#oh y'all it's snowing and I took my winter tires off two days ago because I'm not trading in my suv with the good rims/tires

[justsomebucky]

Finding Closure (Part 1)

Summary: AU. Reader left behind a hometown full of misery to make a new home in Brooklyn. A death in the family forces her to briefly return to the place that has haunted her dreams and memories for three years. Will she finally be able to move on, or will a figure from the past change everything?

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x reader

Word Count: 2,837

Warnings: angst, language, more angst, mention of alcoholism, mention of death, mention of funeral, mentions of neglect, mentions of estranged family members, heartache, sadness, mentions of sad childhood

A/N: This is the first part of my submission for the talented and wonderful @tatortot2701 ‘s AU writing challenge. (Tay, please disregard until it’s completed!) Y'all wanted angst, well…I took a fluffy prompt and darkened it. I tried not to but this story wouldn’t leave me alone. I’m not sure how many parts it will have.

My prompt was 28 .“____ is not a real word.” “Yes it is!”

Part:  1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6

You knew it could only be bad news when your phone rang at three in the morning.

That call was the whole reason you were standing back in your hometown’s local airport, watching the luggage carousel loop around over and over.

Logically, there were a limited number of reasons as to why someone would call at three in the morning. Maybe it was the wrong number, or a butt dial. Maybe someone was drunk, or someone was going into labor. Since your only two friends in the entire world didn’t fit any of those categories, you knew that it was a stranger calling.

Bad news was a relative term, too.

Was it really all that bad? To some the news you received would be devastating. To you, it had been a long time coming, and you were sort of relieved to have the weight of it off your shoulders.

That didn’t stop you from feeling guilty about it, though.

“Hey, friend.”

You looked over at your best friend and roommate as she gave you a gentle smile. Darcy Lewis might be one sarcastic bitch for most people, but with you she always showed kindness without pity.

The difference between your life and Darcy’s was staggering. She grew up in Boston, the daughter of a business tycoon and socialite, set to inherit millions of dollars when they passed away. They kept up her monthly allowance into adulthood, and she’s never wanted for a thing in her life, except maybe friendship.

“Hi, Darce. I’m sorry, I guess I spaced out again.”

Darcy reached a hand out to rub your back gently for a second. “It’s okay. You don’t have to be the tough one today. Let me.”

The running joke between the two of you was there was no way you were some rural kid, since you were as tough as any native New Yorker. Your move to a small two-bedroom apartment in Brooklyn had changed your life, your personality, and your outlook tremendously, and meeting Darcy had been a part of that, too.

She could have afforded the Upper East Side, or Downtown Manhattan. The only reason she had even bothered to move to a small apartment in Brooklyn is because she wanted the hipster experience to help her art and photography.

Her ad for a roommate had even said that exact phrase, and you thought it was a joke until you met her.  She opened the door wearing dramatic eye makeup and covered in paint, with a small camera in her hand. Darcy’s impromptu pre-screen interview was full of questions like, ‘do you dream in color or black and white?’ and ‘if you had to be a type of architecture what would it be?’ Her last question was ‘Red Sox or Yankees?’

You told her that you didn’t always remember your dreams, but you were pretty sure it was both, and that you didn’t care what kind of architecture you were, as long as you were in New York.

Oh, and you couldn’t give a rat’s ass about baseball.

Facts and reality were your game. You were an analyst by day, and an over-analyzer by night, and you were damn good at both.

The two of you balanced each other well. She made you remember to enjoy a more colorful life, and you reminded her to bring her feet back down to earth.

Three years later, the two of you were still best friends and still living in that small apartment. She never threw her circumstances in your face, and you never held it against her. On the rare occasion, she would bail you out of your financial woes, but you always paid her back.

Today, you were so very grateful for her. You offered her a smile. “I’m fine, I promise. Just…tired.”

“There’s a taxi outside. I told him to stay put for us for an extra twenty bucks.”

The second you saw your bag come around the bend on the carousel, you hauled it to the floor and grabbed the handle. “Good, let’s just get this over with.”

Early spring always felt the same here.

You were standing on the sidewalk, just outside of the hotel that Darcy had booked for the two of you. It was halfway between your old neighborhood and the airport, declared by her to be a neutral zone to clear your head if you needed to.

Not that you would. This was a clear, cut-and-dry kind of visit. It shouldn’t take long.

Brooklyn had been unseasonably warm, but this place? It was as if the grey winter just wasn’t ready to let go. A crisp chill remained in the air, allowing you to see your breath every time you sighed. Small piles of snow still littered the grass, and you couldn’t help but think to yourself that out here, everything seemed frozen in time.

That was one of the reasons why you left in the first place.

Your hometown was, for lack of a better word, stuck. It was stuck in a time that didn’t exist anymore, stuck in an era where the generation above yours refused to change in even the smallest ways, even if humanity begged for them to grow and prosper. You avoided them, you resented them, and most of all you pitied them.

It also didn’t help that bad memories haunted you wherever you walked. Thinking about your childhood usually only brought you down.

Your mother’s unexpected death when you were just two years old left your life in a tailspin, though you were much too young to know it then. Thankfully, you were an only child, because your father’s neglect and subsequent alcohol abuse made you grow up faster than you wanted to.

It wasn’t until you were sixteen years old that everything turned around for you personally. Life at home didn’t change, but you were able to be there less, thanks to…

No. Nope. Not thinking about him right now.

Your head turned to the left at the sound of Darcy’s boots clicking on the cement path. She gave you a bright smile, and you gave her a small one in return, trying to reassure her that you were still okay.

“So, what’s up first? Should we get this morbid show on the road?”

“First I have to accompany his ashes to the plot next to my mother,” you answered, turning on your heel to walk beside her to the rental car that was dropped off a little bit ago. “I don’t really want to, but I…I can’t imagine…”

The thought of the groundskeeper being the only person at a makeshift funeral kind of made you sad.

“It’s okay. I’ll be there, too.” She unlocked the car and threw the keys to you. “You don’t mind, right? You’re more familiar with the place.”

“I don’t mind,” you assured her, sliding into the driver’s seat.

Driving through town was easy, mostly because there was never any traffic here. You made your way on some winding roads, until the outskirts of your town were finally reached. The same old welcome sign stood at the edge of town, desperately needing some upkeep.

“It’s, um…cute,” Darcy said, staring out the window. “Like in a creepy Deliverance kinda way, but still.”

You laughed for the first time since arriving. “It’s not that bad, but…yeah.”

Familiar locations passed by in your periphery. There was the old post office, and the only market for about ten miles. Houses that used to be familiar to you were now mostly occupied by strangers; some were painted a different color and nearly unrecognizable.

The one place that nearly broke you when you passed was your old high school. You’d tried to think of ten different routes to get around it, to avoid even seeing it, but road construction crews made that impossible.

Darcy picked up on your discomfort, nodding toward the building as you went by. “Did you go there?”

You nodded grimly. “Graduated at the top of my class.”

“Holy shit, no wonder that analytics firm wanted you to work there so much!”

School was absolute garbage on a regular basis, but your high school in particular had little to nothing to offer a student who wanted to advance in a science field. When you specifically requested more computer classes, more anything that would be helpful for you when you graduated, the administrators tossed you into a Home Ec class like it was nothing. You were heartbroken…until…

You shook your head, trying to clear thoughts from your brain that you weren’t ready to process.

The brakes squeaked a little as you parked in front of the funeral home. When you didn’t make a move to shut the engine off or get out of the car, Darcy reached over and turned the ignition for you.

She didn’t even mind, sitting there silently with you while you had a death-grip on the steering wheel, trying to find the courage to face your father for the first time for years.

Or, rather, trying to find the courage to face what was left of him.

“Whenever you’re ready,” she murmured, laying her head back against the headrest.

You didn’t even blink.

Hours later, the last of the dirt was tossed unceremoniously over the small vault box you’d chosen for your father’s urn to be laid to rest in. When they thought you weren’t paying attention, you heard the one groundskeeper joke, “Which side goes up?” You couldn’t even muster enough anger to reprimand him, though. He was the product of his less-than-stellar upbringing in this hellhole.

Darcy was having a hell of a time in her fashionable boots, so that kind of lightened the mood. She didn’t know that lingering snow combined with warmer temperatures meant ice melt, and soggy, muddy ground.

“Careful,” you told her, turning away in your much more sensible shoes. “It’s slippy.”

“Slippy is not a real word,” she called out behind you.

“Yes it is! It’s real here. Say it to literally anyone and they will understand.” You rolled your eyes to the sky as you made it back to the car ten times faster than her. “We won’t be here long enough for you to get used to the local vocabulary, though, unless you walk this slowly everywhere we go.”

“Thank goodness,” she muttered to herself as she finally reaching the car. “I never saw this much mud in Boston!”

“Do you realize how pretentious you sound right now?” You eyed her carefully before getting into the car. “You never saw much mud because you never went outside unless it was to your deck or patio or whatever.”

“Pretentious? Maybe. Yet you love me anyway,” she retorted, slipping into the car and shutting the door with a sigh of relief.

You glanced over at her. “You’re right. I really do. Thank you for being here. Thank you for helping me through this.”

Darcy shrugged. “I love you, too. Now, I hope you remember some decent places to eat because I’m freaking starving.”

You knew what this was.

She was trying her best to distract you from falling into a pit of despair, and once again you found yourself counting your lucky stars that you had this wonderful, beautiful, kind-hearted sarcastic bitch as your best friend.

The only restaurant you recognized (since so many had closed when the markets crashed years ago) was a little bar and grill down on Main Street. It used to be called Jet’s, but it must have changed ownership, because the name The All-American was emblazoned in neon lights above the door.

By now, the dinner crowd had already arrived, and that included the regulars and the drinkers in town (though to be fair, most regulars were the drinkers).

You didn’t care for crowds, but for Darcy’s sake you’d put up with it. Besides, you’d just come from burying your estranged father. Who gave a shit if the town drunks remembered you?

Darcy led the way this time, fully intent on getting some kind of salad and a glass of wine ‘if this place even has such things.’

You followed feebly, fully intent on getting food and biding your time until you could go to sleep, wake up, and leave this god-forsaken town.

Once you were seated in front of your burger and fries, and Darcy had her house salad with a side of ranch dressing (which she doused the salad with, thereby negating its health benefits), she started in on the questioning.

What did you do for fun here?

Who was your best friend when you were younger?

Did you ever leave the town for field trips?

No seriously, there’s nothing fun here. What did you do to pass the time? Study? No wonder you’re so smart.

Thankfully, she avoided your family history. She knew a lot of it already, thanks to some tequila-induced confessions back in Brooklyn.

You reached for a french fry in silence, trying to prevent any further questioning for the moment. You didn’t mind talking about it, but you’d prefer questions in small doses.

It wasn’t all that special of a sob story, anyway.

Your mom and dad were high school sweethearts. No one knew she was sick. When she died, he died with her in every way but physically.

He resented seeing you, because you look so much like her. It wasn’t fair, in his eyes, that she was gone but you remained to remind him of what he had lost. He hated that you hated this town. He thought you were an ungrateful, intellectual snob. He didn’t want to see you, didn’t want to remember his pain, so he drank his days away.

He never went to your recitals…never saw you score a goal during your very first soccer game…never chastised any boys for flirting with you…never watched you get your diploma…all because he just didn’t participate in your life.

You didn’t lash out, though. You didn’t become a statistic, didn’t join the crowd doing drugs and sleeping around, even when the offers were tempting. All you’d have to do is picture him, a stumbling mess, shaking his head at you.

The only goal you had in mind was to get out and better yourself, make your life worth living, and you managed to do that somehow.

There was only one person who could have possibly kept you here. If he had asked you to stay, you would have given up everything to spend your life with him. Instead, he broke your heart…he rejected you, he gave up on you, he told you he didn’t love you anymore.

You hadn’t seen or spoken to him since.

There were nights where you missed him, and you thought maybe you still weren’t over him. You’d lie awake at night letting the what-ifs drown out any rational thoughts. Sometimes you would dream about a life with him by your side, only to wake up far away and completely alone.

Man, there were some nights where your dreams felt so real, like if you reached out you could feel him again. The harsh reality was, you never had any intention on staying here. You didn’t want to, even if he were to come to you right this minute and ask.

That was completely farfetched, though. You knew he never would, not after that night.

Being home only reinforced the idea that you leaving was the best thing for you.

When Darcy finally stopped her interrogation to take a bathroom break, you allowed yourself the time to glance around the room. Most of the patrons were total strangers, including lots of gas well workers that drifted from all over the country to make twice as much cash as they were used to seeing. It was a shame they didn’t hire locally instead, maybe that would kick-start the town’s economy.

You saw a couple of guys who were a few grades below you in school watching a baseball game on the giant television in the corner. It had only been three years, but to see them look almost the same as they did in school was a little unnerving.

For you, High School felt like a lifetime ago, after all.

Some women who were dressed in far too little for this chilly weather were playing pool, while some of the older men stared at them as if it wasn’t a creeper move.

Your eyes flitted from face to face. You had this strange feeling that you were being watched, but no one was meeting your gaze yet. One quick glance to the restrooms told you it wasn’t Darcy making her way back to the table.

That familiar anxious feeling started up again as you kept searching for the source of your discomfort. It took a minute or so, but you finally found it…found him.

Your spine stiffened at the sight, and anger started bubbling up inside you.

You should have known better.

Bucky Barnes was staring at you from across the bar…and he didn’t look happy.

Part:  1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6

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Story Tags: (Open)

I’m going to take the first 20 people for story tags (if I even get that many interested…I’m not expecting it this time around haha)

All the story tag spots are filled! Thank you

#bucky barnes x reader #bucky x reader #bucky barnes imagine #bucky barnes drabble #bucky barnes fanfiction #bucky barnes reader insert #bucky barnes au #AU!buckybarnes #au!bucky #mechanic!bucky #bucky barnes fanfic #bucky barnes angst #jsd finding closure #taysauchallenge