Letter
Apparently he does fall asleep because when he wakes the police are standing in his room. They’re saying Y/N has to come with them, that Y/N and Bucky can’t stay together. People are shouting in the hall. He thinks it might be Steve and Sam.
Y/N is looking up at him with tired eyes, her head still against his shoulder. “I’ll go.” She whispers as the chaos in the corridor continues to rise. “They just don’t want us making something up together. Finalizing details.”
“No,” his voice is hard. “We were sleeping.” For some reason that fact seems really important to him. They were sleeping, they’re both tired and shouldn’t be disturbed. He presses his nose into her hair and inhales sharply. Someone is always trying to rip them apart.
“Miss?” A police officer says. “You need to come with us.”
“No.” Fear makes his voice shake this time.
“Buck,” Y//N whispers, pressing a hand to his cheek, turning her head to meet his eyes. “It’s okay.” Her voice is terrible and small, both from the pain in her throat and fear. She’s afraid. “I’ll be okay. It won’t be for long.”
His hands are shaking again and now the doctors are getting involved, telling them not to disturb the patients. “But I promised,” his voice cracks. “I promised that we wouldn’t be separated again.”
She pats his cheek. “You aren’t breaking any promises. I’ll be right upstairs.”
But there’s panic creeping into his eyes, wild and untamed. “Y/N,” he whispers as the noise in the room and in the hall reaches a crescendo. “You don’t understand. I can’t do this again. I won’t. I can’t fucking do it. I can't take this chance. What if you don’t come back? What if he’s alive-I-,”
A gentle shushing noise leaves her as she continues to stroke his cheek. “I won’t be far.” He presses his forehead against hers and pleads again. Don’t do this. Don’t leave me. It breaks her heart but she pulls away and takes the officers hand. “I love you, Bucky.” He looks betrayed, heartbroken. He looks like he’s never going to see her again.
But Y/N won’t stay there, not when they’ll be accused of collusion. Not when they might be accusing Bucky of murder and her being there could hurt him.
She lets the officer help her back into the wheelchair. There’s a deep aching in her chest as she’s taken back to her own room and fussed over again. She hadn’t looked back.
~
Two weeks pass in which they’re allowed no contact. Y/N is released from the hospital but Bucky is not. She hears the stories though. How he ripped his stiches open one night from twisting and turning in fear, and wakes up screaming every other night. How the stress of being kept and questioned and away from her is making him crazy.
She screams too. But at least she has Sam to come to her door and calm her. Bucky has no one but the cold attention of a nurse who cares little. The police have stopped questioning her yet show up nearly every day to his hospital room. They’re being entirely too thorough in her opinion. It’s clear to her what happened. It was self-defense, and Rumlow would have killed them if one of them hadn’t done it first.
Nothing the medical staff says can change their minds, about the stress affecting Bucky negatively and impeding his recovery.
Not only that, but the whole city has heard about the murder. They all seem to suddenly have an opinion about Bucky and Brock and Y/N. Some think Bucky is a cold-hearted murder, obsessed with Y/N. Some think the same thing about Brock. They’re on the local news nearly every damn night.
Their city isn’t small but it’s also not large enough to give her anonymity, and so now she can hardly leave the apartment.
Because although people are split about which is evil, Bucky or Brock, no one is split about whether or not Y/N is to blame for the whole thing. She led both of them on. She spurred the rivalry between them. They used to be best friends and she destroyed that, made them fight over her and hate each other. She’s a whore that got a little too greedy and in over her head.
The only thing she seems to be able to do is cry. And she can’t leave the house, she can’t see Bucky, she can’t turn on the TV, and everyone seems to hate her. People she doesn’t even know hate her. People who have known her since she was a child suddenly have doubts about everything she’s ever done. They think she deserves what happened to her.
So, she cries and waits for it all to be over, waits for it all to go away. All she wants is Bucky back, all she wants is for them to be together and safe.
But that is apparently too much to ask for.
She’s sitting in the living room of her father’s apartment staring at the blank wall ahead of her, thinking about what she could have done to prevent this from happening. Y/N starts to convince herself that it is her fault, and she burrows deeper into the blankets piled around her on the couch. Sam hands her a cup of coffee as he sits down next to her. He’s worried again, she can see it in his eyes. “You should paint.” He suggests, shrugging, “Or draw or write. Do something. Give it to Barnes when you see each other again. Shouldn’t be long now.”
Y/N shrugs back at him but doesn’t say anything, holding the hot mug between her hands, letting the heat of it seep into her skin. “He’s been writing to you.” Her head whips around to look at him, shock written on her face.
“No he hasn’t.” Her voice still cracks with strain when she speaks, sounding very much like she was losing her voice or just recovering it. “He doesn’t write to me.” It had always been the other way around. He claimed he was no good at it. And he wouldn’t try, not even for her.
Sam just shrugs and hands her an envelope with her name written on it before standing and leaving the room. His handwriting is neat and careful as though he had spent a great deal of time creating each letter of her name.
For a moment all she can do is stare openmouthed at the letter before she sets the mug down on the coffee table and rips it open.
Doll,
I know we aren’t supposed to be communicating but I miss you too much not to. There’s something I think you should know. All these years that you’ve been creating for me, I’ve been writing to you too. It ain’t good and I ramble a lot about sappy things and I never told you because I was embarrassed about it. But when I get outta this damn hospital and back to you, I’m going to show you all of it. From when we were just kids to now.
I’ve been writing something to you every day we've been apart. There’s so much I want to do and say. I love you, Y/N. I miss you so much, babydoll. More than you’ll ever know. This’ll be over soon, I promise. And I can’t wait to be back by your side. I’m so sorry about everything. You deserve so much better than this situation, so much better than me. But I hope you’ll still keep me.
I know you’ve had it rough lately and that it’s largely my fault but I hope this helps. Keep your chin up and when we’re back together we’ll make something together.
All my love,
Bucky
She presses the letter to her chest and takes a deep breath, as her heart aches horribly.
Everything will be okay. They’re almost there. They’re almost to the end. They’ll be together soon, because they’ve done nothing wrong.
A tear tracks down her cheek as a shaky breath passes her lips. It doesn’t matter what anyone else thinks either. She knows what she’s been through and it doesn’t matter what anyone else thought about it.
Quickly, she hunts down a piece of paper and writes a letter back, scribbling out all her thoughts and love and only stopping when she runs out of paper. Then she seals it in an envelope and writes Bucky's name as carefully as he had written hers. She shoves it at Sam as she passes him in the hall and asks him to deliver it before going to her room.
There are plenty of canvases left over in her room and she immediately picks one up and sets it on an easel.
A smile curves her lips as she grabs some paints from a nearby drawer. She knows exactly what she’s going to create for him this time.