Sebastian Stan & Bucky Barnes Imagines

It's Been A Long, Long Time - J.B.B.

I highly encourage you listen to the song It's Been A Long, Long Time while reading this chapter. I believe it will make the atmosphere of it all the more sentimental. :] Enjoy.

Ninety-nine years old and you're doing just fine as you hum the tune coming from the speaker of your caretaker's iPhone in the corner of your laundry room. It's 2018 and you've aged quite a bit, lived through a lot, and seen so much that it blows your mind how much you've endured throughout your long life. You've seen times of war and times of peace, formed and broken countless bonds, experienced love and heartbreak. Out of all of that, out of everything you've encountered, the heartbreak came the closest to killing you.

The year was 1940. There was a war brewing in the world. But at the time, America wasn't at war and you were glad for it. War meant drafts and drafts meant men being taken. In the first half of the year, your dad and brother were the ones you wanted off the draft list if the time ever came. But in the last half, you added another man to that list.

James Buchanan Barnes.

Man, he hated his real name. Every time you used 'James' instead of 'Bucky', he would groan and whine about how you knew how much he hated it when you said it. It reminded him of all the times as a kid when his ma would shout his full name from the front yard when he was playing in the street or doing something naughty. You would always laugh and he'd forgive you simply because he loved the sound of that laugh.

You loved him. You really did. You knew he was the one for you. It just tore you apart when a couple years down the road, Bucky told you he had enlisted to help the war effort. You wanted to be mad. But you couldn't possibly when you were so devastated. It took you a week just to stop crying long enough to talk to him. You felt terrible after that. You had tortured him for 7 long days and wasted your shortened time with him. But eventually, you gathered yourself enough and told him you respected his decision, as hard as it was to accept. You also knew that it was inevitable that he would join the military. If he hadn't enlisted, he would have been drafted. There was no escaping this once Pearl Harbor happened and the United States entered the war.

It pained you greatly to see him leave and to let him go, not knowing if he would come back. But it hurt you even more when that telegram came to your door, carried by a solemn messenger. You broke down right there in the doorway. Not having even read the letter, you knew what it said. You cried for weeks and lost a lot of weight from not eating. Your Bucky was gone and nobody could get you out of your house.

Eventually, you realized you couldn't do that anymore. You had to be strong and keep going for yourself and for your family. Bucky would have told you the same thing. So you got yourself back together and kept living. It was hard at first but, eventually, a long while down the road, you were sometimes able to think about Bucky without a tear falling from your eye.

You promised yourself once he died that you would never get married. Bucky was the one and maybe you were just being picky but you weren't going to marry any man that wasn't Bucky. Your family tried to tell you that that decision was a mistake but you knew it wouldn't be. You were perfectly happy living out your days unmarried. If there was no Bucky Barnes, there was no chance of you getting hitched.

While you're in your laundry room folding some dish towels with your caretaker, Angela, the doorbell rings, causing you to jump. You laugh a little once the initial shock is gone.

"Scared me half to death!" you say with hand on your chest. Your caretaker laughs with you.

"I'll get it, Y/n," Angela said as she put down the towel she was folding.

"Thank you, dear," you say as you continue folding your pastel yellow towel.

Once you finished folding it, the song coming from Angela's phone starts again from the beginning and you hum along. It's Been A Long, Long Time has been one if your favorites for a long time, now. Every time you listen to it, so many memories come flooding back. The tune just has such a sentimental tone to it.

"Y/n, you have a visitor!" Angela calls from the front door, bringing you out of your thoughts.

"Oh really? Who is it?"

"He says his name is Bucky. Do you know a Bucky?"

That name meets your ears and you don't say anything for a moment.

Surely not.

Surley it's not who you think.

But you can't help but wonder.

"Y/n?" Angela calls back when you don't answer.

"Yes, bring him in to the laundry room. I wanna see him for myself," you answer, not sure of your voice. You hear the front door close and the sound of shoes on the hardwood floors. Taking a breath in and letting it out, you try to prepare yourself just in case the person that walks through that doorway is who you think it is.

Angela appears in the entrance, then a large man behind her with long chocolate brown hair. At first you think, this couldn't be him. He's too young. But when you get a good look at his face, you realize this is none other than your lost soldier, James Buchanan Barnes.

A gasp escapes your mouth as you stare at his stubbled face.

"Bucky?"

The man before you offers a small smile as he steps further into the room. You're suddenly taken back to that happy, happy time before he was gone, when you were both just young people in love, and tears start to well up in your eyes.

"Yeah, doll. It's me," he returns as he steps up closer to you. A few of your tears fall and Bucky takes one of your frail hands in his.

"You're here. You're alive!" You say before bursting into tears. Bucky takes this time to hug you tightly.

"Yeah. Yeah, and I came to see my special girl," he says over your shoulder. He pulls away to look at your wrinkled face again and you notice how glassy his eyes are, threatening to spill tears onto his cheeks. You bring a hand up to his cheek, just to make sure he's real. You both stare at each other for a long time, trying to make up for all those years you lost. As you do, the lyrics fill the silence around you.

Never thought that you would be
Standing here so close to me.
There's so much I feel that I should say.

But words can wait
Until some other day.

Kiss me once and kiss me twice and kiss me once again.
It's been a long, long time.
Haven't felt like this, my dear, since can't remember when
It's been a long, long time.

You'll never know how many dreams I dream about you
Or just how empty that all seem without you.

So kiss me once and kiss me twice and kiss me once again.
It's been a long, long time.

At some point, you snap out of your state and start shuffling to the living room to sit.

"Well, come on over and sit down in the living room. You have a lot of explaining to do, James," you say, throwing a smirk back at Bucky who is following behind you. He groans then laughs.

"Don't I know it, doll."

I hope you all enjoyed it! Thanks for reading :]