Remember

|3| 1934

pov steve~

"Okay, Buck," I started. "The only way I can help you remember is if you let me. You have to trust me."

"I do," he replied monotonously, as per usual. He sounded like he didn't even care, but I know the old him and I know he would have wanted to be saved. I just hope I'm the right person for the job.

"Ok, I'll start with uhm... I guess the first time we met. It was 1934 and you had just moved in a few apartments down from where me and my mom were....."

I walked backwards out of the apartment, locking the door behind me. Mom told me to go to the store for her. Whatever.

"Oh- I'm sorry I didn't see y-"

"No worries," the boy interrupted me. "I'm James," he introduced himself, sticking his hand out.

I took it. "I'm Steve... do you live here?" I asked.

"Yea, just moved in a few days ago with my dad and sister, Rebecca."

"Where from?"

He chuckled. "Just a ways down the block actually. It's a long story but, here we are."

"Here you are," I repeated. "Where're you off to, then?"

"Grocery store. My dad made me a list and everything," he waved it in the air so I could see.

"Same, my mom just sent me. D'you, maybe, wanna head out together?"

"Sure... oh, also, how old are you? Sorry if that's weird I'm just won-"

"No worries. I'm 16, what about you?"

"I'm 17," He replied.

"Oh... cool," I felt my face blush the tiniest bit before turning around and walking out with him at my tail. He was... there was this... feeling. Like a spark. Like an impulse.

"And how's that gonna help me remember, I don't know, literally anything?" Bucky asked, irritated at the fact that I wasn't helping.

"Okay okay..." I sat and thought. What the hell can I tell him that'll produce results?

He sat there and looked at me blankly.

"I was five foot seven inches, one hundred and ten pounds, scrawny like a sixth grader. I looked like walking pneumonia... too bad there weren't inhalers for my asthma. I had terrible vision and eyesight and I've had literally every illness that there's a modern day vaccine for. Oh, and my mom - Sarah - died of tuberculosis in October of 1936..... then there's you. Five foot nine inches, built and muscular like no other 17-year-old I knew. You'd always care for me when I was sick because you never were, lucky. And we did everything together. Literally, Bucky, and in every sense of the word."

"In every sense of the word, you say?" He asked. I looked at him full of thoughts and about to burst out and tell him everything he had been missing when I stopped myself.

"That's a story for another day, Bucky," I ignored his question. It was better to leave it like that for now.

Maybe the less he knows about... us, the better it'll be for both of our wellbeing's.