added, "You can stay, Romanoff, it's really just gonna take a second."
"Yeah, I'm still leaving," Nat muttered, moving past him.
"She'd probably rather you stayed," Bucky called after her, but Nat was dead set on leaving. He turned back to me. "Sorry. I'm not trying to have a moment or something."
He stayed across the room, even as I stood up to talk to him. "It's okay," I started. "We can—"
"I was gonna have Steve give you this, but he said you were around today. So I just came to give you this myself," he said quickly, cutting me off. I didn't miss his eyes scanning over my face, then my body. It didn't feel predatory, but rather panicked, like the answers to a quiz were written on me, and he only had a split second to memorize as much as he could.
He dropped the notebook down on the table instead of handing it to me. It didn't relax when he let go; it sat there still folded in on itself.
"What is it?" I asked, despite the fact that he was already edging back out of the room.
"I wrote a bunch of shit in it," he said, like that explained it. "Just—Don't take it like I'm trying to change your mind. I'm not. I just wanna help you remember. That's what it was for in the first place—keeping the memories. You don't have to read it, but that's what it's for."
"What...?"
I picked it up as he turned around, almost completely gone. But he turned back to me suddenly, like he'd remembered something. "If you do read it, I stuck a loose paper in there somewhere—you should read that first or else the rest won't make sense. And I mean the one loose paper that's folded, not the other ones." He paused, and then remembered something else: "And sorry if there are mistakes with spelling and grammar and shit."
He'd nearly made it to the hallway as he backed up while he spoke. Then he ducked out quickly, out of my sight, when he apparently decided that was all I needed to know.
"Bucky—wait—" I called after him, confused. But he was really gone that time.
A/N: eat ur heart out mr darcy