winter soldier

@xsoldiier​

Why was it that it always felt the same? Yelena knew how to do her job. She was one of the best there was, if she wanted to brag. Her own father liked to boast about it– one of the greatest child assassins the world has known. That was Yelena, the walking weapon who had finally received her freedom. Her world was supposed to get better after that. And it had, for a moment. Her work traveling the world and freeing the Widow’s was rewarding. She wore whatever she wanted – which was yellow; lots of yellow and patterns. She even got a dog and named her Fanny because it made her laugh. Yelena had a ledger she could never escape from, but she was living.

Then, Natasha died.

It wasn’t just that she had died. She had died while Yelena was nothing more than a pile of dust, blipped away into oblivion. Five seconds had passed and Natasha had died in the middle of them. Alone, Yelena had given in to her rage and sorrow. Valentina had told her that Clint was to blame and she went to kill Clint. No questions asked, just a death wish to the man she blamed. Everyone knew how that turned out. It hadn’t been Clint. He had loved Natasha, was her best friend. He had tried to save her but Natasha – brave, bold, stupid Natasha – had fought harder. Now, Yelena was alone.

That’s how she ended up in the warehouse, her black mask covering her entire face. The green of the goggles tinted the darkness as she moved through it, familiar with its shadows. It always felt the same now. The Thunderbolts gave her an assignment, she went out, she did it, she went home. Sometimes she killed and sometimes she didn’t. There was always blood, though. There already had been and the night was young. Crouching as she paused, blonde strands were freed as she pulled the mask off and tucked it into her belt. Her braid was tight still; a few fly aways wouldn’t kill her. What would kill her was the monotony if she didn’t get to go home soon.

Footsteps broke the silence. Her spine stiffened, head tilting to the side as she clocked which direction they were coming from. As soon as they got closer she lunged from her spot, three steps launching her into the air as she vaulted over them with her legs lashing out. Landing in a crouch on the other side, the red of her widows bite glowed against the concrete. Although she was prepared to throw herself at them again, the blonde paused and her brows furrowed. She rose then, brushing off her knees.

“That actually kind of hurt,” she tossed out. The landing had been wrong. “Oof.” 

The Widow’s Bites were clicked off as Yelena took in the man. James Buchanan Barnes. Bucky. She knew of him, of course. Steve Roger’s bestie who had fallen to his supposed death, only to be turned into a brainwashed assassin. Yelena related to that last bit a little. 

“Now, I know who you are, so I’m not going to ask. Bucky.” She clicked her tongue. “I am going to ask what you’re doing here. This is my assignment, and you could have gotten yourself killed.” That earned a laugh. “I’m kidding. I wouldn’t kill you. They would come and avenge you and I don’t like running very much. More killing. Too much work, y’know?” Maybe he didn’t. She shrugged. “You got me for a second there. However,  I don’t like to share, Bucky. You should leave.”

His ass was numb. 

James tapped his fingers monotonously against the side of his rifle, playing out the inane rhythm of ICarly - the newer one, Sam had told him, dropping a bowl of corn chips into his lap and pressing play. 

That hadn’t been the strangest show he’d put on - James had started humming a Disney show tune while cleaning his guns, all thanks to Sam fucking Wilson. 

He’d originally been flat on his stomach, occasionally glancing through the scope, tracing the entrance where his target would walk through, analyzing air speed, trajectory, potential obstacles. But the time ticked forward, extending past the call time, and then kept on ticking.

An hour over, James had swung his legs around and propped up against the nearest wall, yanking out a granola bar from one of the pockets of his tactical pants. It tasted like ass, but it’d appeased the growl in his stomach and he’d used the mindless munching to keep his boredum from eating away at his sanity too much. 

It’d been the soft *click* of a window opening and the even softer weight of footsteps that had yanked him from the swirl of growing impatience, and James slowly climbed to his feet, stepping over the rifle. He pulled a .45 out of his belt and stopped moving, listening for the source of the sound.. 

A weight crashed into him and James threw an arm out, ending his stagger before he lost his footing entirely. 

“What the fuck, Yelena?” 

She was dusting off her legs, she was making remarks, she was talking. Endlessly.

“Quiet.” He bit out, the shuffle of movement echoing out somewhere beneath them. 

A security guard, a bystander, the freaking mark. James didn’t know because he couldn’t see, because he was standing across from a five foot two assassin who had to bend her neck to make eye contact with him. 

The door was right there. It was closed but unlocked. All she had to do was grab the handle, turn it and take two steps out into the hallway. Just like that she’d be free. No more sister, no more lover. No moral obligation to be good or shed her skin to try and live up to the expectations that people carried in their eyes. Natasha Romanoff ( as they knew her ) was a good person. A spy rehabilitated. A hero. The Red Room was bad, yes, but if the woman who had thrown herself off a cliff to defeat Thanos had come from it there had to be the possibility of good. That’s what Yelena’s shoulders were buckling under: the potential to be good her sister had created. Maybe she had it in her. It was likely. That didn’t mean Yelena wasn’t terrified to try, terrified to fail. Besides, hadn’t she said she was done being Natasha? Being good just because she was could lead to Yelena being pigeonholed into copycat once more. 

“Мне здесь не место.“ Her words were both tired and honest. She continued on in Russian, “I never wanted this. Any of this. I like Russia and I’ve learned to like who I am. Or tolerate her, at least. It’s like spitting on me. Miss America? Pies, husband, fences. Children?”

Bag falling heavily to the ground, Yelena abandoned it so move closer to where James was sitting. Despite the fact that she was standing they were just about at eye level. Her lips twitched a few times as she tried to pick her next words, English and Russian phrases tangling together. She let out a slight huff before frowning. Wanda had twisted her inside out and made her shiny and new. Yelena didn’t want to be polished. That was her sister. She was fine to continue conversing in her first language even though James didn’t like it. Yelena had pocketed that part of herself for his sake, but she wasn’t willing to budge out of who she wanted to be again.

“I know you have your sad story too. I tell you I spent half my life being mentally manipulated and controlled and you tell me you know how it feels because you experienced it too. I tell you they took my name and taught me that I was only worth anything when I was “Natasha” and you sympathize because you couldn’t remember your own for longer than you had it. This?” She tapped twice at her temple. “We’ve been here. I can drink and kill and cope because I know how this goes. But Wanda – she violated me. It wasn’t enough to take my dignity and turn me into someone else.”

It was then that Yelena finally allowed herself to touch the hollowed space of her stomach. Had there actually been life in there that Wanda had created and destroyed, or had it just been distended flesh in one sick facade? Yelena had graduated at sixteen years old, a full year and a half then the expected. She had reported to the infirmary with her head held high and eyes closed as they wheeled her away on the gurney. She hadn’t cried. Not even after, when she waited for the ache to subside. James had seen her in both the light and the dark, had seen her body. The scar was tiny, the warped skin the only sign of what the Red Room had done. What she had asked to do because her traumatized mind had been conditioned to believe the Red Room owned every iota of her. At the end of the day, Yelena didn’t resent it like Natalia did. She hated children and wouldn’t have had one anyway. Her childhood had been a ruse she had been stupid enough to believe. Why bring life into the world? It was all too easy to eliminate. 

“I came to terms with what the Red Room did – the sterilization. The control they thought they had over my body. I said I would never let someone take my autonomy again and she did. She put something in me and I had to pretend to be happy about it. You got hurt, but you were a good person before. You had dreams. I’m not and I never did. My ‘family’ was a cover I believed in because I was little. I don’t like being reminded of the past, and I think running is better because the body count is lower.”

Because she looked at him and saw three happy children.

Because she looked at him and saw an idyllic life that she had never let herself imagine.

Because she was a coward. Just a little bit.

“You’re right,” a sardonic smile took over. “Eventually someone will kill me. It’s best for you if you’re not around when that happens.”

James tracked her movements automatically; eyes skating over her face, down her shoulders, across her stomach where her hand was resting. He stilled there for a moment, flashes of Westview streaking across his field of vision as if he were still there, still living the life of a man who existed only in the fabrication of Wanda’s perfect world. 

If he thought about it long enough, he’d piece together the false narrative much in the way he pieced together his past - he’d hear Yelena’s delicate American accent; could smell the revolving door of odors from motor oil to cinnamon to wet dog. He could remember smiles painted across faces of children that, in retrospect, didn’t really look like them at all. But for a time, he’d had the American dream. 

He’d slept without nightmares, worried over work orders instead of his kill list. James was boring, mundane, nonexistent. For a handful of weeks, all that mattered was his family, his friends. Now? 

His vision came back to him as he finally refocused, returning to the present. James caught everything Yelena said, every declaration and every statement. He wanted to tell her to leave; to go live the life she felt was required of her, but instead,

“It wasn’t fair, I know that. I know that because I was right there with you, down in the trenches, experiencing the same apple pie life. I wanted that fifty years ago, before I’d lost the arm, before I’d lost the war. I expected to come home to a crowd of people cheering our victory on. I didn’t want to stay enlisted; I wanted to help Steve, sure, but I didn’t want to spend every day fighting a never ending war. That was never me. I did what was needed, and it sent me decades into the future with a keen marksmanship sense and an affinity for a woman who thinks running away will serve her any better.” He paused, swallowing.

@xsoldiier

Natalia. Eve. Natalia. Eve. Natalia. Eve — Yelena.

For a long time, Yelena had known who she was and who she was meant to become. She spent hours shoving herself into the mold of someone else because they told her it would make her good. It would make her more than good, actually, she’d be the best. But that wasn’t the truth. That was the Red Room with their determination to replace the golden child they had lost. They didn’t have Natalia anymore but they had Yelena and had decided somewhere along the line that a replacement would be good enough.

The past can be tricky. It latches onto you with its sticky fingers and never really leaves, even when time goes by. Yelena chose to not speak of the time between when she had gone against all her instincts to follow Natalia out of the Red Room to where she was currently. There was a lot to process, and so, she chose to acknowledge none of it at all.

Natalia. Eve. Natalia. Eve. Natalia. Eve — 

A lock unlatched. There was a slight creak of a door and soft footprints. When Natalia had first died Yelena had made it a point to have no real home base. She kept her belongings light and threw them away often because money was no concern. It was some time after her sister came home and her relationship with James became more consistent that she officially signed a fake name on a piece of paper and started paying monthly cash fees. She didn’t want to admit to having a life so far away from the home she hated, but one had been waiting for her all the same as she left Westview. The S.W.O.R.D. agent who had tried to get her into counseling had ended up flat on his back. James had carried her through the Hex but the second they were on base and his grip loosened she had been on the ground with a flurry of Russian curses as her only goodbye.

The metal was cold under her hand as the gun began to reassemble. It had been her deescalation in the past, a technique taught by Natalia. You took the weapon apart and put it back together until your hands stopped shaking. Repeat. Again. Yelena’s hands were shaking, but she was also in a rush. Her duffel had the cash she kept under her floorboard and a few rounds. Fake passports, some wigs. Nothing personal. Clicking the safety in place, the blonde tossed the gun in the bag and finally turned it around as she hefted it into her arm. She didn’t to see him and she didn’t want to remember.

“Дети были настоящими. Просто чтобы вы знали.” Yelena had logged onto the S.W.O.R.D server because, despite her best intentions, she had to know. “Но не этот. Не наш.“ The last word was sticky in her throat. Ours. It had never been theirs to lose. Teeth grinding together, Yelena shook her head and grabbed the leather coat from the back of the chair.

“Думаю, для нас будет лучше больше не видеться.”

Because that’s what she did. She ran.

They hadn’t seen each other since they’d been separated and examined and James had vehemently refused the psych eval a handful of times before they finally let him out. Yelena had already been gone by then, but he’d expected that. The two of them shared memories that were implanted and forced into molds of people so far detached from who they really were that coming back down into reality had shuttered them both. He expected distance, he expected her to give him indifferent looks and neutral tones - what he hadn’t expected was to see her with a duffle bag thrown over her shoulder with the intention of running. 

She still wasn’t looking at him. That was expected. 

“Вы выбираете бежать?” Their relationship had been tenuous at best, something existing between them that was never spoken, but never expanded upon either. But they’d built a level of trust in each other that James was watching walk away. Suddenly, he was just so very tired. 

He sat heavily in the stool, the weight of her words settling in his chest, but he pushed it aside. He was good at that; James was an expert in avoiding sensitive topics that made him feel beyond the basic emotions, and thinking about the life Maximoff had subjected them to hurt too much. That was how his life was supposed to have gone. He wanted to fight for his country and then settle down, die old and wrinkled with a wife and kids. He’d wanted that white picket fence life with pies baking in the window and the laughter of children bubbling in his ears. He craved domesticity and he realized too late that he’d let it seep in and he buried his face in his hands, drawing in one breath after another. 

She was still there, just long enough that when he picked his head up, he could still see the outline of her shoulders, but he suspected he’d already lost her. That was the way of their lives, as it were. They were transient, never meant to settle down. The life they’d been given had been a taste of what James had wanted in a different lifetime. But he wasn’t David - mechanic, father, husband. He was a reformed assassin that never quite managed to scrub the blood clean from his hands. 

“трусливый.” the word slipped out of him before he could catch it, rising out his throat on a wave of feeling. Not all of it was directed at her, but a lot of it was. Yelena had started to mean something more to him than either of them had intended and even if he didn’t hold that against her -- well, he did. 

Daisy wasn’t exactly in the best mood, but she was trying to not let her disappointment leftover from the Hex get the best of her. It wasn’t exactly the outcome anyone wanted, but it was what it was. And she didn’t even want to think about her next day back at work in that moment. Honestly, all she wanted to do was go back to her hotel room and pass out. But then she got an invitation to go grab a beer, and Daisy would never turn that down. Although, once she got there she ended up ordering something a little stronger – a few shots of scotch on the rocks.

She swirled the drink in her hand as she waited for Barnes to show up, and before she knew it he was sliding into the booth across from her. “Of course. I’m not gonna say no to a drink. I think we all need one. Or several.” She grumbled as she rubbed her forehead and listened to him explain why he wasn’t with Sam or Yelena in that moment. “God, that’s rough.” She couldn’t help the soft chuckle as she shook her head and took a long sip from her glass. She didn’t particularly care for the blonde assassin during her interaction with her back at H.Q., but to each their own. She was sure it was probably different when you were sleeping with a person. “And how are you doing? After the whole Westview thing.” She was one of the head broadcast analysts during everything, so she’d watched her fair share of Bucky’s side plot.

Terribly was the answer his mind supplied, but the word got caught in his throat. James had ignored both Steve and Sam’s request for counseling, instead choosing to deal with his PTSD in the best way he knew how - by not dealing with it. He got up, went to work, came home, and fell asleep. Sometimes his evenings would be a little more colorful, as it was tonight, but otherwise, he washed, rinsed, and repeat. It wasn’t exactly the best coping mechanism, but James wasn’t in the position to get locked up in a straight jacket for the brief moments his control slipped and the panic bubbled in, making him violent and unpredictable. Instead, he had passed his psych eval well enough after the trigger had been removed in Wakanda and he simply survived. Didn’t mean he wanted to talk about it though.

Westview had been cleared out, the town returning to whatever hell hole it had been before Maximoff got her hands on it, and James had returned to his top floor apartment, feeling heavier than he had in years. The fog of mind control left traces and though he’d been staunchly requested to go through a psych eval, he had declined in favor of a hot shower and warm beer. A few weeks MIA hadn’t impacted his rent, considering he was automatically billed, but it had shut off his electricity and trashed everything in his fridge. Still, he sank a few bottles while he redressed in the dark shadows of his apartment and checked his phone one last time. 

The confirmation was enough for him to forgo the half drank third beer and shove his feet into his boots and grab his keys. The bar he frequented was grimy and in a bad part of town, but it usually meant no one bothered him as he slid into the booth opposite Johnson, a fresh, thankfully cold beer from the bartender in his hand. He kept his jacket on but took his hat off, his hair still slightly damp and curling at the edges. 

“Lay it on me. Let’s see what I’ve got. I used to trick my support group into thinking I had at least half an idea about what was going on.”

“Brave move, considering 7/10 you sounded like a bumbling idiot.” His tone was light, teasing. “Christmas is coming up.” he said after a moment, the levity in his voice drying up. “Do you get the person you’re sleeping with a gift?” the question was said with remarkable stoicism, while James was being mostly serious, he also enjoyed the small pushes into Sam’s comfort zone. 

“I don’t know, man! I’m wigging out over here. Nothing makes sense anymore.”

“You got a reason or is this your natural disposition?”

And yet you stayed.

Yelena stayed, Natalia left. That was a common reoccurring theme in their lives. The prodigal daughter had gone off in search of redemption and Yelena continued to be the Red Room’s knife. Even when she had cut ties she had still stayed in Russia and kept up her trade. It wasn’t that she had to be there or she was scared of leaving. Yelena had run missions around the globe. She just liked what she liked and knew how to be content. Unlike — 

Why did every tangent lead back to Natalia? Natasha. Her sister had imprinted on her before they were sisters at all. Yelena was her replacement, the chameleon built to inhabit her skin. Love her, hate her, obsess over her. Yelena had done it all. Who looked at a child and decided the best thing to do was to strip them of their own identity and force them into someone else? The Red Room didn’t see the girls as children at all, so it was a moot point. Now, for whatever reason, Yelena was stuck like a fly in amber. Her hands were her own, not Natalia’s. They had undone the brainwashing that had been hardwired into her head. Natalia could die, Yelena could live. Natalia could – It did not matter. It did not matter. It did not matter. Her ghost had not followed Yelena into bed with Barnes. It had been Yelena’s lips and Yelena’s lips alone that had traced a path from the hollow of his neck and up his jaw, breathing in the sweet mix of sweat and whatever shampoo he had used. That pleasure had existed for Yelena and Yelena alone.

It was hard for Yelena to get lost in thought. She always felt too tense, too on edge. Her mind didn’t drift into daydreams often because her eyes needed to be trained on what was in front of her. Clarity had to be maintained even when a bottle was sweating in her hands. For some reason though, her mind was still soft from the morning and a few hours of actual, decent sleep. As James began to acquaint himself with the kitchen once more Yelena braced her forearms on the counter and leaned forward so that her body was braced against the hard ledge. 

“И все же я остался.” She repeated quietly, her mind still elsewhere. Barnes knew Russian, but she wouldn’t make him speak it. It was her language of choice, her mother tongue. One day Yelena had realized Natalia had began to speak more English than Russian. She had resisted some but eventually all their conversations crossed over. The encounter from the night before had left her feeling a little more warm than when she had started. Had she infected herself like Natalia had? One little taste of the potential of something and her will would begin to cave. No. She would not be that type of woman, even if it was tempting.

“Are you a romantic?” Yelena straightened as her reverie ended. “You know, I’ve always had limited support in my life and it’s been a let down. I hate that. Being let down, disappointed. It’s why the only person I try to rely on is myself.” At least she could be harsh in her punishments that way. “I don’t think I get to have domestic. That’s now how they made me. It doesn’t matter what I want.” It was a brief moment of honesty that she hadn’t expected to admit to. Fingers clenching slightly, blue eyes hardened ever so slightly. “Black,” she confirmed. Russian style was preferable but James was encouraging her to not start her day with a numb tongue.

Very distinct? Sure. He wasn’t wrong there. “I have one that’s gotten me this far. Everything I do, everything I’ll ever be – it’s tinted. But you, you got out. And by out I mean you don’t do the same dirty дерьмо and say it’s your choice. Maybe it’s because you have people who care about you.” Didn’t Natalia care for Yelena? Did it matter anymore? “Tell me, James Buchanan Barnes. What does more look like to you?”

James took a sip of his coffee, the taste acrid and bitter on his tongue. It was almost enough to shake the hazy fog of sleep from his mind and by the time the scalding liquid hit his tongue for a third time, he felt a little more normal in his skin. He tried to settle from his place opposite Yelena, his free hand gripping the vinyl countertop that was fraying at the lip, scraping against the vibranium plates. The intricate technology that had only been updated decade after decade meant that he could feel the dig of cheap countertop into his hand as if it were his own skin, sending signals up his nerves, and yet no matter how long he lived with the prosthetic, it still felt foreign sewed into him. James rubbed absently at the scar tissue with his thumb, the coffee sloshing in its mug as he listened to Yelena and tried not to mull over the obvious. Still, he wondered what it would be like to wake up and not feel like he was dragging around a man who didn’t exist anymore. Maybe that man did still exist, and maybe that’s what crept into his nerves and frayed them at the edges. 

Her question caught him off guard -- even if it shouldn’t have. They had just been talking about what it means to be domestic, but he was almost tempted to ask her to repeat herself. Instead, he cradled the half empty mug to his blue cotton shirt and felt the warmth against his skin. Pulling his brows together, he considered lying or giving half truths, but what was the point? Yelena wouldn’t care enough to do anything with it -- and yet his mouth still felt dry at every turn of this conversation. That was the rub of it though, wasn’t it. He could bed her, but morning after conversations were difficult, even if he had pushed for her to stay. “I was,” he said, his dark eyes flitting to somewhere behind Yelena for just a moment before he settled back onto her. “I was also a bit of a tool, but I used to know how to do this.” he gestured vaguely, not meaning much and yet meaning so much at the same time. He wasn’t trying to push this tepid relationship into anything deeper than what it was, but he’d felt so adrift in this reality that leaning into Yelena felt natural. Normal. Even having Steve in his reality had never felt right, not really. Steve, in all his goodness, would never understand what it felt like to be what they were. Weapons, stripped bare of their basic humanity. It was an incredibly hollow feeling.

“That can get lonely,” his words felt small, so James cleared his throat and tried to push out of the unsettled environment he’d unintentionally walked in to. He tried to focus on why he’d nudged Yelena towards staying, to having a cup of coffee, maybe a bite to eat. He just didn’t expect all the little moments they’d shared over the past few months -- the connections in their pasts, how they intersect in such a harrowing way -- and how it had been so easy to let those feelings swallow him, to open a door that would be difficult to close. He understood that there was a clear line drawn between them, nothing more than what they’d done last night -- and that cold realization made him wonder why he’d asked her to stay. 

Maybe he was a bit of a romantic.

“It’s not the same,” he started, dark gaze soft as he watched her. “but when I was first coming out it, beginning to feel myself existing in my body again, I never thought I’d get used to it. If it wasn’t for all the shit they did to me, I think existing out of intermittent cryo would’ve killed me by now, considering I spent more time in ice than I did out.” his hand, the one that made odd whirring noises when his brain sent signals to it, clenched harder on the countertop, just enough that he felt the wood beneath it begin to warp. James forced himself to ease. “The memories came back slowly, getting whiffs of some restaurant beneath a location I used to stake out, and it would hit me like a truck. It took years for me to stop reacting to them so obviously, to stop getting sideways looks. The concern on their faces bothered me the most and I had to learn how to stop showing it. Now they exist mostly in my dreams,” or nightmares, really “I never thought I’d ever be more than what they made me -- the man I was before was just an echo, a ghost. He stopped existing the moment I jumped on that plane.” His goal of getting out of his own head seemed lost now, now that he was trying to give Yelena something to relate to. He hated this about them, and yet needed it at the same time. To talk about it, even if it made his skin crawl. She listened enough, always watching him carefully as he spoke, and her calm handle of his trauma had been what’d driven him into bed with her. His long talks with Steve had always been over a bottle of whiskey neither of them felt, with Steve’s bright blue eyes drowning in a mix of guilt and grief. James had hated it, hated how he felt like he had to reach out and clap Steve’s shoulder and tell him it was all going to be alright. That it wasn’t his fault -- it wasn’t, James would never put that on Steve, but Rogers was who Rogers was. Carrying the damn world and all its problems on his shoulders. It’d gotten to be too much, and James had pulled away, schooling himself to being stronger than he was. 

Yelena was the first to ever see it was all a facade.

He didn’t know if that bothered him or not. 

“It took everything to find my agency again. To stop wondering if the trigger in my head would go off and I’d be sucked back in.” James took a measured breath. “Basically, all you have is yourself now. All you have are your wants and your needs, and there’s no one there pulling the strings anymore. The past few months I’ve tried to focus on what this life meant to me now that I wasn’t stuck under HYDRA’s control. You have that opportunity too. Even if it is a bit of domestication.” he tried for levity at the end there, but he didn’t know if the flat tones of his voice helped. “I used to -- have people who cared. I left those people behind.” And now James existed in a two bedroom apartment with peeling wallpaper and yellow twinged linoleum under his feet in the kitchen. The rest was hardwood, but it was warped in various spots and there were more than a few that creaked beneath his heavy footsteps. The walls themselves were paper thin; he constantly heard his neighbors plumbing through the drywall, could hear their shouts and the sound of their radio and TV. It was oddly comforting at times, little bits of human contact without having to actually face anyone. 

“People caring about me was half the problem,” he admitted, finally pushing himself off the counter and setting his almost empty cup down. He needed to move, he suspected, as he started to feel his nerves fire blankly under his skin. Popping open the fridge, he pulled out the All-American breakfast ingredients he clung to like a child to their blanket -- James always so desperate to find his footing in this world by going back in time. Setting the egg carton with the package of bacon balanced on top on the counter next to the stove, he occupied his movements by taking longer than needed to find a pan. Not like there were many cupboards for it to be hiding in. 

“You good? Need a glass of water? I’ve uh - ” Sam paused, rifling through his pockets, “I’ve got uh — a paperclip!”

His brows reflexively rose as he surveyed the kid. “Far cry from a glass of water. Not sure why you were going through your pockets to begin with.” 

A conundrum. That was what Yelena was wrapped up in. A conundrum that she refused to even acknowledge. She wore her personality with the guise of it being straightforward when in actuality she rarely found herself trying to unravel all of the trauma and little fucked up snarls that her upbringing had left her with. Yelena had moved through life in what she believed to be straight, decisive lines but found in the end she had been going in circles. Existential, existential, existential. Life had been a red blur before Natalia had helped her save herself. She hated this new purgatory between what she had always been and what she didn’t think she had it in herself to be. So, where did this fall on the spectrum?

This: a night of intimacy ( even though you could only be as intimate as you allowed yourself to be –  which was easier said than done ).

This: the fact that Yelena felt seen and she hated that even though she loved attention.

Whatever. Did it matter, really? Most thing in life didn’t and life itself was all too fleeting. Life was short and Yelena was in the middle of experimenting. James made more sense than a lot of her other little ( or big ) flings did. They knew each other marginally and had more in common than she would with almost anyone else. She hadn’t gotten in bed with him for an intimate, soulful connection. She wasn’t ready for that yet. Yelena wasn’t sure what she wanted, but she had no regrets as she tugged her other boot on, the stiff black leather yet to be broken in. She and James stood across from each other: one appearing to be soft and still ruffled from the bed despite the cold metal arm and the other once again tied into a tight package.

“I don’t have any friends.” It was a statement, a fact. Nothing to bemoan. “So no one would care if I yelled it from the rooftops anyway.” Yelena had little interest in them. Natalia’s friends had gotten her killed; her fancy life and her title. The rebranding of the Black Widow ( so ugly and twisted ) until a hero. Смехотворно.

Still, coffee sounded nice so Yelena found herself nodding in a mild agreeance. “I usually prefer to leave before morning. Less messy. Domestic is… fictional. A fantasy where the housewife ends up taking too many pills. Coffee is fine.” 

Peculiar and distinct. Yelena didn’t know how to be anything other than what she was, and what she was happened to be someone who was very rarely welcomed anywhere.

Maybe that’s why she she actually wanted to stay.

James let the silence stretch between them, the quiet following the lines of comfortable more than he would have expected. But the bouts were common -- neither of them particularly chatty. He more broody, her more...reticent. They moved in an air of understanding and that was something James craved more than he liked to admit. Ever. Before stepping into this world, he’d enjoyed the opportunity to call on people to have coffee with, lunch with, drinks with. It wasn’t common for him to make an appearance, but he had a small group of people he relied on to keep him from backsliding -- and entering this world had made him realize just how much he leaned on them. The Steve here had the same worry lines in his brow and the same hard set to his jaw, but he knew an entirely different version of him. Someone who walked a similar path but somewhere they’d divulged. He knew Bucky. But James had shed that persona a long time ago, the nickname almost foreign to his ears at this point. The name had been a sort of lifeline when he’d first come out of it -- but as time passed, it has just become a reminder of what he’d lost. Over and over again. 

Setting up his humble coffee maker, he turned his back to it and leaned against the counter, arms coming up to fold across his chest as he met Yelena’s gaze across the way. She was beautiful -- the light peeking through the blinds in the kitchen catching the blonde tones of her hair, illuminating against the soft skin of her cheeks. But James had long since stopped caring about appearances. He could appreciate them, but it wasn’t what had drawn him to her in the first place. In fact, nothing did. Yelena had appeared in his apartment with questions on her tongue and a bottle of liquor that belonged to him. If he were being frank, he wouldn’t have sought her out on his own; yet here they were. One night of sex -- which could only really be defined as such -- and he was starting to wonder what it would be like to watch her go. To wash the sheets and make his bed and fall asleep without a warmth next to him, without the weight of her body denting his mattress. 

For years and years he slept alone, and now he wanted to go back to the night before and do it over again. And again. “And yet you stayed.” it wasn’t a prompt for explanation, just a statement. “Domestic is what you make of it. Domestic can mean chained down and monotonous, but it can also mean...” he took a breath. “Caring. Support. Mutual agreement. It’s just a word.” he turned to grab a mug and then filled it before setting it in front of Yelena and making his own. “Black?” It was a courtesy check, but he didn’t move to act on it if she said no. “You have a very distinct view of the world, Yelena,” her name still felt foreign on his tongue, even if he was used to saying it by now. “I did too. Maybe I still do. I’d like to think I’m open to more.”

“It’s too early to tell if the morning is good.” Yelena tossed over her shoulder as she rolled over. The sheets - they were stiff but smelled clean - got tangled up on her legs before she kicked her way free. Her body had never been an issue. It was a tool, a weapon. You kept it fit and trained. People liked it even though Yelena remained ambivalent about a great many things. Her body was pleasing, that she knew. Улыбнись, солнышко, men had leered in Moscow with tobacco stained teeth and vodka drenched tongues. Sometimes she let others touch her but only on her terms. Always on her terms. In that moment she was exposed, a small scar nicked by her bellybutton with surgical precision. Natalia had rubbed hers when she was upset and lost in thought when ( she thought ) no one could see but Yelena had always worn hers as what it was: a badge. They may as well have branded her when they had taken away a natural right. Not that Yelena cared. Children were a scourge against the earth for the most part.

After allowing a moment of exhibition she reached down to pick up her shirt and tugged it on. Simple, but nice. Bought with blood money. As she followed through the routine of clothing herself and pulling on her dark jeans as well, the blonde paused and straightened. “That’s cute, James. Very domestic. You did not strike me as the type. I must be special.” The words were coupled with a wicked smile, sharp and to the point. Still, it was actually nice enough that Yelena decided to indulge him.

“So,” she draped her coat over one arm as she headed towards the bedroom door. “Is this a secret or can I tell my sister? We’re very close, you know. лучшие друзья.”

The metal whined as he smoothed out the pleats on his shirt, his dark hair falling into his eyes when he looked back up, silently following Yelena’s movements. He didn’t really watch her - his gaze more unfocused as he mapped her movements automatically. She’d been the first in a while -- the first choice in a while. What fragments of his memory offered were bits and pieces of women, their faces obscured by time, but their bodies, their actions, were painfully clear. A manipulation, a tool, a time spent to gain intel, information. And it was the same process as the rest -- execute action, divulge information, wipe memory. He’d come out of HYDRA’s grip with no interest -- but time had made things easier. Made him feel more normal despite all the tics and troubles he carried with him. 

Yelena had been the first to not question him, both during the night and into the morning. No curiosities were being restrained out of politeness, no wonders and lingering stares. This was easier, he thought, and something he should have considered (not solely involving her) a while ago. He followed her without responding, his bare feet making soft sounds against the old wood floor. When they were in the hallway and his door was shut behind them, he stepped around her, turning to face her in the dim light. 

He’d caught her tone before, but still offered a response, even if he didn’t expect Yelena to go running to Natasha anytime soon. “You can tell whoever you want. Shout it from the rooftops. Your sister and I don’t have much in the way of a relationship, so I’m not sure she’d even listen.” He hadn’t slept with Yelena because of her relation to Natasha -- moreso because of the same reasons that had drawn him in with Natasha to begin with and because his and Yelena’s physical chemistry far outweighed their emotional. It didn’t make well for pillowtalk, but he wasn’t really a fan of digging around in his head anyway. “Coffee then? You’ve got the wrong guy if you think I’m going to ask you to leave or make up some excuse to get you out of here. No one’s asking for domestic or to make this more than it was--.” blowing off steam? what exactly had it been? “--but you’re welcome to stay.” 

“I’m sorry – can you repeat that?”

“You’ve just got a bit of-” he sort of motioned with his hand before relenting and he leaned over to snatch a hand towel off the counter. Offering it, he said, “Here.” He then resettled in his chair and brought the cup of coffee to his lips. “You got your memories back. Congrats.” he said, genuine.

“So, let me make sure I have this right: my father is apparently the worst person who just decided to be a less shitty person and everyone is cool with that?”

“You’d be surprised at what they’d forgive around here.”

“So what’d you come here for, Barnes? 7/10 odds I don’t got it.”

“Advice. Though, now that you mention it, you’re probably right.”

“if we’re being honest living without memories was kind of freeing–infuriating, but freeing. don’t get me wrong, i’m glad i’m…me again, it was just…less complicated.”

“A lot less complicated, but turns out, way more disingenuous. Bit of a toss up.”