Steve Rogers & Bucky Barnes Imagines

3. Bucky - Memories Part One

"I miss her, too."

Bucky glanced up at Steve, a bitter look on his features but it softened slightly when he looked down at the picture again. The quality of photographs wasn't great back in the 40's, when the picture was taken, but he could clearly see the three people in the photo, two of them being him and Steve. The other was a woman he had been beginning to remember, and wishing desperately that he hadn't.

"I can't tell if I miss her...I just feel empty. The memories are still fuzzy, but it just feels like something is missing. I just don't know what."

Steve shrugged, sitting next to his friend on the couch and grabbing a different photo from the box. Steve had given it to him months ago to help bring back memories, a little reluctantly with the photos of Y/N though because he didn't know how Bucky would react. The box had photos, letters, some small objects...including an empty wedding ring box.

"Can you take me to her grave?" Bucky asked in a grim tone as he reached into the box, pulling out the smaller one. He had opened it several times, not bothered as much by the fact that it existed, but mostly toward where the ring itself was.

"Of course I can," Steve replied, his eyes resting on the box in his hand, "But it's just a headstone. She's not actually there."

His brow furrowed as he looked up at Steve in confusion, "What do you mean?"

"She went missing in the mid-forties, right after I...crashed the jet. She was never found, but her mom put the headstone in after a few years."

"I'd still like to go," Bucky whispered, opening the ring box and staring at the empty space. It looked exactly like how his heart felt – missing the most important part. Without the ring, the box was just a box. And without Y/N, Bucky didn't know who he really was. 

Y/N M/N L/N

1918 – 1945

Nothing else was written. Her mother couldn't afford to write anything like "In loving memory" or "a sister, daughter, and friend" like most graves had. 

Bucky's hands were shoved in his pocket, partly to hide his metal hand and also so Steve didn't know he was clutching the little box with dear life. Steve seemed saddened too, because they were all best friends, even when Y/N and Bucky were dating. They never let him feel like a third wheel. Her going missing hit him as hard as when Bucky had supposedly died.

"What do you think happened?" Bucky murmured, speaking for the first time in half an hour of being at the grave. Steve gave him a sideways glance, seeing the pain in his friends features.

"Unfortunately, girls went missing all the time back then," Steve's fists tightened in anger but he managed to control his tone, "Especially of her age."

That ended the conversation. Bucky was angry, bitter that this had happened, but what did it matter? Even if she had lived until Bucky escaped HYDRA and got his memory back, she would have been in her nineties, having lived a life of moving on from him. It would have been like Peggy Carter to Steve – he had seen the look in his friend's face when he returned from visiting her every once in a while, and it wasn't something he wanted to feel for himself. But this wasn't much better.

"May I have a moment alone?" Bucky asked, not looking at Steve. Steve glanced at him worriedly again but nodded, heading for the car.

Bucky stepped closer to her grave, surprised to feel a tear sliding down his cheek. Rarely had he shown emotion, especially in the last few months, but he didn't try to hold it in now.

"I remember," he whispered, taking the box out and opening it again, staring at the empty space, "And God, it hurts to fucking bad. I'm so sorry I did this to you. I should have been there, I should've-"

He froze suddenly, his gaze fixing on something flapping under the headstone. It was old, and a tree had slightly uprooted, causing the stone to shift upwards in the ground. Under a crack, almost invisible if Bucky hadn't been so close, was a yellow paper flapping in the breeze.

With trembling fingers, he knelt down and tugged the paper out, his heart racing as he examined it. Holding the paper in a roll was a small, simple, yet heart-wrenching object – a proposal ring. 

Bucky was in almost too much shock to call Steve to him. He stared at the paper in the ring in his hands, wondering what it meant. Slowly he slid the ring off the paper, placing it in the little box with hope and fear.

It fit perfectly.

He wasn't sure what this meant, but he got a hold of himself and unraveled the paper. The words on it caused his heart to just about stop.

You will never see Y/N again. Not unless you come back to us, Soldier.

A/N - Long time to see! Sorry about the wait for this one, it's not a request but something that I wrote a while ago (it's also a bit different from my usual writing but hopefully it won't suck :P). It would be a three or four part story, not sure if I'll finish it yet but let me know if I should! Also, send in requests - I have more time to write for winter break.

Hope you enjoy :)