Positive Regard

Chapter Twelve

Steve convinced Bucky to not leave us. He was miserable, though. He barely slept. He slept on the couch, even though Steve and I both offered our rooms. On the forth night, I went out into the living room.
"Bucky?" I whispered.
"Hm?" He closed the book he was reading and looked at me.
"Come sleep with me." I sat down beside him, pulling my legs up onto the couch.
"I'm good out here. I'm just reading."
"I want you to come sleep with me." I repeated, reaching up and twirling a strand of his hair.
"No. I said I'm fine." He pushed my hand away.
I tried not to look like I wanted to cry. "Bucky..."
He smiled and kissed my hand. "Goodnight, doll."
"Please come sleep with me."
"Baby... you don't get it."
"I know. I'm sorry. I just..."
"I know you want to help. But there's nothing to help. I'm fine."
"You aren't fine, Bucky. You'll feel better if you get sleep."
"I do sleep. In Romania, I used to stay up until I couldn't so I wouldn't bother the neighbors. And it worked. So that's what I'm gonna do. And I don't want to sleep with you because I don't want anything to happen to you. And I definitely don't want to be the cause of it—however. I would be more than willing to—"
"No." I laughed. "Remember how you used to always say 'it's the twentieth century, doll, we can do whatever we want'?" I asked, making my voice deep.
"Yeah, and now it's the twenty first century, and we can sure as hell do whatever we want. The sinners of the twenties broke the twentieth century for us and the sinners of the sixties broke the twenty-first."
I smiled. "Yeah, no. It never worked then, it's not gonna work now."
"Worth a shot." He shrugged.
"Come lay with me, at least. You can leave before you fall asleep if you want. Just come lay with me." I kissed his cheek and grabbed his hand. I stood and tugged on his hand until he stood and followed me.
"Are you still scared of the dark?" He asked with an amused smile as we went into my room.
"I'm not scared. I just don't like it." I got in the bed and pulled the covers up over me.
He got in bed, not even touching me.
"Just curious, Buck. How do you expect to have sex if you won't even come near me?"
"Wait, are we having sex?"
"No. But come here."
He put his arms around me and pulled me to him. "I don't deserve you."
"No. You never have." I smiled.
"Oh, no. I was pretty damn great."
"You are pretty damn great."
"No." He moved his arms away from me. "No."
I wrapped my arms around him. "I still love you."
"Stop saying that." He said quietly. "Please. Nobody has deserved it less."
"I disagree." I whispered, playing with the corner of his jacket. "And I'm sorry, but there's nothing you can say to change it."
"You should've watched that video of the Starks." He pushed me off of him. "I shouldn't be here. I need to go back to the living room. I shouldn't have even come back."
"No, please stay."
He turned his face away. "Rosie... I..."
"Look at me."
He turned to me, his eyes wet. "Rosie, I need... Don't look at me like that."
"Like what?"
"Like you give two shits. You shouldn't love me like you do. You shouldn't. I don't deserve it. Not after... I just don't."
I didn't know what to do. I just desperately, desperately wanted him to be okay. I decided not to say anything—what could I say? He had a negative response to anything and everything. I touched his hand.
He kissed my hand. "I love you."
"You just don't want me to say it back?"
"Yeah. Something like that. You..." He turned to look at me. "You look at me just like you used to."
"What's that supposed to mean?" I raised my eyebrows.
"So sweet and innocent. Like you love me and respect me. Like I'm some sort of hero—like, you know, after you got over being mad about me not telling you the truth about Germany." He smiled.
"That's because I am sweet and innocent and I do love you and respect you, and I do think you're a hero."
"I don't think you understand the concept."
"I don't think there's a concept I need to understand."
Bucky smiled a little. "Hey, do you remember the time I said I loved you and you—I don't remember what you did, but I know it wasn't a good reaction."
"Well, I told you not to be an idiot and left in such a hurry that I left my coat in the middle of winter. I avoided you for a week."
"I thought it was two."
"Yeah, but I was trying to make myself look better."
"Too late, doll." He smiled like he used to. "Wasn't it your house too?"
"Yep. It was."
"Where'd you even go?"
"I don't know. Probably to the café."
I turned off the lamp and moved to lay down. He laid down beside me, wrapping his arms around me. "Babe?" He asked.
"Hm?"
"If I was somebody else, you wouldn't still love me."
"But you're not somebody else. You're Bucky Barnes."
"I'm not the person you think I am anymore."
"Do you remember—"
"Probably not."
"Do you remember that time when we were little and my brother was being an idiot and I was being a pest and following you guys around?"
"That doesn't narrow it down much."
"Shut up, I wasn't done." I laughed. "That time at the river in your grandfather's yard? He dug out part of it so people could swim in it and tied a rope to that tree right by it?"
He nodded.
"Remember that time one summer when you guys decided it was a good idea to tie the rope between two trees way up high and slide down it?"
"Oh, yeah. That did happen. Also, I'm pretty sure that was my idea, not Matthew's."
"It probably was." I smiled. "You were both idiots."
"Yeah, yeah. Matt did it and then you climbed up the tree but got scared and didn't wanna come back down."
"Yeah, that."
"Then what happened?"
"You climbed up with me and said Matt was the guinea pig so it was safe but I still didn't wanna go, so you said you were scared of heights but you were gonna do it anyways. You said there was nothing to worry about, so I told you to go first, so you went and let go over the pond and—"
"Yeah, and you screamed like a little girl." He laughed.
"No, that was Matt."
"Oh yeah." He laughed genuinely for the first time since I'd seen him in this century. "I made fun of him for that for, like..."
"You made fun of him for that your whole life. You even said it at his funeral." I smiled.
"Your cousins got in a fight at that funeral."
"Yeah. It was over a seat."
"Weren't they, like, twenty?"
"Yep."
"I'll be right back." He got out of bed again.
"Where are you going?"
"To write it down."
"Bring it in here." I turned on the lamp. I was tired.
I expected him not to come back, but he came back carrying a bag. He sat down on the bed and pulled out various notebooks until he found one that was empty and started writing.
"Why do you do that?" I asked.
"I don't wanna forget again."