Monster

Twenty-Eight

I was glad Bucky was going to stay the night again. We had a whole weekend to spend away from the diner. I had it planned out in my head. Which is to say, I planned for almost nothing. I wanted it to be as boring and ordinary as possible, even though I'd just argued with my sister about boring and normal not being who I was. It wasn't because I enjoyed that lifestyle, exactly, but because I thought it might be good for Bucky to focus on ordinary things for once. He didn't have enough of it in his life. I also just didn't know what to do to keep him busy without leaving the house. It's not like we could go see a movie and get coffee or go on a date. We were confined there. But I think we were both more comfortable that way anyway.

I still couldn't sleep. The truth was that I hated sleeping alone. It was one of the reasons I was so comfortable when Steve was there. It was also why I allowed Oscar to start spending the night in my house so soon and so often. And okay, there were a few one-night stands due to not wanting to be alone. But that's besides the point.

And it wasn't that I wanted Bucky to crawl into bed with me or anything. Or even that I wished Steve was there for a night of platonic cuddling. I did like it when he was there, but we were both so used to being alone.

The point was that I slept better when there was a body beside me. I didn't have as many nightmares. As if just the feel of weight on the bed, or the heat of a body, or even just an arm draped across me, was enough to ground me even subconsciously.

There were a lot of trees between my window and the neighbor's porch light. The only time my room lit up at night was when something tripped the sensor. Then I'd see all those twisted shadows swaying across my walls. The light was bright, and sometimes I lay there for a long time staring at it. I couldn't fall asleep when it was on, but I never bothered to try to block it out with heavy curtains. And I liked it when the tree would shake out of the rhythm of the wind, and I'd see a fat silhouette scale the branches. I watched the raccoon climb the tree until his body thumped into the house and scuttled into the nest he made in the attic.

I really should have called someone to get him out. He was probably damaging the house, and it would be a pain in the ass to deal with when I inevitably threw in the towel and had to sell. But I'd made peace with the little guy. He made me feel a little less lonely sometimes. Like I was able to provide something for this tiny little life, even if he dug into the trash and left trails of garbage through the yard. He didn't like my trash much anyway. He preferred the neighbors' because they were a family of five and produced enough garbage to keep him fat and round all year long.

Maybe Clara was right. Maybe I was too nice, and I did have a strong mother duck instinct. I let my attic and house suffer for a raccoon I almost considered a pet. And now I was potentially putting my own life at risk by taking in a trained assassin with memory loss. And I'd forced him to cook bad spaghetti. Maybe my mom was right about me too. Maybe it was just in my nature to care about things. Saying I was destined for motherhood was probably her way of saying I was destined to care about other people. I just wish she'd worded it differently.

I lay there listening to the raccoon get comfortable in his nest until the sound of a muffled groan came from the other room. I sat up and strained to hear through the ringing in my ears. The doors were closed, but I could still make out the sound of Bucky struggling. He was quiet and only really spoke when he thought he needed to. He sometimes had to go out of his way to make a sound so he didn't catch me by surprise. So the fact that he was groaning in the guest room made me think something was very, very wrong.

I couldn't just sit there and let him go through it alone. I knew what it felt like to fight through a nightmare and wake up in the dark in a strange place. The nightmares weren't as bad when there was someone nearby to bring me back. I wanted Bucky to feel that same comfort. So I climbed out of my bed and headed across the hall to the extra room.