Lux Brumalis: "The light of winter"/"Winter's light."
After defeating the Flag Smashers and conquering his inner demons, Bucky is trying to live a quiet life in New York City. While being Cap's sidekick has brought him (mostly unwanted) fame and at...
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A/N: Academic jargon notes are at the bottom!
You gave me fifteen hundred To see your hypnotherapist I only went one time, you let it slide Fell on hard times a year ago, was hoping you would let it go and you did - Phoebe Bridgers, "Motion Sickness"
Over the next few days, it becomes harder and harder to call her apartment home. Luke calls or texts every day. They meet up for coffee. He looks great, while she's got bags under her eyes from sleepless nights and a pounding headache from too much cheap chardonnay.
"Charlotte, you're burning the candle at both ends."
"I know."
It's been that way her entire life. Charlotte doesn't know how to stop. Her brain is always on the move, always thinking, always jumping from one idea to the next, and she's obsessed with her work. She's the only person in her family to come this far. Her mom never went to college, neither did her dad. Her mom was a secretary for a big financial firm for 35 years and her dad owned an insurance company back in Vancouver, British Columbia. Charlotte moved to New York to do her undergraduate degree, and realized that this is where she wanted to stay. So, she ended up getting her citizenship just before she got Blipped.
Charlotte has something to prove. She just doesn't know what that is yet.
Right now, she's basically living at her office, sleeping under the desk to avoid having to come home to the saddest apartment in the world. Her couch is a mattress. When she's not working, she's sitting on it watching Netflix while she inhales a bottle of wine.
Like she's doing tonight. She's tried going out with some of her PhD cohort to blow off some steam. It was her goal to hook up with somebody - just something mindless and stupid. Maybe getting some sex for the first time in seven months would take her mind off of things and make her feel less devastated.
But every guy she picked looked like Luke.
And then she wound up crying at the bar to one of her friends talking about how much she missed Luke while she clutched her third old fashioned of the night.
So, she doesn't really go out anymore.
She doesn't even know what she's watching, most of her attention is fixed on Craigslist. She gave her notice this morning. Her landlord seemed upset; said she and Luke were great tenants, but Charlotte told her that she just couldn't stay here anymore. There are too many memories in these walls.
She scrolls through the ads looking for apartments at first before realizing that she's kidding herself trying to live alone in New York, so she quickly decides to peruse the wanted ads. Most of them are looking for feet pictures, which there's nothing wrong with, but they don't belong in her search query. She sighs softly and grimaces at the shitty ads. One says "WOMEN ONLY" which means it was written by a very creepy man. Charlotte sips her wine and frowns before something catches her eye.
