a bittersweetness (one-shot)
Summary: When the war came, everything changed. It was inevitable that you would be pulled apart by it. You’d seen it happen when the first one came, this one wasn’t going to be any different.
Bucky enlisted as a soldier, you enlisted as a nurse, and Steve… Steve’s health didn’t allow him to go anywhere beyond his own backyard.
And yet, on the 31st of December, camped in Europe, you three reunite again.
Pairing: Hints of Steve x Reader. Cousins Reader & Bucky.
WC: 4.3k words
Warnings: Set in the 1940s. Canon divergence. Platonic relationships. Angst. Tension. Fluff. Emotional hurt/comfort. World War II. New Year’s Day. Some PTSD hints.
New Year's Day - Masterlist
“I’m fine,” Bucky insisted as you adjusted the pillow behind him on the cot, doing your best to make him comfortable. His voice was firm, but the weariness in his eyes betrayed him. “I’ve been through worse.”
You ignored his protests, carefully straightening his arm to keep the IV in place.
“You were gone for a long time,” you countered, keeping your voice steady. “You’re dehydrated and exhausted. And probably doing even worse, if we actually get someone to examin you!”
‘A long time away’ was a gross understatement for what had actually happened.
Bucky had been kidnapped by the enemy, tortured for God knows how long. It took Steve — who was Captain America now, apparently — to get him back.
Not the scrawny, sickly kid you used to patch up after scraps in Brooklyn alleyways. He was tall now, impossibly strong, and wielding a shield. It felt like something coming out of a moving picture!
“I can recover from exhaustion by sleeping,” Bucky argued, his tone just full of exasperation, as if he had any right to it!
You shot him an unamused glare, your patience thinning.
“You can’t replace electrolytes and water by sleeping, Bucky. You need care. And if you think I’m going to sit back and do nothing while you recover from this, you don’t know me at all.”
It was strange, seeing him like this — hollowed out by what the war had done to him, by those days away.
It was easy for your thoughts to go to a simpler time, when the three of you — Bucky, Steve, and you — were inseparable.
Aunt Winnie had raised you like her own after your mother passed. She was your father’s sister, stepping in when he struggled to raise a daughter on his own. She treated you with the same love she gave Bucky and Stevie. It was always the three of you against the world.
