( open )

[redactions]

| characters | Bucky and you.
| date/time | Thursday afternoon.
| location | Around
| rating | G.
| summary | The best way to greet your neighbours is to feed them.
| note | I wrote in prose but feel free to use brackets.



He falls asleep instantly on the moss bed, the smell of it familiar and steadying. Combat lends sleep of no restful kind but he barely dreams at all, waking up as soon as the first ray of light peers through the window. There's a moment of bewilderment, and then reality introduces itself to him all over again as he notices the wings are still there when he picks up his gem. He flattens them self-consciously, before finally deciding they take up too much space and leaves the gem carefully tucked under his pillow.

Breakfast, however, is the immediate problem. He saved some water from the rains and an edible mushroom, and it's boiling away merrily on the stove. The glow worm is unusually cooperative, but Bucky supposes that if he's now the size of a dragonfly it's not the weirdest thing in the world.

It's actually nice. He could get used to it.

Once the worm's been sent off with an appreciative scratch on the head, he picks up the large bowl of stew and starts knocking on a few doors.

'Hello?'

Comments

[redactions]

[ He approaches, and sits at a polite distance. ]

Casablanca. You?

[dissemblance]

Shanghai Express.

[She smiles, and pulls her legs up to sit cross-legged with a dancer's grace.]

But I liked Casablanca too. Hmm-- favourite type of pie?

[redactions]

[ He hmms, he expected her to pick something more contemporary. ]

Can't say I saw that one. Anyway. Apple. What kinda music do you like?

[dissemblance]

[Movies and on to music. Things he misses from the front lines. It gets filed away.]

I like all kinds. I have a weakness for instrumental work - classical, or jazz - but I'm also a big fan of rock'n'roll, which is a bit more modern.

[She doesn't say it in a disparaging way, or a pitying one. Anna knows he's 'dead' and Natasha knows he isn't, but he doesn't need to be treated like glass over either fate.]

[redactions]

[He gives her a cheeky look, only a bit more modern? and she sees the first honest smile. ]

Uh-uh. Exploitable weakness, madamoiselle. You like to dance?

[dissemblance]

[With a brief flash of a little girl's fond remembrance,]

I used to do ballet. So yes, James. I do like to dance. That was two questions.

[She could ask another throwaway question, but she doesn't want to. Instead,]

What did you think of the war?

[It's said with nothing more telling than the faint curiosity of someone born long after the echo of the last shots died away, the last shells left their mark on open countryside or city streets. Anna isn't a woman to romanticize the war, hardly that. She isn't afraid to get her hands dirty, and doesn't shy away from dark histories.]

[redactions]

[ He beams at her as he raises his hands, palms facing her. ]

I'll make it up to ya, promise.

[ The play doesn't smother itself when she asks, instead he sort of settles, like a heavy rock has been placed on his chest, and while his eyes are bright, they are sharper too. ]

What do they tell you about it?

[ There's much more to her than meets the eye, and he's curious as to how it's lived on in the future. ]

[dissemblance]

[There's the man he was before the war. It's a brief flash, but it fills in another of the gaps in her knowledge, clicking down into place like a bullet in a magazine.]

Depends on who you ask. Where you look. It's sanitized for schoolchildren, glamorized in the movies. Some of it's erased altogether.

[With wry amusement,]

Did you know, for example, that America was responsible for winning the war singlehandedly against Germany? While the French cowered in the streets and the British drank tea.

[She's an art director that knows her history, at least.]

You're still up by two questions.

[redactions]

[ With brief seriousness, though he's still smiling, ] I did say I'd make it up to you. I'm a man of my word, Anna.

[ He frowns at what she says, though. ]

That's not right. French were fightin' Fritz long before us, so were the Tommies. The Russians too; they had the worst casualties. Germans rarely ever took 'em alive. [ she's Russian. She might've had and lost family in the War, and his expression twists with sympathy ] That ain't a morale boost, it's plain lyin'. We weren't nothin' to HYDRA's guns, we never woulda made it if it hadn't been for all'o'folks over there with us.

[dissemblance]

[He slips into the vernacular of a Brooklyn back alley like a second skin. A sign of anger, she thinks, well-restrained but nevertheless present.]

No, it's not right. But it is how the world works.

[redactions]

[ Plainly, ] Well, it's bullshit. [ softer, ] Pardon me. [ and a beat, normal volume, ] Next thing you'll be tellin' me is they kept that stupid Captain America crap.

[dissemblance]

No pardon necessary. I'm a New Yorker, same as you.

[And her ears are hardly delicate, but he wins points for being a gentleman at least, and 'Anna' gives him a smile.]

Not a fan?

[redactions]

[ A soft hmph. ]

He's my best friend. [ and he's happy, honestly. Steve getting the attention, love, and respect he deserves. But the War's home for him, while it's taking away little bits and pieces of Bucky, and showing him only the shadows in the room ] It's not how he should be known.

[ As just Steve. Not a symbol. Just a good man, but that's a world Buck's too dead to see. ]

[dissemblance]

He was a symbol when the country needed a symbol. It may be a little-- [one corner of her mouth quirks down,] 'cartoonish', but it endured, and it's meant something different to every generation since. Something important.

[The smile comes back, a bit shy.]

I dressed up as him once for Halloween. That was... the year the Soviet Union fell.

[She was busy hating him, actually, for everything he stood for. But in hindsight, if the little girl she never got to be knew Steve Rogers the way Natasha does now, it could have been a reality.]

[redactions]

[ 'The country', and not 'we'. He smiles wryly, not truly feeling it in his heart, but it does reach his eyes. ]

S'pose it does.

[ He doesn't want this on his best friend, even Steve can - and would - carry it. It's a selfish wish, just like 'don't go to war'. He's got no say in it anymore, perks of being dead. ]

For what it's worth, I bet you looked swell.

[dissemblance]

[Her smile turns a bit coy.]

I did all right for myself. My shield was made out of a cereal box. And I may have punched a boy for telling me Captain America couldn't be a girl.

[redactions]

[ He laughs, light and honest. ]

Damn right.

[ Still cheerful, ] So anything else about the War you want or y'wanna get a head start on your two questions?

[dissemblance]

Funny, I don't think you actually answered my question at all. I asked what you thought of it.

[James Barnes, the man. Not the sergeant, or the symbol. Just him.]

[redactions]

[ Another soft hmm, as he sits back. The honest sentiment takes no thought, it's the words he needs to choose carefully. ]

It was worth dying for.

[ Anna's smart. The only reason she hasn't mentioned his death is because - what? Probably being considerate. He could have talked about how it wasn't just the good fight, it was taking care of your buddies, seein' what was really out there threatening the world. They'd come across a few camps; he'd been in one. But in the end - would he die again? The answer's simple. ]

[dissemblance]

[Her expression softens. Anna may be sympathetic, but the scope of the sympathy and the deeper understanding comes from Natasha's own life.]

A lot of people thought so.

[Gentler,]

It wasn't April, was it.

[It's a question in all save inflection. She already knows, and so does he.]

[redactions]

[ He swallows the joke about wasting one of her questions on this. ]

It's May.

[ He remembers it was cold, and nothing like the death he imagined or wanted. You were supposed to die quick: bullet through the head, grenade, a good sniper. Or slow, with a friend, so at least somebody was around to hold your hand, or kiss your brow as death came (and would Steve, had that been the case? It was always the other way around with him at Steve's bedside). All that'd been there for Buck in the end was that damn ravine, and the grey sky, and the thought that it just wasn't fair at all. ]

[ Softer, ] I'm sorry I lied to you.

[dissemblance]

I'm a stranger to you, James. It's none of my business, and you deserve whatever secrets you have a mind to keep.

[It's not your fault. It echoes in the stillness of her mind.]

[redactions]

Yeah, but you knew and you coulda stopped me right there.

[ He shrugs. ]

[dissemblance]

Well. Where I'm from, I was taught to respect my elders.

[It's a light, teasing statement. No hard feelings, Barnes.]

[redactions]

Oh. Ha-ha. That's funny.

[ If she's counting the honest smiles, it's up to two now. ]

Next question?