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#3. talk to my bachelor supervisor and be like hey thanks for all the help but turns out it was just a waste of your time but i'll see you
honeyednights · 3 years
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#so like the mental health decline i hit like two months ago just... wow#does not go away#and like calling it a decline sounds weird because i don't think i feel any worse? like it feels the same as always?#it's just that i physically cannot get anything done. like there's just a block on doing anything i need to do. and the stress from not#doing anything mixed in w the amazing state of my mental health just makes everything stop even more.#so like here i am#two months away from my bachelor's thesis#with nothing done#oh and i literally yesterday found out i fucked up w some classes so i'm missing two classes in my minor<3 which i have no interest in#anymore <3 or rather i took two other classes than the ones i should've taken. which i just didn't read properly the thing my first year#@ uni so like That's Great#life really just punches you in the face sometimes huh :)#so i've decided that like. maybe i just need to stop everything and put my mental health first for a lil bit#so now i need to like 1. talk to my guidance counsellor and figure out the two missing classes and ask about getting sick leave for this#semester and the next - which the latter should be v simple#and 2. call the student loans office because i need to get them a medical certificate so that the money they're giving me this semester#will still be like idk valid?? and so that the classes i don't finish will be 'forgiven'#3. talk to my bachelor supervisor and be like hey thanks for all the help but turns out it was just a waste of your time but i'll see you#next year!!#4. talk to my therapist about a) a new therapist since she's going on leave in june b) getting her to write something my doctor can use in#the medical certificate i need#and c) talk about getting meds bc... shit's not getting easier and i think it might be a good idea to try those out after like flat out#refusing everytime someone has mentioned trying meds in the past 10 years#and 5. talk to my doctor about getting the medical certificate and meds#yikes this seems like so much........... and i'm just so uuuuuuugh why can't i do this. which is such a moot point to dwell about bc i Know#i struggle and i have and that doesn't make me any less worthy of anything - and i'd never ever have think that about anyone else#but when it's me it's like .... y'know#and like especially when i feel like such a failure for not managing to just pick up my books??? and just read them???? and i've already#spent a year longer on my bachelor's than 'normal' and so the thought of extending it another year is just :))))))#oh and also i need to get a new job to get enough money to cover all the bills for next semester since i wont get any loans which is
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adhd-sorcha · 4 years
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Hey, i also was recently (1 year) diagnosed with ADHD. And I'm considering going back to college, considering what to study next or finish my masters degree. Started thinking maybe I'll go to med school as this pandemic has really made me reconsider things. I guess my question for you is this..what are you studying and how has the studying been for both the phd and the research master's degree you have? I have a BS in psychology (only stated this for reference) thanks in advance. Good luck!
Hello! I’m actually studying a related field to yours! My bachelors is in neuroscience (though it also involved other biological fields and some chemistry and some psychology). For my the masters, I did research into Parkinson’s disease and the PhD was in the same. (Both were pre-clinical research, so no human patients involved)
I’m going to preface this by saying that I was only diagnosed after I started my PhD (I think around December? So only a few months ago!). It would be good to keep that in mind while reading this because my experience is very much coloured by the fact that I was not receiving any accommodations and genuinely didn’t understand why I was struggling. So, this may not sound too positive, but I like to think that it’s a situation that’s fixable or avoidable, especially if, like yourself, you go into your work knowing that you have ADHD. (Also, keep in mind that I did a lab science, so some of what I say might be a bit specific to that!)
I found my research masters to be a complete slog and, if I’m honest, did not particularly enjoy it. I did a one year MSc. It was all research and no classes. At first this sounded like a great idea. I had been starting to struggle with classes and exams in my undergrad from maybe third year. I put it down to being sick of classes. I now know that’s not the case. It was because my work was moving more to self-directed learning and modules whose grades were based entirely on one big exam and so needed a lot of study instead of smaller, more manageable homework type tasks.
A research degree is very self directed. With my masters involving no classes, my getting the degree was based completely on my thesis. 
It involved: 1) spending hours at a time at my computer looking through data bases and reading paper after paper. 2) organising and planning my experiments. 3) carrying out those experiments. 4) being trained in on new lab techniques/how to use new equipment.  5) analysing and interpreting my data in the context of all the reading that I had done. 6) putting it all together in a nice neat document. 
In other words: time management and self-regulation are key. Not easy when you have ADHD, even worse when you don’t know you have ADHD. I really enjoy lab work and analysis, so getting myself to go do those really wasn’t that bad. I really really struggled with the reading and getting the writing done.
I struggled and I didn’t understand why I struggled. I didn’t understand how other people did multiple experiments in one day and read papers in between lab work and wrote a few thousand words over the weekend while I was lucky if it only took me one whole day to read the main points of a paper.. I didn’t understand how everyone else could rattle off information on their research topic off the top of their head, while I struggled to remember the details of a protocol I did earlier that day. I felt like I was getting through my lab work very slowly and not as efficiently. As you can imagine, I felt like I was incompetent and useless and that everyone was better than me and that I didn’t belong working with them. 
Unfortunately, this wasn’t resolved before I started my PhD. And a PhD doesn’t just involve research. It involves taking classes and often it involves assisting in the teaching and supervision of the undergraduates, as well as organising training on different equipment and then the assessments for all that training... It got very busy very fast and you have to do all that work yourself. I had one class that I kept forgetting to even go to because none of my lab mates were in it to remind me to go (and it was my only class whose mark was attendance based! Why brain??? Whhhhyyyy????). And, once again, I felt like I was far more inefficient and less-abled than my lab mates. Now, everyone was very kind and supportive, but they had their own work to do too.
It was a few months into the PhD that I found out that I had ADHD and that was only because I sought treatment for pretty bad depression and anxiety. I’ve taken medical leave to try to recover from these and I may even drop out altogether. But you know what? I still think a research degree in completely doable with ADHD! And I still plan on getting a PhD at some point.
Like I said at the start, it’s important to remember that I did this without knowing that I had ADHD. I had no medication. I had no accommodations. And I didn’t know to take it easy on myself. Most importantly, I didn’t know to ask for help.
My biggest advice? Ask for help! Or at least tell someone when you’re struggling. In my experience it’s a big help
I told my MSc supervisor that I was struggling with my mental health and that it was interfering with finishing my thesis. She was so understanding and it was so helpful in getting it sent off for examination.
I told my PhD supervisor that I had just been diagnosed with ADHD and within about 5 minutes he had all my lab work rearranged and planed out for me and basically told me that he would make the start of my PhD as straightforward for me as possible while I got a handle on everything going on. 
Just before I went on leave, my counselor in the university was helping me get set up with the disability support services to see what kind of accommodations I could get (they could include longer exam times, more flexible deadlines for assignments etc...).
I told my lab mates what was going on and they provided more general support just by having people to talk to.
Okay, so my experience probably doesn’t sound like the most encouraging of prospects, but take it as a more cautionary tale. This was how not to do research with ADHD! If you go into your degree already knowing you have ADHD, you’re already miles more prepared than me! Especially because I’m now learning and beginning to accept that sometimes, for us to do well, we need to do things a little differently to neurotypical students. I used to beat myself up over things that I now realise were actually coping strategies (like, I’d have to write more reminders for myself than other people would or something like that) and that there’s absolutely nothing wrong with doing those things if they help. The neurotypical way isn’t the only way. Sometimes I  unknowingly did things in an ADHD friendly way and assumed I was doing it ‘wrong’ when what it actually was was just different.
I would definitely encourage you to go back to study if that’s what you want to do! But it will definitely be important to remember that you have a hurdle that not all the other students are going to have to jump over, so be kind to yourself, don’t be afraid to ask for help and don’t be afraid to do things differently if you need to.
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postphdneurolife · 4 years
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#3 - 100 days of productivity
19th of December 2019 | Day 3/100
Yesterday I created some figures to better understand the results of the data I acquired. While Matlab took its time to calculate and plot the figures I further worked on the introduction. You cannot tell from this angle but I bought a macbook pivacy screen. I really dislike when people keep staring at my screen. That is so impolite.
I really like my desktop background on the big screens. I took this picture years ago at the place where I lived during my bachelor studies, in the morning when I waited for the bus.
Later in the day, I was so exhausted from talking to colleagues and from interacting with people in general that I just wanted to go home. And I am really honest and raw here: I found myself being angry at someone for no real reasons. But no, not angry at this person, rather angry with me...
Because I claim something that I don’t even own. And it is not that I don’t want this person to gain knowledge about this one thing. It it just the way the person told me about it. In his face and the way he told me about it, was full of guilt. Like why would you feel guilty about it? If there is nothing fishy going on behind my back, just tell me in a normal way.
It is the topic that I am kinda (should be) the expert in, since this it is the topic of my  PhD.... I am collaborating with him because his group wants to use the analysis that I am using because their analysis is not showing what they wanted to show. Or at least they want to elaborate more by doing another type of analysis. And that is really really great. I am happy that they came. But you know, there are so many fishy things going on behind my back that I could scream. I am open-minded about my data (HEY, SCIENCE NEEDS TO BE SHARED, right???) and ideas but I am not gonna hand in my piece of code that I have that basically is my PhD work. Like the code is on the internet, everybody has access. But for me, being completely new to this topic and having no real data at hand, it took me a while to understand how it works, and how to adapt it for my needs. And that is also the reason why they came! I now have a code where I can say, I contributed to it quite a bit and I wont just give it to people. Like... we are all doing the same thing, and what I heard from his supervisor was: “Ah ok, so we gotta publish before you!“... Like... yeah right, thanks, awesome. That is the only reason why I don’t share *my* code. And you think I have ever heard a thank you from this guy after I sent him papers that could help his studies? Never. And that is what annoys me. He/they take, don’t say thank you and sell it as their “work“. No, I don’t like this. And I don’t support this behaviour.
But now you guys have a piece of the dynamics and behind the scences of my PhD open space workplace. A “scientific research institution”, we are basically a big group with little subgroups having more or less different topics. I am my own group, my supervisor is in the clinic and doesn’t really know what is going on at the campus (Don’t even know if he would be a help). 
So back to what I wanted to say: Since I am kind of an introvert (too much human interaction yesterday, also nice ones) I just wanna stay at home this morning and work from here (I don’t even know if this is allowed, I just do it). Later I have my skype meeting with my advisors (also whose code is on the internet, I am lucky enough to collaborate with him !!!!! :)))) and I have also been to his lab). So I gotta hurry and finish these figures and files to send them off to them.
And STAR WARS yesterday was great!  I always get so inspired, the movies are very well made. They tried to put a lot in this last movie (last? let’s see :D), so some scences were just short and they kinda “hopped“ through scence in the end, but it was still very well made.
We again had the vegan vietnamese udon noodels at the christmas market as a treat (I overcame my urge to leave people and go home but cooking at home also didn’t sound good, so there we were).
Okay, such a long text... But I had to bother you with that. 
Please, take care of yourself. You are great and precious.
Today I put a smile on my face and tell myself I am valuable because I am.
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A Little Too Real (14)
Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 4.5, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 7.5, Part 8, Part 9, Part 10, Part 10.5, Part 11, Part 11.5, Part 12, Part 13
Summary: RealityTV!AU- You are a wardrobe supervisor for a popular TV network. The show is planning a reality TV show like the bachelor and Bucky is the newest contestant. But as the competition starts he realizes that he doesn’t like any of the girls…on the show anyway.
Pairing : Bucky x Reader 
Word Count: 8090
A/N: Well...this is it guys! The very last chapter of A Little too Real. There WILL be an epilogue but I am so sad to see this one go. I want to say a big thank you to everyone who has read and loved this story and I hope you guys stick around to see what I have planned next. I love you guys and enjoy!
P.S. There is a lot of theatre Wardrobe lingo in this chapter, sop if you get confused or have no idea what I’m talking about HERE is a guide that explains everything
Warnings: Angst, Fluff, Kissing, Fluff, 
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Y/N’S POV
My flight landed around 1 am and because it was so late and I had no way to get into my apartment until at least tomorrow, I checked into a hotel. I opened the room to a big king size bed and dropped my bags on the floor before collapsing on the bed. I didn’t bother to get changed or anything that involved me getting off the bed, I kicked off my shoes and climbed under the covers. I didn’t have the energy to do much else at this point, so falling asleep was easy.
When the morning came and my alarm went off, I begrudgingly rolled out of bed and got ready for the day. I had two four hour calls with one hour long lunch, which meant that my first call was at nine and still too early considering how little sleep I got last night. 
It wasn’t that I wasn’t tired enough to go to sleep, believe me I was, but the guilt of leaving and the rampant thoughts of Bucky kept me from sleeping peacefully and woke me quite frequently. And of course the time difference kind of messed with my head. 
But I showered, getting the airplane grim off of me, and did a little bit of makeup, wanting to look a little nice for my first day. I also chose something a little nicer to wear, but still comfortable enough to do all of my work. 
According to the Assistant Costume Designer the first fitting for the day started at 9 am which was also the start of my call, unfortunately. So I left my hotel, got in a cab and made it to theatre 30 minutes earlier than the call time, wanting to have a chance to set up the fitting and get a lay of the theatre beforehand. 
Once I got to the theatre I walked around the building until I found the stage door which was already open. Going inside I found one of the security guards who gave me my pass and key card for the theatre and was even nice enough to show me down to the wardrobe room, which he also unlocked for me. Inside the wardrobe room were racks upon racks of clothing and on the table, meant to be my workspace, was a stack of paperwork and keys to the wardrobe room, I was guessing. I grabbed the key off the desk first and grabbed the Roscosmos keychain that Bucky had bought for me, placing the key on the ring before putting it in my bag, where I couldn’t lose it. Then I started to go through the racks of clothing, opting to fill out paperwork after the fittings. 
Not only were these costumes absolutely stunning with the different brocades and laces but also being in the Renaissance fashion made them so much more outstanding. So, knowing that Leah would be the first girl in today, I went ahead and pulled her costumes and put them on the rack inside the fitting room. I also found my notepad for notes and put things out on the table, just in case we would need them, like safety pins, straight pins, measuring tapes, and a few other things that we probably wouldn’t need but I put out anyway.  Hopefully we wouldn’t need too much since these were final fittings. 
So then it just became a waiting game. I was hoping that the assistant would get there before the actress did but sometimes it just depended on the person. From what I had heard I had gotten a good assistant to work with, so despite me always wanting to be early, I’m sure she would be on time for the fitting. 
When I had finished setting up the fitting room, even pulling the next two sets of fittings and setting them closer to the fitting room, I decided to walk around the theatre, get a lay of the land. Depending on the show, the union status, and touring company, how nice the rehearsal space tended to vary. For instance, the first tour I ever worked was a small show with only about 14 performers, it was non-equity, and the touring company couldn’t afford to fly us anywhere so we were on a bus, which meant we were in a rather small theatre for the two months of rehearsals, fittings, and tech. With this show, where there were 22 performers, where this new tour was equity, and where we got hotels and flights, we got a much bigger theatre with space and organization and the ability to do a really good job setting up this tour. 
So I wandered around looking at this beautiful theatre, wondering about what shows had played there, meeting a few people along the way, and eventually circled back to the Wardrobe room before 9:00 came around. I walked into the room, seeing someone looking at the clothing on the rack outside the fitting room, the ones for the two later fittings. 
“They’re absolutely beautiful.” I said, grabbing her attention. 
“Gregg doesn’t do anything but beautiful.” 
“No he doesn’t. You must be Nakia.” 
“And you must be Y/N. It’s nice to finally meet you.” 
“It’s nice to meet you too.” I reached out and shook her hand and then we turned back to the costumes. 
“Well, I guess let me get you caught up on what I’ve done so far before the first actress gets here.”
“Sounds like a good idea.”
“So first, we have two four hour calls today, one for the three fittings and the second for the crew watch. I’ve gone ahead and started the paperwork for the costumes that have already been fitted, made the piecelists and hopefully after the run tonight I can start on the tracking. I also want to start an extra list for this next round of fittings so that we can start buying skins and of course I’ll go back to the actors who’ve already been fitted and ask them what they’ll want. I’ll make a list and have the shopper go pick up those items and extras for our gondola backstock. And I’m not sure if you know or not, but I already sent an email to Gregg asking him if he was using Broadway costumes for swings, since we had one drop out last minute.”
“Yeah, he handed me a stack of costumes this morning, they’re in my car.”
“Great, she’s our third fitting so, if you want I could go and grab them and bring them in?”
“Oh no, I have someone whose helping me out for the day, he’ll bring them in in a bit.”
“Okay. Other than that, the run through starts after the lunch break. You can sit in the house and make note of anything you see and I’m going to be backstage walking through the old supervisor notes and talking to the actors about what they think they’ll need for their quick changes and whether or not anything needs to change.”
“You’re not going to watch the show?”
“I’m going to be on the road with this tour for over a year, I think I’ll know the show front and back in no time.” 
So the two of us started going over some of the other fittings from before, still waiting for our first actress to come in. We got to about 9:15 when I started thinking that she wasn’t coming. 
“You know, in my experience, I’ve never had anyone show up this late to a fitting before.”
“Oh...did I tell you 9?”
“Yes?”
“I’m sorry I meant 10. I must have been thinking 9 because we get done at 1 and a four hour call starts at 9. Leah won’t be here until 10 though.”
“Okay, well there’s plenty of stuff to do until she gets here and I’m hoping your assistant will get here before she will.”
“He should be here any second.”
“Well before he gets here I’m going to grab the rest of those shoes. I just got them back from the shop and now that they’re painted the color that Gregg wanted, we can order shoe paint too. It’s as if everything is coming together.”
“Yeah as if.” We both laughed. 
So I went to the back of the room and grabbed as many boxes of shoes as I could, kind of like a juggling act, knowing either way that I would have to take a second trip. I set the boxes down outside the fitting room, on the ground below the costumes, grabbing Nakia’s attention while I put them in the correct order. 
“Hey, did we ever get those other LaDucas in?” 
“I couldn’t tell you the first thing about any LaDucas.” 
That voice made the whole world stop and the only thing I could hear was the erratic beat of my heart. I wasn’t sure when I was going to see him again, I knew I would but I didn’t think it would be today. 
I slowly stood from my crouched position and turned to face him, for a brief second wondering if I had just imagined the voice as him. 
He stood there looking as handsome as ever in a tuxedo, the nicest one I had seen him in to date, and yet he looked absolutely exhausted and like he hadn’t slept in a while. 
“Bucky...what are you doing here?” 
“Well Nakia asked me to bring in those costumes.” He gestured to some costumes wrapped in plastic hanging up on the rack next to the other costumes for the fittings. 
“I meant what are you doing in New York?” 
“I came to be with you.” 
“You flew out here—“ 
“To be with you and to do this.” He stepped forward and placed his hands on either side of my face, pulling me to him and, finally, kissing me. I relished in his kiss, sinking into his embrace, enjoying the moment...even if it was only for a moment. 
I pulled away from him but not too far from his embrace. “You know, just because you show up at my work and sweep me off my feet, doesn’t mean I’m going to quit.” 
“I know.” And again with the kiss...God, his lips...
And yet I pulled away from him again, my breath starting to get a little labored. “And this kiss doesn’t fix everything.” But God did I wish it could. And because it didn’t, I just wanted to be clear with him, despite the fact that he was doing a pretty good job of clouding all rational thought. It was just...when he kissed me it made me feel like I had before, all the times we had spent together before it all blew up in our faces. It was as if every time he brought his lips back to mine, there was something that reminded me of every reason I loved him. 
“I know.” Kissing me again, he held me longer this time not letting me out of his grasp too quickly but letting me pull away anyway.
“There’s a lot that we need to talk about before things can go back to normal, a lot that I’m still confused about.”
“I know.” This time when he kissed me, he moved his arms around my waist, pulling me even closer to him. This time I lingered a little longer with him, pulling away what seemed like forever later, when I was able to think of something else to say. 
“And—“ 
“I love you.” He interrupted. 
“You love me?” 
“I love you so much, I have loved you since the second I saw you in that interview. I loved you every time you sassed me, I loved you every time you smiled or laughed, I loved you when you hated me, and I’ve loved you every second in-between. I know that there’s a lot that I need make up for and a lot that I have to explain but I would spend a lifetime getting in your good graces again if it meant that I got to be with you.” 
“You love me?” He smiled and let out a laugh.
 “Is that all you heard?” I tried to say something to him, anything but the shock of hearing those words said to me by him, made things very hard to comprehend. I mean I had heard what he said, all of it, but in my head it was as if there was absolutely nothing there, nothing but those words. “I’ll say it a million more times, if it will convince you of how much I love you.” He moved his hands back up to hold my face. “Because I do, I love you, I love you, I love you and I’ll never stop loving you.”
“Really?”
“Really.”
“I love you too...I have for a while.”
“That is the most heavenly thing I have ever heard you say.” He had this huge smile on his face and I couldn’t help but smile back at him. And this time when we kissed it felt different, I had pushed all the doubts and fears aside for one blissful moment. “Say it again?” He asked when he pulled away. 
“I love you.”
“I will never get tired of hearing that and I love you too.”
“Bucky—”
“Don’t say anything yet. I know that you probably have a lot going through your mind right now, but if you’re willing, just stick with me a little while longer.”
“Don’t think for a second that I would give up so easily. What we have is worth a lot more than one mistake and two weeks without seeing each other.”
“I’m really glad to hear that. And I know that you’re about to have some fittings, but I would love to take you out for lunch...and maybe explain some things.”
“Anything with food is a win for me.”
“I see how I rank.” I laughed at him and moved out of his embrace for the first time since he walked in. 
“So what are you going to do for the next three hours?”
“Well I was thinking about getting a room in a hotel nearby, take a nap, shower, change.”
“I was about to ask where you were taking me for lunch, you know, considering the fact that you’re wearing a tuxedo.”
“Yeah…” He laughed a bit at his outfit, “I picked it out for you, but then you didn’t come to filming so of course I had to wear it here. And despite the romantic that makes me out to be I do have to admit that I came straight here so I didn’t really think about changing. I really just kind of took advantage of the circumstance.”
This time I laughed at him, this was definitely the man that I loved. “Well, I like it a lot and I love a good romantic gesture. But to give you as much time as possible, you are more than welcome to go to my hotel room and do whatever you need to. I will say though, I need you to be back to the theatre by 1:00 if we’re going to get as much time as possible for lunch.”
“That I think I can do.”
“Good, so go get a nap in because you look exhausted.”
“Thanks.”
“Your welcome.”
I grabbed my bag and gave him my room key before he left. Nakia came back in and had this smile on her face, I didn’t say anything to her about it, I just spent the time I had left getting ready for the fittings. 
And as fittings usually go, there wasn’t much to say. The three girls who came in today were incredibly nice and took the hour they were allotted to ask questions and to try on their looks for the show. Nakia explained when they would be wearing certain costumes and I made sure to take note of anything that I would need, as well as everything that still needed to be done. The only thing that didn’t settle when I saw Bucky for the first time, was how real the fittings made this feel. I was leaving LA, I was leaving my friends and the worst of all was that I was leaving Bucky. I knew that these three would always be there, but the idea of getting on the road and living out my dream made me torn inside. 
I had taken this job because I thought I was alone, that I could head out and be completely fine, cut myself off from the world and from everyone who had ever left me or done wrong by me. But being with Bucky, no matter how fake the show had been, made my whole world better. He made me want to be happy, he made me push myself, and he gave me everything I had ever dreamed of, even if he didn’t realize it. 
Before the third fitting was done, having luckily caught Bucky before he left the hotel,  I texted him and asked if we could just order lunch from room service and stay in. Of course he was on board with that, but I just didn’t want to have a conversation like this in public. The short walk back to the hotel gave me the confidence to say exactly what I planned to, running everything in my head before stepping into the lobby. 
I took the elevator up to the room and knocked on the door, waiting only a couple of seconds for him to open. 
“Hey.” He said, already looking a lot better after a nap and shower, I could only assume. He was simply wearing jeans and a henley, but it was the way that the henley hugged his muscles that distracted me from what he had just said, my mind completely dropping all of the preparations I had just done moments ago.
He stepped out of the way to let me into the room, still looking at me for some kind of response. “Hi.” I managed to get out as he closed the door behind me and took my things from me. I watched as he did, having to remind myself, after the three hour break from each other, that he was actually here. 
“See something you like?” He asked, when I hadn’t torn my gaze away from him. He just smiled at me, making his way back over to me. 
“You.” I said, feeling relief at the fact that I didn’t need to hide what I felt for him anymore. I could so simply say that I liked him, so simply gawk at how handsome he was, it was a nice feeling. 
“Me?” 
“Who else would I look at?” Now standing in front of me he leaned down and kissed me, wrapping his arms around my waist and really distracting me from the actual objective of this lunch. 
I pulled away. “Bucky…” Even though I was smiling, I tried to give him a serious look, letting him know that I meant business.
“What? It was your fault.”
“My fault?”
“Don’t start something you don’t have time to finish.”
“Me?”
“Yes you, you were the one watching me...thinking about me.”
“You were the one who put on the tightest shirt you owned.”
“I see how it is.”
“Bucky…”
“I’m kidding. But it is noted that you like my shirt.” He winked at me and gave me one of those heart stopping smiles.
“Let’s order lunch before you get me into any more trouble.”
So we climbed up on the bed and grabbed the menu, quickly ordering before things got serious.
“So…” He started. 
“So…”
“I definitely owe you an explanation.” The happy look on his face had completely disappeared. 
“You know that this isn’t going to change the way that I feel about you.”
“I just don’t want you to be upset again.”
“Believe it or not, I think that putting what happened behind me is the best thing I can do right now.”
“Really?”
“I would like to know what happened though.”
“Okay...the morning after our date, I woke up before you did so that I could make you breakfast. Honestly, the best part of that morning was just how beautiful you looked, how peaceful you were, and just remembering everything about that night, how wonderful it all was. I went downstairs to the kitchen and right as I got there, my phone went off. I kind of figured it was someone from the network so I didn’t answer at first, figuring I could deal with them when I got back, but they kept calling. So I finally answered.
“It was a representative from the legal department and...and they told me that they knew that we were seeing each other and that they had proof. I didn’t know what it was at the time, but they obviously had video from the kiss in the wardrobe trailer. At first I tried to dispute it, but he kept going on about how it was in violation of your contract to date a coworker. Initially I thought that it would be an easy fix, that we would just have to keep us under wraps while at work. It was when he started talking about Jackson that I realized that this was a real problem. 
“He told me that there had been some legal issues right after they arrested him. His lawyer tried to get him released on the grounds that I had assaulted him, that the whole thing had just been a misunderstanding between the two of us. Of course Asa fixed everything, but because I had punched him at work on network property, it was the network’s responsibility to protect me. So there’s the first strike against us.”
“The first?”
“The second one being all the time off you had. With your accident, you not being able to work and there only being the two of you, they had to start paying Wanda overtime for all the extra hours she was coming in. Not to mention they were still paying you because it was an accident you had no control over.”
“Please tell me that that’s it.”
“No...this one is my fault again. The thing with Chloe kind of blew up. First of all the ambulance and medical costs automatically went to the network because you were injured by a coworker on network property. They had planned on suing Chloe at first because she was the one at fault and there were a ton of witnesses that saw what happened. But her lawyer was counter suing because there was a grey area when it came to whether or not you were actually still working for the network or if your paid leave meant that you werent. Then there was the question on whether she actually did anything to you that harmed you or if it was all because you were sick before you came in that morning.”
“God, what a mess.”
“A very big legal mess and really a lot to keep from you, especially after having always told you everything. I understand that you would be upset.”
“I’m more upset that I was kept out of this, not really the fact that you didn’t tell me. I can understand a gag order and the reasons for upholding that. But you shouldn’t have had to handle that on your own.” 
“Strangely enough, there were actually three gag orders.”
“Three?”
“Anything legal that happened with the network was heavily protected because they didn’t want any news outlets to get word of all the legal issues that they had with this show. The first gag order came from Jackson’s lawsuit, the second from Chloe’s, and the third from ours.”
“Ours?”
“More or less. The thing with Jackson was my fault, kicking Chloe off the show was my fault—”
“None of this is your fault.”
“I have to take some, that’s kind of why it’s ours and not just yours. That morning, I had to think quick and I obviously made a decision that wasn’t ideal. But after everything that he told me, after everything that you just went through, I couldn’t let the network take what your father had left for you. I had an inkling of what I had to do but I didn’t want to get to that point, so I called a different lawyer, not wanting to take Peggy away from you, and got a professional opinion. 
“He told me that the only way for this to go away was to take away the only thing that they had on us, which was the idea that the reason I did what I did, was for you. And the only way I could think of doing that was to make you really mad at me, so that you wouldn’t talk to me. But he also said that there was no other option than to pick someone on the show and finish the contract.”
“I was going to ask you about that.”
“I chose Ulani.”
“I thought you would.”
“Well her girlfriend was very understanding so that was nice.”
“What?” I was completely shocked. “Are you serious?”
“Yeah. Ulani actually came to me and told me all about Diana and how they were in the exact same situation as we were, she wanted to help out. It was also nice to have someone to talk to about everything, well what I could talk about, but it was also nice because I knew that she wasn’t trying to be with me.”
“Wait, Diana...from props?”
“Yeah.”
“I would have never thought. When you said that you chose Ulani I felt a little jealous, but I’m really happy to hear that she’s happy with someone else. Not to mention, Diana is a total sweetheart.”
“You’re cute when you’re jealous.” He leaned over and kissed me quickly. “But no need to worry, because I choose you and I’m always going to choose you. I think the question is...are you going to choose me too?”
“Bucky, like I said before I’m not that upset anymore. The truth is I want to be with you, you’ve made me happier than anyone I’ve ever dated and honestly I can’t imagine my life without you. This...us, was always a little too real. In that world of fake words and plastic personalities, I couldn’t even begin to believe that I had met someone as incredible as you. It’s why I never said anything to you, I felt like we were stuck in a fantasy and that at any moment I would wake up and my reality would be without you. I should have known better because you are the most real thing I’ve ever had. But the fantasy is over and this is the real world...and you’re here.” 
“I’m here for good.” 
“But there are things to consider, things that change things, very real things.” 
“No matter what ‘things’ you have going through that head of yours, I’m still not going anywhere.” 
“But—“ 
“What are you thinking about?” 
“A lot.” 
“Give me one.” 
“Well...the biggest one, my job. I may have taken this job when I was sad and not in the right headspace, but this is my life and I’m about to go on tour for more than a year. I hate to even think about it, but every relationship I have ever had has fallen apart under the pressure and quite frankly the distance, including mine with you. I mean, no matter what I did or how much I loved  someone... they still left. If you left again...I love you so much that I don’t think I would make it through again.” I was starting to get really emotional. 
“I’m here for every bump and curve, for every good moment and bad. What can I do to convince you that I’m not going anywhere?” 
“I don’t know. I don’t know the first thing about a normal relationship. I don’t know how to quiet this anxiety and worry running through my head and I’m scared that I’ll do something to mess everything up.” 
“Nothing you could do would ever scare me away. It was absolutely amazing to have you so close to me these past couple of months, a dream really. We’ve gone through more together as friends than most couples ever have to deal with and we were by each other’s side the whole time, disregarding the legal stuff. Our relationship is the most real thing I have ever experienced and transitioning into something more will come with its challenges. But just because we aren’t close to each other doesn’t mean that I don’t love you or want to be near you every second of every day. Just because we’ve been through some of the toughest things doesn’t mean that I wouldn’t go through more or even less with you. You are my everything...and you don’t give that up once you find it.” 
“Really?” 
“Really. I know it may be tough sometimes and we’ll figure things out as we go but I can’t imagine doing it with anyone else.” 
“Me either.” 
This time when he kissed me there was a relief that hadn’t been there before. No, we didn’t have everything figured out and we didn’t know the answers to every question we had but for the first time none of that seemed to matter, the fact that we loved each other was enough. And that was enough to push the doubts away. 
“So I have a proposal then.” I said between kisses. 
“Did you get me a ring?” He smiled at me and I laughed at him. “I’m kidding. What’s your proposal?”
“Can we just...start over...in a sense?”
“What do you mean?”
“You were my best friend for months and even though we were fighting our feelings for each other, there was something so pure between us. I feel like lately all we’ve had are awkward conversations and the occasional small talk. I never wanted us to get there, I don’t want anything between us to be awkward or tense, we’ve never been that way before.”
“I don’t want to be that way either.”
“Good. But the reason I ask is because of something my dad said. I’ve been thinking about him a lot and…” I paused, trying my best to keep my emotions at bay; he placed his hand on mine, giving me a small but great comfort. “The call that he had made to me, that day of our kiss in the trailer, I asked him about you after you left. He told me that only some people are lucky enough to find the person that they will spend the rest of their life with and honestly I think I got really lucky with you.”
“You got lucky with me? No, I got lucky with you, I never thought that you would love me.”
“Well, I do. And I want to put these last two weeks behind us and I want to have a first date where you’re not forced to disappear in the morning. I want to start fresh on the boyfriend/girlfriend front, so we don’t have to think about what happened.” 
“Okay.” 
“But that means that you have to come up with an even better first date.” 
“Challenge accepted...I’ve got all of New York for ideas.” 
“I’m off Monday.” I moved closer to him on the bed.
“Perfect.” His face, his lips moved even closer...
“I love you.” 
“I love you.” And our kiss, was one of a new beginning. 
****
BUCKY’S POV
I thought that I was going to have a harder time trying to convince Y/N that I hadn’t completely screwed up. I had already been feeling terrible about everything, doubting if she was ever going to give me a chance again, but getting what happened out in the open seemed to really help things. There was time to figure out the logistics of our relationship, there was time to get answers and time to fix the doubts; that would come with loving each other and diving head first into an actual relationship with Y/N. She had given me a second chance and that’s all I could have asked for. I would spend a lifetime making up to her these past two weeks, but lucky for me it seemed like that was already moving to the past. 
So with the conversation done for the moment, and everything seemingly good between us, we ate our lunch, made some small talk, and she got ready to head back to work. Which meant that I needed to find something to do for the next four hours. 
“I don’t suppose that you would want to come with me? We’re just watching the show and then there will be a production meeting afterwards. You can’t come to that but I’m sure I could sneak you in for the show.” 
Or maybe not. 
“Yeah I would love to go.” 
So we headed back to the theatre and met up with Nakia before heading into the “house” as they call it. We sat in the middle of the orchestra level and Y/N grabbed a notepad, pen, and a huge stack of notes. Nakia had her laptop, a walkie talkie and her own huge stack of notes. 
We didn’t have to wait long for them to start the show, they didn’t want to waste any time, seeing as, according to Y/N, the show was two and a half hours long. The opening number started and the cast came out on stage in there street clothes and though it was underwhelming without the spectacle of costumes and whatnot, they started out strong and sounded great. But let me tell you, for a crew watch there sure was a lot of talking.
It seemed like Nakia and Y/N had something to talk about every time someone walked on or off stage, which was frequent. Not only that but there was a tech table, as Y/N had explained earlier, that was constantly calling cues and talking about something that needed to be fixed. So if I was going to have to listen to people talk amongst the singing I opted to listen to Y/N, at least that way I would be learning something new about her job. 
And tuning in, I definitely had a lot to learn. The lingo was the biggest thing, there were a lot of things I’m sure that didn’t get used outside of a theatre: pit pads, doubles, gondola and gondola village (she couldn't mean a boat right), DeLuca’s, tap mics, wings, ASM, PSM, DSM, Dead clothes, Prop box, on deck, preset baskets, tech week, 10 of 12 day, and more. 
The whole thing seemed pretty confusing to me but I tried my best to catch on to what I could and I made note of things to ask about later. And then we got to intermission. 
“You doing okay?” She asked me when the house lights came back up and I could really see her. 
“Yeah, I find it kind of weird though that you’re supposed to be watching the show and yet everyone is talking.” 
“Unfortunately that’s just how everything works when we’re this close to opening.”
“I was able to hear some of the things you were talking about but I didn’t understand most of it.”
“Yeah, there’s a lot more to theatre than there is to film...at least in Wardrobe.”
“Seems like it.” 
“That and there’s a lot more that goes into a traveling production, we want to make sure that we have whatever we need for anything that could happen.”
So for the next fifteen minutes of intermission I asked Y/N questions about the things that I noticed and then it was on to Act 2. 
This time around I didn’t have nearly as many questions and everyone seemed a little quieter this time around. It was nice to just pay attention to the show and to laugh at all the jokes and smile at the crazy musical number that happened towards the end. One thing's for sure, I was definitely going to get tickets to see this show. 
Sooner than expected this time around, the show finished and the actors all came out on stage. The director quickly went up and started to give notes so that they could leave as soon as he was done, Y/N explained. So while he spoke to the actors, all of the technical crew started to gather around the tech table with notepads and the like. 
“So why don’t you go and wait out in the lobby for me? Maybe find somewhere we can go for dinner.” She said to me.
“That I can do.”
“I’ll be out as soon as I can.”
“Okay.” So I walked out and found a bench to sit on in the lobby, pulled out my phone and started to look around the area for a good place to eat dinner. 
NAKIA: Hey. Just heard from T and it looks like he’s getting off at the same time we are. Double date? 
BUCKY: Sounds good to me. Any places in mind? 
NAKIA: Yeah. I’ll have T make a reservation. 
BUCKY: Great. 
Not having a distraction anymore, certainly did make sitting in the lobby by myself that much longer. And yet somewhere amongst the waiting the actors came out and made their way out of the theatre. 
For some reason I thought I had been in the clear once the show was over. I thought that the world would forget about me and move on to another bachelor. I should have assumed differently. 
Pretty much all of the girls came over to me and started asking me questions about the show and asking to take a photo with me. I didn’t really want to be in any photos, because I knew that once they posted them, someone would have something to say about me being in New York the day after the show ended and not with Ulani. But I did want to be nice to them so that when they found out I was with Y/N they wouldn’t be rude to her or to me when I visited. 
So I took the pictures and answered there questions and hoped that this wouldn’t all explode in my face. But the question that they all seemed to be asking was why I was in New York, let alone a closed rehearsal for a touring show. 
I wasn’t exactly sure what Y/N wanted me to say, so instead of saying something that could possibly get us both in trouble I told them that I was here for work and that a friend of mine was working the tour. I would explain what happened to Y/N later. 
But when that was over and they all left me alone I decided to hide myself from anyone else and play around on my phone until Y/N was done. 
Which was much later. 
I had fallen asleep by that point, laying in the most awkward position on the bench.  Despite having slept earlier, even if it had been really short, I didn’t think that I would pass out waiting for Y/N.
I woke up to the feeling of her lips on mine, even if it was just a peck, and when I opened my eyes, I saw her beautiful face and a smile that stole my heart.
“Hi, Mr. Sleepyhead.” She was sitting on the ground next to me, her fingers running through my hair. 
“I didn’t mean to fall asleep.” I smiled back at her and moved to sit up. 
“I know. Are you ready go?”
“I am if you are.”
I stood up and helped her off the ground and then we made our way back to the hotel to change for dinner. 
“So, I hope you don’t mind but Nakia texted me earlier and asked if we wanted to go to dinner with her and her boyfriend, you know like a double date. She set up a reservation for us at this place, but if you’re not up for it I would understand.”
“No, I’m good for a double date. But I am more curious to know how you know Nakia.”
“I don’t know her, not really, I know her boyfriend. We kind of went to school together.”
“Kind of?”
“Yeah. I went to MIT, he went to Harvard. We met at a bar our Freshman year and then moved in together after that. We lived together until we both graduated and have been friends ever since.”
“Well then I’m excited to meet him.”
“I’m sure you’ll like him.”
We made it back to the hotel and into our room, Y/N going straight into the closet to grab her dress for the night and the iron and board. 
“Why don’t you let me do that?” I asked, taking the board from her hands and setting it up. 
“You want to press my dress for me.”
“You’ve had a long day and you should relax.”
“You fell asleep on a bench earlier, if anyone should relax it should be you.”
“That? That was a power nap. I feel fine…” I took the iron from her hands and moved her back towards the bed. “Let me help, you relax.”
“Ok. But I’m going to go fix my hair first, I wasn’t really in the mood to do anything with it this morning.”
“You look beautiful just the way you are.” I stepped in front of her, blocking her path to the bathroom. 
“Thank you.” She reached up and kissed me...I would never get over that. 
In a moment of sheer distraction she passed by me and went into the bathroom, leaving me with the pressing. So I got to work. 
The dress was a beautiful shade of blue, I could only imagine that it would look amazing on Y/N, but I might of bit off more than expected. The dress was long and there was a lot to the skirt, not to mention near impossible to get the top let alone the sleeves. But I wasn’t going to let Y/N down and I told her that I would get it done, even if it did take me longer than it would have if she had done it. 
She must have been watching me for sometime because I could hear her trying to hold back her laughter when I couldn’t figure out the best way to get the front of the dress pressed with its wrap style. 
“Bucky, please let me help.”
“No, I got it.” Then I felt her hands on top of mine, slowly prying the iron from my hands. 
“We need to leave soon and you still need to get dressed. Thank you for pressing my dress.”
“But I didn’t finish.”
“Just a little advice...I usually do the top first so that the skirt doesn’t get wrinkled. Also it’s a lot easier to go back through when it’s hung up and just let them steam from the iron get the wrinkles out of the top.”
“Good to know.”
So as she finished her dress, I went into the restroom and put my suit on, having already pressed it earlier and took a couple of minutes to fix my hair back into place. 
I walked out into the main room and quickly stopped in my place. I probably should have said something or gone back into the bathroom but I was completely frozen in place. 
Seeing Y/N in her bra and underwear shouldn’t be weird right? I mean I had seen her in less...a lot less and she had definitely seen me the same way. And yet she amazed me. She was just so simply getting dressed, an everyday action, but seeing her in this way, in a way that no one else got to, made me feel a greater love for her. I got to see her scars and imperfections, I saw her past painted on her skin and I saw the insecurities she tried to hide with clothing. Everyone got to see her strength and her confidence, but I was lucky enough to see everything that they didn’t. And knowing that, having finally admitted my love for her, I couldn’t help but stare and become even more entranced by her beauty and just wonder how I had somehow won her heart. 
“See something you like?” She turned around to face me, obviously knowing that I was behind her, still with a glowing smile on her face. 
“You.” I said smiling back at her. 
“Well that is definitely something we should bring up later, but now we have to go.” She winked at me and I couldn’t help but laugh at her. God I was doomed, this woman would be the death of me. 
We both put on our shoes and headed down to our ride to the restaurant. I opened the door for her and slid in right next to her, and as soon as we were settled and on our way, Y/N grabbed my hand and held it in hers. 
We didn’t really talk on the drive. It wasn’t that we didn’t want to talk to each other, it was that there wasn’t anything to say. We had talked about the biggest elephant in the room and despite how complicated I had made things, we had come to an understanding about everything. We weren’t 100% good and we would still have our issues but for now, we were fine, we had each other. Everything else would come with time. 
We pulled up in front of the restaurant and I helped her out of the car, before escorting her into the restaurant. I gave the hostess my name and she showed us to our table which was already occupied by Nakia and T’Challa. I walked over to him first and gave him a big hug, I couldn’t even remember the last time I had seen him. 
“Hey Buck.” 
“Hey T.” I said. “Or is it your highness now?”
“One article called me that and now I can’t seem to escape it.”
“I have to admit that it suits you.”
“Yeah...whatever. How have you been?”
“I’m doing great.” The four of us sat down at the table and our hostess placed menus in front of us before leaving us alone. 
“You know, Nakia and I watched your show.”
“Did you? Well, don’t believe everything you see. I ended up a lot luckier than I did on the show.” I reached out for Y/N’s hand and she placed hers in mine, we both smiled at each other. “But...forgetting about the show, this is Y/N, my girlfriend. Y/N, this is my friend T’Challa, you probably know him as the King of Broadway.” 
“If you want to stay friends, you’ll stop calling me that.”
“I don’t want to be a fangirl but I saw you as Coalhouse in Ragtime and your performance was outstanding, absolutely incredible.” Y/N said to him. 
“Thank you, that was actually my first lead role on broadway, and it was the show where I met Nakia.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, she was the Wardrobe Supervisor and I was the actor—”
“And the rest is history.” Nakia finished. She reached over and grabbed his hand, just like I had with Y/N.
Our waiter came over to our table and took our drink orders and then headed over to the bar. And then Nakia asked the question that I’m sure was on both of their minds. 
“Ever since you called me, I’ve been very curious about the two of you. So I have to know...what’s your story?” She said referring to the two of us. 
“That is a...very complicated question.” I said with a smile on my face. 
I looked over at Y/N and the feeling that I felt looking at her, out to dinner with our friends, and free from everyone holding us back, was the best feeling in the world. I never wanted this feeling to leave, this feeling of complete and utter love for someone else, the feeling that I would do absolutely anything to see that smile on her face or hear her laugh fill a room. I had known before that she would be my world but now there was no doubt that she was my everything, and that was an incredible feeling.
“Our story? Well...it all started with an interview.” She began. 
****
EPILOGUE 
Tell Me What You Think Here
Tags: @fangirl1802, @seargantbcky, @lust-for-pan, @38leticia, @barnes-and-noble-girl, @karipaleta, @capandbuck, @camillechan, @findacauseandserveit, @audasia25, @kendallefire , @alicerozenju, @snuggleducky, @mell-bell, @lifeasabookbutterfly, @the-red-world-of-jess-chibi, @iamwarrenspeace, @ssweet-empowerment, @chook007 , @juliagolia87, @jjsoccer11, @smol-flower-kiddo, @mrsdaamneron, @isaxhorror, @barnesism, @thatgirlrowan, @linki-locks11, @janeyboo, @vgurl18, @guera31, @bornfortherainydays, @carryonmy-assbutt, @calwitch
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the-canary · 6 years
Text
Starlight - B.B (3/6)
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Summary: Mysterious, but life changing things always happen if you just let life take its course – you decided to try it for once. (Modern AU!Reader/Bucky Barnes).
Prompt: Emily Dickinson: XXI
Masterlist
Part 1 | Part 2 
A/N: This is for @abovethesmokestacks ‘s Summer Writing Challenge.  At the end, I am not trying to make the main character seem vain or greedy, as shown with the constellation’s background story, but the beauty and other things that she holds from Bucky’s POV. Just wanted to point that out. 
Feedback is always welcomed.
As much as Bucky loves traveling and seeing the stars from all types of different scenery while enjoying the type nature that you just can’t get in New York, he still has his bad days. There are days were he shuts himself in his hotel for days, where the screams and darkness living within his mind suffocate him. There are other days where he is completely numb, ignoring the red in his eyes and the red from where he scratches too hard -- but, he thinks he deserves it after all he has done.
It’s one of those times when he slowly makes his way way into central Arizona after spending some time in Utah. From the very beginning, Bucky felt like something was off -- he was too hot, the desert reminded him too much of his time back in the Army, and the coldness that settled over the desert dug too deeply into the scar tissue of his left arm and the invisible wounds that ran up and down his body.  
“ Hey Sam ,” he calls his sometimes friend after being woken up by the hotel staff -- his neighbors had given numerous complaints throughout the night of his screaming.
They threaten to kick him out without remorse, worst case scenario they call the police, but Bucky leaves to another hotel closer to the road  before they can.
“ Hey Stevie ,” he cries to his sleepy best friend, as the unfriendly darkness (the one without stars) causes him to cry all night, though he tries to muffle the sound until he gets two hours of fitful sleep.
He’s no good, is all Bucky can think to himself, as tears stains run down his cheeks and there’s a heavy feeling in his chest. He turns over and reaches out for his little journal. Blue eyes stare that the picture tapped in the beginning for a long time, as he wishes a certain someone was here with him but at the same time, wishes (and is happy) she is so far from him -- probably has already forgotten about him. He lets out another choked sob at the thought.
He’s no good for anybody.  
 Arizona has to be the worst state you have ever been to, though it wasn’t you’re doing -- everything just seems against from the beginning. You had felt a sense of renewal after coming back from New Mexico and it showed in both your professional and personal life, as you finished projects with stellar praise from your superiors and you had even gone out a couple of times with your friends and had even started talking to Wanda every once and awhile. Things were going great and then your supervisor, Mrs. Hill, had decided to send you to a week long seminar in Arizona, and while you had been excited in the beginning -- the traveling details, extra work hours, and general disregard for your health slowly changed your mood. It also didn’t help that it was the fucking middle of summer and your mother had been in the same area, through her own work was well, causing you to meet up as a result for a quick family dinner. However you should know by now those never ended well.
This what you do, what a disappointment. No romantic life either, what good are you  for anyways?
By midweek, you were tired from the lack of sleep and anxiety running through your veins leading to you  sitting in the middle of your room with your notebook, hoping that writing might calm you down like it usually did -- it wasn’t doing a good job. You wanted to go home, you wanted someone to tell you it was going to be all right, but even with all the small changes that you had been making… you didn’t have any of that. Why didn’t you? Weren’t you good enough? Was your mother right about the choices you had made since leaving her home all those years ago?
The anxiety and suffocating loneliness becomes too much, as you walk out of your hotel room in shorts and a old t-shirt to look for a vending machine, just to get out of your head and focus on something else -- that’s when you see him standing next to your destination, red-eyed with shaggy clothing and hair as you stop breathing for a moment.
The universe always knows what you need, as your grandmother used to say.  
 Flagstaff, AZ
“Bucky?” a soft voice drags Bucky from his endless tasks of counting the stars from his current viewpoint. It wasn’t enough, but it was better than staying in his room by his lonesome, but the sound of that voice makes him think he’s finally lost it. Why would she be here of all places?
He wipes away the sleep from his eyes, to make sure he isn’t dreaming, “Doll, what ya doing here?”
You smile as the sound of his voice, as you step a bit closer to him. You both look like individual wrecks in the middle of the night, but seeing him just lifts your spirits like they haven’t been in a long while. He straightens himself up, as you look at the machine trying to pick what to choose, as you explain that you are here for work purposes and he tells you that he’s still traveling, actually on his way to see the Grand Canyon. With the trade of plenseteries over, there is only one other ignored issue  to bring up between the two of you -- the elephant in the room, and you ask first.
“Can’t sleep?” you ask timidly as red-rimmed blue eyes look at you before turning to look at the dark canopy he knows like the back of his hand, but sometimes it can feel disorentiening, like he’s a little kid afraid of the dark. He shakes his head and tries to stay nonchalant about the whole situation, he doesn’t need to burden you with his problems.
“Can’t sleep. Nightmares,” he explains with a shrug, as your brittle smile takes him by surprise. Your next words do even more so.  
“Ah, insomnia,” you tell him you own problems with a light laugh that cracks in the end. You put a dollar and some change into the machine only to pick up a small candy bar afterwards, but it isn’t enough as your stomach growls even harder after you finish said morsole, the lack of food and general sickness you have been avoiding is finally catching up with you, as you look away from Bucky in embarrassment for a moment -- only for his stomach to return your stomach’s call.  
“Do you wanna get something to eat?” you laugh, loud and sweetly, as Bucky feels his face get hotter for a moment. He is ready to deny your invitation --he doesn’t want you to be wasting your time or money on him more than you have to-- until you add with a smile, “I’ve got a company card.”  
“Well, I can’t say no to that,” Bucky lets out with a chuckle, as he watches your face light up like a Christmas light, though he doesn’t exactly understand why. You tell him to wait and run down the hall to where your room is, as Bucky shakes his head unsure of what he got himself into but appreciating whatever had brought you to him for the night.
You run back outside with your keys and wallet, as you motion for Bucky to follow you to the white rental car that was parked not that far away from your room’s location. He can’t help but shake his head at your sudden enthusiasm, but he can’t feel like it’s warming up his bones and chasing all the voices in his head for a moment. As he gets into the car and you head down a little ways to find a diner that caught your interest earlier in the week, you are both happy to not be spending another night alone.
 Once you enter the 24-hour diner,  the two of you realized that you were both hungrier than you had originally thought, since you end up ordering a big breakfast with hash browns, Bucky does the same but with an additional side of pancakes. Though it was silent as you stuffed your faces, you started to talk about anything that comes to mind as he tells you about Steve and Sam, while you talk about work and Wanda. Once you have talked about all of them, you get down to the real business at hand -- stars.
“I graduated not that long ago and I wanted to celebrate,” Bucky explains bashfully on how he got the idea for his star journey after finally getting his Bachelor’s degree, but instead of being met with disbelief or apprehension, all he can see is pure amazement on your face, “Wanted to see what I fought so hard for.”
“That’s amazing, Bucky,” your smile dazzles him completely, as you stop to tell the waitress that you need two chocolate cakes with scoop of vanilla ice cream, much to his embarrassment.   
“What about you? What made you go to New Mexico?” he questions as he leans a bit more, his blue eyes meeting yours and waiting for an answer because since the very beginning --with you coming into Inwood Park wearing a business suit but with all the curiosity in the world in your bright eyes-- he wondered why you were so into stars.
“I think I’m trying to look for something,” you start explaining softly while having Bucky’s undivided attention, “My grandma died a while back and left me a lot of her art, all of which was stars. It wasn’t until recently I finally got to take a good look at them, I didn’t know a single constellation nor its meaning. I just feel like I need to know now, like I owe it too her, ya know?”
You give him a watery smile before wiping a stray tear from you eye, as he grasps your hand for moment, “I’m sure she would be proud of you, doll. Taking the first step is never easy.”
You give him a nod, unsure of whether your voice is going to crack or not if you try thanking him. However, the mood quickly passes as the waitress comes back with your desserts. You hum in appreciation at the sight of the chocolate cake before taking your spoon in celebration.
“To you, Bucky, for graduating and taking this journey!” you declare before taking a bite, as Bucky just shakes his head in embarrassment.  
“To you and your grandma,” he says, though not as loud as you. And you stay there for awhile, simply enjoying each other’s company.
 The drive back to the hotel is quieter as the lack of sleep and heavy food begins to hit both of you, and you’re thankful that the diner wasn’t that far since your eyelids are dropping as you park in the hotel once more. You stay there, in a hazy sort of happiness and ready to go to sleep only to feel someone opening the driver side door and picking you up. You turn your head only slightly to see Bucky with the same haze taking over his eyes, though there is a satisfied smile on his face.
“Time for bed, Sleeping Beauty,” he states and you briefly wonder if this was how Bucky usually acted with all the ladies or if it was the sleep deprivation talking, but you don’t say anything as he carries to your room and opens the door. He sets you down as softly as he can. A soft touch to your forehead before he gets up to leave, though he is apprehensive to be left alone in his room once more, especially after spending all this time with you. However, a light touch to his right hand causes him to look down once more.
“Stay,” you whimper out, as blue eyes widen for a moment at the thought that you don’t want to be alone either. He wants to say no, scared of what might happen if he falls asleep, of how he could hurt, but your hold on his hand tightens and you drag him down a bit, “ Please. ”   
The sound of your voice and the shimmer of your sleepy eyes break Bucky very easily, as he lays down as you move to the other side a bit more. Due to you holding his hand, he is facing you in the center of the bed, as he tries his hardest to keep his left arm from you, just to protect you a bit -- as best as he can. You give him one last smile while holding his hand, but leaving a gap between the two of you.
“Goodnight Bucky,” you sigh before closing your eyes and letting slumber drag you away for the first time in a week, blue eyes watch as your breathing begins to slow down and light snoring escapes your parted lips. Bucky yawns and the soft warmth next to him slowly begins to drag him to sleep as well, though he does try to fight it here and there.
“Goodnight,” he whispers out your name before setting down into a dreamless sleep.
You end up missing those morning workshops for the seminar, though you can’t help but agree that it is the best sleep you had gotten in some time, though it is a little embarrassing to have woken up to tangled limbs and a soft caress of your name on his lips -- but, you would never tell him that.
 The few remaining days you have in Arizona are spent with Bucky as much as you can. In the mornings, you go to all the workshops and network the best you can, but the afternoon and evening are spent eating, exchanging stories, or simply driving aways out to the desert and talking (and by extension taking pictures or writing down things) about all the stars he knows and you want to learn of. Though for tonight, you were simply lying down on your bed together, trading stories after ordering some hotel food.    
“I don’t know, I like Andromeda better,” you laugh from your side of the bed while staring at the star map that he usually carried around, as Bucky shakes his head, “Okay, so who do you like?”
“Cassiopeia,” he remarks as you get up a little and give him a look of disbelief  since you knew her story well enough, but before you can ask he already bets you to the explaining his reasoning, “She was beautiful and knew what she wanted, I like that in a gal.”
You laugh before pushing your elbow into his rib cage just slightly,”You’re ridiculous, Bucky.”
He laughs along with you, never saying anything of how her story reminds him more of you than Andromeda ever could.
 However, just like in New Mexico, good things have to come to end as you wrap up everything and get ready to head back to Pulliam Airport to head back home. Bucky is standing in front of your rental car a sad smile on his face, but looking better than he was a few nights back, and his own backpack placed near him as he continued his journey towards the Grand Canyon. You’re standing a bit closer than the last time you left each other, as his right hand sweeps over your knuckles for a moment. You give him a small smile, encouraging him to tell you what is on your mind before you have to go.   
“Could I have your phone number?” he asks shyly, as your smile grows at his request, “I mean if it isn’t too much to ask.”
“Of course, you can,” you state before he takes out his phone, which you had seen here and there throughout the days you spent together, and punch in your number as a new contact, “So, don’t hesitate to call me.”
“Okay,” is all he manages to say.
You take a step forward and though you hadn’t talked about the nightmares or insecurity that haunted the both of you. You knew that you needed to tell Bucky one more thing before you left tim, “Bucky, you’re more than enough. Got it?”
“I know,” he breathes out, understanding what you are trying to tell him. His hand tightens around yours just a bit as you smile and he swears than he can see the stars shining in your eyes, even though it is the middle of the afternoon, and he knows he has to say it as well, “You are too, doll.”
“Okay,” you smile, taking a step back and heading towards the front of the car, though you’re already missing him, “But don’t forget to send me some star pics on your adventures, or just call me!”
“I will!” He smiles and watches you enter the rented car and drive off, his heart lighter than before since he had entered the desert, but also aching at the loss of you, wondering if he was going to see you again but knows he had you a bit closer than before as he stares at the number on his phone  -- a new, cozier picture of you, of when the two of you had been lying about and your hair was a mess, but there was a huge smile on your face. He couldn't get rid of the smile on his face for a couple of days, as he keeps moving forward.
Hey, doll...was thinking of you when I took this.
It’s a picture of the dark sky over a mountainous backdrop, but if you looked hard enough you could see the vague outline of Cassiopeia, and maybe that’s what was he was starting to feel for you.  
Part 4
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Fluffy Love [EXO Sehun Drabble]
Based on my post here if 7 First Kisses featured all of the EXO members as potential bachelors for the lead female character, I wanted to write out a brief snippet of what one of these scenarios would have looked like.
What better way to try one than in honor of the birthday boy? (Which is today in the US – April 12) Enjoy reading and Happy Birthday Sehun!
Rating: G
Notes: Y/N is the reader’s name – she takes the place of Soo-jin in the drabble. Her colleagues Sun-yeong and Ji-yeong remain the same.
“You will meet a great guy...in ten seconds~!”
Is that even remotely possible? you thought as the woman departed the help desk with a wink.
You clasped your hands together as you looked ahead, tuning out the sounds of your gossipy co-workers who were discussing their plans after work. Here you were, 25 years old on your birthday with no plans and no one to celebrate it with. So far this was shaping up to be a pretty uneventful –
“Aiiiiiiiii!!” Sun-yeong screeched as she tore her gaze away. She pointed dramatically to the front and you blinked as you spotted a small white dog running toward the desk.
“Where’s the owner?”
“Ugh people are so careless these days!” Ji-yeong groaned as she craned her neck, looking around for the owner.
You moved from behind the desk and knelt down, calling out softly to the dog.
“Come here boy, it’s okay,” you said as you held your hand out, palm up.
The dog slowed its pace and came closer, bumping its nose into your hand. He sniffed it thoughtfully for a few seconds before he placed both of his front paws on your knees, eyes twinkling.
“It could have fleas!” Sun-yeong wailed as she watched you pet the dog on the head.
You ignored her comment as you leaned closer, checking the dog’s neck for a collar and tag. You had to rotate the collar around until you spotted a silver tag and you flipped it over to see the name.
“ViVi,” you read as you tilted the tag to read the engraving. Well, it wasn’t exactly ‘a great guy’ like the mysterious woman had promised, but hey, you weren’t complaining about the cute white fluff ball in front of you.
“Where’s your owner, boy?” you mused as you scratched behind his ears. ViVi tilted his head to give you better access to his ears, eyes fluttering as he enjoyed the attention.
“Should I call the Animal Control?” Ji-yeong asked as she picked up the phone.
You scooped up ViVi in your arms and frowned when you heard her question. “No, I’m sure his owner must be here. Don’t be so hasty!”
The sound of a sneaker squeaking loudly on the floor, followed by a few surprised cries made you snap your head up as a young man with close shaved hair skidded to a stop at the end of the hall.
“Careful young man,” an elderly woman advised him.
“So-sorry m’am,” he wheezed, looking down for a moment to catch his breath. “I, I’m trying to find my dog – my brother wasn’t holding onto his leash tightly and he got away from me!”
“Excuse me Sir?” you called out, hoisting ViVi higher. “We found a cute little white dog just now – is he yours?”
The young man jerked his head up and his dark eyes met yours. You tried to hide the look of surprise on your face when you realized who it was.
“Oh Sehun? From EXO?” you murmured.
“EXO? What nonsense are you rambling about Y/N?” Ji-yeong snorted as she flipped her hair over her shoulder. “That’s the owner of the pedigree dog show champion ViVi, Oh Sehun!”
“ViVi’s won every competition for the past few years,” Sun-yeong added. “Everyone talks about how his owner’s quite handsome – it’s a shame that he’s so devoted to ViVi that he hasn’t dated anyone yet.”
How do they not know about EXO? you thought as he approached the desk. Since when did ViVi compete in dog shows?
“Ah Y/N noona, thank goodness you found him,” Sehun said with a relieved smile as he held his hands out.
Wait, he knows my name?
ViVi squirmed in your arms when he saw his master and you snapped out of your daze to pass him over the desk to Sehun. You swallowed the lump in your throat and returned the smile, silently telling yourself to not say something stupid.
“No problem Sir,” you replied, clasping your hands in front of you.
Sehun tilted his head and shot you a confused look. “Sir?” he asked, “Ah noona, why are you acting so formal with me? We grew up a few blocks away from each other as kids!”
We what? you thought, trying to recall if you ever crossed paths with him before. Then something hit you – the mysterious woman! Was it possible that this wish she granted altered your past so you would come face to face with the maknae of EXO as an old friend?
Maybe...her passport she had left at the desk by accident didn’t resemble a normal Korean, Chinese, or Japanese passport. It was a snow white color and the pages seemed to glow, unlike the average passports you checked when helping people with their duty free shopping.
“Ah ri-right! Sorry Sehunnie,” you mumbled, ducking your head.
Sehun chuckled as he watched you, shaking his head. He met your eyes as one hand scratched behind ViVi’s ears. “I get it – you’re just trying to be professional at work. Thank you again for finding ViVi – I swear I’m going to kill my brother for not holding the leash properly.”
“You’re off work soon, right?” he asked as he shifted his arms around to hold ViVi.
“Um...yes in...half an hour,” you replied as you glanced back at the clock on the wall. “Why ask?”
ViVi leaned his head against Sehun’s chest and panted happily, looking lovingly up at his owner. Sehun smiled at ViVi before leaning closer to the desk.
“Because I’m taking ViVi to the park and seeing as we’ve both been busy, I thought we could catch up,” he said. “Unless...you’re too busy noona, then I –”
“No!” you cut him off. “I mean, I’m not busy! Yes, that sounds good to me. So um, I’ll meet you at the park then?”
Sehun glanced at the clock and shrugged his shoulders. “It’s only half an hour – I’ll just wait for you, noona.” He straightened up and raised a brow, a faint smirk crossing his lips.
“Actually, can I have ViVi stand behind the desk quick? Make it seem like he’s working and helping his noona out?” He started to dig around in his pocket for his phone and one of your colleagues chimed in, saying that it was fine.
“Take as many photos as you’d like!” Sun-yeong chirped as she hurried over to you. “Do you want any of us in them?”
Ji-yeong fluffed her hair and shimmied over to Sun-yeong’s side.
Sehun looked up from unlocking his phone, brows raised. “Uh...I was going to just take a picture of ViVi. But...maybe I should have one with ViVi working alongside Y/N noona as his supervisor.”
He put ViVi on the counter and ordered him to jump down to the lower part of the desk. ViVi obeyed and turned around, standing on his hind legs as he placed both front paws on the counter.
“Closer, closer ViVi,” Sehun commanded as he gestured for ViVi to move closer to you.
You moved toward ViVi and tucked a strand of hair behind your ear as you straightened up a few papers, pretending to look busy.
“Noona! Look up please!” Sehun called out. “1...2...3!”
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A Little Too Real (5)
Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 4.5
Summary: RealityTV!AU- You are a wardrobe supervisor for a popular TV network. The show is planning a reality TV show like the bachelor and Bucky is the newest contestant. But as the competition starts he realizes that he doesn’t like any of the girls…on the show anyway.
Pairing: Bucky x Reader (eventual)
Word Count: 5450
A/N: Long time coming, but it’s here. I don’t have much to say, besides that you guys are awesome and I love you! Enjoy!
Warnings: fluff, sad!bucky, angst, mentions of injury, cliffhanger (sorry)
Tags: @fangirl1802, @seargantbcky, @lust-for-pan, @38leticia, @barnes-and-noble-girl, @karipaleta, @capandbuck, @camillechan, @findacauseandserveit, @audasia25, @kendallefire , @alicerozenju, @snuggleducky, @mell-bell 
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WEEK 3
BUCKY’S POV
I had to believe that the new week would bring something good. Not because that last week had been so terrible but the more that I thought about what happened with Y/N the more I wanted to make it up to her.
So, I quickly got ready for the day, putting on jeans and a t-shirt. The drive from my apartment over to Y/N’s wasn’t so bad and I stopped at a little coffee shop along the way, grabbing the two of us some coffee and something to munch on.
I drove up to the front gate of Y/N’s apartment complex, typed in the code that she had used before, and then Clyde waved me through after he recognized me from the first time I had been there. Finding Y/N’s apartment from that point was all muscle memory as I drove to the back building and walked up to the door I had only seen once before, but couldn’t bare to forget. I knocked on her door and was not expecting to see who answered.
“Hey, Barnes.” Tony left the door open as he turned around to go back to the couch. On the coffee table in front of him were two different laptops and it looked kind of like he was programming something.
“What are you doing?” I asked, heading into the kitchen to set down the coffee and food.
“Oh, Y/N asked me if I would change her phone number, so now I am changing all of her accounts so that the new number is registered instead of her old one.”
“But why?”
“Because she asked me to. You should be getting a text soon from the new number.” And it wasn’t even a couple of seconds later that I got a text from a unknown number. “So what brings you by?”
“Well I was going to ask Y/N to come to PT with me, but if you two are doing something…”
“No, I just came over to get access to her laptop.”
“Is she here?” I asked, looking around the apartment.
“Oh, yeah. She’s sleeping, I just decided to stop by before Luna’s diagnostic check. You’re going, right?”
“I’ll be there.”
“Then you better wake up Y/N.”
“Yeah.”
I grabbed the coffee and scone and walked into Y/N’s bedroom. She had a soft little snore and was propped up on a pile of pillows, hair strewn out across them, but completely cuddled in her blanket, looking as peaceful as could be. I sat down on the edge of the bed and moved her hair out of her face before I tried to wake her.
“Y/N?” She stirred a little. “Hey, Y/N?” I said a little louder and her eyes started to open.
“Bucky? What are you doing here?”
“Tony let me in.”
“Tony’s here?”
“Yeah, he’s in the living room.”
“What are you doing here?” She asked, sitting up to look at me better.
“I was wondering if you wanted to go to PT with me?”
“You want me to go?”
“Yeah. I mean, I won’t be doing too much. Tony’s going to be running some new diagnostic checks because of the whole thing that happened last week and we’re going to check on Luna.”
“Luna’s going to be there?” She smiled.
“Yeah, I figured that you may want to meet her.”
“I would love to go.”
“How fast can you get ready?”
“Never underestimate the speed of an ex-dresser.”
“I’ll time you.”
She grabbed the coffee cup out of my hand and quickly took a sip before she handed it back to me and headed for the bathroom. I went back out to the living room where Tony was sitting and sat right next to him. While we waited Tony did some last minute work and I grabbed my phone out of my pocket, saved Y/N’s new number and deleted the old one.
It couldn’t have been but twenty minutes later that Y/N came out, completely ready to go. I had to admit that that was an impressive time for a woman to get ready, I had never seen that before. Tony grabbed his things and the three of us left her apartment and headed over to the PT building.
When we got inside we made sure to sign in and we headed over to the tech room first where Tony would set up the computers for the diagnostic checks.
As Tony worked, I took Y/N on a small tour of the facility and introduced her to the few physical trainers and medical staff that I had come to work with during my recovery.
As we walked around, she told me about how Peggy had actually asked her out to lunch a couple of weeks ago and how the two of them had just instantly became friends and practically talked every day, I mean when she wasn't talking to me of course or working. And then I told her about the party that I was planning for my mom’s birthday and how it was going to be a big event this year since this was kind of the first year that I didn't have anything going on. Of course Y/N was invited so I made sure to give her the information and I told her a little about my mom so that she could get her a present if she wanted to, even though I insisted that she just bring by a couple of her birthday pies.
Once I had finished my tour we stopped off in the lobby and decided to finish waiting for Luna and her mom there.
“Thanks for coming with me today, by the way, I know that it was like I just showed up in your bedroom and asked you to come, but I’m glad you’re here.” I teased.
“That’s because that is exactly what happened.” We both just laughed at each other, but looked over at the door when Luna, with her bouncy little blonde curls, came skipping in. As soon as she realized I was waiting for her, she launched herself into my arms and held onto me as tightly as she could.
“Bucky!” She yelled.
“Hi Luna.” I placed her back on the ground in front of me and looked at the new dress she was wearing, a replica of the new Cinderella dress. “Or should I call you princess?” She giggled and curled herself around her mother’s leg.
“No, I’m Luna.”
“Oh. Well, Luna this is my best friend Y/N, we get to work together on my show.” Y/N waved at her. “She helps pick out everyone's clothes and sometimes she even makes them.”
“You know how to make dresses?” She asked Y/N.
“Yeah I do.”
“Princess dresses?”
“Any kind of dress you can think of.” She smiled. We heard someone walk around the corner and Luna got excited again running straight for him.
“I’m ready when you guys are.” Tony said as Luna grabbed his hand and pulled him away before he could barely finish his statement.
So the remaining three of us, went back into the tech room and I grabbed a chair, placing it right next to the table where Tony had set up his computers. Y/N went to move a chair right beside me for Luna, but I just picked her up and put her in my lap just like we usually did .
“Why don't you move a chair right in front of us, so you can see this? It's pretty cool.”
“We fix our arms at the same time.” Luna said to Y/N as she moved her chair to face the two of us. Luna's mother moved a chair right next to Y/N so that she could help if she needed to.
“At the same time?” She asked.
“Yeah, She’s a little s-c-a-r-e-d of the wires.” I said a little quieter hoping to not draw her attention too much away from Tony.
Luna’s...crushing on Tony. It’s the cutest thing ever. She loves him despite the hard outer shell he usually wears for everyone else. In reality he's just a big old teddy bear, but more so with Luna.
To start the diagnostic setup, I placed my arm on the table with the inside of my arm facing up and then Tony started attaching the wires. As soon as he was done setting up my wires, Luna moved her arm to rest right on top of mine, in the same position so that Tony could then attach her wires. I wasn't quite sure what about this made Luna feel better, but it did. Maybe because she saw me doing it at the same time and her seeing that I wasn't being hurt helped ease her, but I wasn't sure. Unfortunately the check took some time so this was the point where getting Luna to talk was very important.
“So, I haven't seen you in a while. You started school already right?”
“Yeah.” She said quietly, very nervously watching what was happening with her arm.
“You must be in like the fifth grade by now.” I teased.
“No!” She giggled and turned to look back at me with a smile. “Preschool.”
“Oh. What have you been learning?”
“Music and shapes.”
“Shapes can sing?”
“No!” She laughed.
I kept asking her questions about school and sometimes Y/N would ask her something. But we just talked to her until the software was done updating and as usual she was perfectly calm despite her nerves.
After we finished up with Tony, Y/N, Luna, her mom and I all decided to go out for lunch. We tried to convince Tony to come with us but apparently he had a meeting to go to. Luna gave him the saddest puppy dog eyes I had ever seen but he somehow was able to say no to her, I’m not sure how but he did.
I took the four of us to Luna’s favorite restaurant and we had a really good time just talking and letting Luna tell us these stories that probably were not nearly as funny as they were when she told them.
But overall seeing Luna, having Y/N meet Luna...I don’t know, it made things real again. Since I started being friends with Y/N I had pushed down pretty much everything that I had been feeling, mostly because of the reality TV aspect of our relationship. Because despite the fact that this was supposed to be reality, I couldn’t help but not feel more fake doing the show than I had ever in my life. Y/N made me feel real and seeing her with Luna made me think about life with her, how I didn’t want to be part of a reality without her.
But ignoring that for a moment, there was a very harsh reality that lived within my revelation, the possibility of Y/N not liking me the same. And as I stared at Y/N, thinking about how great these last weeks have been, I couldn’t help but want to keep that as sacred as possible. So I had to figure that the best way to keep what we had, was actually to not do anything to jeopardize that, including keeping my feelings at bay.
So as the next couple of days passed, I tried my hardest to do just that. I focused a little more on the show and the nine remaining girls, I worked a little more with Tony and the time that I spent with Y/N was more limited but still fun and casual.
And of course I couldn’t forget the countless hours of planning that I had to put in for my mom’s birthday party. I was very excited for the surprise, it was hard to surprise my mother, but I was also excited to see her, since I hadn’t in so long. Y/N spent some of her time helping me out, giving me a female opinion, which I was very grateful for.
The night before our last night of filming for the week and before the night of the party, Y/N, Steve, Peggy and I were decorating my apartment with the party decorations I had bought. Peggy volunteered to make the cake and Y/N was baking some birthday pies, with some begging on my part. Steve and I weren’t much good for planning where the decorations went, but we were pretty good at listening to where the girls wanted us to put things or where they thought things looked the best.
As the night grew later the place actually started to look like a party could happen here which would have never happened if I had been by myself. Steve and Peggy were the first to leave, telling me how happy they were to have helped out and that they couldn't wait for tomorrow. I thanked them for coming over and helping me out before they went home, leaving me and Y/N alone.
“You know I should probably head out too. I've got to go to the store before work to get your mom a present.”
“You really don't have to, she'll love the pies.”
“You can't go to a birthday party without a gift.”
“Fine.”
“And we’re done here anyway, you need to get some sleep. You said your mom was driving in early right?”
“Yeah. She's got a six and a half hour drive to make. I usually fly up to see her but she insisted on driving down. She’s probably about to leave actually, she says there’s less traffic that way.”
“Smart. But you do realize that you’re going to have to meet her somewhere else now.”
“Why?”
“We just spent like four hours decorating your apartment for her surprise party.”
“Oh...yeah.”
“You can’t bring her here.”
“Yeah I see that now.”
“Well, why don’t you just...treat her to a spa day or so something. There are a lot of hotels that have spas in them and I’m sure that she would enjoy the relaxation after her long drive.”
“That’s not a bad idea.”
“You could tell her it’s a present.”
“Yeah, thank you.”
“No problem.”
“I’ll see you tomorrow, then?.”
“I wouldn't miss it.”
And with that she left. I grabbed my phone and looked around for a nice hotel/spa for my mom and set up an appointment before texting her the address and asking her to go there instead of my apartment. Of course she was suspicious but I guaranteed her that is was a good surprise.
After I had convinced her to go and after she begged me to meet her for lunch, I turned back around and looked at the decorated room. I smiled thinking about the wonderful night we had putting all of this together. I loved the way that Y/N interacted with Steve and Peggy, kind of like she had known them for years and I loved how much they loved her back.
Another thought that I also had was about the fact that whenever I had something to do or wanted something to do, Y/N was always the first person to pop into my mind. When I was younger it used to be Steve, you know we would go to baseball games together and we’d go get food. But when he met Peggy things changed, it wasn’t that we stopped hanging out it was like we added Peggy to our team. But the fact that I could see Y/N joining our “team” made me nervous and made me question the way I acted around her or talked to her or anything with her.
Yet the biggest factor of this revelation was simple: I never thought of any of the girls in the same way that I thought of Y/N.
This singular thought managed to keep me up most of the night and when I woke up in the morning I was actually very ready to kick some more girls off the show.
This week had been kind of weird, not just because of the dates but I also could feel the tension in the air. I sort of knew what happened when I wasn’t in the room, but according to Y/N they were different people when I wasn’t there. She never told me who, because she wanted me to make my own decisions but I had been so paranoid all week because of this shift.
I begged Y/N to tell me something just to take my mind off things, something that would confirm that I wasn't going crazy. But she was stubborn and wouldn't tell me anything about the girls or what they had done. So instead I tried my hardest to push that aside and did anything I could to distract myself. I took a shower, I picked out a suit for lunch, I trimmed my beard, I even ironed my shirt for tonight, despite Y/N telling me she would do it, all of this just to give me some peace of mind. And with the hours I wasted, it gave me plenty of time to get dressed and meet my mother for lunch at her hotel.
When I got there, the hostess at the restaurant, the one right off of the lobby, showed me to the table that I had reserved for our lunch. It was about ten minutes before my mother came down and was escorted to our table. I stood up from my chair and wrapped her tightly in my arms.
“Hi mom.”
“Hi.” She said with a huge smile on her face.
“Happy Birthday.”
“Thank you.”
“How was your drive?” We both sat down in our chairs, facing each other.
“Long.”
“I’m glad you're here though.”
“Yeah, the drive was worth it. I’m happy to see you.”
So we ordered food and drinks and we just caught up on all the things we had missed about each other. I told her about the show and how it had been going and of course she was curious about the girls and yet for some reason I couldn't bring myself to tell her about Y/N. She asked about Steve and Peggy and even wondered about Luna and how the new updates on the arm were working. She told me about her friends and she brought up the fact that one of their daughters was getting married and how nice it would be to have grandchildren, you know, the whole guilt trip.
But the food was good, the conversation better and after talking to her I was ready for filming. I told my mom to meet me at my apartment later, telling her that I would text her when I got back from filming so that I could let her in.
So from the hotel I headed to the studio, stopping to get some coffee for Y/N along the way.  When I made it to the Wardrobe room the door was locked. I tried knocking but I didn't hear anything on the other side of the door and nobody came to open up.
To me that was very strange, Y/N was never late...unless she was helping me out or I was distracting her. Never late. So the fact that she wasn't here was the first sign that something was wrong. I chose to ignore it, seeing as she was allowed to be late at least once of her own fruition. But I definitely made note of the strange occurrence.
So instead I went to the hair and makeup trailer to get ready, now being thankful that I ironed my shirt before I came. Steve met up with me at some point, being the perfect distraction from my worry.
But as it got later I couldn't help but feel the thought that something was wrong creep back to the front of my mind.
“She'll be here, she never misses.” Steve said, before I headed back to my trailer to get dressed.
As much as I wanted to believe Steve though, I couldn't help but think that she wasn't coming, especially when I waited as long as the director would let me, for her to show up.
So, trying my hardest to hide the ache in my heart, we started filming. Tonight’s filming, like most shoots at the end of the week, was easy and with that two more girls were gone. You would think that I would be a little more torn up with there being so few girls left already...but I wasn’t. I was worried and upset and not really in the mood for dealing with these other women.
So as soon as we wrapped up filming and the crew said I could leave, I headed for my trailer, Steve following me as I went. He handed me my phone as we walked and I typed out a message to Y/N.
BUCKY: Is everything okay? Did I do something wrong? I still hope to see you at the party.
Knowing that I didn’t have a lot of time to get back to the apartment, and knowing that Peggy was handling the guests who had already shown up, I stepped into the small bedroom to change.
“Bucky are you okay?” I heard Steve ask on the other side of the door.
“Yeah, why wouldn’t I be?” I even flinched at how harsh and not okay that sounded.
“I know you’re upset—”
“I’m not upset.”
“Bucky...she’s got to have a reason. We both know that Y/N is not one to break her promises. She would have been here if she could.”
“Yeah I know.”
I came out of the room dressed and ready to go to my apartment, the whole drive over spent in complete silence. As soon as I got to the door though, I changed my whole demeanor, having no other choice than to ignore the terrible feeling in my gut. I put on the biggest smile that I could muster and I walked into my apartment.
I found Peggy first, thanking her for helping out until Steve and I had gotten there and then I quickly made my way around the room, thanking everyone for coming but also looking for Y/N, hoping that Peggy had missed her. When I didn’t find her and I had waited longer than originally planned, I texted my mom, telling her to come on over. The hotel wasn’t too far from my apartment, so it was pretty easy to gauge when everyone needed to hide. I was on the look out for her while everyone else enjoyed themselves and honestly it was a nice distraction from the fake demeanor I had to keep up while everyone was looking. This way I could stare out the window and not worry about anyone asking me if I was okay or put on a fake smile to lie to them and tell them that I was.
I saw my mom’s car pull up and quickly turned to tell everyone that she was here. I went to stand by the door and waited a few seconds after she rung my doorbell to answer the door. She walked in with a huge smile on her face, looking like she had had a really great day. I leaned down to give her a hug and invited her in. When she set down her things, everyone came bursting out of their hiding places and yelling, “Surprise!” as loud as they could. 
She turned to look at me with a big shocked smile on her face and wrapped me in her arms one more time before she went and started greeting the guests. And then the party went on as planned: she talked to everyone, she opened presents and we dished out cake and ice cream. She couldn’t have been any happier.
And despite the surprise having gone perfectly, I was still in a pretty foul mood. Y/N never showed up...which wasn't like her. She was always there or at least would tell me if she couldn't make it, which was never the case.
But apparently my foul mood was very evident to my mother.
“What are you so upset about?” She asked.
“Nothing.” I said turning to face her. 
“James Buchanan Barnes, tell me what is on your mind.”
“It really is nothing, a friend of mine was supposed to come and she wasn't at work today, but it just isn't who she is to not show up.”
“She?”
“Mom, seriously.”
“Well I could try and help you, but you haven't told me anything about this girl.”
I glared at her, but delved into the shortest explanation of mine and Y/N’s relationship. She seemed to be gulping it up and I knew I was in for an earful when I finished.
“There's clearly something wrong.”
“What?” I wasn't expecting her to give me an answer so soon, a lecture though I did expect.
“I think something's wrong. I mean you've pretty much proven that she would never do something like this, at least not of her own will.”
“You think she could be in trouble?”
“Not necessarily, I just think she had a really good reason for not being here.”
“I know, I’m trying to believe that but I’m worried.”
“I know. But the fact that you care so much about her being here is sure proof that you like this girl. And when you find her—”
“Mom!”
“Don't ‘mom’ me. There's no time to waste, you have to find her.”
“But this is the first party that I have been able to come to—”
“I don't want you here, I want you to go find Y/N.”
“Okay.” I said, but was honestly surprised to hear her say that.
“I mean I want you here but I also want you to find her. It's the beginning of a really great love story.”
“Mom!”
“I’m serious James. Go find her.”
So with my mom’s blessing, I left the party and, without really thinking, I drove over to Y/N’s apartment. I pulled up to the gate and Clyde came over to my car.
“Ms. Y/L/N hasn't come back yet.”
���When did she leave?” I asked, 
“She left this morning for work earlier than usual or at least lately.”
“But she hasn't been back here since then?”
“No.”
“Okay. Thanks Clyde. If she comes back will you have her call me?”
“Is she okay?”
“I don't know.”
There was definitely something wrong. I wasn't exactly sure what it was yet, but something was off.
So I drove back to the studio hoping that she was working or something. I had to park outside of the security gate, since it was so late, and walk in. As I walked around the lot, peeking in on unlocked sets and checking the wardrobe room, I ran into Mike, one of our many production managers.
He looked tired and a little frazzled, furiously typing on his phone, clearly not having seen me.
“James!” He said after our run in had drawn his attention away from his phone.
“Hey Mike? What are you up to?”
“I just got the strangest phone call.”
“Okay?”
“A call came in at the executive's’ office. The man asked to be redirected here, to this specific lot. When he finally got transferred to my office he told me that he's Y/N’s father.”
“Her dad?”
“Yeah. He told me that I had to find her friend Bucky?”
“He said that?”
“Yeah apparently she's in the hospital and he doesn't want her to be alone. I mean I don't even know how to begin looking—”
“She's in the hospital?!”
“Yeah. You're friends with her right? Do you know this Bucky?”
“Yeah that's me.”
“What?”
“It's a nickname my family uses. What hospital is she at?”
“UCLA Medical Center.”
I grabbed my phone out of my pocket and started walking away from him. I texted Steve, to let him know what was going on and so that he could tell my mom.
I quickly got back into my car and sped away from the lot, making my way towards her, as fast as I could.
There were a million things going through my head as I sped to the hospital and honestly knowing that she was there but not knowing that she was okay, was causing me more pain than I had experienced in a long time and that's saying something. I had no idea how I was going to get in to see her but I knew that I needed to be close to her.
So I walked in the lobby of the the lowest level and right up to the nurses station, hoping by some chance that they would let me in to see her.
“Excuse me.” I said, grabbing the nurses attention.
“How can I help you?” She responded.
“I’m looking for Y/F/N Y/L/N.”
“Name?”
“James Barnes or Bucky.”
“Bucky?”
“Yeah.”
“Her father told me that you would be coming by.”
“He did?”
“Yeah, if you’ll have a seat I’ll let her doctor know that you’re here.”
“Okay.”
I didn’t have to wait long for her doctor to meet with me, maybe fifteen minutes. He took me from the waiting area to her floor where he explained what was happening with Y/N before he would let me in to see her.
“I spoke to her father on the phone and he explained to me that you were one of her closest friends. Y/N is going to need a lot of help when she gets out in a few days and since he doesn’t live in the country, he believed that you would be the best fit for helping her.”
“Absolutely.”
“Okay, I'm going to try and explain briefly what happened but the police will be by later to check in on her and finish their report. You can ask more questions regarding what happened when they get here. But simply, Y/N was in a terrible car accident, she was lucky though. It may not sound like it but she came in with a collapsed lung and a broken leg but when we got her x-rayed we found that her diaphragm was also ruptured. Usually it’s a pretty hard thing to diagnose without any other injury so we got lucky that we had to focus there. We went in and repaired both tears and gave her a cast for her leg and she’s doing great. When you go in she’ll look pretty beaten up because of the bruises and cuts, she’ll also have a tube helping her breath until we know that that lung is working fully again. But she’s doing really well and she’ll be able to go home soon.”
“Okay.” I’m pretty sure that I was in shock just from hearing everything. That and the fact that this doctor was actually trying to make me believe that this was less terrible than it was.
“I know this is a lot, but it could have been a lot worse. I could tell that she was a fighter and I know that she’s going to be fine, you just need to have a little faith in her. But take some time and process this before you go in, it’ll be less shocking for you.”
“Okay.” I nodded.
“And if you need anything or if you notice anything wrong, her nurse’s name is written on the board in the room and she can help you with whatever you need.”
“Thank you.”
“Sure.”
I shook his hand and then he left. I stood outside of Y/N’s room and took some time to process, like the doctor had suggested. And when the need to see her overcame the fear, I opened the door and stepped in.
I stared at her for a long time, feeling terrible for having assumed that she would ever be any different than who she was. Y/N would have been there today, she would have been at the party too if she had any control over her day...but she didn’t, not today. And I was the jerk who had assumed the worst.
But when I got out of my head I moved to her bedside and sat myself down beside her. I grabbed her hand and held it in mine, not thinking about anything but her.
And with these thoughts came the true revelation. There was no way around it...I was in love with her.
PART SIX
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Text
A Little Too Real (4.5)
Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4
Summary: RealityTV!AU- You are a wardrobe supervisor for a popular TV network. The show is planning a reality TV show like the bachelor and Bucky is the newest contestant. But as the competition starts he realizes that he doesn’t like any of the girls…on the show anyway.
Pairing: Bucky x Reader (eventual)
Word Count: 3300
A/N: Wow! With this part that makes week 2, 300 words short of 10,000 words. It’s kind of crazy to think about. I’m sorry that you’ve had to wait so long for this, but there is a lot of setting up that I had to do through this chapter and you may or may not catch on to it, so it took me a little longer. I love you guys and Enjoy!
Warnings: Angst, Fluff, google translate
Tags: @fangirl1802, @seargantbcky, @lust-for-pan, @38leticia, @barnes-and-noble-girl, @karipaleta, @capandbuck, @camillechan, @findacauseandserveit, @audasia25, @kendallefire , @alicerozenju, @snuggleducky
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BUCKY’S POV
“So what happened on your date?” Y/N and I were sitting in my bed, eating whatever cereal I had in my cabinet and watching some rom com that was on TV. She had already told me everything that happened with Tony and how it was not a successful date and as much as I hated to think it, I was very happy to hear that her date had gone poorly. But following the talk of Tony, she became very insistent on knowing how my date went and I wasn't exactly sure why I didn't want to tell her that I really didn't like any of the girls.
“It was okay.”
“Okay?”
“Yeah.”
“And that's all you want to tell me?”
“She was great, beautiful and she knew all the right things to say to me.”
“But?”
“But she was as...normal as every other girl I’ve dated.”
“And?” I laughed at her, she just knew me so well.
“And when we kissed, there wasn't anything there.”
“So, much like my night.”
“Pretty much.”
“Well we tried, right?”
“Right.”
“Are you going to keep her on the show?”
“I guess I should for now.”
“Why?”
“Honestly I don't know. Would it be weird if I kicked her off even though I picked her for the one on one date?”
“Well if you know for sure you don't like her…”
“Yeah, I'm not sure. I'll have to wait and see how the group date goes.”
“That sounds...horrifying.”
“Yeah we’ll see.”
Despite how late it was, Y/N and I stayed up and talked for hours, forgetting all about the movie that we had started. I couldn't take my eyes off of her and the whole while I was thinking about what Wanda had said.
At some point in the night I felt her head hit my shoulder and when I moved, just the slightest, to look at her, I saw that she was fast asleep.
I let the back of my head fall back against the pillows, resting my cheek on her head and I let myself believe, for that night, that she was mine, that she wanted me just as much as I wanted her.
Y/N’S POV
I don’t know when I exactly fell asleep but when I woke up in the morning I definitely remembered where I had fallen asleep. I looked over at Bucky, whose chest I had been sleeping on, to see his blue eyes wide awake.
“I’m sorry, I didn't mean to fall asleep on you.”
“That’s okay, I enjoyed the company.”
“You don’t think that we could just skip today? You know just lay around and eat ice cream and watch movie musicals?” He just laughed at me.
“Movie musicals?”
“Don’t judge me.”
“I’m not, I like musicals.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever heard a guy say that before.”
“I’m a constant surprise.”
“Sounds about right.”
I laughed at him and then I heard my phone start to ring. I looked at the number to see that it was an international number coming from Moscow.
“Привет.” (Hello.)
“Является ли это Y/N Y/L/N?” (Is this Y/N Y/L/N?)
“Да” (Yes.)
“Речь идет о вашем отце.” (It’s about your father.)
“Он в порядке?” (Is he okay?) Bucky moved closer to me trying to listen in on my conversation, placing his ear right next to my phone.
“Он рухнул на работу и был Петровские Ворота медицинский центр.” (He collapsed at work and was taken to Petrovskie Vorota Medical Centre)
“Но он в порядке?” (But he is okay?)
“Да. Врачи хотели бы провести несколько тестов, но вскоре он должен вернуться домой.” (Yes.The doctors would like to conduct several tests, but he should return home soon.)
“Он бодрствует? Могу я поговорить с ним?” (Is he awake? Can I talk to him?)
“Он спит. Но он попросил меня сказать вам, что он не хочет, чтобы вы летели сюда.” (He's sleeping. But he asked me to tell you that he does not want you to fly here.)
“Он сказал, что?” (He said that?)
“Он сказал, что вам нужно быть на работе и что он в порядке.” (He said that you need to be at work and that he's fine.)
“Я останусь здесь, но ты скажешь ему позвонить мне, когда он уйдет?” (I'll stay here, but will you tell him to call me when he's discharged?)
“я буду.” (I will.)
“Спасибо.” (Thank you.)
“Хорошего дня.” (Have a nice day.)
“я попробую.” (I’ll try.)
I hung up the phone and took in a deep breath.
“Are you okay?”
“She said that he's okay.”
“But are you okay? You should go see him.” He stood up off the bed, moving to stand in front of me.
“No, if my dad said that he didn't want me to come, than it can't be serious.”
“But why would your dad tell you not to come?” I realized what I had done and had to come up with a quick excuse. I couldn’t exactly tell him the truth without telling him my biggest secret.
“The trip is long and I can’t leave the department without supervision, I would be out the rest of the week, maybe even longer. But he is also my father and he asked me to stay here, so I’m going to listen to him. You don’t have to understand but I have spent so much of my life without him and I’m not going to do anything to mess it up now.”
“You’re right I don’t understand, because I would do anything if I could see my father again. But unfortunately I don't have that luxury. You should—” At his words I stood up, trying to level to him as much as possible.
“You think that my father living in another country is a luxury?”
“That’s not what I meant. I just don’t think that you’re thinking straight.This is —”
“I have my reasons for not being able to see him, reasons that I haven't told you yet, reasons I haven't told anyone. And you know what? You've gotten closer to me than anyone has before, I opened up to you and right now you are judging me for something you know nothing about. I have never judged you about anything, I have always accepted you for what you are and right now I am accepting that you are a jerk.”
I grabbed my shoes off the floor by his bed and quickly left his apartment. I drove immediately to the studio and headed to the wardrobe room. Wanda was already there and could see the anger that was on my face, that being said, she didn’t say anything to me.
I honestly don’t know why I had gotten heated so fast, maybe because it was my dad he was talking about, but I just couldn’t understand why he would react the way he did. Then again, I did interrupt him...but it still didn’t give him the right to assume things about me.
I grabbed a spare piece of fabric and a whole bunch of grommets and headed back to my work table at the back of the room. I grabbed the speaker and plugged in my phone, playing the music as loud as I could and I just went after it. I had no reason to install grommets on this piece of fabric other than the fact that I got to hold a hammer and take out my frustration on making sure this piece of fabric had the most grommets of anything in this room.
I was pounding at the grommets and thinking about everything that had happened when I felt someone tap on my shoulder. I turned and saw Tony.
“Hey.” He started. 
“Hi.”
“Are you okay?”
“I’m sorry, I set grommets when I’m angry.”
“Well what did that piece of fabric do to get on your bad side?”
“You’re not funny.” I said, despite my threatening smile.
“What’s got you so upset?”
“Bucky.”
“Do I need to beat him up, because I will.”
“No, I’m afraid that I was wrong too. Not as wrong as he was but still...slightly wrong.” He laughed and grabbed my hand.
“What did he do?”
“My dad is in the hospital, he fell at work, but the nurse told me that he didn’t want me to come and visit. I told Bucky that I wasn’t going to go and see him and he said something that just made me so angry, I just got so defensive. He did something that I thought he would ever do.”
“What?”
“He judged me. The reason that what I have with Bucky works so well is because we don’t assume things about each other, we don’t judge each other. He doesn’t know what I have been through with my father and he assumed that he knew what I should do concerning my father.”
“I’m not saying that he was right to judge you, but I can also see where he is coming from.”
“You’re not supposed to have his side.”
“Well, this may not be something you want to hear but you’re judging him right now. And I think that that is why you’re in here pounding at grommets.”
“How am I judging him?”
“Because as you have pointed out, he has no idea what happened with your father, but you have no idea what happened with his.”
“But I—”
“I think the more important question here is what were you doing with Bucky so early in the morning.”
“Not what you’re thinking. But why are you here, I’m sure it wasn’t to come and stop me from installing unnecessary grommets on things.”
“No, Bucky has his group date today and I am doing some follow up tests on his arm. I just thought that I would stop by and see you before I went searching for him.”
“Well thank you for stopping by, but it sounds like you have something to do.” I started to walk away from him, but he grabbed my hand and pulled me along as he went in search of Bucky.
BUCKY’S POV
I don’t know how I let her walk away from me this morning and if I didn’t feel guilty as hell for it.
After Y/N had left I headed for the studio, meeting up with Steve, so that he could help me go over everything for tonight.
“Hey man.” Steve said, walking over to where I was working.
“Hey.” I said standoffish.
“Wow, what happened to you?”
“Nothing.”
��It doesn’t sound like nothing.”
“I hurt Y/N. She’s mad at me.”
“What did you do?”
“I just said something stupid.”
“Sounds like something you would do.”
“Well thank you for taking her side.”
“Well maybe you should invite her to go bowling with us tonight.”
“I can’t invite her, I’m supposed to be on a date with 11 other girls. If Y/N came I would end up talking to her all night.”
“And that’s a bad thing?”
“She wouldn’t be up for it.”
“You didn’t ask her.”
“And I’m not going to.”
“You are making this so much harder than it has to be.”
“You know I asked you and Peggy to come tonight because I feel out of my comfort zone. I would really like for you to be there, but don’t make me regret asking you.”
“I just want you to be happy and I can see that you are when you’re with Y/N.”
“Things are more complicated than that.”
“Bucky I have to tell you something, it’s about—” We heard voices coming up behind us and turned to see Tony and Y/N walking towards us.
“Hey there, look who I found.” Tony said. “I believe I’m here to check your arm out before your date..s.”
“Yes.” I sat down in the chair closest to me and he placed his bag of tools on the table. He started to dig through the wires that made up my arm and I looked at Y/N for the first time.
“I’m sorry.” I said to her. “I shouldn’t have said that about your dad.”
“I’m sorry too. I didn’t mean to blow up at you.”
“Then I guess we were both wrong.” I smiled at her. 
“Well you won’t hear me say it.” We both just laughed at each other. “But yes.”
“Well Stevie, I think we are needed...anywhere else but here.” Steve and Tony left the two of us to talk.
“So…”
“When I was eight, my mom died. My dad sent me to America to tell my mother’s family that she had passed. He was going to come with me but he couldn’t figure out his passport, so he sent me anyway saying that he would meet up with me in a few days. Once I was in America though, they didn’t let me go back. I didn’t see him again for eight years and I have only seen him in person twice since then. It’s not that I don’t want to see my father, it’s that I don’t want to mess up what we do have, I value it too much.”
“I didn’t mean what I said, about it being a luxury that your dad was alive. I think I’m just still so angry at what happened to my dad that I lashed out at you. My dad died when I was 12, he was hit by a drunk driver and he died instantly, they didn’t even try to save him. The driver was brought to the hospital and went through surgery and he lived. He only went to county jail for a year...that was his sentence for killing someone.”
“Bucky, I’m so sorry.”
“I just don’t want you to regret anything with your father, that’s why I was so mean to you.”
“I’ll call the clinic again and if he isn’t released I’ll go see him.”
“Good.”
“And let’s not do that again.”
“What?”
“Argue.”
“I can’t guarantee that, I may be wrong a lot but I’m not known for going down without a fight.”
“Oh? You’re a big softie.”
“What did I tell you about telling my secrets?”
“Shut up.” I stood from my chair and wrapped her in my arms, hugging her as tight to me as I could. “Well you better get going if you’re going to get to your date on time.”
“Yeah. I’ll see you around Y/N.”
“See you.” And then she left.
Y/N’S POV
I walked away from Bucky and back over to Tony, grabbed his hand and walked away from Steve before I asked him anything.
“There is something that I need to ask you about. I was going to text you but then you showed up and the whole thing with Bucky...”
“What?”
“I saw the news this morning.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah. Do they know that it was me? I mean I liked going out with you but I value my privacy and you did say that they’re wouldn't be any paparazzi at the event.”
“My PR team doesn't think that they know who you are. I told them to handle it though and they’re pretty good at making things disappear especially when it comes to me.”
“Well just to be on the safe side, I know that you can work magic with technology.”
“And?”
“I need you to change my phone number and let everyone know in my contacts list that I changed it.”
“Wait, you want to change your phone number? I can make sure that no one finds out about the two of us if that’s what you’re concerned about.” He looked really upset.
“Tony, this isn’t about you. I like you, you’re great company. I’m just not looking to be found...by someone.”
“Are you in trouble?”
“No, I just don’t want my past catching up to me. Please, will you do me this favor?”
“Fine, but you owe me a dinner.”
“Fine, dinner.”
“But I’m paying.”
“What?”
“I never make a lady pay.” He grabbed my phone out of my hands and we walked back to the wardrobe room where he hooked my phone up to the desktop in there and went to work.
BUCKY’S POV
The group date actually was not as bad as I thought it was going to be. The girls were very competitive, as expected, but having Steve and Peggy there made things immeasurably easier. It also showed which of the girls were genuine because these were my two best friends and their presence in my life was non-negotiable. So anyone who did not get along with them automatically made it on my possible elimination list.
All throughout the games I made my way around to talk to the girls, pausing every so often to play a few throws with Steve and Peggy. It was kind of crazy how the girls fought over my attention, it wasn’t nearly as bad as the first night I had met them, where they literally stole me away from other girls, but it was mostly as bad. But as I promised, when the competition was over, the winner of the overall bowling games, we played three games and averaged the scores, won a one-on-one date with me.
So later that night, I took Ulani out to a nice restaurant where we simply ate dinner and enjoyed drinks on the rooftop. Ulani was super nice and beautiful, like most of the girls, but unlike the other girls she was different and it was refreshing. She was a former model, to pay off school loans, turned astrophysicist and believe it or not we actually talked about space for hours, while looking at the barely visible stars.
And I had to admit that it was really nice to talk to someone about it again. I really missed it. No one ever brought up my time training to be an astronaut because they thought that they would hurt my feelings. And when Ulani did there was no hesitation, she was excited to talk to me about it, seeing as I was probably one of the only people to fully understand her. The only thing that would have made me feel better was if we had had the chance to talk about my arm.
So far none of the girls had brought it up, I knew that they could see it but the fact that no one had the courage to ask me about it brought my head back to Y/N.
So yeah, Ulani was good and I wanted to see more of her.
The following day I met up with Y/N and I followed her around as she worked, talking to her about the girls and getting her opinion on who I should keep on the show. She seemed to like what I told her about Ulani and we ended up keeping Layla, my first one-on-one date, in because they’re had been three girls that I had already wanted to get rid of because of how rude they had been to Steve and Peggy.
Of course, when it came time to announce who was leaving, I didn’t tell them the reason that they were being kicked off but I did hope that they caught on. And like she always was, Y/N was there for me.
When I got home that night I saw that I had a text from Steve, which reminded me that he was trying to tell me something before Tony showed up.
STEVE: How did it go?
BUCKY: Good. Earlier, what did you want to tell me?
STEVE: Nothing, it was nothing.
Little did I know that he actually had a big secret that he was trying to tell me.
PART FIVE 
Tell Me What You Think
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A Little Too Real (4)
Part 1, Part 2, Part 3
Summary: RealityTV!AU- You are a wardrobe supervisor for a popular TV network. The show is planning a reality TV show like the bachelor and Bucky is the newest contestant. But as the competition starts he realizes that he doesn’t like any of the girls…on the show anyway.
Pairing: Bucky x Reader (eventual)
Word Count: 6360 (i give up on trying to make these chapters short)
A/N: So this is sort of the first part of this, meaning that there will be a 4.5 coming soon because I just wanted to get this out to you guys and this “week” isn’t technically over, that and we won’t know what happened with Bucky. I also apologize for being so stupid lately. This past week has been weirdly rough for me and I don’t really understand this funk that I’m in. I’m working on a lot of things but nothing really feels good enough, I’m feeling really down, so I’m sorry. I hope this part is good and enjoy
Warnings: angst, fluff, kissing
Tags: @fangirl1802, @seargantbcky, @lust-for-pan, @38leticia, @barnes-and-noble-girl, @karipaleta, @capandbuck, @camillechan, @findacauseandserveit, @audasia25, @kendallefire , @alicerozenju
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WEEK 2
Y/N’S POV
The following week was when we started filming the actual dates. Bucky and I spent another night together where we went over his wardrobe for the dates, figuring that this may be something that we do for every week of filming.
The following morning, I was about to head over to the studio to get some work done when I got a call from Bucky.
“Hey, Bucky.”
“Hey, Doll. You haven’t left for the studio have you?”
“I’m about to walk out the door, why?”
“I need your help.”
“This isn't another wardrobe question is it, because I actually—”
“Y/N please.” Then I heard a painful groan on the other end.
“Bucky?” I heard no response. “Bucky?!” I said louder, but heard no response. “Bucky I'm on my way.”
I drove like a crazy woman to get to Bucky's apartment and was surprised to find the door unlocked. I immediately walked in and saw Bucky lying on the floor in his living room.
Seeing him lying there made my stomach drop and for a second I stood too stunned to move.
“Y/N?” I heard him call out.
“Bucky?” I ran over to where he was and looked at him and was surprised to see that he actually looked okay.
“My arm—”
“What happened? Are you okay? Do I need to call for an ambulance.”
“No, no. I called Tony, my arm...something's wrong.”
“What can I do?”
“I need to get to my room, without moving my arm.”
“I'm not sure—”
“I'll have to move it to stand up, which will be incredibly painful, but I need you to help me after that.”
“Okay, what do you need me to do?”
“I'm going to put my arm at a 90 degree angle and then I need to get into a sitting position. From there we can try and stand me up.”
“Okay.”
“So get behind me and you're going to prop me up by pushing on my right shoulder. It's going to have to happen fast and I'm hoping that it won't hurt too bad.”
“Just tell me when to go.”
“I’ll count to three and you go on three. By the time I get to your count my arm should be good.”
“Okay.”
“Okay.”
“Take a deep breath. It's going to be okay.” I said, I could tell now that he was not looking forward to the pain.
“Thank you for coming.”
“Of course.”
He took in a deep breath and started to count.
“One,” he moved his arm as he said, “two,” and then looked at at me as he said, “three.” My hands pushed up on his shoulder, sitting him up. He tried to hold back the sounds but the pain got too bad and he let out a loud groan, mixed in with a few choice curse words.
“I'm so sorry.” I said.
“It's okay, it's okay.” He was breathing heavy and I just sat next to him as he took a few minutes to recover. “God that hurt.”
“Are you okay?”
“I will be, I just need to get it propped up, I need to take the pressure off the joint, the ligaments that are still attached to my clavicle are being overworked. I don't want them to tear.”
“What happens if they tear?”
“My real clavicle won't be attached to my fake humerus, causing a lot of pain and no way for my arm to be operational.”
“Okay, so very important.”
“Yes, very important.”
“What's next?”
“I just need to stand up. So you're just going to push my right shoulder again, maybe my lower back and I will keep my feet from sliding.”
“Okay.”
“On three.” He counted down again and on three I pushed on his shoulder and he moved his legs until he was standing.
He took a minute and he steadied himself. He didn't seem to be in any pain this time, which made me feel better.
“Let's get you to your room.”
“Yeah.” He started walking and he held his arm as I followed behind him. He walked over to the left side of the bed and I pulled back the blankets so that he could slide in. I grabbed a pillow from the other side of the bed and he slowly slide into the position he wanted to sit in before I carefully put the pillow under his arm.
With the pressure lifted off of his shoulder, I could see him relax and fall further into the bed. I sat down on the right side of the bed, watching him closely.
“Are you okay?” I asked.
“I’m much better now, thank you for coming.”
“It's no problem. But what happened, why are you in so much pain?”
“Over the weekend Tony and I started working on the next development for the arm.”
“Which is?”
“Feeling. We wanted to try and create artificial nerves that could connect to the real ones and help with adding feeling. We thought we had something and I insisted that I try it out. Obviously it backfired.”
“This is just a setback, you'll get it next time.”
“You think so?”
“I think you're smart enough to do anything.”
“Thanks.”
“But I was also wondering, why did you call me?”
“Well I was sitting on the couch and I was thinking about the show and all of the sudden I just started having this terrible pain in my arm. I started to panic because it just kept getting worse and then I thought that if I could just get somewhere and lay flat that it would be better. So that's how I ended up on the floor, but the whole time I was freaking out I just knew that if you were here that you would help me and would keep me calm, I just wanted you to be here. So I called Tony and asked him to come over and then I called you.”
“I'm always here to help, always.”
“Thank you.”
“So what are you going to do now?”
“Well I'm going to remove the newest updates and reset the arms software and hopefully it'll start moving again.”
“Doesn't sound too hard.”
“It isn't, I just wish that it had worked.”
“Me too.”
We both heard the front door open and I moved off the bed to go for the door when, I'm assuming, Tony walked in.
To be completely honest, he was very attractive. I had seen pictures of him but it was nothing compared to what he was like in person. He immediately walked over to Bucky's side of the bed, setting a bag full of tools beside him.
“Hey, Barnes. What seems to be the problem?”
“I can’t move my arm without being in immense pain?”
“Just a small a problem.” I said sarcastically, trying to lighten the mood.
“Right.” Tony replied with a chuckle. “Has it been acting up lately, have you noticed any sparking, or anything out of the ordinary?”
“Anything out of the ordinary...besides the metallic nature of it?”
“What is wrong with you all the sudden? I swear like ten seconds ago she was looking at me like I was a wounded puppy.” Bucky said to Tony, laughing at my sudden change. Tony reached for a tool and moved to start opening the panels on the outside of the arm so that he could get inside.
“Sorry, I get sassy when I’m nervous.”
“Nervous?” Tony asked.
“It’s not everyday I meet a billionaire.”
“Tony Stark.” He introduced, dropping the tool and sticking his hand out for me to shake. I took it.
“Y/N Y/L/N.”
“You’re not on the show, are you?”
“No, why?”
“Because you’re too good to be on reality TV.” I tried not to smile at him, but he was charming.
“No, I just work for it.” Both Bucky and Tony laughed.
He picked the tool back up and started removing the wires that had been causing Bucky pain. I ended up moving a lot closer to Bucky so that I could watch what Tony was doing and the whole time he was working, Tony very openly flirted with me. He also explained how some of this stuff worked and how they started building it in the first place.
But if I was being more honest...talking to Tony was nothing like talking to Bucky. He was a nice distraction though and with him around it was easier to hide my feelings, easier to shove them down. At first I was okay with the idea that Tony was a distraction but then it dawned on me...what if every other man I talked to never compared to Bucky, what if every other man was just a distraction?
I quickly shook the thought from my head and when Tony was done getting Bucky’s arm fixed, I offered to show him out.
“You know, I thought that I had met all of Bucky’s friends but now that I've met you, I find that you are the most interesting.”
“That's because I'm new.”
“New can be good.”
“Can be?”
“I want to take you out.”
“Out?”
“To this thing I have tonight.”
“What kind of thing?”
“A formal, black tie kind of thing.”
“Really?”
“My PR guy said that it would be smart to bring someone with me to this thing, if I don't pick one he usually grabs some random girl off the street, shoves her in a dress, and throw her over my arm. Now that I've met you, a wonderful woman I can have an actual conversation with, I would really like to take you.”
“This isn't a PR stunt is it?”
“No. Believe me, if I didn't have to go to this thing I would just invite you back to my place, order a pizza and watch some random movie that I haven't already watched on Netflix.”
“You really want me to go?”
“You would make my night significantly less miserable.”
“Well how could I say no?”
“That's the spirit! I know it's last minute but if you need anything—”
“I have a dress.”
“Really?”
“I'm in wardrobe, of course I have a dress.”
“Okay, where can I pick you up?”
“Well I was supposed to be at the studio about an hour and a half ago so I'll be in the wardrobe room.”
“Then I'll pick you up from there.”
“Sounds good.”
“Great, I'll see you tonight.”
“See you tonight.”
I closed the door behind him and went back to Bucky's bedroom. He just looked at me as I walked in the room, trying to hide my smile.
“How are you feeling?” I asked.
“A lot better. My arm should be fine for filming tonight, we’ll see.”
“That's good.”
“You know, I really appreciate the fact that you came to last weeks filming because I know that that is not part of your job, but either way I'm going to miss you tonight.”
“I—”
“He asked you out. You should go out and have a good time. I have a date tonight, you don't need to watch that.”
“But you'll text me if you need to talk to me...right?”
“Of course.”
“So...do you want a ride to the studio?”
“That would be great.”
“And you're sure you're okay?”
“I promise and the sling should help if there's any more pain in my shoulder.”
“Okay. But we've got to make a stop first.”
“Coffee?”
“Okay, two stops.”
“What's the first one?”
“My apartment.”
“Ooh the mysterious home of Y/N Y/L/N.”
“There nothing too special about my apartment, but I would like to keep where I live a secret. I don't just take anyone to my apartment.”
“Are you implying that I am special?” He said with a smirk on his face.
“Well you're some type of special.” I murmured under my breath, but he heard me. He started with a shocked face but then started to laugh, which made me laugh.
I drove up to my complex which was a lot nicer than what he was probably thinking. You had to type in a code to get through the gate and the security guard, Clyde, always made sure that no one followed in behind me. He did ask about Bucky but I told him that we worked together and that I was giving him a ride into work.
I pulled up to my building, the one furthest from the front gate and parked in my spot.
“So what are we stopping here for?”
“Tony wants to take me to this event he has going on tonight, it's super fancy apparently. I have a dress here and I'm already late for work so I know they're not going to let me go early to get ready for a date.” We walked up the staircase to the second floor, walking down the hall until we stopped at my door.
“Don't you work for yourself?”
“I still work for the network and have things to do.” I grabbed my keys and put it in the lock.
“So what does your dress look like?”
“Wouldn't you like to know.” I opened the door and let him in behind me. “Just give me a minute.”
I walked into my bedroom and over to my closet, shoving clothes out of the way until I got to the very back where I saw the two garment bags hanging. I grabbed the smaller of the two and laid the bag on the bed before I started digging through the shoes on the floor of my closet for the pair I wanted to wear.
As soon as I found what I was looking for I grabbed the shoes and my garment bag and headed back out to my living room. Bucky was roaming around the space looking at the few things that I had.
“Have you eaten?” I asked.
“No but you offered to stop for coffee.”
“Cofree is not breakfast.”
“But the bagel shop right next door to my favorite coffee shop is.”
“And where would that be?”
“I'll take you there.” He started walking out of the room and I quickly followed behind him, locking my door as we went.
“No. Let's not forget about what just happened with your arm. You can tell me where it is.” He stopped and turned to look at me as I rushed to keep up with him.
“You are no fun.”
“Well you know where I live so you can tell me where your favorite coffee shop is.” We walked back to my car and climbed in. I started the car but waited for him to give me directions.
“Fine but only if you let me buy the coffee and the bagels.” I started to drive out of the complex.
“How does that math work out?” He gestured where to turn as we spoke.
“I let you drive and I reward the help with food and drink.”
“I could just pay for myself.”
“Or because you are so late for work and you helped me out and I’m trying to be generous, you could let me pay.”
“You really want to pay that bad.”
“I’m all about even exchanges. My parents were married...almost twenty years but they were friends since they were young. They always had this thing that they did, where one would do something for the other and the other would return it. It gave them countless excuses to do things for each other and I grew up seeing the love that they shared for each other. I mean, even if they were arguing my dad would bring my mom flowers because she had ironed a pair of his pants the morning before the fight. I know that were not like them, but you're still my friend and I will always believe they had the best relationship. Which means that when you do things for me, I will do things for you, the best relationships that I've had work best when it's give and take for both people. I don't expect you to do the same because I know it’s just sort of a habit that I’ve acquired from watching my parents and now that I’ve said this out loud it sounds like I’m trying to get even with you.”
“No, it doesn't sound like that. It’s actually really sweet, I wish that I had some more memories of my parents. But I like the idea of it all, it seems like a really great way to communicate with each other.”
“I think so too. I mean we’ve just had a whole conversation because I wanted to buy you coffee. Turn here, it's right around the corner.”
“A pretty good conversation.”
“Yeah.”
So I pulled into the parking lot and he bought me coffee and we ate our bagels before we finally headed into the studio. He walked me to the wardrobe room and I asked him to swing by later before Tony was supposed to pick me up and I said that I would help him prepare for his solo date tonight. And then I got to work.
Wanda had a few questions about why I was late but I promised to tell her later. So after a couple of hours I headed over to the hair and makeup trailer and begged them to help me out since this was a date with a billionaire and I had no idea what I was doing.
So when it was about an hour and a half before Tony was supposed to pick me up, I had to convince myself to put the rest of my work aside until tomorrow and headed over to the trailer. Wanda sat by my side while they did everything and I asked her to hold off on the twenty questions until we could be alone.
And as soon as we got back to the wardrobe room she was all over me. I could barely get in a word until I begged her to let me explain. I told her everything. At first she didn't believe what I said about his arm, then again she didn't spend a lot of time with him, but she came around and was surprised to hear that I was going on a date with Tony.
“So you're going on a date with Tony?”
“Yes.”
“I thought we were talking about James.”
“James is just my friend.”
“You can keep lying to yourself.” She whispered under her breath.
“Wanda, I have the chance to have a really good date tonight. I haven't been on a date in what feels like years. When I talked to him it was easy and he's funny and charming. Buck—James has made it clear that we are nothing more than friends. So why should I believe that there is something there when we both know there's not.”
“Have you given him a chance?”
“Have I given him a chance? Why would I give him a chance? We don't like each other like that. I value his friendship, he is a good person, someone that I want to have in my life. But not as anything more than a friend.”
“I'm just trying to look out for you.”
“By trying to convince me that I like someone that I don't?”
“I've heard things about Tony and he's constantly in the limelight...I can see that you're excited for this date but I just want you to be careful.”
“I know...but it's not like I'm running to the paparazzi.”
“It may not seem like that right now, but an “event” with Tony Stark is bound to have photographers.”
“And?”
“And you know.”
“I should have never told you.” I murmured.
“Really, that's what you think?”
“I'm grateful for you, for watching my back. You've been here for me but I'm not going to hide from them for forever, I don't want to hide forever.”
“And you think that you want to unhide yourself because of Tony?”
“I don't know, that's why I agreed to the date.”
“You know, you can lie to me all you want about not liking James but I can see it. I can see the way that you two look at each other and I don't believe for one second that you don't feel something for him. Not to mention the fact that he is a much safer option considering he is on a TV show to fall in love with someone else.”
“Yeah and him being a reality TV star who is supposed to be in love with another woman is supposed to help me how? Because if I wanted to, I could date him in secret without anyone knowing? What about the fact that I would hate having to see him with other women? But what you don't seem to understand is that James is my friend...friend and I like being friends with him. So yeah, if I want to date Tony I will, and if they come, I'll be waiting.”
BUCKY’S POV
I was actually pretty excited for this date tonight, surprisingly enough. I had just finished setting up the date and made my way over to the wardrobe room. I was about to walk in when I heard Y/N talking to someone.
“But what you don't seem to understand is that James is my friend...friend and I like being friends with him. So yeah, if I want to date Tony I will, and if they come, I'll be waiting.”
I turned back around and knocked on the door, stopping their conversation.
I walked into the room to see Wanda messing with some papers on the desk and Y/N had her garment bag in her arms.
“Hey.” I said.
“Hey. I was just about to change.”
“I don't suppose I could join you?” I said mockingly. She looked over at Wanda before she spoke but looked at me when she did.
“Your suit is already hanging up behind the curtain.” She smiled and gestured to the fitting room and I walked in behind the curtain, pulling it shut behind me. Then I remembered that my arm hadn’t rebooted yet.
“Hey, Y/N. Can you come help me?”
“Yeah, what’s wrong?” She peeked her head in.
“My arm hasn’t rebooted yet and it’s been years since I got dressed with one arm.”
“Oh sure, I can help.” She grabbed the white dress shirt and held it out for me to put my arms through. I got my right arm through and tried to bend my left arm, but it wouldn’t bend right, without causing some pain.“Let’s get the left one in first.” She suggested and adjusted the shirt so that my left arm would go in first. She moved around to the front of me and started to button the shirt. “You know it’s been a while since I dressed anyone.”
“Well I couldn’t tell.” She handed me my pants when she was done, I removed my jeans, and pulled the dress slacks up to my waist. “If you could just keep the pants at my waist...” She put her hands on my waist and I quickly did the button and zipped them up.
“I’m impressed. I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone do their pants up with one hand.”
“Why are you looking down there?” I teased.
“Let’s remember that you’re the one who asked for my help.” I laughed at her and she tied the tie around my neck before she helped me into my jacket. Thinking I was done she went out to grab her dress and I put my socks and shoes on and was about to ask her to help me tie them but I heard her talking to Wanda. I put on my sling extra slow.
“I am done talking about this. I want to have fun tonight. And I don’t want to talk about them again. I’m done with them.” Y/N whispered. She didn’t seem angry she seemed...desperate.”
“Go on your date...but if he does anything to hurt you—”
“I know.” She laughed. “I’ll be careful.”
“Good.”
I stepped out from behind the curtain. “Sorry I forgot about the shoes.” I said.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to leave before you were done.”
“It’s okay. I’ve gotten used to just using elastic laces but these shoes are new.”
“You used to use elastic laces in your shoes?”
“It was the only way I could get away with not tying my shoes.”
“You don’t have to explain that to me, I think elastic laces are miracles for shoes.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, all of the shoes that we use for quick changes have elastic laces.”
“That’s cool.” She stood up after she was done tying my shoes.
“You look good.” She said.
“Thank you, I couldn’t have done it without you.”
“You, but it was nice to be asked.” She smiled again but tried to hide it as she picked up the garment bag. “Now it’s my turn.” She went behind the curtain and started to change, asking Wanda to come in and zip her up when she was ready.
But I wasn’t ready when she came out…
“Wow...I—you—I mean—”
“I think that's the first time I've ever made you speechless.” She smiled.
“You look beautiful—stunning.” I finally spoke. She was wearing this beautiful half navy, half cream dress with some beading around her waist.
“Thank you.” She turned to look at herself in the mirror when I saw something that interested me.
“You have a tattoo?” I asked, referring to the words running vertically down the left side of her back. I could make out a few words, but the rest were hidden underneath her dress.
“I have three actually.” She looked back at me with a smirk on her face.
“Three?”
“Yeah, one here on my wrist,” she held out her right hand, a semicolon, “and one behind my ear,” there was a pair of vintage scissors behind her right ear, “and the one on my left side, closest to my heart.”
“What is that one?”
“You know Russian.”
“Yes, but I can only see the first three words.”
“And the other ones are a little more private.”
“Private? Why?”
“Because you would have to get me naked to see them.” I don't know if my jaw hit the floor but if not I definitely felt like a deer caught in the headlights. “That or you would have to see me in a swimsuit.” She laughed at me and turned back to the mirror. “Anyway, I'm glad you like the dress. I wasn't so sure about wearing it, but with the late notice I had to chose between this and the overly fancy one.”
“No this one is good, it looks good. Why weren't you sure?”
“Well it's a little personal...I guess. I made it and the beading was something that my mom was working on right before she died.”
“You made this?” My hand reached out to touch the fabric, feeling how smooth it was.
“Yeah, I had to make a lot of things in school this was one project.”
“It's beautiful.”
“Thank you.”
“You know I used to have a tattoo.”
“Really?”
“Yeah...before the accident.”
“What was it of?” She didn't even bat an eye when I brought it up, she never did. Other people did.
“It's pretty nerdy.”
“Well I have never doubted your nerdiness.”
“When I first started working for Roscosmos, I helped build a new satellite that ended up taking this stunning photo of space, so I had it tattooed on my bicep.”
“Oh my god.”
“What?”
She just started laughing. “That is the nerdiest thing I've ever heard.”
“I'm going to show you the picture and then you'll understand.”
“No I understand, I'm sure it was beautiful and in all seriousness, if you want I can take you to my artist, she’s really good. She may think that a tattoo of a galaxy is insane but she'll do it.”
“I may take you up on that sometime.”
“I will warn her ahead of time.”
“Yeah that may be a good idea, my guy wasn't too thrilled about it when I asked him to do it. But then again he was a very angry Russian man.”
“Sounds about right.” We both laughed.
“Anyway, are you ready for your date?”
“It's been a long time since I was on a date...so I hope so.”
“You'll be fine, just be yourself.”
“If I'm taking your advice, you have to too.”
“I would be an idiot to doubt you now, even if it is my own advice.”
“Like I said—”
“You don't have the constitution to be wrong. I know.” We heard some rustling coming from over on the table and saw Wanda doing some work. Honestly I had forgotten that she was even in the room.
“Wanda what do you think?” Y/N asked.
“Do you really want me to tell you two what I think?”
“About the dress.” She corrected.
“The dress is great.”
“That's all I need to hear.”
“So when does Tony get here?” I interrupted, trying to erase the tension in the room.
“He should be here soon.”
It was a couple of minutes later before we heard a knock on the door and one of the show’s PAs poked her head in.
“I have Tony Stark for you?” She said.
“Yeah, send him in.” Tony walked in wearing a, most likely, expensive black tuxedo. He was wearing a million dollar smile and I would be lying if I said I wasn’t a little jealous that he was the reason for her smile.
“You look beautiful.” He said.
“Thank you.”
“Are you ready to go?”
“I am.” She turned to look at me before she went. “Have fun on your date tonight.”
“You too.”
They walked out arm in arm and I stared at them the whole way.
“You guys are so bad at hiding it.”
“Hiding what?”
“The fact that you are totally in love with each other.”
“I—We are—How did you know?” I caved.
“So you are in love with her?”
“I wouldn’t say love, but there’s something different about her. I don’t feel the same things about the other girls that I do when I’m with Y/N and I don’t know what that means.”
“Sounds like love.”
She grabbed her things off the table and left the room, leaving me very confused about what I was actually feeling for Y/N.
Y/N’S POV
We left the studio, in a limo...a limo, and his driver took us to one of the most extravagant hotels in LA. I had to remind myself not to look so stunned because everyone else there had probably been to events just like this before, but sometimes I couldn’t help it.
“I think that this is the most beautiful place I have ever stepped foot in.” I whispered to Tony.
“Well it’s nice, not the most beautiful thing I have seen tonight.” I looked at him and tried my hardest to hide my blush when I saw that he was talking about me.
“You are one smooth talker.”
“Thank you, it is my only skill.”
“You’re such a liar.”
“I'm trying not to be too egotistical on the first date.”
“I see.” I laughed as he showed me to our table.
The table was made up of complete strangers but Tony made sure to introduce me to everyone and we managed some good conversations. He asked me to dance a few times and we told each other things that you would tell someone on a first date. But overall Tony’s company was good and different. I loved spending time with him and he knew how to make me smile and laugh. There was only one problem…
“You ready to get out of here?” I looked around the room to see that some people were beginning to leave.
“Yeah.” He grabbed my hand and led me outside where we waited for our driver to pull up. “Tony, I had a lot of fun tonight. I was so scared that I was going to mess this up, but you proved me wrong.” He stepped closer to me wrapping his arms around my waist and I wrapped my arms around his neck.
“Well, I’m really glad that you had a good time. I was nervous to bring you to this event, just because sometimes these things can be really boring and—”
“It wasn’t.”
“Good.” Taking advantage of how close we were he leaned down and kissed me. But before I had a second to process he pulled away and opened the door to the limo for me. I slid in first and he moved in after me.
“Um...can we try that again?”
“Yeah.” He slowly moved closer to me and this time I took in everything that happened. The look in his eyes was one of excitement, his hands were soft, holding my face close to his, and his lips...definitely knew what they were doing. But there was still one problem...  
We pulled away and stared at each other, trying to find words.
“You can be honest.” He started. But the look in his eyes told me that he was feeling the same way that I was.
“No.” I said.
“Yeah.” He agreed.
“I mean it was a good kiss.”
“Yeah a great kiss.”
“But…” But I was thinking about Bucky the whole time? I couldn’t say that.
“Nothing.” We both said, we laughed at each other.
“But I have really liked hanging out with you and I would love to see more of you.” He said.
‘I would like that. It’s too bad though.”
“What?”
“That I wasted this beautiful dress on you.” He laughed out loud at me.
“Yeah what a shame.” We both laughed at each other, but he stopped, looking like he was trying to come to terms with something. “I have something to ask you, it’s kind of been stuck in my head and now that we kind of agreed on this not being something, I really want to ask.” I was hoping that he wouldn’t ask what I’m pretty sure he was going to ask, but… “So uh...what’s up with you and Barnes?” I just chuckled at him.
“There’s nothing going on with Bucky and I.”
“But he lets you call him Bucky?”
“Yes.”
“Interesting.”
“What?”
“It’s just that the only other person I’ve ever heard call him that was Steve and Luna.”
“And?” I was still pretty amused by his accusations.
“He’s known Steve practically since birth and Luna is a little kid.”
“I’m sure he let’s you call him Bucky.”
“Nope.”
“Well you guys work together.”
“And you don’t?” I tried to say something in return, but stopped myself. “You can be honest with me. I won’t tell him.” What could be the harm? He was no Wanda and I believed he would keep my secret.
“Yes...okay, I like him. I have pushed my feelings so far down because he’s on the show to find the love of his life and he’s made it clear that we are friends.”
“It’s not very clear to me that you two are friends.”
“What do you mean?”
“The flirting and the way that you two look at each other when the other isn’t looking. That’s why this, between us was never going to go anywhere. I thought that I would give it a try at the least but after that kiss…” He looked at me like he could have only told from the kiss.
“Hey you said the kiss was good.”
“The kiss was good, but it was just good.”
“Yeah.”
“I want to be honest with you and I don’t want you to freak out when I tell you this, but I miss my wife.”
“You’re married?”
“Separated.”
“Oh.”
“You were the only women that I’ve been attracted to since the separation was legalized and I can’t stop thinking about her. I really wanted this to be something, I wanted to prove to myself that I could get over her. But I don’t know if I ever will and I’m sorry if this makes it seem like I used you. But if it’s any consolation I have actually enjoyed myself tonight.”
“Well I would have to apologize too, because I think I sort of did the same thing, but to get Bucky off of my mind...not your wife.” He laughed at me and it was like the air cleared. “You should win her back.”
“What?”
“Win her back. If you still love her, fight for her. Show her how much you still love her.”
“I think it’s probably too late.”
“I don’t think it could ever be too late if you still love her.”
“You think?”
“You just have to be willing to fight for her.”
“You have to be willing to fight for him too.”
“It’s different with him, he doesn’t feel the same way. He’s got fifteen girls trying to catch his eye and I would rather not get into an actual fight over him. Those girls are ruthless.”
“Yeah, well, you’ve already caught his eye, so you’re a little ways ahead of them.”
“You're wrong.”
“No I’m not, you just don’t believe me.”
And like the gentleman he was, he dropped me off at home, making sure that I got in safe and then he left. I walked to my room and changed out of my dress and I looked at my phone for the first time.
I had a few missed texts from Wanda asking me to text her when I got home and one text from Bucky asking how my date went. I thought about everything that I talked with Tony about and opened up my phone to respond.
Y/N: Can I come over?
Bucky: Sure.
PART FOUR.FIVE 
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Text
A Little Too Real (3)
Part 1, Part 2
Summary: RealityTV!AU- You are a wardrobe supervisor for a popular TV network. The show is planning a reality TV show like the bachelor and Bucky is the newest contestant. But as the competition starts he realizes that he doesn’t like any of the girls…on the show anyway.
Pairing: Bucky x Reader (eventual)
Word Count: 5583 (eek)
A/N: So this is long over due, but I DID IT! I'm hoping that getting this out will get me back into the swing of things for the summer. Thank you guys for being so patient with me and I really hope that you guys will stick around now that I'm back from my mini hiatus. I'm really excited to come back and feel free to send me comments and feedback and requests. Also I'm sorry for the length, I thought I had been done but then I thought of the angst and I couldn't not do it, the plot must go on. I'm just hoping the length will tide you over until I'm finished with the next chapter of something (I have a few things going). I love you guys and your support over the past few weeks has been astounding, I appreciate it so much. (Y/F/S/D-Your favorite Starbucks Drink)
Warnings: Fluff, Angst
Tags: @fangirl1802, @seargantbcky, @lust-for-pan, @38leticia, @barnes-and-noble-girl, @karipaleta, @capandbuck, @camillechan, @findacauseandserveit, @audasia25, @kendallefire 
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EPISODE ONE
BUCKY’S POV
To say that I was nervous was an understatement. Instead of waiting around my apartment though I decided to spend the day in the wardrobe room with Y/N. So I quickly got ready, not really doing anything because I knew that the makeup and hair teams would have their way with me later. Then I stopped in at Starbucks grabbing the most caffeinated drink they had for me and a Y/F/S/D for Y/N.
As I walked into the room someone was walking out and almost ran into me. I swerved out of the way as she kept walking and texting on her phone, completely ignoring me. I walked over to Y/N whose head was resting on her work station, looking defeated after her visit from whoever that woman was.
“Hey Doll, don’t look so upset to see me.”
She picked up her head and looked at me. Her face automatically broke into a smile and her eyes immediately to the coffee.
“Is that for me?”
“No, I thought I would just buy it and tease you with it.” She rolled her eyes at me and reached out for the cup. I smiled at her and came to sit at the chair next to her, putting the cup in her hands. “So who was that vile woman who just walked out?”
“You saw her?”
“She almost made me drop the coffee.”
“That would have been terrible.”
“She almost knocked into me too.”
“Well as long as the coffee was okay.” I laughed at her, which made her smile again. “But, she’s a reality star from another show, I just got done with her fitting.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah, I’m booked for the day.”
“Oh.” I tried to say the same as before but sounded more upset. I think she caught on to my disappointment.
“But I could use your help, if you want to stay.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. If I have to step away to take fitting notes, the fittings last longer.”
“You want me to take notes.”
“You are literate right?”
“Yes I’m literate.”
“Good. Then I guess you can stay. But you have to write down everything I say.”
“Will do.”
We had the next actress come in and she started talking to the woman. So like she said I started writing down everything that she said…just to mess with her. Most of it was abbreviated but everything that they talked about I wrote down. So when the actress left, Y/N came over to look at my notes and then glared at me.
“Bucky?”
“Yes?”
“Why did you write down everything?”
“You told me to write down everything you said. So I did.”
“Bucky.”
“Y/N.”
“You are crazy.”
“I was just doing what I was told. You said—”
“I know I said everything. But next time just write down what I tell you to write down.” She turned to get the next fitting set up but then looked back at me. “I’m watching you.”
“You can watch me all you want, doesn’t mean your fitting will get done.” I smirked at her and she tried her hardest to hide her smile before she turned away. She went behind the curtain and ignored me until the next actor came in. We worked together all day on her notes and I teased her about any little thing I could. She was fun to mess with. When we got done with her last fitting I had about an hour until I needed to meet up with hair and makeup to get ready for filming.
“So you going to be at the filming tonight, right?” I asked.
“Uh…yes. Why?”
“Just wondering.”
“Why?” She came and stood right in front of me.
“Well I figured that at least one of the girls has to be crazy so I will need someone to hide with between breaks.”
“Oh, I see.” She smiled at me.
“I can only take so much crazy.”
“Well I will be there and I will also bring your suit over to hair and makeup as soon as I steam out the wrinkles.”
“You’re the best Y/N. Want to get dinner with me?”
“Sure.”
So we left the wardrobe room and we both went over to the tent that was serving dinner for the casts and crews of the network. As we ate, we talked and Y/N made my nerves disappear. She always had a way of making me feel at home.
Y/N’S POV
As soon as I was done with dinner I tried to return to the wardrobe room, knowing very well that my best friend and Wardrobe assistant was racing to catch up with me.
“Y/N, wait up!” She yelled after me, obviously my fast pace having not worked.
“Hey, what’s up?”
“What’s up? What’s up? Maybe the fact that you spend every moment you can with James or that you’re eating every meal with James, or how about the fact that James was taking notes for you at your fittings today. Maybe that’s what’s up?”
“And?”
“What’s going on? I am your best friend and I want all the juicy details…right now.”
“Wanda, there are no juicy details. We’re friends. We like to hang out with each other, nothing else. I mean he’s on the show, so nothing else could happen even if either of us wanted to, which neither of us do.”
“You can’t tell me that you have no feelings for that beautiful…man. If I could sign up for the show now…I would.”
“I don’t have feelings for him like that.” I lied, having pushed those feelings down. “I really just like to hang out with him.”
“I don’t believe you for a second.”
“You don’t have to believe me, but you will have to live with the fact that you’re wrong, not me.”
“Oh, I’m never wrong.”
“Don’t you have something to do?”
“Don’t you have someone’s suit to steam?”
“Oh, you mean my job?”
“Sure whatever you say.” She laughed at me and then we parted ways. I went back to the wardrobe room to steam Bucky’s suit and then I headed over to makeup and hair to check in with him.
I walked into the trailer and took a seat in the empty chair behind him, hanging the suit on one of the hooks on the wall behind me. Bucky had his eyes closed as the hairdresser ran her fingers through his hair, making sure that whatever product she had put in his hair completely disappeared. When she was done, he sat back up and slowly opened his eyes, seeing me sitting behind him.
“Hey.” He said, stretching and yawning, trying to wake himself up.
“Hi.”
“Sorry, people messing with my hair always make me tired.”
“Duly noted.” He smiled at me.
“So what are you doing in here?”
“I brought your suit.”
“Oh, yeah that’s kind of important.”
“Yeah but I will warn you, I made a mistake and now your shirt doesn’t have any sleeves.” I said in all seriousness. I saw a brief look of panic cross over his face and when I smiled, not being able to contain myself, he laughed hard.
“You almost had me there. You almost did.”
“Oh and it got quick rigged with velcro.”
“Ha ha very funny.”
“I couldn’t resist, if i didn’t at least try I would have missed out on a great teasing opportunity. Y/N 1, Bucky 0.”
“Oh so we’re going there.”
“Might as well. We’ve got a long ten weeks ahead of us.”
“Yes we do.”
As soon as he was done with hair and makeup I handed the suit off to him and he changed. He came out looking as good as before and I would be lying if I said my heart didn’t leap in my chest at the sight of him and his smile.
“You want to do that fancy knot you were talking about?” He held out the tie for me.
“Sure.” I placed the tie around my neck, pulling the ends until it was the right length, moving the tail and body around until I got the “fancy knot.” I took it from around my neck and handed it to him.
“Fancy.” He said and went to put it around his neck.
“Are you nervous?”
“Yeah.”
“Just be yourself and trust your gut. Also don’t let any of them feel weird about your arm. They don’t know the story, so they don’t get the right to be weird about it.”
“Thanks.”
“And…” I moved to fix his collar, moving my hands around his neck, “remember that you deserve to be happy. Listen to your heart.”
He looked down at me, the new closeness increasing the tension in the room and god if I didn’t just want to reach up and kiss him. But the thing that really threw me off was just for a second I thought that he wanted to kiss me too.
The door to the trailer opened and before the guy could walk in I pulled away from Bucky.
“Hey, you ready?” I turned and saw Steve standing in the trailer. “Hey, Y/N. He looks good.”
“Well, it is my job.”
“Are you ready to go?” Steve asked.
“I’m as ready as I’m going to get.” Bucky said. He turned to grab his jacket and looked at me before he walked out. “You’re coming right?”
“I’ll be there. I’m going to pop some popcorn first because this is going to be a show.”
“Ha ha you’re very rude.”
“Go, I’ll be there soon.”
The truth was I just needed some time to recover from the almost kiss that probably didn’t happen and was all just in my head. That and I was going to have to watch 25 other women go after him, when in truth I do wish I was one of them, and I needed to put my head back on straight.
BUCKY’S POV
We climbed into the car that would take us over to the house that the girls would be staying at. Steve was sitting next to me and we was staring at me, pretty much the whole way there. I knew that he had something to say, and most likely not something I wanted to her. But it was getting annoying real fast.
“What?” I turned to look at him.  
“So what’s up with you and Y/N?” He asked blatantly.
“She’s my friend.” I looked out the window.
“I don’t know about that, the air was pretty thick when I walked in.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Of course you don’t.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Nothing, I just…I see the way you look at her.”
“The way I look at her…”
“Like she’s something special.”
“She is special, but she’s my friend.”
“Right now, anyway.” I turned and glared at him. “Come on, you can’t tell me that you don’t feel anything else for her. She’s beautiful and I have never seen you smile as much as you do when you’re with her.”
“And?”
“And you like her.”
We pulled up in front of a huge house and I moved to climb out.
“That’s beside the point.” I tried to say low enough so he wouldn’t hear, but I think he did.
READER’S POV
I showed up at the house with my kit in hand and walked over to the production area. Everyone there was setting up all of the equipment needed for filming and I just kind of looked around for something to do.
To be honest I usually didn’t do this. I used to, before I became the head of the department, but going out to set that was the wardrobe crews job. So why was I here?
“Hey, you made it.” I heard from behind me. I turned to see Bucky sitting in a director’s chair, waiting to get filming.
“I wouldn’t miss it.”
“Here, why don’t you sit in my chair? I’m sure they’ll call me to do something soon.”
“Okay. Thanks.”
“Yeah.”
I looked up at him and could see the worry etched there.
“What are you thinking about?” I asked.
“You know, I have done a lot of terrifying things before. I’ve worked on billion dollar rockets that have flown into outer space, I had to have my arm amputated after it got stuck in one of those very expensive engines, I had to learn to live a whole new life, and yet for some reason I feel terrified about being on this show.”
“You?”
“I know. I just…I’ve never been on TV before. I didn’t think there would be this many cameras and there are so many people standing around watching me. I mean am I insane? This is how this works right?”
“Yes. I know that this may seem strange to you, but it’ll be okay. Like I’ve told you before, it’s just important that you’re yourself. Try and ignore the cameras.”
“Yeah.” I looked up at him and saw him staring out at the people moving around, obviously letting his nerves get the best of him.
“My mom…sometimes I forget that I ever had one. But when I was little I used to be terrified of storms, the blizzards used to get really bad in Moscow, but she was always there to comfort me. I thoroughly believe that she had the best hugs in the entire world. Anytime she held me I knew that everything was going to be okay.” He looked over at me, his eyes narrowed, causing a wrinkle to form on his forehead. I wanted to reach up and smooth the lines, the worry, from his head..
“Do you miss her?” He asked.
“Every day.” I looked back down at the ground. “But, anyway, I think the best way to not feel terrified of things is just to know that you’re not alone. And she always made sure that I would never be alone…as much as she could.”
“What do you—?” I knew what he was about to ask, so interrupted him.
“Can I try something?”
“Try something?”
“I think it’ll help your nerves.”
“Okay.”
I stood up from the chair and faced him and literally in the most awkward way possible I hugged him. I was kind of kicking myself for the way I did it, but he didn’t seem to mind. He pulled me in tighter, making the initial awkwardness vanish as we settled into each other’s arms. I had my arms wrapped around his neck, his chin rested on my shoulder, his arms squeezed my waist, holding me firmly to him, my hand moved to the back of his neck, where his long hair met skin, and we breathed in each other, a sense of relief washing over us.
I don’t think it lasted long but for a second I thought the whole world stopped moving. I was the first to pull away and even when I did his hands still lingered on my waist and my hands moved to rest on his arms.
“You’ll be okay, they’re going to love you.” I started.
“Thanks.” He looked at me just a second before he let go of me and went off to do something before they needed him for filming.
I plopped back in the chair and put my face in my hands.
“I saw that.”
I nearly fell out of the chair at the voice coming from behind me.
“God, are you trying to kill me?“ I turned to face Wanda.
“Oh no. This budding romance is only at the start, it’s no fun if you die before it gets really heated.”
“Heated?”
“The sexual tension between you—”
“Wanda!”
“I’m only stating the facts here.”
“No you are stating your opinion.”
“Why are you here?”
“I am here to—”
“Do you job? Wrong, my job is to go to location and insure that what you’ve done at the studio makes it here. So your job is what, a good thirty minutes from here?”
“Fine, he asked me to be here, is that what you want to hear?”
“No what I want to hear is that he grew some balls and asked you out on a date. But then again—”
“Wanda!”
“Come on. Like I was trying to say before, the sexual tension between you two—”
“Please stop, if you care for my sanity at all, you’ll stop.”
“I’ll stop…for now.”
“That’s definitely not what I meant.”
“This is far from over.” She glared at me as she walked away and I sunk down lower in the chair, waiting for filming to start, hoping it started soon.
It wasn’t much longer that they decided to start. This first episode was pretty simple from my understanding, the only hard part was that most of the episode was a repetition of the same choreography but 25 times and with 25 different women. The woman would drive up to the house, get out of the car and walk over to Bucky, or James as they would call him, who was standing in front of the house at the edge of the driveway. Then they would give him a quick first impression spiel and go inside the house. Pretty simple, or so I thought.
The first woman to come out set a good bar for everyone else. All of the women were instructed to wear a formal gown and this woman was very beautiful, supermodel beautiful, and she played it simple, gave her name, told him a few things about herself and then she went inside. It was kind of every girl after that got steadily worse, and I don’t know if they planned it that way, but it was bad.
You had the drunk girl, the girl who showed up in a costume, the girl who tried to play a practical joke, the girl who went for it and tried making out with him, the girl who rode in on a horse, and the one who brought her grandma to talk herself up. It kind of made everyone else dull in comparison, or seem “normal” as they call it.
About halfway through the limo first impressions, Steve came over at sat with me and we just laughed at Bucky’s reactions to each of the girls. And when we finally got to break, after all of the girls were in the house, Bucky came over to us and we tried so hard not to laugh.
“Okay, just let it out now.” He said and with that we couldn’t keep ourselves from laughing. “Okay, okay.” He looked at me first. “I know that you helped pick these girls out and I pretty sure that about half of them were some kind of joke.”
“No, I got to initially go through the candidates but I wasn’t there for the final selection. But believe me if I had known that some of those girls were that bad I wouldn’t have pulled them out for selection.”
“Well look at the upside, first impressions, I bet you know who you don’t want to keep on the show.” Steve said positively.
“But he still has over half of the episode to film. And you still get some time to talk to the girls before you decide which 12 get to stay.”
Steve stood from his chair and Bucky moved to sit, having been on his feet for a long time now. I grabbed the other half stack of notecards (cards with the girls name and face on them) from Steve and compiled our stack. He looked kind of down after that and I wasn’t completely sure what was going through his head but it looked like he needed a pep talk.
“Here,” I handed him the stack, “you need to work on memorizing their names and try and just breath. I know that that seemed really crazy but you need to think about each girl and how you felt, not about what they did. First Impressions aren’t everything.”
“Thanks.” I placed my hand on his shoulder and grabbed Steve’s arm before I walked away.
“You know, you’re really good for him.”
“Am I?”
“Can I tell you a secret? Bucky can’t know that I told you.”
“Okay.”
“Last night Bucky came over to my apartment, talking about how nervous he was and I tried everything I could, but he was planning on quitting. He left this morning with every intention of leaving the show and asking them to find someone else. He said he was going to stop by and see you before he went to the producers. But apparently it was something that you did that convinced him to stay on. Now we don’t think this at all, but Bucky has always battled with this idea that he was never going to be good enough for someone. It’s how he got so deep into his depression before, not being able to handle life with just one arm. But he’s better now and I can see him actually being happy with someone and maybe with one of these girls. So honestly I was upset when he said he wanted to quit. But either way, I’m glad you convinced him not to, even if you did it unintentionally. He needs you to support him, so I’m glad you’re going to be around to help him.”
“Yeah. I’m glad too, he deserves to be happy.”
“He does.”
As soon as we were done with our talk we walked back over to Bucky. Who was flipping through the cards and talking under his breath. I let my hand rest back on his shoulder and some of the stress seemed to leave him.
“You okay?” I asked.
“Yeah, I’m better.”
“How’s the name game going?” Steve asked.
“Good I think. A lot of names to remember for one night.”
“You’ll be fine, if you forget don’t be scared to ask for their name. It kind of gives them a chance for a second impression.” I said.
“Okay.”
“And go with your gut.” Steve said.
“Yeah.”
“James they need you back on set.” One of the PAs came over and announced.
“Okay, let’s do this.” He stood up, handed me the cards and straightened his suit before he walked back over to the house. And Steve and I sat back down in our chairs waiting for the next half of the show.
We watched as Bucky made his way back in the house, when one of the members of the production staff stopped him and put him back on his mark from earlier. We had gone through all of the girls so why was he out front again?
We waited to see what would happen and then another limo pulled up.
“What’s happening?” Steve leaned over and asked me.
“I don’t know.”
“I thought that there were only supposed to be 25.”
“I thought so too.”
So we watched, the suspense I think killing us all. And then a red haired woman stepped out of the limo, wearing a beautiful black silk/satin gown, that hugged all of her curves and showed way too much skin.
I didn’t look at her long, I quickly turned to Bucky to see the absolute horror on his face. Which then turned to unquestionable anger. Steve and I both moved closer to the screen that the director was watching, trying to listen in to what was going on.
“What are you doing here?” He growled.
“I missed you Bucky.”
“You don’t get to call me that.”
“What should I call you? James?”
“You shouldn’t be addressing me at all. You shouldn’t be here Natasha!” He rose his voice.
“I’m sorry about what happened, but I’m here now.”
“Yeah? Now is too late, I needed you then.”
“What about second chances?”
“I gave you a second chance and a third and a fourth and I’m not giving you any more chances to fool me. I did this to start over, so I’m not going back to you.”
He then stormed out of the frame of the cameras and to god knows where. It looked like she was about to move to follow him but Steve thought quicker.
“I got Nat, you go get Bucky.”
Then we split up. I ran in the direction that he stormed off, walking aimlessly, looking around the backside of the building for him, when I was pulled off my track and behind a tree.
“Bucky—” He just pulled me in his arms, taking in a deep breath as he settled his face in my neck.
“God I hate her, I hate her.” I didn’t say anything to him. I just held him and when he still felt angry I moved one of my hands to his hair and just let my fingers run through it, massaging his scalp as I did.
He took in a deep breath and I could tell that he was feeling better.
“I’m really glad it was you that followed me.”
“Well it looked like you needed someone to hide with.” He laughed at me and finally let me go.
“I can’t believe they asked her to be on the show.”
“I had no idea—”
“I know.”
“You know what’s good about this though?"
“Y/N you don’t know what hap—”
“The good thing about this is that you’re the one who gets to kick her off.”
“What?”
“She asked to be on the show, she’s a contestant and you have to kick off 14 people today. She could definitely be one of them.”
“Yeah. You’re right.”
“It does mean that you’ll have to put up with her for at least a little bit but it’s just one night and you have so many other people you need to talk to. Just don’t let her being here cloud your judgement.”
“You’re right…as usual.”
“I don’t have the constitution to be wrong.” He laughed and smiled, looking a lot better than before. “You ready to go back?”
“If I have to.”
“Well we could just run away, skip the country, you know the easy way of dealing with things.”
“Don’t tempt me.”
“Come on. Let’s go get this over with. Then we can go drink our feelings away.”
“God, that’s a great idea.”  
So we walked from the back of the house to the front where the crew was obviously waiting. There was no sign of Natasha and as soon as Steve saw us he came over to where we were.
“Everything okay?”
“Yeah, Y/N’s getting me drunk tonight.”
“No, I said—”
“It’s okay.” Bucky said before he patted me on the back, winked and walked back over to the production crew.
“I did not say that I was going to get him drunk. At first I offered to run away.”
“You are a bad influence on him.”
“No I’m not.”
“If I’m being honest, you’re probably the only one who could have brought him back from that.”
“She must have done something terrible to get on his bad side.”
“Oh she did.”
The rest of the shoot went fairly well. Bucky went inside the house and started chatting with the girls, getting to know them better. Any time that Natasha tried to talk to him, he ignored her and pulled aside another girl to talk to. And the whole time I sat next to Steve and we watched Bucky and Steve watched me. I don’t know what he was looking for but it started to creep me out.
“What?” I asked when I couldn’t handle it anymore.
“What?”
“Why are you looking at me?”
“Oh, no reason.”
“You’ve been staring at me this whole time.”
“Do you like Bucky?”
“What? Of course I do.”
“No— like like him?”
“What are you getting at?”
“I talked to your friend Wanda—”
“Well that’s your first mistake.”
“She says that she sees something between the two of you and I think so too.”
“And like I told her, you’re crazy. Bucky is my friend.”
“And he’s practically my brother, but he’s happy with you.”
“As a friend.”
“As maybe more.”
“Steve—”
“I’m serious Y/N.”
“So am I.”
I turned back to the scene in front of me and then we had one more break before Bucky chose the 12 girls to move on in the show. He was looking through the notecards again and pulling out the girls that he liked the most and I was surprised to see some of the weird limo exits were mixed in there.
I watched as he smiled at each girl and as I sat there I couldn't stop thinking about what Steve said. Maybe I do wish there was something more.
BUCKY’S POV
When we came back from the last break of the night, I finally announced the 12 girls that advanced to the next week. When the remaining 13 girls got up to leave, I made sure to say something to each of them and thanked them for coming on the show. And then there was Natasha.
“I was really hoping that we could work this out.” She started.
“It’s too late for that, I’ve moved on. And I want you to be happy, but it’s not going to be with me. Goodbye Natasha.” I said with as much sympathy as I could.
“Goodbye James.”
When the director called cut, I immediately walked over to Y/N and Steve, grabbed her hand and just walked as far away as I could.
“Bucky stop, for a second.”
“I just need to get out of here.”
“And we’ll go but…are you okay?”
“I’m gonna need a few drinks to answer that question.”
So I took Y/N back to my apartment and we grabbed all of the alcohol I had, a few glasses and settled in on the couch. I was staring at the wall, sipping at the liquid in my cup, when her voice broke the silence.
“Do you want to talk about it?” She started. I turned to face her and she moved so she could look at me.
“Natasha and I…we dated for years; a year before I moved to Moscow and the two that I was there. We made the long distance work and everything was really good.” She placed her hand on my knee and I looked down at it, pausing to collect my thoughts. “After my accident, you know, things got bad. I was out of a job, I had no arm, and I was thousands of miles from home, from anyone who cared about me. I tried calling her, I begged her in voicemail after voicemail, for her to come to Moscow…but she never came, never even answered my phone call.”
“Bucky—”
“That’s not the worst part. The final time that I called her I told her that it was over, that if she couldn’t even tell me over the phone some kind of reason for not being there, then I was better off without her. Steve was the only one who ever showed up and he got me back here and he helped me get back to where I was. And then about 3 months after I got back to America, I saw her on the street with another guy.” He paused, I didn’t say anything, waiting for him to continue. “They were engaged had been dating for a little over a year.”
“I knew she was a jerk.”
“Yeah. I thought things were so good. And you know, I had chances to go off and find another women. It wasn’t like I was a recluse and I’m a nice guy I could have found someone to date, who lived in Moscow. But every time I had the opportunity I always went back to her, little did I know that she was further away then I thought.”
“I’m going to do for you what I do for everyone else that I’ve ever helped through a terrible breakup.”
“Okay?” She relaxed back on the couch and opened her arms to me.
“Come here.” She said, I looked at her, hesitant, before I moved back to rest against her. My head was laying on her chest and her hand pushed my hair back and out of my face.
“Bucky, you are good person, inside and out. You have had the opportunity to do amazing things and you do not need anyone to define you. Natasha doesn’t deserve you…and if anyone deserves to be happy, it’s you. So forget about her because you have so many other things to look forward to. You have so many people who love you and there’s no reason to let her take that away. You will find someone else to be with, because you are kind and funny and smart. Someone will come along who appreciates every aspect of who you are. But until then I will always be here for you and I will make sure that you are happy.” The whole time she spoke, he fingers ran through my hair, it didn’t take me long to relax in her embrace, to close my eyes and just listen to the sound of her voice, her encouragements.
Not only did Y/N show me that she was everything that I needed, but she may have just convinced me that she was everything that I wanted.
PART FOUR
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