run to you - bucky barnes

two

"The thing is, I think it's getting worse," Cassie Martin, a fellow USAF veteran, spoke softly. Telling the group, a detailed account of her own personal experience with post-traumatic stress disorder and how her service continued to impact her new civilian lifestyle. Marci hadn't planned on going to the VA this morning. In fact, when she woke up, she had purposefully ignored Sam's pestering phone calls and messages he left encouraging her to show. Yet as she made her way out of bed, her eyes fell upon the burnt blankets that remained on her floor from her mishap yesterday. So here she was, sitting with a group of people, just as troubled as herself, on the hard metal folding chairs that made her body feel just as uncomfortable as her mind when left to her own thoughts. Despite the obvious heavy conversations that were sparked, these meetings always had a way of bringing her comfort despite the difficulties that presented when listening to stranger's accounts of their post war experiences. That's why they exist. "A cop pulled me over last week; he thought I was drunk," she let out a sound that could have been mistaken for a laugh, "I swerved to miss a plastic bag," Cassie paused, finding the strength to continue. Marci watched, pity in her eyes, as Cassie closed her eyes and took a deep breath to calm her racing heart, "I thought it was an IED," she admitted, her tone revealed a sense of hopelessness. 

Marci allowed her gaze to remove itself from Cassie as the woman finished speaking. Staring at her feet for a moment before she then closed her eyes and let out a shaky breath. Cassie's account had hit a spot within Marci's soul. The horrors of her own account with the explosive devices played through her mind like a movie. Distant screams of her dying friends echoed within her ears. Her mind beginning to wander back the flame fueled incident that took place just a day prior as a result of that cursed day.  A familiar voice pulled her from her intrusive thoughts and caused her to open her eyes, head rising to put a face to the voice.

"Some stuff you leave there, other stuff you bring back. It's our job to figure out how to carry it. Is it going to be in a big suitcase or in a little man-purse?" Sam Wilson, session leader and friend, made eye contact as he soothed the tension, a small chuckle erupted in Marci's chest and a soft smile made its way to her face but didn't quite meet her eyes. "It's up to you," Sam nodded, eyes still locked on his best friend. Marci sighed as his words sunk into her mind. The session had reached completion and the group of veterans began to disperse into the crowd.

Sam, being the friendly man he was, left the podium area to chat privately with as many people he could. Something he always did to make sure not a single person left feeling worse than they had arrived. He worried for them. All of them. 

After making his rounds around the room, instead of finding Marci like he normally would have, he made it way over to someone he had noticed standing discretely in the back of the room for the last few minutes of the session. A slight smirk made its way to his lips as he approached the blonde-haired man. 

"Look who it is," Sam smiled as he approached the super soldier, "The running man."

"I caught the last few minutes," Steve Rogers began, a downcast look looming over his chiseled features, "It's pretty intense," he admitted, understanding the lasting horrors of war well.