Melany wakes before the alarm.
At first she doesn't know why.
The room is still washed in pre-dawn blue, the kind of light that makes everything look softer than it really is. The air feels cool against her skin where the blanket has slipped down her shoulder.
She blinks slowly.
Listens.
There it is.
The absence.
Bucky isn't asleep.
She doesn't need to open her eyes fully to know it. She feels it in the controlled rhythm of his breathing. In the way the mattress holds a faint tension beside her instead of sinking into full rest.
She turns her head.
He's on his back, staring at the ceiling.
Not rigid.
Not haunted.
Just thinking.
The faint city glow outlines the slope of his jaw, the hollow beneath his cheekbone. He looks calm.
Too calm.
Like someone who has already made a decision.
"You're up," she murmurs.
His eyes shift toward her instantly, awareness sharpening in that quiet way he has.
"Morning," he says softly.
His hand slides across the sheets until it finds her hip. It rests there, warm and firm, thumb brushing once like a silent reassurance.
"You didn't sleep," she says.
"Some."
She hums. That means no.
She props herself on one elbow and studies him more openly. There's something settled in him lately. Not the tense vigilance she's grown used to. Not the quiet bracing he sometimes does when things feel too good.
Settled.
Like the ground under him is finally steady.
"You feel different," she says.
His brow lifts slightly. "Different how?"
She searches for the word.
"Certain."
The corner of his mouth tilts faintly.
"That bad?"
"No." She shakes her head, tracing her fingers idly across his chest through his shirt. "It's just... new."
He watches her hand like it's something precious. Like he's memorizing it.
She rests her cheek against him, listening to the steady beat beneath her ear.
His heart isn't racing.
It isn't guarded.
It's solid.
For the first time since she's known him, he doesn't feel like a man waiting for something to be taken away.
He feels like a man building something.
Her pulse skips for no logical reason.
-
The kitchen later is all noise and light.
Sam is arguing about music volume. Natasha is stirring something on the stove with theatrical patience. Steve sits at the counter with coffee, sketchbook open but attention split between lines on paper and the room around him.
YOU ARE READING
Doll. // Bucky Barnes X OC
أدب الهواةMelany Banner has spent her entire life being watched, protected, and managed - all because of who her father is. When a classified S.H.I.E.L.D. protocol forces her into close quarters with James Buchanan Barnes, she expects another soldier followin...
