pov- imagines

BALLOON- B. BARNES

pairings: bucky barnes x reader
warnings: a panic attack, ptsd, indications of abuse/bad experiences that can be attributed to a background in hydra or something else since i left it sort of open-ended. lots of self-deprecating thoughts, tears, angst.
about: : kind of combined either one day they dissociated and buck was trying to bring them back down to earth or they got into an argument and she flinched but he thinks it's because of him and his past?

days like these feel heavy; blurry, like you're watching from underwater. the warnings begin days before, when unwelcome memories too familiar for you to forget begin to creep their way back into your life, your habits, infiltrating the broken maze of your mind in a way they only know to do from experience. it makes you forget you're not there anymore—trapped, breathless, your grip on reality breaking your fingers and slicing open skin, exhausted enough to not realize the blood dripping down your arms is a mix of your own and someone else's—forces you back into the routines you were held to.

wake up at four—precisely at four, or you will be woken up in a way that forms welts onto your skin—don't look anyone in the eyes. you are nothing.

it's familiar, the lifeless routine the only way to stay alive.

it's been so ingrained into your brain with the metal that connects to your temples and the brands that are burned into your skin that you find yourself doing them years after you're out, when you're in the safety of the apartment, the safety of bucky.

the same bucky who trails gentle fingers over your arm to bring you back down when your eyes are suddenly open without your permission at four in the morning, who kisses away frightened tears when the signs move to nightmares that leave you trembling in the warmth of your bed.

it all comes to a head a few days later—today. and you realize the warnings are nothing. you would take the warnings over this anytime. anything over this paranoia that something is behind your shoulder, that your footsteps are echoed, your shadow covering another, just waiting to lunge at you, to rip you apart. you can't help it today. you wake up silently at four and can't be in the bed any later, because every time you try to close your eyes, your voice is screaming that you need to get up, there is no other choice. bucky doesn't realize you've woken up, you were finally able to convince him to lower his guard when he was with you, where there is no need for his skills, and you are conditioned into doing everything quietly enough to trick the world into thinking that you don't exist.

you don't turn on any lights because you don't want to risk waking bucky up, so you sit in the darkness of the kitchen until he wakes up, unable to stop yourself from shaking. your neck snaps every few minutes when you turn to a shadowed corner where you're sure you saw something move. be careful, your mind cries, they're there, they're there.

your hands cradle your face, pulling at your cheeks to shut yourself up, and you catch yourself slumping. sit up straight.
your spine immediately straightens, hands at your side, face shiny with tears staring straight ahead. you let a shuddering breath leave your lips before you begin to sob, slapping a palm to your mouth to muffle the sound. quiet. shut up, shut up, they'll come if they hear you, shut up.

with nothing but your terror to accompany you, you let it envelop you like a blanket full of holes, sharp icicles digging deep into your ribs until they pierce your lungs and you feel like you can't breathe anymore. shut up. you grip onto it like a vice, instructions guiding your motions as if you were some kind of robot.

bucky finds you in there the next morning, after panic creates messy hair and frantic stumbling through the door due to the fact that you weren't next to him anymore like you usually were. at the sight of you, hurriedly cleaning the living room, bucky's eyebrows furrow in confusion, "y/n?"