Bucky sat in the dim apartment, the android phone he procured for cash from a sketchy corner electronics store with a pay-by-the-minute SIM card in hand. He watched the videos over and over. ‘Avengers Tear Up New York!’ ‘Steve Rogers AKA Capt America Tries Hot Wings!’ Sometimes he paused the videos and just stared at the image on the screen. It’s really him, he thought every time. He still couldn’t believe Steve was alive. He could see from the news clips and posts online that Steve recovered from his ordeal in the Potomac. Bucky longed to talk to him. He composed emails and deleted them. There was so much to say but he couldn’t say any of it. Any contact with Steve would put them both in danger.
Once Bucky was sure he was safe, well relatively safe, after DC, he tried to find out as much as he could about Steve, Captain America, the Avengers, Natasha had he met her before? She seemed familiar, and Tony Stark. Of course Steve got defrosted and went right back to being a superhero, and he’s buddies with Howard Stark’s son. Bucky couldn’t help but feel shame every time he watched hero Steve clips and read hero Steve articles. Steve was saving the world while Bucky was destroying it. Logically, he knows it wasn’t his fault but he can’t stop the guilt. How many people had he killed? He had no idea. There were spies and secret agents and other assassins among his kills. But there were also ambassadors and scientists and couriers who had no idea what they were carrying. And people who happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time. And wives and loved ones killed to send a message. Had he killed children? He didn’t even want to know. He couldn’t think about it or the shame and guilt would swallow him whole. More than once he held a gun to his head and nearly pulled the trigger. The only thing keeping him alive right now was the thought that one day he could atone for contributing to the evil in the world, make up for the loss of life. If he’s going to do that though, he needs to stay alive.
The apartment he rented in Warsaw was nondescript, a hole in the wall, really. Bucky surprised himself by somehow knowing Polish. He took day jobs which paid in cash, never staying at one for too long. He gave fake names and vague backstories. Fortunately, some of his Bucky charm was starting to come back and he was able to smile and get people to go along with it and not ask questions.
The person he wanted to talk to most in the world was Steve. But every time he rehearsed a conversation in his head, he started feeling tears in his eyes. Sometimes he just let the tears fall. It felt good in a way, to feel things again. He knew exactly what Steve would say, that he was still a good person and none of this was his fault. Steve was always the better person of the two of them though. While Bucky was chasing girls and sneaking into movies, Steve was trying to get himself enlisted in the army to fight Nazis. He was the smallest guy he knew but he had the biggest heart. He missed his best friend more than anything. It was starting to truly feel like 70 years since he had seen him, well seen him in a capacity other than trying to kill him.
Bucky was unpacking the sack of produce he had bought from the street vendors one Saturday morning. He felt like he couldn’t get enough fruits and vegetables, after being fed nondescript protein mush and electrolytes through an IV for years. He heard a knock on the door and quickly put a hand on the gun at his side. He opened the door slowly, only to find a package on the floor and a small child running down the hall. Bucky tossed a stone at the package and shut the door. It wasn’t a bomb. He kicked at it a little. Picked it up and examined it. It was wrapped in brown paper and in neat print letters written on the paper - ‘Bucky Barnes’, and underneath that it said ‘jerk’. A big smile broke out on his face. He immediately knew the identity of the sender.
The paper removed, he could see indeed it was a book. Bucky opened the leather cover to reveal pages of sketches. There were sketches of places and things only he and one other person would know. The couch in the apartment he shared with Steve. The old movie theater in their neighborhood. The newsstand outside their building. The next pages had more sketches of what Bucky assumed were Steve’s life now, like the Washington Monument, his friends Sam and Natasha, Stark Tower, Then the last few pages had sketches of Bucky. One of him as a child, another in his Army uniform, and one of him how he looks now. He didn’t draw him as a menacing Winter Soldier, which is how Steve last saw him. He involuntarily winced thinking of how Steve’s last vision of him was his fist coming down on his face. Steve’s sketch showed Bucky with a weary but kind eyes, long hair falling slightly over his face, a leather jacket and glove over the metal arm. He was thankful Steve didn’t include the metal arm in the picture.
Bucky looked at the sketchbook over and over again, noticing new details each time. He realized it was starting to become evening and he shut the book. Suddenly it occurred to him that Steve knew where he was. Or he knew someone who knew where he was. He didn’t want Steve to be in any danger for knowing this information. He was also fearful that his location was not as secret as he thought. Bucky knew he would be discovered eventually but he was worried about Steve. Even with Steve larger and stronger than him, he still had the instinct to protect him like he was still the asthmatic underweight kid the Army wouldn’t accept.
Bucky grabbed his knapsack and threw a few changes of clothes, his journal, and the sketchbook in it. He packed a cooler bag with his produce and some nuts and crackers. He put some cash in an envelope and shoved it and the key under the landlord’s door on the way out of the building. As he walked outside, he took out the pay-as-you-go phone and looked at a map of the world. Where to now? He picked a location, took the SIM card out of the phone, threw it in a trash bin and kept moving.