Two Sides of The Same Coin: Grumpy x Sunshine

hoax

"Can you please come down?" Bucky shouts, his neck craning to try and get a better look at you. But it'd be a whole lot easier if you hadn't hidden at the very top of a tree in the middle of the woods.

It was only thanks to his heightened super soldier senses that he found you in the first place.

More specifically, he heard your ragged breathing. It was all luck really. With the area narrowed down, all he had to do was find you. That's when he saw your legs swinging from a tall branch in one of the trees. "No one's mad at you. But you do have everyone worried sick, we've all been trying to find you."

You remain silent, lifting your legs onto the branch so Bucky can't see you at all. "Alright, I guess I'm going to have to climb this big ass tree all by myself...I'm 106 years old, I might break a hip."

Still silent.

"Okay, here I come," Bucky warns one final time.

"Are they going to lock me away?" you finally call down.

"Who said anything about locking you up?"

"No one...but when I'm bad I get locked up."

"I wouldn't let anyone lock you up."

"Even if I deserve it?"

"It'd be a whole lot easier to convince you if you weren't all the way up there."

You hesitantly lower a thick vine for Bucky to grab. He huffs, grabbing the vine thinking that you're really going to make him climb it. As both his hands wrap around the vine, the vine shoots upward. Bucky yelps but before he can do anything he's dangling right in front of you.

"I've never climbed a tree like that before," he tries to joke, joining you on your branch. "Hey, you're hurt."

"It's okay," you whisper, angling your arm away from Bucky's view. 

"No, you're really hurt, Doll. Look at your arm," he says, gently gripping your arm to examine the large wound. There's blood dripping down your arm, almost completely down to your hand.

You wrench your arm out of his hold, ignoring the pain that radiates from the large wound when you do so. "I deserve it after what I did."

"That's an oddly masochistic thing for you to say."

"I'm not a masochist, at least I don't think I am, but...when you do bad things, you get punished. That I do know."

"I'm going to be honest with you: I don't even know where to start unpacking that, but what happened with Wanda was an accident. She knows that."

"I don't know what happened. I really didn't mean to- I swear," you croak, your voice cracking. Bucky takes a moment to look at you, eyes red-rimmed, face contorted with guilt and fear. He's never seen you like this, you're always so resilient, letting everything roll off your back. Up until now, he'd only ever seen you sort of upset, and even that was pretty mild considering what he'd learned about you. It's startling, seeing this side of you. A side that up until now, he wasn't sure even existed.

"I know- I know that. You wouldn't hurt her on purpose."

"I'm dangerous, James. I hurt someone," your voice breaks. You want to bury your head into his shoulder, to seek the comfort you so desperately need, but you're convinced that you need to punish yourself at this moment.

Bucky sees your hesitation, the rigid way you're holding yourself and the tightness of your jaw. He gently wraps an arm around your shoulder being especially careful with your injured arm, "You know for someone who's exceptionally forgiving and tolerant, you're very hard on yourself."