a lion among wolves, bucky barnes (hiatus)

twenty-eight

NEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK
2015

IT was eight in the morning, and Steve sat on the edge of his bed, chin rested on his hand, struggling to contain his misery.

He tried to force himself not to think about June. He tried to force her smile from his memory, to force her mannerisms and habits and overall self from his mind, though it was a useless feat, like trying to fill a strainer with sand.

Steve stayed perfectly still as another wave of anguish hit him, choking him down to his bones. He had tried to convince himself that there was a chance that he and June would work—maybe after so long she'd feel differently about Bucky, or maybe their kiss could really mean something. He was willing to latch on to any flicker of hope.

Unfortunately, Steve was smart, and he knew, deep down, things like this didn't work that way.

He remembered a film he'd watched last year, per Natasha's recommendation, called Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. It was about a couple who had broken up and had their memories of each other erased to make the pain of loss more bearable. Steve thought that he'd lost enough of his own life already . . . but forgetting what he felt for June didn't seem so bad at the moment.

He ran a hand over his face, dreading leaving his room, dreading facing the world and not being able to let a shred of what he was feeling show. Worst of it all was Steve could hardly enjoy Bucky's return because he was so overwhelmingly jealous of him. It was the most despicable he'd ever felt, but it was jealousy he could not suppress. He would hide it, however, from both of them. He would not lose his two best friends over something so frivolous.

Weighed by his hopelessness, Steve stood and trudged to his door, grabbing his gym bag on the way out. Punching the shit out of something seemed like a good way to calm down.

• • •

IT was eight in the morning, and June wondered, very seriously, how much coffee was too much coffee.

She had already downed three cups. Her hands were shaking, and she could feel the sporadic hammering of her heart, but that didn't discourage her from pouring a fourth mug. Coffee was good. She needed to be alert.

Alert, hyperactive, bordering on paranoid. She didn't want Bucky or Steve surprising her again.

June was grateful no one had ventured into the kitchen yet. The canary sunlight poured through the windows and striped the floor, and the humming yawn of New York rose up with it. June closed her eyes and imagined she was normal—this was her penthouse and her kitchen, and she would proceed with her day like any common person would, without the Avengers, and without international terrorists. Maybe, in another life where Hydra had not stolen her, June had a boyfriend that didn't hide his feelings for her, or disappear for months at a time. Maybe she had a real job, and maybe she could call her mother for her childhood gazpacho recipe when she fancied it and could meet her niece at least once. In this other life, June came back from that hospital after donating blood and taking their survey with the $300 she was promised, and bought her family dinner, and ended her twentieth birthday with falling asleep in her own bed, in her own home, on her own terms.

When she opened her eyes the world was unchanged. Her hand seared where boiling coffee spilled over her skin, and June realized she had overfilled her cup. She cursed sharply and dumped the excess in the sink, and mopped up the mess with a dish towel. When June looked up, she found Tony watching her, eyebrows knit with concern, though it was difficult to ascertain how sincere he was because meanwhile, Tony was dressed in slippers and a zebra-print robe.