Isolation [Bucky Barnes // The Winter Soldier AU]

I. Fallen

When I get where I'm going,
on the far side of the sky,
the first thing that I'm gonna do
is spread my wings and fly.

"When I get where I'm going" - Brad Paisley

1804 - Liverpool

Charlotte could hear her mother praying in the next room through the paper-thin walls as she hugged her straw-stuffed bear to her chest. The cold winter air clawed at her freezing fingers and toes, her feet bearing no socks. She winced at the numb feeling the temperature gave and let out a short whine of discomfort.

With gapped teeth clashing together as she shivered, Charlotte glanced over to the bed beside her own and rolled onto her side.

"Nathaniel?" she whispered shakily, recieving no reply from her older brother. This caused a pout to tilt her pink lips as she threw the bear at him. "Nathaniel!"

"Charlotte, go to sleep," the sixteen year-old hissed quietly, snatching up his sister's bear and pegging it at her. It hit her head with a soft swish. He then lifted his head from the scratchy pillow and glared at the smaller being. "I'm not getting a beating just because you can't--"

"What's going to happen to William?" Charlotte cut him off, and he paused. William was the youngest of their five siblings; only four years old. She wasn't much older than him. Just a week earlier he fell ill with an unknown sickness and collapsed in the crop field after he chasing the cat around.

She looked at Nathaniel with wide, glassy green eyes as his silhouette rose from his bed and sat on the edge of her own. His hand gently caressed her head and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. "He'll be okay," he said quietly with a sigh. "He's just sick."

"When will he get better?"

"He'll be alright, Charlie," he assured her, yet she could see the worry reflecting in his brown eyes from the light of the flickering candle.

"Promise?" her voice came out in a rasp as her throat was overtaken by a coughing fit.

Nathaniel let out an audible whine of distress and brushed his hand across her forehead. "You're burning up," he sighed, standing up from the bed and turning towards the door to retrieve their mother. Before he left her arm's reach, Charlotte grabbed his hand and made an attempt to sit up.

"Pr-romise m-me!" she choked, squeezing his hand as her eyes watered. He hurriedly returned to her side and laid her back down, pressing his lips to her pale forehead.

"I'll be right back," he muttered before leaving the room.

She called out after him in mid-cough, hands shaking at the thought as to why he didn't promise. Nathaniel on the other hand, knew he couldn't promise. It wasn't his place to confirm the survival of their sickly brother. Unlike her, he understood why William woke up after coughing up blood and why the boy's skin produced cysts. He understood death.

She heard Nathaniel speak to their mother and sensed the trembling notion in his voice. "Mama, Charlotte started coughing and I-- her forehead-- and-- Mama, it's just like Will--" he spat out in a whimper before breaking into a sob. His voice became muffled as their mother embraced him into her arms and stroked the back of his neck soothingly. The gesture always calmed Nathaniel down, as did it the rest of the children. Their mother's gentle nature and her melodious voice brought them such peace that it made Charlotte wonder if she were an angel, fallen from the gates of heaven.

Just as her coughing fit died down, Charlotte's mother entered with a cloth and water dish. She sat on the side of the bed and smiled as she placed the cloth into the water. "Your brother is making quite the fuss out there," she said, wringing the rag out before softly pressing it to her daughter's forehead, "it's always the waterworks with that one." The girl smiled and gave a cough into her shaking fist as she looked up at her mother through wet eyes, feeling the cool cloth wipe away the forming sweat beads. "Sleep, my love," she cooed as she began to hum softly.

Her mother's presence, combined with the graceful tune in her voice, caused Charlotte's eyelids to grow heavy as she succumbed to her will and fell asleep.

"Dream of life," she whispered once the girl was asleep. She remained by her side for some time before slinking out of the room and into the silence of the house.

* * *

The very words pierced through their mother's heart as the doctor exited William's bedroom. Although she felt it was coming, the hollowing feeling which that loss came with drove her to the ground in a mess of tears. Charlotte stood, empty, at the doorway of her own bedroom as she watched the doctor close the door behind him. And as she played the scene again in her mind, the tears flew freely from her eyes and dribbled down her face.

"I am very sorry, ma'am, but the boy... did not make it," came the well-rehearsed dialogue from the doctor's mouth. He held a cliché frown of pity upon his face as he settled his hand upon the woman's trembling shoulder.

"No," she whined in a pained tone, her body turning into that of her husband's. He embraced her body tightly, hands gripping onto her back as the both of them slowly melted into the floor in a puddle of tears.

Nathaniel swallowed the thick lump in his throat upon the realization. He was dead. His jaw tensed yet not a tear fell from his burning eyes. His throat constricted and dried up, words unable to form as his hand slowly slid into Charlotte's own small one. She reciprocated the gesture almost immediately by squeezing as hard as she possibly could. However, no matter how much pressure she applied, it would never lessen the pain she felt.

I do hope that this is written well enough for the first chapter and that you continue to read :) Mulţumesc, thanks!

~ James, WintersChildrenUnite