[oom] nobody told me all the patience it takes

[from_the_outside]

She's had a really nice day. 

It's been ages since she's been able to spend this much time with Nakia, and they'd made the most of it, heading out of the city to go for a long hike and a swim at the end of it, then a wonderful dinner and plenty of wine, and by the time Sharon walks back down to the hut by the lake, she's relaxed and happy and still a little tipsy and she smiles as she smells the familiar scent of coffee drifting from the hut windows.

Bucky's pouring himself a cup as she comes in, and she presses herself familiarly against his back, her arms going around his middle, and presses a fond kiss to his shoulder. It takes her a second – tipsy – but she's pretty sure this isn't the same outfit he was wearing earlier... not that they don't all look sort of similar. "Hi," she says.

"How was your day?"

Comments

[nerves_of_ice]

"Not too bad," he decides, leaning back against her just a little. Her clasp isn't too tight, which is probably good, all things considered.

"Want some coffee?"

[from_the_outside]

"A little. I don't want to be up all night."

She squeezes him gently. "Do anything fun?"

[nerves_of_ice]

Caught off guard, he lets out a slight 'mmph' sound and a quick huff of breath. It's not that anything hurts, more just an ache, and anyway it's all already healing, especially after that stuff that Wei Ying had badgered him into.

(Fucking zombies.)

Bucky sets his mug aside and reaches for another one for her, turning his head to give Sharon a quick smile over his shoulder.

"Dropped by the local for a bit is all. How about you? What did the two of you get up to?"

[from_the_outside]

Sharon might be slightly tipsy, but her ears work just fine and she's frowning when he turns to look at her. "Did that hurt?"

She lets go of him to come around to his side and run her palm up his stomach, her frown deepening when she feels something that isn't just his body beneath the fabric. "What is that?"

[nerves_of_ice]

Bucky sighs. "I can explain." Hopefully, he adds, "Coffee first?"

[from_the_outside]

Undeterred, she lifts up the hem of his shirt. Her expression undergoes a rapid series of shifts from shock to concern to horror as she looks at the bandages taped down over his skin, all along his chest and down towards his belly.

With a wrench, she tears her gaze away and meets his eyes, her own stunned and more than a little wild with worry.

"What happened?" she demands.

[nerves_of_ice]

That look on her face--

Bucky abandons the coffee completely to settle both hands on her upper arms instead, lightly running his palms up and down, trying to soothe. "It's okay," he promises, low and gentle. "I'm okay. It's just a few scratches. Already almost healed."

[from_the_outside]

"A few scratches?"

She only just barely hear the way her disbelieving voice goes up and gets louder over the ringing in her ears. He got hurt. He got hurt and she wasn't there. He's trying to soothe her and that's the last thing she wants when he got hurt.

And he heals too fast for a couple of scratches to require bandages.

"What. Happened?"

[nerves_of_ice]

"It's not as bad as it looks." Not any more it's not, and anyway it could have been a lot worse, if he wasn't who he is. Bucky sighs again.

"There was a little incident with a giant zombie rabbit in the forest outside the local," he explains. "It won't be a problem any more, but... maybe don't go walking in the woods there alone, okay? Just to be on the safe side."

[from_the_outside]

"What? What the hell do you mean, giant zombie... what incident?"

She lets the hem of his shirt drop and stares at him, her hands lightly landing on his chest before she lifts them away like she's burned her palms, worried about hurting him further. "Just tell me what happened," she pleads. "Stop trying to sugarcoat it."

[nerves_of_ice]

He runs his hands down her arms to take her hands in his, and puts them back on his chest, covering them with his own. "You won't hurt me, baby," he says, softly. "It's okay."

"Remember Shuri wanted me to do fine motor control tests today? I swung by the bar to see if I could come up with a few new things to try, and ran into Wei Wuxian - the cultivator guy I mentioned before." The corner of his mouth quirks in a wry smile.

"Turns out they've got a metal in their world that's a little like vibranium, in that it can do some weird things with energy. He was a little worried I might pick up trouble that way without meaning to, so we got to talking about how to prevent that, and ended up going out to the forest to test some options."

[from_the_outside]

She looks at the gleaming metal hand settled over hers, trying to wrap her mind around it all.

"And you got jumped?" she guesses. Her stomach is squirming itself into painful knots at the very thought.

[nerves_of_ice]

"Not exactly," he hedges. "Wei Wuxian was testing a few talismans, and called up some, uh, ghosts to do that, and I guess the zombie rabbit was close enough to hear."

Bucky shrugs, very slightly. "What was I supposed to do, let it try to eat him?"

[from_the_outside]

Her expression is shifting again, from worry to disbelief. "He called ghosts," she repeats, like she hadn't heard him right the first time.

"And a giant undead rabbit showed up and you decided to, what, fight it? Why didn't you just pick him up and run for it?"

[nerves_of_ice]

"I know, it sounds insane, doesn't it." He doesn't wait for her to answer that. "See, I guess ghosts - some ghosts? I don't really know how it works - anyway, they have the kind of 'resentment' he was worried about, so he needed to call some to test the warding talisman."

Bucky winces a little at her question, and then argues, reasonably, "I could have. But then that thing might still be out there. It could have hurt someone."

[from_the_outside]

With every word that comes out of his mouth, her fear and horror expand, along with a growing sense of disbelief.

"How is him calling resentful ghosts a good idea?" she demands. The ringing in her ears hasn't lessened; if anything, it gets louder at what he says last.

"It did hurt someone! It hurt you!"

She takes a deep breath and consciously unclenches her fingers from where they've gripped into his shirt. "Is Wei Wuxian okay?" she asks. It's important.

[nerves_of_ice]

"I'm not a magic guy, I don't know how it works," he tells her. "But I gather it's an easy way to check and see if the protective thing is protecting against what it's supposed to? They basically looked like black smoke, is all."

He runs his right hand back and forth over hers as he adds, gently, "Someone else, then. Someone who wouldn't have been okay. I'm fine, Sharon, really." A slight, wry smile quirks the corner of his mouth. "So's Wei Wuxian. A lot tired - he overdid things - but he's okay too."

[from_the_outside]

He's okay. Wei Wuxian is okay. It's a relief, but that relief is swiftly followed by something else.

Her jaw sets. "And you knew you'd be okay?" she shoots at him. "What if your arm locked up or malfunctioned? What if it bit your head off? Do you think you'd have been able to heal up from that like you would a few scratches?"

Her voice is rising again. "Did you even have any back up? Did anyone have any idea where you'd gone?"

[nerves_of_ice]

He's scared her, he realizes, and remembers the feeling all too well from the day she and Nakia had gone on what was supposed to be a simple mission that had turned out to be anything but.

"We had a -- something like a signal flare, basically," he temporizes. He's pretty sure that's what it was supposed to be, something to let Wei Wuxian's friends know there was trouble. "In case things went wrong."

[from_the_outside]

"So you shot it off, right?"

She stares hard at him, willing him to say yes, of course we did. "Because it sounds like things went pretty wrong."

[nerves_of_ice]

"Um."

The hesitation answers for him, he realizes.

"I was a little busy."

[from_the_outside]

"Jesus, Bucky!"

She pulls her hands away and paces to the other side of the hut, terror and fury mixing in her chest until it feels like they've filled her lungs, then turns on him, nearly shaking. "What the hell were you thinking? You could have died!"

[nerves_of_ice]

There are a lot of arguments he could make, he knows, but none of them are what's most important, not right now.

"I'm sorry," he murmurs, watching her. "I'm sorry, baby."

[from_the_outside]

She doesn't want him to be sorry, she doesn't want him to apologize; she wants him to argue so she can get some of this awful tornado in her chest out into the open. "You could have died," she reiterates.

"And I would have never known what happened. What do you think that would do to me?"

She stares at him across the hut. "I know you're used to being on your own," she says, every word carefully level, "but you aren't the only one your decisions affect anymore. Or are we only partners when it's me doing something you don't like?"

[nerves_of_ice]

The blow lands with the impact of a grenade. He stares back at her.

"That's not fair." Somehow he manages to keep it low and steady, although there's something tight thrumming under the words. "It wasn't supposed to be anything but a test. Practice."