A Place for You & Me ・Bucky Barnes

the session

"So, James, what have you been up to this week?" His therapist, Dr. Christina Raynor, asks cooly. 

"Oh, you know, the usual. Making peace with myself when I can," He replies cooly, as well.

"And what about when you can't make peace for yourself, what do you do?" She raises a brow.

"I just uh.. go out walking," He gives a forced smile.

"Right." A pause ensues. "Anything else? How about the list?"

"Yeah, I've been working my way through that, too."

"Have you been following the steps I gave you?"

"Yeah, of course."

"What are the steps?" 

James pauses for a moment before taking a deep breath.

"Okay, James, I'm gonna stop you before you even start. You don't remember the steps and that's fine, but I really need you to try here, okay?"

"Sure, yeah, I'm trying."

"No, but really try," she looks at him intently. He sighs deeply. 

"Okay. Rule number one is..." He looks off to the distance for a second. "Don't do anything illegal."

"Good. Number two?"

"Yeah, number one is all I got."

"Okay. Number two, no one gets hurt. Kind of important."

"Yeah, well, why isn't it number one then?" He cocks his head to one side and she exhales curtly.

"Rule number three-- make amends with the situation/person."

"Ah, yes. Simple."

"Look, James. I know this is new for you, which makes it hard. But if you want to get past your past, you need to make these amends." 

Her tone of voice gets quiet now. "Have you been sleeping well?"

"Yeah, just fine."

"You have bags."

"I always have," he shrugs and she looks down at her empty notepad.

"How about you track your nights of sleep? This will give me a breakdown of how good you claim you are sleeping, huh?"

"Alright... I suppose I just write down how many hours I get?"

"That and your nightmares. What they consist of, how often to occur, things like that."

"What if I don't have any?"

She looks at him. "James, someone with your history always has nightmares."

He looks at the window and watches the busy street. 

"Have you seen Sam at all recently?"

"No," he answers still looking at the window. 

"Why not?"

"He's busy."

"How do you know that?" He looks back at the therapist. "Did you call him to find out?"

"Yeah. It goes to voicemail each time."

"Let me see your phone."

James darts his eyes at her.

"What? Why?"

"If you have called it shouldn't be a problem, right?"

He looks down at his feet. "Okay. I haven't called him."

"Yeah, I know. Why haven't you? And don't say he's busy."

"Because.. he has his own problems."

"This isn't about you having problems. He's your friend and you need that community." A moment a silence follows her statement. "How about you try to get back into society? Can you manage that?"

"How am I suppose to do that? Just waltz in like nothing happened?"

"There's a good chance people do not know you or your past. Use that to your advantage."

He scoffs slightly. 

"Try going to a coffee shop after this session. Pick any one, order something, maybe read a book, and just enjoy yourself. You don't have to talk to anyone, but just observe. Can you do that for our next session? I'll be waiting to hear your experience."

"Yeah. I can do that."

"Great. See you the same time next week." James gets up and leaves, noting how tightly he was gripping his journal. He quickly puts it inside of his jacket before he goes back out.