𝗗𝗜𝗚𝗜𝗧𝗔𝗟 𝗦𝗜𝗟𝗘𝗡𝗖𝗘 - 𝗺𝗮𝗿𝘃𝗲𝗹

Light of Love

AEI: TW: discussions of self-harm scars and violent topics, tho nothing graphic.

ALSO, I wouldn't call this a trigger warning bc it's not rlly, but James and Isabell are strange creatures, OK? they have strange expressions of love. that's what i'm gonna say ahead of this chapter.

THIS ISNT A WARNING FOR ANYTHING WEIRD THO DW; I PROMISE IM NOT COMING OUT AS A NONCE OR SMTH!! I JUST WROTE THIS AND THEN LOW-KEY CONSIDERED IF PEOPLE COULD TWIST IT, AND BECAUSE SOME OF Y'ALL ARE SICK MFS, YOU PROBABLY COULD, SO JUST BEAR THIS IN MIND!

ANYWAY 😃

I hope you enjoy reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it, and I also hope you understand my metaphors bc fuck there are a lot of them :)) ALSO ALSO LISTEN TO THE SONG IVE LINKED BC ITS SO FUCKING GOOD AND VERY THIS CHAPTER CODED

The thing about talking, especially when you have been quiet for a long time, is that it can be very hard to stop. You remember new details of your story as you go, things long buried in time, and the feelings come flashing back to you like a hurricane.

And once Isabell opens her mouth, she can't seem to close it again.

There's too much to say.

She tells James about Nat; the brightness of her smile, the rasp of her voice, every time that Isabell looked at her and found parts of herself in her eyes. She talks about Maria, the fact that she worked herself to the bone to keep the world spinning, the silent way she cried, the safe smell of her clothes. Isabell talks about Steve, even though James knows him inside-out anyway, and once she's done with the near past, she goes back.

Much further back.

Kitty's hand in hers, the soft blonde of Annalise's hair, Stephen's wit and Flavia's heart. The taste of their blood in her teeth, betrayal caught in her throat, and the look of complete confusion before she wiped them out of existence.

The men of HYDRA, with hungry brains and hungry mouths, who were never taught to keep their hands to themselves. The ones who tied her up, beat her into submission, worked her to death and then right back into life again.

Starvation, sticky sweat and the smell of dead bodies that James is all too familiar with. Growing up with nothing, loosing everything that could've been anything, toys smashed in the dirt and dolls strung up by their necks.

Warning signs and screaming through the walls, memories that are theirs to share. Isabell meeting James, locked in her cell, his teeth sharp and her laugh high with insanity against the stone walls.

The first time Isabell ever felt protected was with his jaw tight around her fingers.

Being retrained as a shadow rather than a team player, as her own killer but still somehow somebody else's. Grabbing The Winter Soldier's blood-slicked hand and staring up at him.

Help me. Look after me. Save me. Fucking look at me!

His eyes were harsh, black and icy, but they always softened when they met hers. He gripped her tight as the soldier melted out of him, pooling in crimson on the floor below them.

"What have I done?"

"Don't worry. Nothing as bad as I have."

Isabell stitching his cuts, whilst he marvelled as hers sewed themselves back together. She put her hands against the smooth bones of his ribs - unnervingly vivid against his skin - and willed him to stay alive. To stay with her.

He always did.

Howling, wailing, pinned to a table and sedated because; "I want Jamie, I don't want to go back! Don't want to do It again!"