Winter Warmth - Bucky Barnes x Y/N

Furnace

A familiar voice emerged from the coridoor, facing you with a smile. "Coffee?" "I've got one, thanks Buck." You held up your coffee cup in his direction and took a sip.

"How you feeling?" You stared at him, craving the body that hid underneath his clothes. You placed your book down beside you and rose from the couch, walking toward him and hugging him softly from behind.

"Still a little shook up, but nothing i've not dealt with before." He paused what he was doing and turned around, lifting his arms up as he wrapped them around you and left a lingering kiss on your forehead.

"Well, if you get them again, don't take it out on your room. Come see me." Your head tilted and your eyes held love in them. "They're not real. They're not you. This is you." Poking his chest with a finger you whispered, looking him up and down and gently sliding your hand down the side of his face. He grabbed your small hand lovingly with his as your fingers reached his cheek. He didn't speak, he just smiled and turned back around to stir his coffee. You stepped back and walked back over to your seat on the couch.

"You look great today, by the way. Not that you don't always look great, cus you do. I just like your outfit. Navy suits you. Makes your eyes pop." He said shyly looking over his shoulder, laughing nervously. "I know what you meant, Bucky. Thank you. You look.. well rested? very vibrant?... You look lovely.." You giggled as you returned the compliment, still thinking back to the sight of him undressed. It was engraved into your mind and it infiltrated your thoughts every time he moved. You put your book down in frustration - everytime you began to read a new line, you couldn't concentrate.

He sat himself beside you, placing his arm along the back of the couch and facing toward you. You shuffled in place to face him, crossing your legs on the couch and holding your coffee between your hands, soaking up the warmth of the ceramic and wishing it was him. "Can I tell you what happened?" He whispered politely, hinting toward the nightmare he suffered through the night.

"You can tell me anything"

"It was 1991, I'd been restarted and given a mission. Howard and Maria Stark." He vibrated with nerves, looking down into his lap and looking back up. You silently prepared yourself to hear the one story you really didn't want to hear. You loved the Stark family with every living breath and the thought of sharing a kiss with their killer crowded your thoughts. You knew it wasn't his fault - he didn't have a choice. But it still didn't make the discovery any easier.

"They wanted no witnesses, make it look like an accident. I hid in some bushes above the road and sped towards the car. I threw a flash bomb through the window and they slammed into a streetlight. Maria tried to get out, but Howard didn't move." His voice started to break. "I broke their necks, put Maria back in the car and stole the serum from the trunk. Shot the security camera out and raided the footage. When I got back to the base, they didn't even give me a chance. Just but me back in cryofreeze and that was it. When Steve took me back from Berlin and we went to Siberia, Zemo showed Tony the footage. Steve hadn't told him it was me. We fought, and went back to Steve's apartment. Tony got over it after a while and brought us back here, but i'm still frightened to talk to him about it. It ruined him. I watched it all happen again. I watched myself kill them. All I could hear was Tony saying 'He killed my mom'. It wouldn't stop. I couldn't stop. I couldn't stop him." He sighed, pulling back tears and holding them in his throat.

You didn't know how to respond. You hadn't heard the details before. It was one thing Bucky breaking the wall that lead you to believe it was an accident, but it was another listening to the gory details of the death of your godparents. "Fuck.." You whispered, biting your lip. "So that's why you smashed up your room.."

"I didn't know what to do, Y/N. I was angry at myself."

"You didn't have a choice Buck."

"But I did it."

You shuffled forward and grabbed his shoulders, pulling him forward and into your arms. He put his face into your shoulder and wept, your hand resting on the back of his head as you strummed his hair with your fingers in consolement. You were paralysed with horror. Not because of what he'd done, but because of what they made him do. You had no clue why he didn't just flip and get revenge on Hydra for hurting him the way they did.

"James." Your hand wiping the tears from his face as he kissed it. "Let me speak to Bruce. I want to help you. You don't deserve to see that again."

"I've tried, he dosen't know how to help. Therapy dosen't work for me." You knew he was right, it gave you coping mechanisms, but that didn't mean they worked.

"Then I'll work with him to find a way to help you. I can't watch you hurt yourself over this. It's been long enough. You've suffered long enough."

"I'm so sorry, Y/N. I know you loved them. I'm sorry I killed them. I'm truly sorry." You shushed him, cradling the nervous wreck he'd become in your arms.

"Let me try something. Do you trust me?" You softly sighed.

"With my life."

Your fingers tapped his temples, pulling away, extracting energy from his mind. You twisted and moulded the energy into a different pattern - you'd pulled his energy in the shape of his brainwaves. The spikes and waves changed from an angry mess to a soft, rolling hill as you gently slammed your fingers back onto his temples. You'd manipulated the energy to silence the bad thoughts that would make their way in and out of his mind as they chose. It was only temporary, but you knew it would work. You had worked on it with Shield in an attempt to be a field counsellor, but you prefered doing the missions.

"It won't last forever, but it should give me some time to speak to Bruce and try to find an answer. No matter what you do, don't go on any missions. Fight in the gym if you need to, but no violence. They'll come back worse when the manipulation flattens."

"Thank you." He whimpered.

"Promise me, James. I just want to help."

"I promise. I promise Y/N." His eyes started to lighten as he kissed your lips softly, holding the sides of your face with his clammy hands. "Thank you" he whispered into your mouth as he pulled away from the kiss and wrapped his arms around you.

"I'll get Tony to take you off of any missions and schedueles he's got. I'll sort it for you Buck. I promise."

"But what about you? You still have nightmares, right?"

"The difference is I can handle them. I trained my powers to work subconciously. They know if i'm having one and they can keep it at bay for me. I shouldn't do it but it's the only thing that works. It'll kill me one day. But I can't go back there, I can't be a Winter Soldier. Not even in my mind. If Shield, or even Tony knew I still have them I'd be taken off the field immediately. They're not like yours. Your's are just nightmares. Mine.. Mine are real." His hand grazed your hair as he looked deeply into your eyes. He could see the pain and anger behind them. He wanted revenge for the people that hurt you. The people that hurt him - and everyone inbetween.

You could hear a door close down the hallway, voices growing louder as they made their way down the hall.

"Fix up look sharp. Someones coming." You giggled to Bucky, lifting his head from your chest and smiling. You pushed his coffee mug up to his face. "Drink."