Floating

Chapter Three

By evening, you'd almost forgotten about your close brush with death.

The whole group had agreed on taking a stroll to some abandoned dock that Steve and Nat had found on their long swim, seemingly all deciding to ignore the obvious subtext of their discovery story- that they'd banged on it. Fortunately for you, it was fully accessible by land, so you managed to convince the others to walk there rather than swim. It would've been a very boring evening on your own at the house otherwise.

Everyone else did a running jump off the end pretty much as soon as you arrived, your period pains conveniently resurfacing at that exact moment. Excuses were made and you happily settled yourself on the edge to watch them swim.

Bucky gave you a knowing look but, thankfully, stayed silent.

It only took around ten minutes for Steve to start randomly challenging people to chicken fights. That was typical Steve, no surprises there, but one thing you sure as hell didn't expect was him teaming up with Buck.

They looked like some kind of comically muscular totem pole, you just had to stand up and get a better view. After a couple of rounds, you'd became so engrossed watching Bucky's arms at work that you didn't notice Sam was missing from the group.

There was a lull in the game, during which Bucky glanced in your direction, his face immediately dropping.

'Sam, no!'

You only managed a split-second of confusion before being shoved off the pier.

You hit the water like a pallet of cinder blocks. The shock left you completely paralysed for the first few seconds but, as soon as you came to your senses and actually tried to swim, the realisation that you were in too deep to touch the ground sent you spiralling into a frenzied panic.

The more you thrashed around trying to get back to the surface, the more you seemed to sink. All you could hear was your own heartbeat and all you could see was the sun's glimmering reflection getting further and further away.

Your mind was just beginning to cloud over when two arms shot through the water and yanked you upwards.

Your instincts kicked in and you grabbed onto Bucky with all the strength you could muster, wrapping yourself around him tight while gulping in deep breaths. You squeezed your eyes closed and just hoped to hell that he'd get you out of this situation as quickly as he possibly could.

He sprinted to the shore. He'd obviously learned some kind of lesson earlier because this time, rather than just dropping you onto the sand, he lowered himself to his knees and kept you firmly in his arms.

Sam appeared on your other side less than a second later. 'Shit, are you alright?'

You did your best to nod through the hysteria, for some reason still trying to keep up your pretence after that pathetic display.

'What the hell was that man?' Bucky sounded genuinely pissed. 'You tryna kill someone?'

'I'm really sorry, it was just a joke.'

'Great joke, maybe next time you could hit someone with a speedboat.'

The two of them kept going back and forth but you stopped listening to just focus on bringing your heart rate down. It was weird, but you had to admit that being held by Bucky seemed to be helping a little. Ordinarily you'd have been violently sobbing and shaking, probably on the brink of passing out, but the firm grip around you and the soft repetition of him stroking your hair was really helping soothe you.

Sam eventually retreated to join the rest of the group, who were huddled a few feet away looking extremely concerned, and Bucky's attention turned back to you.