not the world, not spinning

The first thing he unpacked was his coffee pot. He picked a spot on the counter by a power outlet, plugged it in, and brewed a batch. It was already late but he was too excited to sleep. Instead of heading to bed, he began opening more boxes. At first, he was only really looking for a cup to drink his coffee out of but after he opened one box, he opened another and then another. In the process, he couldn't help but find places for his things to go. He was eager to feel moved in. By the time he was finished, he looked around and saw an apartment that was fully furnished with all of his belongings. In the streets below his window, he could hear the sounds of people in the early hours of the morning making their way to their jobs. Like a quiet race against the sun. Everyone making their ways to offices and warehouses, or shops and restaurants before the sun could get far enough into the sky. He lied down in his bed, and the distant noises of cars in gridlock and bells jingling on hooks over doors lulled him into a much deserved rest.

But that was nearly a year ago now.

Living here taught Sebastian many things but of all the things that he learned, light pollution was by far the most disappointing. One night, he had gone out drinking with some coworkers. It was a hot summer day and their office was in an old building with old owners who don't fully understand how a thermostat works. He wanted to skip the bar entirely, but he was running out of excuses to duck out of things like these. He'd have two drinks. He'd do a few laps. Then, he'd head home to a quiet apartment where the only real conversation going on could be heard through the building walls.

Things were going smoothly for the most part but something strange happened between drinks and between laps. Sebastian stepped out for a smoke. He was trying to limit himself to just one smoke a day and this was it. It was supposed to be like a treat after giving the social aspect of living in a big city a real honest chance. The air was hot and almost wet once he made it outside. He hoped that as he took out a cigarette and his lighter that a breeze would hit him but it seemed to be just one of those days where the wind was not feeling generous enough. About halfway through his smoke, he looked up expecting a sky full of stars. What looked back at him was an empty sky. Splotchy, gray and black, like a little too much ink blotting on blank paper. And the longer that this blank, expressionless sky looked back at him, the more he felt this ache in his chest. It grew and grew the longer that he looked up.

He dropped his cigarette onto the sidewalk and stamped it out. By the time that he should've been back inside the bar, he's halfway finished with his walk back to his apartment. Empty sky watching him the whole way.

Sebastian made it to his building and walked up the stairs to his door in quiet anticipation of his bed. He blinked sleepily as he made a few failed attempts at slotting the key into the doorknob. Then, just as soon as he swung the door open, anticipation died and dread feverishly took its place. It somehow felt even hotter in here than it did outside.

Sebastian groaned, then shut the door behind him. He kicked off his shoes and beelined directly to the window. Opening it wafted in no cold air and only the smell of hot trash from the dumpster a few floors down on the ground that has now had all day to bake beneath the sun. He grumbled about the heat and the smell on his way to the shower.

Once showered, Sebastian grabbed the first pair of underwear he could find out of a basket of clean laundry he never put away. Then, he turned on a little rotating fan that his mother insisted he take with him from the house. Slowly and gratefully, he lied down with his back on the mattress and his eyes looking up at the popcorn ceiling. He thought about his usual spot by the lake back home where he used to smoke his last cigarette of the day. All those times he'd gone out there, he never remembered a time where the sky had no stars.

It didn't take long before his thoughts continued drifting on and on until eventually they made the long drive down the highway all the way back to Pelican Town.

It was raining there.

You hadn't planned to fall asleep just yet. It was just too early, but after a full day of working underneath a treacherously hot sun, perhaps you've earned the right to turn in sooner than usual. The couch becomes uncomfortable if you lay on it wrong for long enough, but the cold wet air from the rain felt nice on your skin. The cat above your head, flicking her tail in displeasure at the racket outside. Snoring softly on the other side of the couch was the dog. Thunder and lightning flashed and rumbled overhead in all colors and pitches.

Your eyes are getting heavier and you're just tipping the edge of unconsciousness when the phone starts to ring. Hair from the end of the cat's tail flicks around your mouth and nose. You reach around clumsily at the phone, spitting away at the hairs, and bringing the handset to your ear.

Groggily, you say "Hello?" and wipe your palm down from your forehead to your chin.

Sebastian slowly turns onto his side, "Sorry, did I wake you?"

"No." You lied, "Not at all. What's up?"

Sebastian hadn't called in a couple of months now. You figured it would happen eventually and you were doing quite well at not taking it personally. Zuzu City was like its own world where a thousand things were constantly happening. Time felt so different there, you couldn't be entirely certain that the city followed the same laws of physics as everywhere else in the world.

"Nothing." Sebastian says. It's now that he's realizing that he's not sure exactly why he called. All he knew was that hearing your voice on the other end made the ache in his chest marginally worse. It felt good. He wondered how much better it would feel if he could get you to keep talking. "It's been a while. I guess I just wanted to hear your voice."

You snort. "Yeah, right."

"What, you don't believe me?" Sebastian replies.

Your finger curls around the phone wire coil, thoughtlessly. "You can try to convince me."

"How do I convince you?" There's a nervous flutter in his stomach, like there was something dangerous about talking to you like this. But, he's not sure why.

"Maybe if we keep talking, we'll find out." You smile. Wind tosses the curtains around and a drop of cold water hits the tip of your nose.

Suddenly feeling hot on one side, Sebastian flips over onto the other. Pictures of your house on the farm come into view in the openscape of his mind. The shoe rack, where one corner of the shelf always had room for his sneakers. His favorite coffee mug sitting patiently in the cupboards. Shirts that belong to him hanging in your closet. A pile of dirty laundry, where one of his long lost hoodies sits buried.

"Do you remember the first time I stayed over at your place?"

"Don't remind me." You say, the muscles in your shoulder tightening. "Your mother couldn't look at me for like a week."

"It wasn't so bad. She got over it eventually. If anything she was more grateful than she was mad."

"You can say that all you like, she's your mom. We hardly knew each other at the time. She probably thought that I murdered you or something." You say.

"I think she was glad that I could depend on the kindness of a friend rather than die her only son from hypothermia in a blizzard."

"If this is supposed to convince me to stay on the phone with you it's not working."

Winter came down on Pelican Town your first year with a vicious speed that left little room for predictability. The sun was visible only through clouds when Sam had generously invited you out to drink and shoot pool with him, Sebastian, and Abigail at the saloon. After multiple attempts at teaching you how to take cue to ball and several beers, the night came and went. By the time that everyone was ready to leave, snow was coming down in thick sheets. Abigail naturally retired to her house. Then, Sam ended the night after he and Sebastian agreed between the two of them that Sebastian could walk you home. Everyone said their goodbyes and you and Sebastian had gone on your way.

The two of you were shivering and damp by the time your feet had touched the porch. And after some convincing, Sebastian agreed to wait out the snowfall by the warmth of the fireplace. What the two of you did not know was that the snowfall would turn into a blizzard that would last for an entire day. For thirty hours, the two of you were stuck inside with a chess board, a deck of cards, and a TV to keep the two of you sane. The storm let up by morning a day later and the two of you were woken up to the sound of Robin's fist pounding on the front door.

Sebastian chuckles, a break in the static. "I was just thinking about your house."

"My house? Can't even spare a thought for your own house?" You say, teasingly.

"Ugh, that place is not my home." He turns onto his back. The popcorn cieling above head boring back into his eyes.

"Ah, c'mon. It's not so bad." You say, eyes moving towards the mountain where Robin's house sits. Lonely and dignified.

Sebastian sighs. A year ago he would have been eager to protest. But, he would be lying if he said that the time and distance between himself and that place hadn't changed things even a little bit. Maybe he simply missed how his basement never got this hot in the summer. Still, he was not exactly eager to visit home any time soon. "I can't say I miss it."

You've only really seen Sebastian's apartment from a set of pictures he'd sent in the mail. At first, it was strange. Everything that Sebastian owned was no longer in that lonely house on the mountain. So many memories linked to pieces of furniture that exist to you now only in those photos. Photos taken in a city that felt farther and farther away the less you heard from him. A city that held for you more bad memories than fond ones. He is there. You are here. You couldn't blame him for not missing anything about Pelican Town when you hadn't ever spared a second thought for the city. But, it also meant that the possibility of him never coming back was becoming more of a reality.

"I guess I know the feeling." You say, sinking further down into the couch. You were sad, you think. Then a thought crosses your mind that sadness and gravity were somehow correlated. And maybe, someone—like a scientist of some kind—should get on that hypothesis to figure out a way to change that somehow. Preferably, soon. You were starting to worry that if Sebastian calls you again, the couch will swallow you entirely.

You remember the hours killed sitting on the sofa while he coded away in his corner of the room where the computer used to sit. The comic books you'd barge in to steal. Lying in his bed, enjoying the cold air on days where the sun was particularly harsh. His weight pushing down on the mattress when he lies down behind you. Memories that were getting farther and farther away from you now. Last month, on a walk back to your farm, you realized too late that you were taking the long way back to pass by the lake at the usual spot Sebastian smoked his late night cigarette at.

You're suddenly restless to get away from this topic. By now, Sebastian must have noticed how quiet it's gotten between the two of you. Bright white light flashes over the sky followed by low rumbles rolling somewhere inside the clouds. The cat, who has reached the limit of her patience stands and abandons you to somewhere less rainy. The dog sleeps blinks a few times, then goes back to sleep.

"Is it raining?" He says.

"Yeah, it is." You answer. Then, you inhale before speaking again. "It started a few hours ago." Then exhale. You reach over and place your hand over the dog's head.

Sebastian feels the slighest pang of jealousy. "I don't think it's rained all year long here."

"It rains once a year in the city but only if you're really lucky. My office didn't have any windows so I never noticed." You recall. "I think you're the first person I've met in a while that actually enjoys the rain."

"I guess there's no one in this city that gets it like I do." He says, jokingly.

"You could say that." You chuckle and move the phone to the other shoulder.

He didn't remember talking to you feeling so difficult before. There's a nervous urge to tell you to go to bed, to not let yourself go tired the next day just to keep him company. But, he thinks about what it will be like once he hangs up the phone and comes to the conclusion that talking to you was much more appealing than being alone.

"I went out to this bar with some of my coworkers earlier." He says. He wasn't planning on bringing it up. It wasn't that he didn't want you to know. It was rather that he didn't feel it was worth talking about.

You hum and the ache in his chest hurts a little bit more. "How was that?"

There's a moment before he starts talking. There was nothing eventful about what happened at the bar. It was just going to be a few casual drinks with some of the other people in his office. After all, there was nothing esepcially unique or exciting about his coworkers. But then, he recalls the half-smoked cigarette he left behind and the starless sky and he shifts a little. "It was nice at first then… I don't know. I left without telling anyone."

"Did something happen?" He hears the slightest hint of concern on the edge of your voice.

"No… nothing happened. I just stepped out to smoke a cigarette. And then, I looked up and noticed that I couldn't see a single star. And then, I thought of how I couldn't remember the last time I'd actually seen one since moving here. And… I don't know. I just wasn't feeling it anymore so," Sebastian sighs, "I left."

"You haven't seen one since you moved there. The last time you've actually seen a night sky with stars was here." You say. "It's pretty much impossible to actually see the night sky in Zuzu City."

He snorts, "What the hell are you talking about?"

"Um… Light pollution is what the hell I'm talking about." You say. "The city produces an excess of artificial light. It's too bright. The glare from all those city lights blocks out the light produced by stars. I can't believe you haven't noticed until today."

"I've been busy. Besides, it's not like anyone else in this city is looking up either."

"The night sky was the first thing I noticed about Pelican Town." You counter. "I hadn't seen so many stars in my entire life. It might honestly be in my top three of things about this town."

Suddenly, there's this strange feeling. A feeling as though the static went past his ears and settled behind his eyes. He's wondering if maybe, he lost a lot more than what he thought he was bargaining when he decided to move here. It was fine at first when he thought that you were the one 'cool' thing about home that he was leaving behind. Sneaking kisses by the lake late at night. Smuggling his bong over to your house to smoke where Demetrius couldn't catch him. The third key on a chain of four that granted him access to your house even when you weren't there. All these small things that were once implicit about his reality were now gone.

There's a tight feeling in his throat. He swallows hard on it before speaking again. "What else is in your top three?"

"Hm…let me think." You say, feeling better now that the topic has changed. On the other end of the line, Sebastian waits anxiously for you to say something again. Where you saw a veil separating the two of you, he saw a canyon. The seconds stretch until it feels as though he's waiting forever. Cosmic radiation hisses and fizzles in the handset. There was a whole lot of space between this place and his hometown. He imagined the tiny little particles moving at the speed of light carrying your voice across highways and between phonelines. It was painful and necessary. Like, losing a finger to frostbite. Two weeks before he moved, the last night that Sebastian spent at your house, he made a mistake.

It was early in the morning, the sun hadn't risen yet. He needed to make it home before his mom woke up. So, he got out of bed, woke you as gently as possible and kissed you goodbye. He grabbed his jacket and his keys but before he was really ready to go, he turned and looked back at you. His biggest mistake. There was nothing spectacular about what he saw. It was just you, sleeping without a care in the world. But, in that moment, when he turned away and reached for the doorknob to start his walk back home, leaving felt like the most illogical thing in the world.

Your voice pierces right through the center of his thoughts. "In no particular order, I like Salmonberry season and the moonlight jellyfish. But, if I'm being completely honest with you, I'm very much looking forward to those jellyfish lately."

"That—that's a good list." He says.

"What are your favorite things about Zuzu City so far?" You say. And, you really are curious because if there was anyone you could trust in the world to see what you couldn't about that place, it's him.

"I like…" Sebastian says, but the words trail off slowly. Life is so fast here, it was the first thing he really had trouble adjusting to. But, nonetheless he was confident that he loved it. There are things in Zuzu City that are not in Pelican Town and he liked that. A lot of things. Most people, he believes, are far too romantic about living in rural areas and small towns. Most people, he believes, would hate to live in a town like the one he comes from. Most people.

"Three things. Name them." You say.

He tilts his body until he's on his back again and he looks up at the ceiling. "I'm drawing a blank."

"Yeah, I do the same thing when I try to think about what I like about that place." You joke. You glance around at the house, wondering where the cat had gone off to until enough time passes and Sebastian's silence starts to become concering. There's a distant rattle of thunder somewhere out of view. "Sebastian? Did you fall asleep?"

There are things he loves about this city and he's trying really hard to think of them. But, in this exact moment, they all escape him. The day that he moved from Pelican Town to here, his mom drove the moving truck. He watched you in the rearview mirror getting smaller and smaller as they drove farther away until eventually you were gone to the horizon.

"No." He says, hesitantly. He pinches his nosebridge and blinks hard. "Sorry. You just sound really far away right now."

You wonder if maybe you should brace yourself for gravity. You think that any second now, it could push you down through the cushions. Instead, you simply lie there, curtains rocking back and forth against warm misty air above you. There's a sudden and anxious feeling that you need to say something. Any second now, disaster could strike and someone needed to say something before lightning hits an electrical cord outside and kills this conversation cold and dead in its tracks.

You inhale through your nose. There's still a corner of your mind that believes that Sebastian is making this phonecall from his bedroom here in Pelican Town. So, you put up your best effort to think about what he would look like if he took up a space in one of the photographs he'd sent you in the mail so many months ago.

"Yeah." You say. "I'm pretty far away." The words are difficult to get out, as though each one had a real weight to it and your body was struggling to hold it all up.

Sebastian's mind goes to the hours long trip it takes to bike from here back to home. He imagines at some point along the highway where trees and rain begin and where the humid, cloudless, starless sky ends. If he were to leave now, he could make it to your house before the sun comes up. Going from east to west on a motorcycle, chasing the moon across the sky. To him, it sounds like the most reasonable answer to the most illogical feeling in the world. It's the only answer.

"Do you… have any plans tomorrow?" He says.

"It's gonna rain tomorrow." You say, eyes drifting towards the open window. "So, maybe I won't."

"Well, neither will I." Sebastian says. "And, my weekend is coming up. So, I guess I'm free to do whatever."

You plant a foot on the ground and push yourself to sit up, wondering if he's implying what you think he's implying. Your stomach feels suddenly light. "Your coworkers will probably ask about where you went earlier when you get to work tomorrow morning."

"Obviously, I'm gonna lie and call off."

"If I was your coworker, I'd hate you." You joke.

"It's a good thing that I won't be around the office to find out if anyone hates me tomorrow." He starts getting up.

"Why wouldn't you be in the office tomorrow?" You say, smile slowly beginning to return the more you allow yourself to believe him.

He's already grabbing a backpack and throwing clean clothes inside. "You'll just have to wait and see."

"I don't know… I'm pretty impatient."

"I'll make it worth it." He stretches the phone cord to a risky length trying to dig through his drawers for a weekend's amount of clothes.

"I'll hold you to it." You say.

"You should head to bed," He says, shoving clothes into a backpack. "I don't wanna keep you up."

You smile. Cold wet air hits your skin. "Alright then." You swing your legs over the edge of the couch and let your feet touch the the floor. "Good night."

"Good night." He replies.

Then, he stops momentarily. Like, he carried himself through the door first while another disembodied part of him was still catching up. He feels cool air wafting from deeper within the apartment and looks up. He meets your eyes through the glass and sees you sitting there, blinking at him. Your form is mantled in the dark blue backdrop of the night sky. His shoulders relax and he kicks off his shoes before making his way to you.

Bucky makes way across the apartment and steps out onto the balcony. You hold the cigarette between your fingers and look up at him. Besides the smoke in the air, the wind carries in just the slightest impression of mint. He looks back down at you with a curious expression. 

You don’t usually wait for him. In fact, he couldn’t remember the last time he’d come home to find you still awake. For whatever reason, you had enough unearned faith in him to never feel the need to wait. Though, part of him was relieved that you weren’t wasting energy on worrying about him.

“Hey, buddy.” You say. 

He kneels down to meet you at your eye level, chin on your armrest. “Hi.” His hand grasps your wrists softly, then turns it so his mouth can reach the cigarette filter. With your free hand, you brush fingers through his hair as you watch him take a long drag. There’s a cut on his cheek and a split in the skin above his temple, purple splotches in full bloom around it. He turns from you when you start to notice and blows the smoke through his mouth.  But, with your hand beneath his chin, you tilt his head just enough to be face to face. “Don’t look at me like that. This is nothing.”

You snort. Slowly, you inch the cigarette closer to his mouth, offering it to him. Sensing a trap, Bucky glowers up at you as he wraps his lips around the filter. Then, you stand up and walk back into the apartment. He reaches to stop you and you dodge out of the way at just the right time. It doesn’t take long before you come back around the corner of the hallway. He grumbles at the sight of a first-aid kit and small wet towels cradled in your hands. “You’re remarkably awful at lying.”

He pauses for a minute, “Gimme that. I’ll do it.”

“No, I don’t think so.” You reply, before sitting back down in your chair. You take the cigarette out of his mouth and toss it into the ashtray. Bucky props his chin back on the armrest and watches your hands open the clasps of the first-aid kit, surrendering to his fate. The sound of his machine arm whirring softly over the sound of car alarms in the distance.

Then, his eyes move up your arm, over your shoulder, up your neck, over your jaw and land on the dark shade washing over your undereyes. He slips his hand through the gap beneath the armrest, pinching at the hem of your shirt. You hum, acknowledging him. He says, “Why’re you still up?” His voice is an impossibly soft hush. He was sure that in a lineup of every single person that has known him, only you could recognize it as his. It was a unique privilege. One he was reluctant to just give. 

“Not happy to see me?” You lean in closer, a damp towel pulled across your fingers. You dab it gently over the cut on his temple. 

“I am.” He watches the flutter of your eyelashes when you blink, ignoring the stinging throb of the cut on his face. There’s a clear nonanswer here that he’s sure you wouldn’t divulge further unless he applied pressure. He tugs on your shirt again. “Why’re you still up?”

You inhale through your nose, lean back away from him, and exhale through your mouth. “I was waiting for you.”

“No, you weren’t.”

“Yes, I was.”

“You never wait for me.”

“Well, now I wait for you.” You say. You make a little show of dropping the towel into the first-aid kit. You tear open an antiseptic pad, your eyes still looking into his. The sky above stains his irises a shade as dark as the ocean. “Is that okay with you?” There’s a little annoyed edge in your voice. 

“Sure.” Bucky answers, 

“Awesome.” You lean in again, dabbing the little pads on his cuts. Beneath the smell of generic soap, there’s him. The smoke of a coal fire. His eyes watch your face attentively. “So, what’s the deal? I for one would jump at the opportunity to be doted on by another attractive person. Did you hit your head so hard you forgot how charming I am?”

“I don’t need to hit my head to forget that you’re charming—“

“There he is.”

“And, I think I’d just do a better job than you at dressing my very fatal wounds.”

You smile, mischievously. “Maybe, you wouldn’t have any wounds to dress if you stopped blocking with your face.” 

“Oh, haha. Funny.” His eyes narrow to slits momentarily. “I do not block with my face.”

“You certainly did these last few days.” You peel a bandaid open. 

“It can’t be that bad.” Your fingertips are warm on his skin as you press the adhesives onto his face. 

“Maybe not by your standards.” You brush your thumb along his jaw. “Some of us are still normal people. And, frankly, looking at you is making my face hurt.”

“There are better ways to tell someone they’re ugly.”

“That’s actually not what I said. But, by all means, the shoe must fit perfectly if you’re so eager to put it on.” You shrug, waving your hand dismissively. “Maybe I don’t care that you’re hurt at all. Maybe I just wanted to be close to you.”

He smiles, but it goes quiet again. Your eyelids look heavy when you blink down at him. It’s warm in the very little space separating the two of you. His back is vulnerable to the cold air. Out of the corner of his eye he watches the smoke in the ashtray disappearing into empty space. The last time he checked the time the hour number was entering single digits. Bucky watches you, watching him, and his smile fades. “Why were you waiting for me?”

A crease in your brow forms. “Because… I’m gonna do whatever the hell I want in my apartment.”

Bucky takes the first-aid kit out of your lap. Reorganizing everything into its rightful place. He shuts it, then tosses the towel aside. Then, he looks back up at you again. It was something in your face that looked foreign on you. Something that he recognized from whenever he sees his reflection. “Tell me.”

You groan and sigh. A warm hand wraps around your palm and squeezes. It was a welcome sensation against the night air. 

“I can’t sleep.” 

“Why can’t you sleep?” He watches your mouth become a tight straight line. “Is it me?”

“What? No.” You say it like it should’ve been obvious. It’s part of what he liked about you, he supposed. For Bucky, to be known by others is to accept that once they do, there’s always a level of unattainability present. Like, once they find out who he is—what he is, a fissure in the Earth cracks open. The gap is so impossibly wide, how could he ask someone to jump it for him? “Well, okay. I guess, technically yes. But, not in the way that I know you’re going to assume.”

“Come on, give me a little credit here. I let you put bandaids on cuts that will heal by the next afternoon.” 

“Fine. But, don’t look at me when I tell you. It’s embarrassing and stupid.” You watch as he chuckles a little and turns so his shoulder faces you. “Anyways, the gods sent me a vision.”

He laughs, only slightly worried because there are very little traces of humor to detect in your voice. “What?” 

“I have this dream.” You say, leaning back into your chair. You didn’t believe in gods. You operated on the sound logic that, when you talk to Bucky, cracks do not form in the Earth. It was a different kind of reality to grow accustomed to. If Bucky could see his whole life before him painted on a canvas, all he would look at is the red. The longest color on his spectrum—on the spectrum of the world. His vision is in perpetual red-shift. But, when you looked at him, you saw the whole of him. Every color under the white light of the sun. Clear-eyed truth. “Well, I keep having this dream—which is why I think I could be the next chosen Oracle of Delphi or something.” 

“You’re using a lot of funny words that I do not like.” Bucky replies

“Oh please. You have an arm made out of space metal and you’re over a hundred years old. I don’t think it would be the craziest thing ever if I was psychic or something. Just bear with me for a minute.” 

Now, he was scared. As far as he knew, you loved his utter lack of whimsy. And, now you were begging him to suspend his disbelief. Whatever it was that was preventing you from sleeping must have really shaken you. Something not so easily done. “Okay, I’m sorry. You were saying?”

“I keep having this dream. It always feels so real and then I wake up. And there’s a minute where I think it’s real when I am awake.” Bucky listens to your voice as the clouds roll over a bisected moon. “It always starts with Sam calling me talking about a funeral. Who to invite, where to do it. What flowers to buy. What song will play. What kind of burial. And I sit there and I think: I have no fucking clue what to do. And, then I realize that he’s talking about you. Then, this thought occurs to me that you’ve died. and then I wake up. I wake up and you’re not there and I think finally, the dream has become real. Like, I went through the entire process of going to bed and the entire time that I did, I forgot that you were just gone.”

There’s a dull ache in Bucky’s chest. Shame, guilt. More shame and guilt than was normal for him. He knows that you told him not to look at you, but he can’t resist. He turns his head and he sees you, looking back at him. “Well, I’m not actively dying.”

“I know.” You prop your chin in your hand. “I guess that's not the biggest thing I’m worried about. I know the deal. I mean, you go out and you beat up some real shitty people. I can be at peace with the fact that one night, you might not come back.

“If you’re having these dreams where I’m dead and that’s not the issue, then what else is there?” He says. Slowly, he reaches his hand up to grab your wrist, pressing his thumb into your palm.

You look a hundred miles away, staring down at him. Flecks of light cross over the wet of your eyes. Like, comets burning up in atmosphere. “If tomorrow Sam called me–or anyone called me–and told me you were dead, I wouldn’t have the first clue what to do. What flowers you would want. What kind of burial you would want–if you would want to be buried at all. What music you would want. Where you would want to be put.”

“I’m not really worried about–”

“I know you’re not.” You shake your head at him and look away. On a window in the building across from yours, you see a reflection of you and him. “But, as the sole regular of your hypothetical grave, I worry. I worry about getting the wrong flowers, or fucking up the song, or putting you somewhere you wouldn’t wanna be. I worry that I’ll be the only person to remember who we were and still not know a single thing about you.”

“You know me. That’s one thing you don’t ever have to worry about.” He squeezes your hand.

“Well, that’s sweet of you.” You press your lips on his knuckles. And, then a minute passes where the two of you sit there, his hand in yours.

“Daffodils were Winnifred Barnes’ favorite. My mom–she would’ve liked you, I think.” He says. Truthfully, he doesn’t know what she would think of you. He can’t remember very much of her other than her favorite flower and the fact that her old apartment building from 80 years ago is nothing more than a loose pile of rubble now. But, there’s a little swell of pride in him when he notices that you’re smiling. “The burial part I’ll leave to your discretion. Just don’t visit me all the time–”

“You’re right. I should move my things there. Put my entire life right next to your headstone.”

“Do not visit me all the time. And, for the song? I guess… if I had to pick,” He blinks out into space for a minute. “‘There Are Such Things’ Tommy Dorsey.”

“I guess… that solves my problem, then.”

“Do you feel better?”

“No.”

“It was worth a shot.” He shrugs. “I think you need to sleep.”

“Probably.” You murmur. “But, I like this. I just wanna sit here with you for a while.”

“I’ve got nowhere to be.” He replies.

“I keep a file on everyone. Including my coworkers.” You shrug, still in perfect rhythm with the music. You put a puzzling emphasis on ‘coworkers’ that he’ll remember for the rest of the week. “For starters, Clint was up to some very intriguing mischief for a few years after… well. And, Scott has a daughter somewhere. He likes to keep that to himself more than he does with his criminal record. But, then again, which of us doesn’t have a criminal record.”

“First name basis, huh?” He says. “I never took you for someone who liked to get so close.”

“Getting close is only half the fun.” You say. Then, you blink through a thought. A realization like an exhale. “Oh, and you probably know that Sam has a particular love for music but he’s specifically partial to collecting records.”

Bucky snorts. “I didn’t think vinyl records were still a thing.”

“They’re quite popular these days.” You say. He watches his reflection in your eyes. His face swallowed by the void of your pupils. Your gaze remains trained on him, as scalpel steadies to a surgery, to flesh. Despite this, you were still watching the entire room—this he had no doubt about.

“And, what is it that you know about me that no one else knows? All of my secrets are in wide circulation as it is. I’m the golden boy of every world government.”

“That is true.” He watches the corner of your lips upturn. “But, I know things about the Sergeant James Barnes. Things that you must have thought previously lost to time.”

His brow twitches downward, momentarily. It gives you the slightest bit of satisfaction. The one thing he hates to give anyone. “Whatever it is you think you know: you don’t know.”

You remember the first time you met Qimir. His name wasn’t Qimir, then. Or rather, that name belonged to someone else. Though, sometimes you still caught glimpses of this person washing momentarily over Qimir’s face. Rays catching in the walls of a hanging prism. Some things had remained the same.

There was an eerie familiarity to it. This person that you knew since his boyhood was the same and not the same. Idiosyncrasies that he kept after all these years. There was something bird-like about his focus. An awareness like distant starlight peeking through holes in a curtain he had punctured, moving too fast in all directions. It was a secret that only he knew, a precious one that he held dear. And by the nature of your connection, you had known the precious secret, too.

It had, for as long as you could remember, made others around the two of you uneasy. The Jedi were not superstitious—but there were rumors. One day, when the Council had grown tired of the novelty that was yours and his mystique, one of the members proposed the idea of sending you to the temple on Takodana and Qimir to the monastery at Mount Pasvaal.

It didn’t take long for the masters at Takodana to notice your bizarre sleeping habits. You stayed awake through nights, doing your chores, your training, your studies while everyone was asleep. The majority of your rest was taken in the afternoons unless you were asked otherwise by the temple elders. When the councilors on Coruscant relayed back with the elders on your wellbeing, they found themselves even more discomfited when the elders had remarked to them of your generally good behavior.

Qimir had no notable behaviors other than the fact that he was frequently spotted throughout the monastery staring blankly into any surface that showed him his reflection. Only, he was never looking at his face and seemingly always at something standing behind him.

You were one mind, conjoined into an image unfathomable to the naked eye. The Council was certain by this time that the two of you would drive one another mad.

The Jedi were not superstitious. However, the two of you were sufficient evidence of the fact that force dyads were a bad omen. A sure-sign for impending doom sleeping dormant on the not-so-distant horizon.