𝓲𝓷𝓼𝓸𝓶𝓷𝓲𝓪𝓬 ❖ 𝓫. 𝓫𝓪𝓻𝓷𝓮𝓼

C H A P T E R (18) - S O L I T U D E

"Yes I slept great."

Silence.

"Of course I didn't sleep and what the hell happened to you?" Cassie asked, motioning towards the dirt patches on her brothers pants.

"Long story. What the hell happened to you?" Steve asked, pointing to her red and puffy eyes.

"Long story..." she answered reluctantly, reliving the night before in great detail. The main reason she hadn't slept. Steve waited patiently, as if he knew there was a second part to her sentence. "It was completely my fault. I gave him a rant, he even helped me out with the wounds but I treated him like shit and he walked out without a goodbye and-"

"Woah woah," Steve interrupted, sitting her down in a chair as he sat opposite her, holding his hands out in front of him, "What was your fault, who's him and what wounds?"

"He walked out because of me."

"Who's he?"

"Bucky. Bucky walked out because I gave him a long speech about the army." She answered, holding back the part about Steve.

"Well that wasn't a good idea."

"No shit." She said, pinching the bridge of her nose and just wanting to scream into a pillow.

"What wounds?" Steve questioned further.

"Oh don't even get me started. But if you see Ryan Terrence again, be aware that he likes sharp metal as a friend."

"Huh?"

"Doesn't matter," Cassie said as she stood up, "But let's just say Bucky probably hates me at the moment."

After the words had left her mouth, Steve followed up with a scoff. It caused her to send a look his way as she leaned against the kitchen countertop with her eyebrows raised. "What?"

"Bucky could never hate you," he began, "It's literally impossible for him. Maybe you just need to talk."

Cassie didn't know what to say, so she didn't say anything. She let the moment pass and just sighed, looking out the window at the house across the street where the bedroom lay vacant once more.

Steve shuffled around in his seat, and Cassie noticed a piece of paper in the inside of his jacket pocket. She took the few steps closer to him and managed to pull it out with him unable to get it back. She read over it quickly and didn't need to read much to understand what it was.

"You were accepted?" She choked out.

"Yeah," he began, rubbing the back of his neck, "I was going to tell you as soon as I got home, but after you told me you argued with Bucky about the army I didn't want to bring it up..."

"Because you're so considerate?"

"Cass, come on..." he urged, trying to get her to understand.

But truly, it was him who didn't understand. Not in her eyes. She had lost both her parents. Her childhood best friend was made to go fight in the war. And whatever she had with Bucky that wasn't just being his best friend had been screwed up too. And now Steve wanted to fight, and there was no way in Cassie's eyes that that could end well. He had the guts and the bravery, but muscle was also important. She valued Steve for his courage, but there's the two types of inefficient soldiers.

All muscle with no courage to pull the trigger.
All courage with no muscle to pull the trigger.

It wasn't going to take a genius to figure out which type Steve fell into, but he somehow could never find it out himself, the fact that he would be better off doing something else. He refused to see that and there was nothing Cassie could do about it except let him leave and be lonely. Solitary.

Solitude.

Something she had dreamed of, whenever she could sleep. The chance to be alone, yet know there are people there, just in case. The feeling is that of when home alone, you feel safer if someone you lived with was in another room, but still giving you the same effect of loneliness. The solitude you desire. The solitude she had desired. But now it had arrived, it came with a cost she wasn't willing to pay. But she didn't have that choice.

A/N; I wrote this chapter at 3:30am, which for me is the equivalent of being high. If anything doesn't make sense, that's what I'm blaming it on.

~G