“dahlia flowers symbolize a lasting bond and lifelong commitment between two people”
--
1945
The moment you got the letter, your heart split in two. It was like you could physically feel the shift in your body - the change you would have to make to live without him. James Buchanan Barne, love of your life, the only Howling Commando to give his life in service of his country. It felt like some sick, twisted joke. You had spent your whole lives dancing around your feelings for each other, until Steve convinced Bucky to confess, and the two of you finally turned your childhood friendship into the budding romance it was meant to be. You only had a year together before he got his orders; he proposed to you the night before he left, promising to come home soon
Now all you had was a letter and his dog tags.
2018
Bucky Barnes was sick. Sick of Steve’s watchful eye, sick of his mandated therapy, sick of living without anyone he knew before.
He loved Steve. Really, he did, but he was more of a nurse than a friend right now. He just wanted someone who understood him; it felt like no one did anymore. Though his thoughts ran rampant, he was on the floor of his bedroom, so close to sleep, when he heard a floorboard creak.
He was on his feet before his next breath, and had the intruder pinned against the wall, knife to their throat. He pressed it just enough to draw a nick of blood before a familiar voice rasped out.
“Bucky, James, please. It’s me. It’s me.” He locked eyes with the woman he hadn’t seen in over 70 years, and he felt all the air leave his body.
“Y/N? What- How are you here?” It felt like he couldn’t form a complete thought, too busy trying to figure out if that was reality or some sick game his mind was playing with him. He took two steps back, knife clattering to the floor, and you pulled your hood away from your face. Bucky sank to his knees without a second thought. “Oh my god.”
He was sobbing before you were even on the ground in front of him, chest heaving as you pulled him into your embrace.
“I’m here, Buck. It’s me, I’m here,” you whispered into his hair as your hands traced patterns along his back. “I’m never leaving, we’re never going to be apart again.” You weren’t sure if you believed that yet or not, didn’t even know if he would want you around for the long run, after everything he had been through. But hell if you weren’t to stay right by his side for as long as he would have you.
His breathing finally slowed to a steady pace, and he looked up at you with as much love as he had the day he left for the war. As he sat up, you shifted your weight, and he heard the slight clinking of metal. Gently, he reached towards your neck, and pulled at the chain buried under your shirt. He nearly lost his breath again as his dog tags rested in his hand. You saw the gears turning in his head, thoughts going a million miles a minute, but you knew the most basic question was what needed to be answered first.
“Let me tell you how.”
Your heart had been severed, but that wasn’t the only thing that changed in you that day. It took you a while to notice - too long. Almost 10 years later, and you looked at yourself in the mirror; it was like you hadn’t aged a day. You began to wonder what you could have done wrong to deserve a fate like this - destined to live so long without the love of your life. You knew from the moment that letter came that you would never love anyone else, Bucky had your heart since the day you met him. So what were you supposed to do now?
All you knew is you weren’t aging, but you had no clue beyond that. And sooner or later people would notice you looked the same at 40 as you did at 24. Making a decision that may or may not be the most stupid of your entire life, you leave Brooklyn to a place where no one knows you.
The worst part was leaving your mother and younger sister, Katherine. They were all you had, especially with your loss of both Steve and Bucky. It was hard, but you knew the shame they would be subjected to if anyone found out you were such a freak, a mutant.
So you took every last dollar you had and went overseas. Germany, France, Italy, anywhere you could. You would stay in a place for as long as you could, hold onto any grasp of a normal life, until you had to drop everything and move on before anyone could notice your lack of aging.
“Wait, so did you ever find out why you stopped aging?” You could tell Bucky was trying desperately to wrap his head around the information you had just unloaded on him.
“In the 70s, I was back in the States, downstate New York, as close as I had been to the city since I left. I was looking for any kind of answers, and I had heard about a school for people with mutations like me. I found it, but there was hardly anyone left; they had all been drafted for the war. But one of them, Logan, was just like me. He had been alive since the 1800s, Bucky. But I found out that essentially, I have a genetic mutation that heals any damage to my body, a lot like your super soldier serum, except I don’t have to stay frozen in ice to not age. My body heals the impact of aging on my body as it happens. The mutation is usually activated by a traumatic event, so it happened when I got the letter saying you had been KIA.”
The gears were still turning in his head, but he asked no more questions. He just gave you a wide eyed look, and a nod to signal for you to continue. The simplest answer, really, is that you just lived your life.
The thing about living for almost 100 years, is that you experience a lot of culture. Every decade brings something new, and you’re never sure what you’re going to get. You got to experience technological advances you never could have dreamed of, more war, changes in civil rights. It was an entirely new world from the one you had been born into.
And then, at 95 years old, you heard the news that Vienna had been bombed, and it was supposedly done by James Barnes, the Winter Soldier. Your heart stopped - just another loop you had been thrown into - as if you could only go so long without a life altering event.
“So you’ve known I’ve been alive for 2 years? Why are you only here now?” The hurt in his voice was apparent, and you could hear his underlying question: did you not want anything to do with me?
Grabbing his face in your hands, you looked him directly in the eye, needing him to see just how serious you were, “James Buchanan Barnes, the second I saw the news, I was doing everything in my power to track you down. Believe it or not, fugitives, especially those that are super soldiers, disappear pretty easily. By the time I was able to get information from Natasha of all people - that woman is hard to convince - you were in Wakanda. I was able to find Steve, but he said there was nothing he could do.”
What you didn’t tell him was that you and Steve had screamed at each other until you were both sore in the throat; you were trying to convince Steve to take you to Wakanda, and he said Bucky needed to recover, which meant he didn’t need you there as a distraction. It was the most you had ever wanted to punch him in the face - and that was saying a lot considering your childhood.
You eventually reached a compromise; you’d stay away, and Steve would give you updates as often as he possibly could, and he would bring you to Bucky once Shuri had removed the triggers from his brain. However, history doesn’t mention that Steven Grant Rogers is a fucking liar.
In two years, you heard from him twice. Once, when they had finally removed the triggers, and again, after the battle with Thanos. After his second call, you were sure he would let you see Bucky; instead, he went off grid again. Fortunately for you, Natasha had become a great friend. She gave you as many updates as she got, and let you know that Bucky and Steve had moved into an apartment in Brooklyn, which brought you to now.
“So Steve never told you where we were, or that I was okay?” All you could do was shake your head, because you knew the moment you opened your mouth, all the anger would spill out again. You didn’t want to ruin this moment with Bucky just yet. “I’m gonna kill that punk.”
You pressed your forehead to his, trying to calm him down. “Buck, it’s okay. He was only trying to protect you. I’m here now, and that’s all that matters.” Both of your eyes sparkled in the moon, glimmering tears rolling down your cheeks as Bucky finally closed the gap between you for the first time in seven decades.
The spark was still there, same as the day he had left for England. You wanted to stay in that moment forever, and you were both content to, until you heard that front door open.
You broke apart and saw Steve standing in the doorway, obviously shocked to see you. You knew before Bucky even got off his feet what was about to happen. He launched himself and got a solid punch in, enough to knock Steve off his feet and into the wall, before you got between them.
“Stop, stop. Bucky! I know you’re pissed, I’m pissed too, but there are better ways to deal with this. Besides, if you get to beat him up, I want to join, and I really don’t want to embarrass either of you.” By that point, Steve was on his feet again. He was preparing for another blow, but you knew had no intention of fighting back.
“Listen, I’m sorry. So damn sorry. I thought you needed time to recover. I knew the second you found out she was alive, you wouldn’t be thinking of yourself. But obviously I forgot the hold she had on you; she wants you better, and you’ll do anything she tells you.” You could hear the genuine remorse in Steve’s voice, and the release of tension in his shoulders was a tell that Bucky did too.
Before either could say a word, you pulled them into a hug, sandwiching yourself between the super soldiers. None of you may know what the future holds, but right now all that mattered was the fact that you finally had your boys back.
And as you looked up at Bucky, love of your life, a man out of his time, you saw the relief there, because now he had the one person who knew him inside and out. Bucky finally had his girl back.