Powerless | b. barnes

06 - progress

O V E R the next month, Ivy and Bucky barely interacted at all. He avoided her at all costs. He desperately wanted to talk to her since he was starting to feel closer to the rest of the Avengers. 

But he couldn't do that. He was too much of a danger to her and the proof was still evident in the marks on her neck.

The bruises he gave her almost a month ago were very faded, but he still noticed them everyday and felt just as guilty as he did the night she got them.

If one hadn't known what had happened, one might assume that Bucky absolutely despised Ivy. Every time she tried to speak with him, he walked away. This was partly because he knew he couldn't allow himself to get closer to her and partly because he was nervous to interact with her. Every time they even looked at each other he glared back and quickly turned away.

At this point, Ivy decided that Bucky would probably never be her friend and that was okay. That wasn't going to stop her from trying to help him.

Every night without fail, Bucky would have a nightmare and every night Ivy would call Steve who would solve it with a couple punches and maybe a speech that would go something like this; "You're a good person, Buck. They did this to you. Hydra killed those people, Hydra tortured you. It's not your fault, you are loved," blah, blah, blah, it was the same almost every night. Ivy was exhausted just from listening to it but she could never seem to ignore it and fall asleep until she knew Steve was gone and Bucky was okay.

She had been doing her research on PTSD and nightmares and thought she was ready to try some of the things she's learned.

She discovered that Bucky almost always has his bad dreams around 1am. She figured if she woke him up fifteen minutes before at 12:45am he might be able to avoid them all together.

She's also learned how to wake him up during a nightmare in a more peaceful manner and she's learned how soothe him after he wakes up—which is probably much better than Steve's more physical method.

Lastly, Ivy found out that if a person is in the middle of a nightmare, it's best to not wake them and let them work it out themselves. Although, Ivy was not certain that she could handle listening to Bucky's gut-wrenching screams for God knows how long, so she's hoping that waking him up early works.

As always, she was up late because of her own bad dreams but also because she's just a natural night-owl. She set her alarm for 12:45am earlier in the day. But she really didn't need to, she was checking her clock every two minutes out of sheer anxiety.

Finally, the clock turned to 12:45 on the dot. Ivy turned off the useless alarm and walked to her door. It was a very short walk to Bucky's quarters but it felt like miles.

When she got to his door and stared at it, she began fiddling with her rings.

She wasn't sure exactly why she was so nervous. She helped take down Ultron, She's an Avenger for God's sake. But a mentally unstable, century-old man with a metal arm and bad dreams was making her shake in her boots.

Sure, Bucky was attractive—there's no denying that. In fact, Bucky's good looks couldn't be considered an opinion, it was a simple fact. However, attractive men had never made Ivy nervous in the past. Despite everything she went through, Ivy was always confident around men. So it couldn't be that, could it?

Oh right, she remembered, maybe it's 'cause last time you did this you almost died, Ivy, she rolled her eyes at herself. She was being ridiculous.

Finally, when she decided that she had had enough time to ponder these thoughts, she got up enough courage to walk into the room.

She turned the knob and slowly opened the door. Bucky was sleeping on his bed but he looked like he was in slight distress. Not quite in a violent nightmare-ish way yet, but probably leading to it.