𝓲𝓷𝓼𝓸𝓶𝓷𝓲𝓪𝓬 ❖ 𝓫. 𝓫𝓪𝓻𝓷𝓮𝓼

C H A P T E R (31) - G R I E F

Howard's home, a place Steve and Cassie had been allowed to stay, was filled with a lingering silence.

The only thing to ever break it would be either Cassie's quiet sobs in the middle of the night or Steve's occasional release of anger, usually involving the smashing of glass somewhere in the house. Cassie didn't exactly know what was going on, she didn't ever leave the room she had been given to sleep in for the time being.

She spent her days lying in bed, not much else to do. With an aching heart and tired eyes, her mind was slowly beginning to fail her. She had isolated herself away from everyone, only finding comfort in the night sky. Her only remaining friends; the stars.

The stars that had been there since her birth and not left her since, watching down on her from above. The stars that lit up her room when she didn't have the energy to leave her bed and turn on the light. The stars that kept her company when her bed felt empty and her heart torn in half.

It was a week after the accident at 3am when Cassie heard a knock outside her room, her heavy eyes slowly travelling away from the window and to the closed door. She saw the light from the hallway pooling in from the door crack, but that was all. She was drowning in blankets, trying to replicate the feeling of having someone else there when the door slowly began to creak open.

When Steve entered and stood in the doorway silently, Cassie turned her head to the side and gazed out the window once more. When his silence droned on for more than five minutes without his departure, she finally looked back at him.

It took everything she had to sit up, no energy left in her at all. She finally got a glimpse of her brother, his upside down smile and saddened eyes. She knew she wasn't alone in feeling Bucky's loss, but that's all she wanted to be - alone.

"I know you blame yourself. But it wasn't your fault."

His words caught her attention, her head turning to him abruptly.

"Remember when Doctor Erskine died?" Cassie asked, her voice croaky from being unused for a week. She cleared her throat in an attempt to make it better, but it came with a slight pain as she coughed.

"...Yes?" Steve asked hesitantly, confused on why she was asking about a death that had happened so long ago.

"Do you remember what I said?" Steve didn't answer, prompting her to continue, "I said how terrible it was to die alone. About how bad it was that me, someone unknown to him, was the only person Doctor Erskine saw as he died. And look what happened. Bucky died alone."

"That doesn't make it-"

"My fault? Yes it does."

Cassie had her hand firmly wrapped around the dog tag on her neck and closed her eyes, sniffling softly to try and keep her tears quiet. And so they were as they rolled down her face and dripped from her jawline.

"It's not what he would've have wanted."

"What?"

"Bucky wouldn't want you to blame yourself and stay cooped up in your room for days on end, Cassie."

"What is it you suggest I do? Skip around the house whilst singing?" She retorted as she pinched the bridge of her nose. "He's gone and I can't do anything about it."

"There's where you're wrong."

Cassie raised an eyebrow at him as he came and sat on the edge of her lonely bed, fiddling with his fingers in his lap.

"About him not being dead? That would be a stunt." She scoffed, running a hand through her hair.

"No we saw him..." he coughed to avoid finishing the sentence, "You can do something about him. We can avenge him, can't we? Get back at the people who did this to him."

His words took her by surprise, she knew he wasn't one to run away from a fight. She definitely knew that. But he was usually petitioning to get her to stay behind, not come along. But he had said we.

"What can we do?"

"Take down HYDRA once and for all?" He suggested.

Despite the grief and sorrow that coursed through her veins, she wanted to end this. Finish it so Bucky could have a funeral, no matter how much it pained her, he deserved one. But she realised there was always a chance she wouldn't return from this fight. Maybe that was better. So, fighting back tears and an aching heart, she made up her mind.

"I'm in."