as the living does not arrive, as the dead do not leave, a captain america fanfic

as the living does not arrive

as the dead do not leave*

…

"He's not here." Steve's voice never breaks, but it does break Natasha's heart a bit every time he calls her—eleven times so far.

They have been goning over Europe with a fine-tooth comb, searching for The Wint—for Bucky. From Spain through France, Germany, Poland, Ukraine. All of the safe houses Hydra abandoned after SHEILD went down.

"We're heading to Sicily."

Natasha chuckles. An idea of a comic strip pops up in her mind: Steve turning the island upside down while munching on pasta. She bites her tongue, though. "Do you seriously think Cosa Nostra could afford him?"

There's a sigh on the other end of the line. There's no point denying that right now he's clutching at straws. Bucky-Steve refuses to accept any other name-disappeared like a ghost. But that's what they called him. The man lives up to his nickname—all of them, in fact.

"And where are you? How's your vacation?"

He's impossible, Natasha shakes her head in disbelief. He's looking for the goddamn Winter Soldier, the Maleficent among the assassins, but still remembers to casually ask about her trip. Ladies and gentlemen, this is Steve Rogers.

She teases, "If I told you I'd have to kill you." For once in her life, that's actually not true.

"Let me guess. Judging by the noises I hear on the phone you're in a big city. It must be warm because even though you said no to bikinis you're probably wearing one right now." She's sure there's a big grin on Steve's face. "And we know it's not Europe, so I bet it's Mexico."

Natasha recognizes Falcon's voice in the background saying, Ten bucks it's Hawaii. She can't hold back a laugh.

"You don't know me at all, guys."

There's a moment of silence between them. Suddenly the joke is gone and reality strikes back.

Sometimes, when she wakes up at night, paranoid, checking the lock in her hotel room, she wishes they were normal. After so many years of spilling blood and stopping hearts, she still catches herself wondering.

"Steve?" Natasha's deep, husky voice fades to a whisper. "You'll find him."

And she hangs up almost believing that.

…

But yeah, Sam would be ten bucks short now.

"Una margarita más, por favor." Too bad her Spanish accent hasn't improved since the last mission here.

Tony would probably shake his head at Natasha's lack of creativity, terribly disappointed. Cancún? Are you serious? Even JARVIS is more imaginative than you! Right, the genius (also billionaire, playboy, and philanthropist—he never lets anyone forget that) would have never, ever, thought about Cancún.

One more reason to stay here.

...

No matter where she goes, Bucky seems to follow—metaphorically, of course.

Bucky's not a Cosa Nostra's lucky charm with a shotgun.

Bucky's not in Russia, Steve says. (Of course he's not, Natasha scoffs fanning herself with a newspaper, even Wint—even Bucky isn't that brain-damaged to go back to those psychos.)

Bucky's not frequenting tea parties in the UK, either.

Bucky's gone.

…

Cancún initially meant 'the nest of snakes', the guide says. Well, she could say the same about HYDRA and SHIELD.

Staring at the Mayan hieroglyphs Natasha wonders if they could have predicted the battle of New York. A catastrophe that changed everything. Galaxies in collision while a new-old threat is nesting in the ranks of SHIELD unnoticed.

One of the signs reminds her of HYDRA's symbol. Would Tony still call her unimaginative?

But the truth is, bitter is the most accurate word to describe her right now. Even on vacation she's haunted by Fury's fake death that for a second felt too real for her to stay cold and focused. By the memories of her and Steve under a siege. The two of them against SHIELD. Bucky's—No, Winter Soldier's dead eyes staring at her from that bridge.

Every night when she closes her eyes, before she starts falling into a black void, she's on that bridge again.

Average people obsessed with their jobs are simply workaholics, but Natasha Romanoff is much more than that. She's workaholic times infinity, she's bits and pieces of the old and the new Natasha put together, she's a walking trauma, a breakable glass bottle filled with deadly substance—

—she's Molotov cocktail.

…

little dark girl with

kind eyes

when it comes time to

use the knife

I won't flinch and

i won't blame

you

…

It's 3:27 am when her instinct—or her paranoia—drags her out of the bed and towards the door. With her back against the wall she creeps closer to the entrance, her right hand clutching at the knife she always hides under her pillow. She smirks feeling the soft red carpet under her feet that's muffing her footsteps. Without any moonlight coming in the room is darker than Schwarzbier. Whoever it is, they won't see nor hear her coming.

Like a cat in a fight, she jumps out of the corner and delivers a hefty kick in the air. Then she lunges forward, knife cutting the space in front of her, until she gets to the light switch.

Once the small lamp in the hallway of her hotel room is on, Natasha looks around squinting her eyes.

Oh well. It's highly probable nobody has ever beaten the air so hard.

When tension finally releases her shoulders and her back, Natasha leans against the door and looks down at her blade. It's strange how her memory works sometimes. In the depths of her mind there isn't even the foggiest memory of the times when she learned to use a knife as a weapon. It's not the only thing regarding which she can't dig out even a crumb of memory. It's a classic case of denial and suppression, she was told. But you can trust a HYDRA therapist as much as you can trust a bald hairdresser.

Playing with the knife, she wanders back into her bedroom.

Pulling the covers up her neck, she waits till adrenaline wears off and sleep takes over. There's no doubt that the moment she drifts off, the familiar pair of dead eyes will stare at her from that bridge again.

(But tonight they are watching from the shadows as she tosses and turns in her bed.)

…

Bucky's not in Switzerland, Steve says. Bucky's not in Turkey. The Middle East greets them with disappointment as well.

"What if it's the other way round, Steve?" Natasha muses sipping her margarita through a straw. "What if it is him who finds you when he's ready?"

"He'll never be ready." Steve says through the gritted teeth. "He needs my help to remember."

The image of last night's fake alarm flashes through Natasha's mind. The knives are just one of many blank pages in her book. She's been to so many dark places she's become a dark place herself. And Steve, especially this lost yet virtuous and admirable relict of the past, should know that there is no escaping yourself.

"Are you sure he wants to remember?"

…

Sunsets at the beach have a soothing effect on her nerves. The sun is slowly drowning in the sea to the sound of salsa music coming from a nearby club.

She rolls her eyes at every businessman in those ridiculous loafers who approaches her, invites her to a private club on a private beach right around the corner, just for a drink, you know. She could make it very clear she's not interested, let's-see-how-you-look-with-a-bleeding-nose clear, but she promised herself not to break any bones on the vacation unless absolutely necessary.

So she smiles and says sorry, she's really into this book she's reading right now.

Then the music stops abruptly and turns into a cannonade, gunfire taking the lead.

Fire's blazing, tourists scream for help.

She scrambles to her feet throwing the book away and rushes ahead.

Before Natasha can get away, explosion rumbles through the air.

The world is falling apart accompanied by gunshots echoing in the background.

All she remembers is the sun-backed sand under her feet turning into red-hot coals.

…

The dead eyes, always those dead eyes, they never stop following her. He's standing on the bridge, gun aimed right at her head. Maybe it's her imagination when she hears him growl Ona moya when he goes after her, and then she's falling down into the concrete abyss—

Natasha wakes up gasping for air, her bed covers drenched in sweat.

The hotel room is absolutely still. She can barely hear is the faint sound of the sirens outside, away at the beach where the club has been blown up.

Then it hits her. How the hell…

Never in her life did Natasha come back home on autopilot. Not after an explosion that rendered her unconscious. She may be one of the best agents in the history (no need for fake humility there), but she's not a robot. If she had been crawling back to the hotel, she would have gotten more injuries. More scratches. She would have been virtually just one heap of sore muscles.

Cursing under her breath, she nervously reaches out towards the old lamp on a small bedside table.

There's a shadow in the corner of her room, a shadow that isn't bothered by being exposed.

She hasn't prayed since she was a little girl, but right she's praying to God, if He exists, that it be just one of her nightmares.

But the eyes boring into hers are as real as the straps that bind her left leg to the bed frame.

…

After trying to get free and failing, falling off the bed, kicking into the air with her free leg while he takes his time and approaches her one step at a time, Natasha changes the strategy. Too much energy has been wasted on a futile attempt to demonstrate her strength while he's circling her like a shark, his stare as deadly.

His heavy boots are just a step out of her reach.

Thoughts are thundering in her head. If he gets any closer, she'll bring him down and strangle him with her bare hands. Steve will never forgive her. But Steve doesn't have to know. Or maybe he will understand, will he? She'll be quick, Bu—no, Winter Soldier won't suffer, even though he deserves to—just like Black Widow and all the other guns-for-hire.

But this brain-washed son-of-a-bitch just stands over her bed, so close yet out of her reach, and keeps staring at her as if he wanted to skin her alive. Sitting on the bed in nothing more but her ruined bikinis, she certainly feels so.

Emotionally strained by the awkward silence between them, Natasha licks her lips (they are so dry and cracked and damn it there's sand between her teeth) and ventures, "You didn't have to blow up a place full of civilians to get me."

If he recognized contempt in her tone, he's doing a great job at concealing it.

"It wasn't just a club. It was HYDRA."

She's about to protests, but somehow, to her utter surprise, she knows it's not a madman's babble.

"So you're on a revenge mission. Good for you." She snorts. "Why did you save me?"

He cocks his head to the side, curious—but only slightly. "How do you know it was me?"

"Wow. Revenge mission and making riddles." She teases him forgetting that he can knock her head off with but a flick of his metal fingers. "And here I was thinking I was the one having fun on vacation."

Winter Soldier stares blankly at her. Obviously, he's as deaf to irony as he is to contempt in her voice.

"Finding and blowing up HYDRA was just a lucky coincidence."

"Then what's you mission?"

"You."

She reaches under her pillow faster than ever.

The next second the knife stops just in front of his face, caught in his hand.

He doesn't even blink.

"I remember you."

"Yeah," she huffs, her breathing uneven, "last time we met you made me jump off a fucking bridge."

"Not like that." He shakes his head. For the first time she notices a change in his eyes There's a glimmer of… emotion? No, it couldn't be.

"What do you mean, not like that?" Her fists clench. She's ready to try her look and lunge at him, even if her movements are restricted to this goddamn bed.

He brings the knife to his eyes turning it in his fingers. "I remember teaching you this."

That's enough for her to push off the bed calling him a fucking liar, yanking at the handcuffs, clawing at his face. She loses her balance, she falls down onto the bed just to jump to her feet again and attack.

He grabs her wrists and holds her in an iron grip, but she won't let this manipulative bastard see her hurt. Her wrists are turning red as she keeps yelling at him, her throat getting sore, her voice turning into a screech. She is going to kill him even if this is the last thing she does on Earth. She'll claw his eyes, those dead eyes out, and she'll send him straight to hell where Winter Soldier—and Black Widow—belongs.

"I remember you. You never ceased to amaze me." He says, unmoved by her tantrum. "Malen'kaya vdova."

Natasha stiffens.

There's a stab of pain both in her head and her heart that makes it hard to breathe. It rips through her mind and body like a knife.

"Go away or I'll swear I'll cut off your tongue!" She roars. "I kill you with my bare hands!"

And so he does.

He leaves her restless, broken, and screaming after him the way she used to long time ago. But only he remembers that.

…

Bucky's not in Australia, Steve says.

Natasha drops her margarita to the floor.

"Everything's okay, Tash?"

Yes, she clears her throat while her hands are shaking, everything's fine. She's just a little hangover, that's all.

She doesn't leave her room for a whole week straight.

…

Bucky's not in New Zealand, Steve says.

There's a heavy rock crushing her chest when she hears the name. "Have you tried Greenland?" She fires, then bits her lower lip. But it's too late. Steve, unlike the crazy manipulative killing machine he still calls his best friend, is very sensitive to Natasha's mood swings. No wonder girls all around the world claim he could be a perfect husband. But what do they know, really.

"Natasha, what's wrong?"

Nothing at all, she says, clenching her teeth. She's just a little sunburned, that's all.

She's not ready to come back to the States. Cancún is such a nice place to have your life smashed into pieces. She'll stay here for yet another week.

…

She may deny it as much as she wants, but she's waiting for him to come back.

Margarita after margarita, the clock is ticking.

…

"Bucky's not—"

"Seriously, have you tried Greenland?"

"Yes."

She's a liar and a traitor. "I'm sorry, Rogers."

"I'll keep looking." Steve says, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed as always. It's incredible—he is incredible in so many ways.

"I'm sure you will."

…

Natasha never turns the lights off in her room. Not since the other night. When she's taking a shower, all she can think of is what she'll see when she walks back into the bedroom. She spends evenings on the balcony, a knife in her hand. She often toys with the arrow necklace she's wearing, her favorite way of collecting thoughts.

And he comes to her, just as she expected—no, just as she hoped. When did expectation turn into hope, she wouldn't know.

She finds him sitting on her bed in his usual uniform minus the mask. He never stops being Winter Soldier, she muses, just like she never stops being Black Widow. Molotov cocktail. Dark places, that's what they are.

"I don't remember you." She says as she sits in the armchair in the corner of the room. It's almost funny how they've switched places since their last meeting. "Not like that."

All Natasha remembers is her being his target. Yet there's a voice in the back of her head insisting that it's not the only thing she's been to him.

"Do you remember Steve?"

He nods but doesn't say a word.

"He's looking for you."

"I'm not here to talk about—" Just for a second his eyes darken. "Him."

Natasha shakes her head. "But he's the closest person you had in this world!"

It seems like he's in real physical pain when he says, "The second closest."

…

He says he taught her how to use knives. He taught her hand-in-hand combat. He left more bruises and scars on her body than he could count. He forged her into the weapon she is today.

They were partners in crime, going on the missions together.

She's about to throw a lamp at him and call him liar again. "It's impossible." She hisses. "I was born long after that. I'm not the person you think I am."

"You are Natalia Alianovna Romanova, a KGB agent, an excellent spy. My disciple and my—" He swallows.

Uncrossing her legs, Natasha leans forward, her eyes fixed on his face. "And who, pray tell?"

The dead eyes stare back at her. "Why don't you remember?"

"Who am I, Bucky?" She snaps, making him cringe at the sound of his name.

"Don't call me that. You used to call me James."

The lamp flies across the room and shatters against the wall just next to him. He stays motionless, as if he knew she'd miss.

…

Bucky's not in Alaska, Steve says.

Natasha just sighs.

"I'm not giving up, Tash."

"I know you're not."

…

She's almost disappointed when she doesn't find him in her room the following night.

(Okay, fine. She's more than disappointed.)

…

as the living does not arrive

as the dead do not leave,

i won't blame you,

instead

i will remember the kisses

our lips raw with love

and how you gave me

everything you had

and how I

offered you what was left of

…

She dreams of Red Room. In her dream she kicks and screams at the shadow of a man. He always brings her to her knees. He kicks her in the gut when she's down. He tells her she's weak and unworthy of his time.

In her dream she goes on a mission to Moscow. She sits by a table during a lavish party and flirts with her target. Her long, black dress has a deep slit, and the man can't help himself but touch her leg. His hand goes up, past her knee, and stops at her thigh. She catches a pair of cold, dead eyes watching her from the corner of the room.

In her dream he tells her he's proud of her. It makes her heart flutter.

In her dream he kisses her the way he is—rough and demanding—and there she is, losing herself into him and losing her mind on the way.

In her dream they make love after they make people's hearts stop beating.

She's come a long and hard way from a disciple to a lover, but all she can think of is that it was worth all the bruises and nosebleeds.

He's a ghost in her dreams and the nightmare in her life.

…

When he pops up in her room again, Natasha strikes him across the face.

"What did they do to me?"

He stands there, gloomy and brooding as always. "I don't know. What do you remember?"

"I remember being your… disciple. I remember bits and pieces of our missions together."

His eyes darken again. "Anything else?"

She feels her heartbeat quicken.

"No."

…

and I will remember your small room

the feel of you

the light in the window

your records

your books

our morning coffee

our noons our nights

our bodies spilled together

sleeping

…

Bucky's not in Canada, Steve says.

"I—" I know, she wants to say. But there's a knot forming in her stomach that instead makes her say "I'm sorry."

"According to our contact a small HYDRA unit was blown up in Cancún. I think it was Bucky."

Natasha's heart sinks.

"We're on our way. I'll keep you informed."

All she can choke out is, "Good luck, Rogers."

…

"Leaving so soon?" He asks leaning against the doorframe as he finds Natasha packing her things in the evening.

"Vacation's over." She doesn't even look at him while frantically throwing her summer dresses into the suitcase.

She's a ticking bomb. She's a liar and a traitor on the run.

But he, of all the people in the world, knows her like the back of his hand. "What are you running from?"

"Too much sun. Bars getting blown up. You."

"If you wanted to get away from me you would pack your things the moment he called you. But you waited till now because you knew I'd come."

Too bad there aren't other lamps she could throw at him right now.

"He'll help you remember."

"I won't let him find me."

She throws her arms in the air, exasperated. "And why the hell can't you accept Steve?! The guy has literally left no stone unturned to find you, because he is your friend. Even after what happened with SHIELD and HYDRA, he chose to stand up for you!"

"Those memories… hurt too much. I don't want them."

But those of her, they bring him comfort and relief.

"Do you think you're the only one hurt here? Steve went through hell seeing you like that!" In a few quick strides she's in front of him, an accusatory finger poking into his chest as she chastises him. "You are one ungrateful son of a bitch, James Buchanan Barnes!"

She expects him to throw her across the room, and so he does. She lands on the bed with his weight pinning her down, his hands holding hers in a firm grip above her head.

But his eyes aren't cold and dead anymore. They are burning with longing and desire, and so are his lips hovering just inches over hers, torturing her with memories she doesn't have.

She closes her eyes, she lets the enemy in.

"If you stay and let Steve help you remember, I'll stay too." She whispers. "I'll let you make me remember."

He's raw and sharp and he will cut her many times before she remembers everything.

He'll scream and break into pieces before he accepts Steve and himself as they are now.

There's no escaping dark places.

But she's his anchor, and so he stays.

…

little dark girl with kind eyes

you have no

knife. the knife is

mine and i won't use it

yet

…

TBC? I don't know. You tell me.

*the poem by Charles Bukowski

[all credits go to the author and Marvel since I own nothing but my poor winter widow heart]