[ Leipzig AU ] I'll be seeing you

[from_the_outside]

A few hours after leaving her apartment for errands, Sharon returns with a bag of fresh groceries, a bunch of fresh-cut flowers, and a pre-paid burner phone that she sets to charge as she moves around the apartment, putting things away, putting the flowers out, and making a late lunch.

Once she's washed and put the dishes away, she opens her personal phone and the new burner, then inputs the number she has from Thessaloniki.

After a moment's consideration – during which she laughs to herself at the idea of going fully into codewords and names, she texts:

New phone
lmk when you're back safe

Comments

[nerves_of_ice]

He's been turning the burner phone on every hour, just to check. He keeps it on only long enough for it to connect to the network and download messages. So far there haven't been any.

It's a risk and he knows it. He can't entirely shut up the part of his brain that keeps screaming about it, but he can quiet it with mitigation tactics. So when the message comes in from the unknown number, sent about forty-five minutes previously if the timestamp's right, he's already had time to consider.

Done. Safe. he replies. It's eighteen hours by road from Berlin to Bucharest and he's nowhere close to the little flat he's got there, but that doesn't matter. 'Back' is relative, for him. It has to be.

Fifteen minutes, he tells himself, and makes himself take a slow sip of coffee from the roadside rest stop as he meanders along the side of the parking lot. There are enough truckers here doing the same thing that he doesn't stand out.

[from_the_outside]

She's just finished hanging the cracked glass art from the spot she picked for it in a kitchen window that gets a flood of early morning sun when the burner phone buzzes.

It makes something twist in her stomach, and she's instantly transported back to the sense memory of being a teen waiting for a phone call and the squirming in her gut once the thing finally rang.

Sharon picks up the burner and grins at the two word message.

copy she sends back, amused.

can't wait to completely abuse this new privilege, you will have regrets

[nerves_of_ice]

Bucky rolls his eyes at that message and sends another two words in response. No regrets.

He hopes it conveys everything it needs to.

[from_the_outside]

Sharon laughs and sets the phone aside to fill up and turn on her electric kettle, then comes back to it.

glad to hear it

[nerves_of_ice]

He can't describe even to himself how the sight of those four words makes him feel, and evades even thinking about it with a reflex born of survival.

Going offline now, he sends instead. Back later. Be safe.

Bucky makes himself shut off the phone, pull the battery, and put everything away without waiting to see what she says. He climbs back on the bike and heads out toward the next objective.

There's a lot to see to in the next two weeks.

[from_the_outside]

True to her word, she absolutely abuses the privilege of having a number where she can effectively reach him, though never to the point where it would be difficult for an important message to break through the chatter.

It's most often late at night, when she's up working or watching television by herself and feeling a little lonely, that she sends him chatty, light messages about whatever she's watching, unconcerned that he's not likely to see or reply until much later. Or sometimes it's photos of something she thinks he'd like. The next weekend, she curls up beneath the green wool throw and sips at a glass of wine as she sends him a message saying she's been cleared by her doctor.

looking forward to our trip

[nerves_of_ice]

Somehow, he hadn't thought about what it would be like to have a steady stream of conversation directed his way, even when he can't be a part of it immediately or directly. It feels like warmth in the cold, or light in the darkness, or any of a number of metaphors that he ridicules himself for thinking even as he understands them in an entirely new way.

His own responses are much briefer, and bounced from cell towers all over Europe, north Africa, and the Middle East. Still, slowly but surely, they become something more than operational confirmation; more than mere proof of life.

He'd deleted and destroyed all the pictures from Greece, for her safety as well as his. The first photo he sends her comes from Italy - a vineyard at sunrise.

Reminded me of you.

[from_the_outside]

She turns the burner on one night at about two in the morning, chin-deep in a file Ross had sent her regarding Ulysses Klaue and can't help smiling at the photo: the vineyard suffused in gold, the sun beginning to climb into the sky.

She's not sure why it reminded him of her, but she likes that it did.

wish I were there

[nerves_of_ice]

Barely fifteen seconds pass before a reply comes.

why are you awake?

[from_the_outside]

She's barely put the phone down before it buzzes, and she laughs when she sees the text.

work
what's your excuse?

(Not that she has any idea what time it is for him. He could be anywhere.)

[nerves_of_ice]

Bucky scowls at the phone and finishes splashing cold water on his face to wash away the vestiges of the nightmare before he replies.

do I need one?

[from_the_outside]

The answer comes after Sharon's muddled her way through another page of notes.

no
not unless it's entertaining
okay so why did it remind you of me?

[nerves_of_ice]

He’s pretty sure she won’t be entertained by the reason so decides to skip over it in favor of answering the new question.

golden
alive - vibrant
intoxicating
to start

[from_the_outside]

Sharon smiles and leans her head on her hand for a second as she looks up at the glass art in her kitchen window.

those are good reasons
now I wish I'd been there even more

[nerves_of_ice]

next time.

Maybe. It’s more a wish than anything else, but why not? None of this should be possible and yet it already is.

it’s not work, he thinks to add.

[from_the_outside]

it's a date

She makes a face at her laptop screen and types out another message.

wish I could say the same

[nerves_of_ice]

He catches himself before he finishes typing the offer to help. It’s certain there’s nothing she can tell him that’s not classified.

hope you’re done soon. You need sleep.

[from_the_outside]

Sharon looks at her work, then sighs a little.

will do my best

If she typed I miss you every time she felt it or thought it, it would make up half her texts. Instead, she types:

one more week

[nerves_of_ice]

yes.

He stares at that for a while, arguing with himself, then sighs and presses the button to place a call.

[from_the_outside]

She almost jumps when the phone buzzes with an incoming call. After a second, she reaches for it and hits the green icon to answer.

"Hi."

Sharon makes a face at her tired, gravely voice, and takes a swallow of water. "Wow, talking in real time. This is a novelty."

[nerves_of_ice]

“Can’t for long,” he warns, keeping his voice low so his neighbors won’t overhear either the sound of him speaking or the language he’s using. “But I thought since we were both around…”

[from_the_outside]

"Yeah."

She closes her laptop screen and gets up from the kitchen table, heading to the couch. "How are you?"

[nerves_of_ice]

“Fine. Good. I’m good,” he settles on. “You?”

She sounds tired, he thinks, her voice a little rough.

[from_the_outside]

"Tired," she says. "Wired. Burning the midnight oil over here."

She runs a hand over the green throw that lives on the back of the couch. "It's nice to hear your voice."

[nerves_of_ice]

"I think you're a little past midnight and headed for morning," he points out. "But it's good to hear your voice, too."