The Twin Flame: Grumpy x Sunshine

Hits Different

"This is why they shouldn't kill off the main guy..."

Bucky POV

For a long moment, there's nothing. A numbness. An empty ache radiating from where his heart once resided. For that moment, Bucky is sure that if he were to look down onto the pavement, his still beating heart would be on the ground at his feet.

The next moment, he thinks he's going to throw up on the street. All over his torn out, battered heart.

He can almost feel his mind snap in half as it races to process the fact that you're being loaded onto the ambulance. You're being loaded onto an ambulance. You're actually being loaded onto an ambulance.

There's no time for him to reconcile that your life is hanging in the balance, he just needs to be by your side again.

He climbs into the back of the ambulance and immediately takes his place by your side. Without a second thought, he takes your hand, lacing his fingers with yours.

He squeezes your hand.

You don't squeeze back.

Once he takes your hand, he doesn't let it go. Not once. He meant what he said to Sam. He had no intention of leaving you again, not in the way he did. Not now. Not ever again.

"I- I'm sorry," you whisper through the oxygen mask, just barely loud enough for Bucky's ears to pick up.

He can't help but notice - it sounds an awful lot like a goodbye.

A single tear slips down Bucky's cheek without warning. He immediately shakes his head, speaking through gritted teeth, "Don't talk like that."

He doesn't wipe away the tear. He lets it trail down his cheek, down his jaw, until it dries at his neck.

He crouches down beside you, kneeling before you as though you were his altar. Even through all the exhaustion, both mental and physical, of the night, there's nothing more important than this. There's nothing more important than you.

"I just need you to keep your eyes open for me, alright? Keep them open."

You nod your head ever so slightly, but even as you do, your eyelids keep sinking. Each time, he worries that it will be the last time he ever gets to see your eyes. He curses himself for not studying them every chance he got.

The ambulance is a flurry of movement from the paramedic. He can see the panic painting their faces.

They try not to look at him as though they're allowing him the privacy and intimacy that should come with saying a final goodbye.

He wants to yell at them. He wants to scream at them that this isn't a time to say goodbye or to have that stupid look of pity on their faces. This isn't a time for helplessness. This is a time for action.

The logical part of him knows as the paramedic scurries around the back of the ambulance that they're doing their best. The part of him that feels like he's losing you wants to demand that they do more, that they pull a miracle from one of their medical bags and just save your life. That's all he needs, for you to be okay again.

He so badly wants to scream at them, but that's not what you need right now.

And so, he ignores it.

He ignores everything that isn't you. In this moment, there is only you. He likes that idea. Just you and him - though he could do without the possibly fatal wound.

He squeezes your hand again, this time, your eyes just flutter slightly, barely opening anymore.

"That's all you need to do, just keep your eyes open, because I swear I will never forgive you if you leave me. You can't leave me." His voice breaks, cracking at the thought of you leaving him all alone in this world. That's how it would go. He knows that. This would break him. This would break Sam. There would be nothing left of either of them. He'd be all alone, left in a world where there was no you. "You - you just can't."