CALL HER | Bucky Barnes

1

APRIL 2024

"Grace Cunningham? Who's Grace?"

Fuck.

"Are you going through my contacts?" I asked, shifting on the couch, watching Dr. Raynor carefully as she studied my phone.

"Yes," she said, glancing back up at me. "And the only name I don't know in here is—"

"Don't go through my contacts."

Her eyebrows shot up. "You don't want me to know who Grace is?"

"I thought you were just gonna look at the calls," I said evenly.

"Who is Grace?"

I should've lied when I had the chance. Now she wasn't going to drop it.

"Nobody," I said, but that felt wrong. "Or, not nobody. She was friends with Steve. She's a genius. Used to work with the Avengers on their tech. I barely know her."

"And she's in your phone...?"

"I'm supposed to call her."

"You're supposed to call her?"

"Yeah, that's what I said."

"Why are you supposed to call her?"

"You know this is terrible practice? We both know that, right? Incredibly invasive."

She snapped the phone shut and tossed it to me.

"This is the one thread you've given me that maybe, just maybe, you're interested in human connection. I'm hanging onto that thread for dear life."

"If I was interested in human connection, don't you think I would've called her already?"

"You tell me. I still don't know who this woman is."

I focused on the bookshelf behind her. I always stared at the same spine—"The PTSD Workbook." Nothing special about it. They were all about PTSD. That one was just in the middle of my eyeline.

Funny how it never moved, though. None of the books on that shelf were ever in different spots week to week. I wondered if she'd ever read any of them.

"Steve wanted me to call her," I told the spine of the PTSD Workbook.

"Why would he want that?" Dr. Raynor asked (rudely, since I wasn't actually talking to her).

I took a deep, tired breath. "You're wearing me down, doc. Alright. She's real pretty."

More than pretty. I added to the PTSD Workbook. In my head, though, so Dr. Raynor wouldn't butt in this time. She looked like a wartime fantasy. I saw her for the first time in 2023, but I was dreaming about her in 1943. You've got no idea.

"There it is," Dr. Raynor said, satisfied. "This is a romantic thing?"

"On my end, sure."

"What about on her end?"

"I don't know. How should I know?"

Listen, PTSD Workbook, old pal. I'm not a mind reader. But the way she wrapped her arms around me and buried her face in my shoulder and told me I was gonna be okay? Yeah, there was something romantic about it.

"Have you met her?" Dr. Raynor asked.

"Once."

"And did she seem like she liked you?"

"Something like that."

"What the hell does that mean?"

"She liked me."