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moonstruckbucky · 3 years

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The Wilds [5/?]

Summary: After a bitter divorce, you seek solace in the wilds of Alaska. Unbeknownst to you, it’ll change you in ways you could have never imagined.

Warnings: More sadness, some anxiety.

Notes: Uh, hi? Please don’t kill me for the absolute nosedive I took with this story. I had some personal issues in my life (false alarms, thank god) that hit a little too close to both the content of this story and some personal experiences, so I had to take a step back. Please enjoy this next chapter where we’ll learn a bit more about Bucky! x

Series Masterlist / Main Masterlist

The lake doesn’t feel so peaceful despite the quietness along the water, which matches your mood. Turbulent, unsettled, marred by rolling whitecaps as a result of the slightly rough breeze. It’s cool today, and as you sit by the water, you try and let the wind carry your uneasiness away. You’ve been doing good, so good, and as if he could hear it, Shawn had to make his reappearance. You’d known he would - he couldn’t let you sit for too long. Had to reassert himself, had to reassert his control.

Control you’re fighting like hell to regain and keep.

He’d called to taunt you, to remind you that he was moving on, happy. Flaunted it in your face by talking about their upcoming wedding. The wedding you did have, only bigger, better, with even more flowers and the best money could buy.

You felt pathetic, irritated that you’d had no confident words to spew at him for his games, and you’re embarrassed by the fact that you’d cried after hanging up the phone. Halfway through another sentence comparing you to Lizzie, and you’d had enough, pulling the phone away and slamming the End Call button as hard as you could. It wasn’t very satisfactory - the effect lost on the development of touchscreen phones.

As you sit by the lake, wind rustling the trees and your hair, blowing it around your face, you allow yourself some small victory - you hung up on him, stopped his attempts to bait you in their tracks, regained some control. It’s a small step, but a step forward all the same, and that little bit of optimism, sun through the clouds, brings a small smile to your dampened face.

Your therapist will be proud when you tell her, admit how much relief you feel just from the minute act of hanging up the phone. Eventually, you’re sure, you’ll stop picking up if or when he calls again to torment you. You can take back control.

Fall’s approaching. There’s a sharpness to the air now that signals the approaching end of summer, and some of the maple trees have begun to turn bronze. Alaska is pretty like this - one season fading into another and for a minute, you don’t ever want to leave. But then you remember that you should find a job, stop living off of Shawn’s money despite the alimony you’re sure to receive. Maybe you’ll settle some place like Alaska, open and free, without the constraints of a city. Somewhere there’s fresh air, but still society close enough should you need human interaction.

For now, you let yourself absorb what the wilderness has to offer.

Until your quiet reverie is interrupted by frantic barking some time later. You know only one person with a dog within living distance of you, and despite your instincts to brush it off, you’re overcome with the need to investigate.

Natalia finds you first, dark fur standing out against the green of the forest foliage. She winds herself around your feet, nips gently at your pant legs, grabs hold of your sleeve and tugs.

“What is it, girl?” you ask, and she barks again as she lets you go, tears off into the trees.

Without question you follow her, dodging in and out. She doubles back a few times, makes sure you’re still behind her. She leads you past the path back to your cabin, past the waterfall where you first met Bucky.

Bucky.

Oh god, what if something bad has happened? Unbidden, your heart clenches tight in your chest, cuts off your air as you run to keep pace with Natalia. You’re not even sure why - you hardly know Bucky but you’re worried regardless.

You nearly eat dirt and leaves as your foot catches on a raised root, but you quickly find your balance and push on. Breath coming harshly, you stomp down the painful stitch in your side.

Natalia dashes up the steps to a cabin similar to yours, though smaller. Quainter. The front door is open, leading you to believe she’d forced it open in an effort to find help. Or Bucky just left his front door open for the hell of it. Either way, you don’t think twice about running inside.

The lights are off, and despite the sunlight, you can hardly see a thing. Natalia’s nails click on the floor as she runs down the hall, barks three times from another room, and you do your best to follow it, feel your way across the cabin’s small space, stub your toe on a corner of a wall. Grimacing, you skim your hand along the wall until it meets the wood of a door frame.

“Bucky?” you call into the room, where you can hear Natalia panting and whining lowly. You squint in the dull lighting, barely making out a shape hunched on the floor beside the bed.

“‘M here,” he answers, voice low and monotone - empty. It twists your heart painfully, face tugging into a look of concern, and you approach slowly.

“Are you okay? Natalia found me…” you offer by way of explanation. In the dark, you see Bucky duck his head, hear his heavy sigh.

“I’m...I’m okay. You don’t have to worry.”

Lips pursing at that, you lower slowly to your knees in front of him. His eyes glitter in the dark where they’re focused on his knees, bent and hugged to his chest. Carefully you lay a hand on his arm, and you feel his body go rigid. Beneath your palm, his forearm is hard and unyielding. He shifts it out from under you, tucking it close to his body, shielding it, lets your hand drop to his knee.

“Bucky, what happened? Why are you in the dark?” Your voice feels loud in the still silence, against the quiet breaths of the man in front of you. Breaths when you really listen to them, quicken, shorten. Your fingers curl into his knee. “Hey, Bucky, you’re okay. Deep breaths okay?”

His breathing slows again, and you can feel him relax a little. Piece by piece, inch by inch, he unfurls his body until he’s a little more open, a little more spread out. You sit back on your heels, give him a little more room.

“S-Sorry,” he whispers, and in the dimness you see him drag a hand down his face.

“It’s okay.” He moves as you speak, rises to his feet to flick on the bedside lamp. Soft orange throws deep blue shadows across his walls, and you forego examining his room to scrutinize him instead.

He looks...rough. Deep circles under his eyes, a haunted look within them that you don’t think you’ve ever seen before. His hands are buried in his sweatshirt pocket, shoulders hunched in a way that suggests he’s trying to hide. You stand as well, rethink reaching out for him. You don’t know him that well, despite the way his obvious struggle tugs at your heart.

“Can I make you some tea? Or fix you a drink?”

Bucky looks like he’s ready to decline, mouth opening to do so as the wall goes up behind his eyes, but he closes it. Nods, just once. Follows you out into the living room, flicking on the lights as he goes. The inside of his home is no surprise to you - mostly empty, save for a couple personal trinkets here and there. Otherwise, no decor on the walls, a tattered rug in front of the fireplace, no other signs that this is his home.

It saddens you for reasons you’re unsure of, but you let it go for now and busy yourself with filling the kettle. Bucky takes down two mugs and then reaches above the fridge, takes down a bottle of amber liquor that’s about a quarter full. He upends it into his mug, takes a long sip of it and avoids your curious gaze.

When the kettle whistles, you fill both mugs, regardless of the alcohol still in Bucky’s. He drops a tea bag into it and lets it steep, gestures to the living room where a ratty couch sits. You sit at the far end, opt to give Bucky some space to clear his head, but to your surprise he sits close to you, close enough that his thigh brushes yours.

“‘M sorry you had to see that. That Natalia bothered you,” he says gruffly after some time. The dog looks up at the sound of her name, tilting her head curiously.

You shake yours, fingers warm from your mug of tea. “She didn’t. I’m actually...glad she found me. She seemed really riled up.”

His smile is tight, uncomfortable, and he shifts on the couch. “She’s really in tune to my….to me.”

It isn’t the whole truth, but you don’t push. Sip from your tea and busy yourself by looking around the room. Now that you’re not overcome with worry for Bucky, you can look a little more closely. The fireplace is covered in soot, a half-burnt log inside it. The paint is chipping in places on the wall above the mantel.

In the center of it is a single photograph. You can’t make out the faces too clearly, but there are four of them in the photo - three men, one woman. You avert your eyes lest you stare too long, but Bucky’s noticed. His shoulders are stiff and there’s a pinch to his lips as he stares hard at the photograph. Awkwardly you sit and drink your tea until the mug is empty.

You ask before you can think about it: “Why were you sitting in the dark?”

Bucky’s breathing hitches, and you grimace, an apology on your tongue. But before you can utter it, he simply says, “I get panic attacks. I had a bad one and...and that’s why Natalia found you.”

Again, he keeps it short, speaking quickly - there’s more he isn’t telling you, but you daren’t push. He’s still skittish, erratic, eyes bouncing around the apartment only to settle on that photograph again for a moment. It clearly holds significance for him, if the way his eyes strain just slightly when he focuses on it, the shadow that seems to pass over his face.

It spreads throughout the room, darkening it despite the lights he’d turned on earlier. Obviously his mood is souring again, and you feel awkward, your skin itching with the urge to get away - back to your cabin where you can fret and overthink in peace. The phone call with Shawn left you on edge, a raw nerve ripe for irritation, and Bucky’s stony, less-than-pleasant demeanor is rapidly putting you off.

He must sense your rising panic, because he looks over at you, the tension in his face softening just a bit to something more somber, something sadder.

“I’m sorry I’m making you uncomfortable,” he utters, taking you mildly by surprise. He rubs at his forehead and drops his eyes - a truly pitiful look rife with self-loathing. It breaks your heart.

“N-No,” you argue, and he gives you a skeptical look. “I understand. I understand really well actually. Um, my, um...my ex...he called me, after you left yesterday. It, uh, it threw me for a bit of a loop. My head’s a little all over the place.”

It’s the most you’ve ever given him about your history, about your struggle, and you can see his face softening, an invitation for you to open up more. But your tongue feels heavy enough after giving even as little information as you have, and you stay quiet, pick at a seam in your jeans idly.

“I’m sorry,” he says again, but this time he isn’t talking about his panic attack or pulling you from whatever you’d been doing. He’s apologizing that your ex still seems to have a hold over you.

If only he knew.

He could, a small, quiet voice chirps in the back of your head. Its presence stills you as Bucky’s gaze burns the side of your face while he watches you. He could if you let him in.

God, how you want to. Despite the terror you feel at getting close to another person, you feel that tug in your heart - the one you felt for Shawn when you first met him. The desire to experience that intimacy with another person, it both thrills you and frightens you. Frightens you so badly you still feel that urge to run.

“I’m okay, if you’d like to leave,” Bucky says, and he says it with a gentle smile. His eyes, though, are tinged with sadness at the thought of you leaving - and you don’t know what to do. He knows you’re uncomfortable and he’s giving you an out.

Do you really want to take it?

Sensing your struggle, Bucky stands up, extends a hand. “How about a walk? Fresh air might do us both some good.”

You eye his hand warily, flickering between it and his face - open, completely readable. He wants you to say yes, but he won’t make you.

That flutter in your heart again at his patience, it’s all the resolve you need.

You take his hand.

#bucky barnes x you #bucky barnes x reader #bucky x you #bucky x reader #the wilds #lumberjack!bucky #bucky au #lumberjack au #bucky barnes angst

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