Till the End of the Line

Before James had come back to the cabin, Sarah had almost managed to convince herself that it'd meant nothing when he had kissed her; that, whatever she might have mistaken for signals of him feeling the same way about her as she did about him, were just exaggerated, romanticised, misconstrued interpretations of his actions; and she had almost managed to forget that she even had those feelings for him.
But she couldn't deny, no matter how hard she tried, that the whistling kettle had interrupted a moment in which James had been on the verge of saying or doing something that'd had nothing whatsoever to do with Hydra, or their general predicament, or anything related to either of those two topics.
Even though Sarah was sure that she had sensed something, she couldn't work out what, exactly, 'it' could have been. At the time her first instinct had told her he'd been about to kiss her again but, since that was just something she wanted him to do, she decided not to trust that particular intuition. And the fact that he had, once more, shown no signs of wanting to continue whatever 'it' had been, confirmed to Sarah that whatever romantic delusion she'd started to dream up was clearly -and as usual- inaccurate.
But there had definitely been something… What could it have been?

In an attempt to figure out an answer to that question, Sarah tried to keep a close eye on James, but this proved to be more difficult than she'd anticipated. James appeared to be distancing himself from her in the days that followed his return; he spent more time outside or behind Sarah's laptop than usual and he barely spoke to her unless, it seemed, it was absolutely necessary.
Sarah wondered, as this behaviour wasn't exactly new to her, whether his trip had perhaps rekindled his old desire to hunt down Hydra's henchmen and, if so, whether he was brooding over another opportunity to go after them.

The weather became increasingly more dismal with every day that passed, bringing along freezing winds and relentless downpours of rain which would sometimes cancel out the possibility of going out to practice shooting. Luckily, Sarah was now at a level of proficiency where she felt that she didn't have to practice as intensely as before.
On those days when they were cooped up inside the house because of the rain and the cold Sarah would curl up in the armchair beside the fireplace and read one of the novels from the well-stocked bookcase, while James would alternate between reading on the laptop, watching the news, or taking out the collection of guns he kept in his duffel-bag and cleaning them on the kitchen table.

It was a particularly cold and foggy day and Sarah had ventured outside on her own to practice for a few hours, until she felt frozen to the core and couldn't keep it up anymore. James was already cooking dinner when she came back inside, with the television on and the volume turned up so he could hear it in the kitchen. The news came on just when Sarah had taken off her sodden jacket and draped it over one of the chairs around the table.
The newsreader's voice carried through the room, as he began: "Good evening. It is Friday, November fourteen, and today's news…" but the rest of his sentence was lost to Sarah, who was gazing blankly into space, her mind suddenly racing.
The fourteenth of November… it meant something to her, something important, although she couldn't immediately say what it was, or why it was important.
James had already laid the table and Sarah sat down automatically when he carried a large, steaming pan over from the stove. While he filled up Sarah's plate, it suddenly hit her.
"It's my birthday today…"
She had blurted it out quietly, more to herself than to James, but he, nevertheless, noticed that she'd said something, even with the television on.
"What did you say?" he asked absent-mindedly, now spooning spaghetti onto his own plate.
"Today's my birthday…" Sarah repeated, frowning slightly.
Ever since she'd got rid of her phone, before coming to Asheville, she wasn't as much aware of what time of the day or what day of the month they lived in as she had been before, but she had heard the date being announced on the news every now and then, so she wasn't exactly totally oblivious. It still didn't explain how she could have forgotten her own birthday?

For a moment she and James just sat and stared at each other, both of them with a puzzled expression on their faces. Then James opened his mouth to speak, but seemed to be struggling for words.
"What do… Should…" he fell silent, straightening in his seat, still looking somewhat confused.
"I can't believe it just slipped my mind!" Sarah muttered, shaking her head and shifting her gaze to her plate.
James was still looking at her intently as she put a forkful of pasta into her mouth.
"Do you…' he began, somewhat tentatively, "Is there something you want to… do?"
Sarah gave a small chuckle while she chewed, "I don't really feel like celebrating, if that's what you're implying."
"Why?"
Sarah chuckled again, throwing him an incredulous, sideways look. She had not expected him to react the way he did; it wouldn't have been a surprise to her at all if he had immediately accepted that she didn't want to do anything and moved on, or even if he'd dismissed the subject altogether. It felt slightly odd to be having a conversation with James about something so utterly… mundane, and his apparent interest made it feel even stranger.
"Well, why should I?" she retorted once she had come to the conclusion that she didn't know how to answer him.
He shrugged and when Sarah focused her attention on her dinner again he, too, began to eat.

James had disappeared behind the laptop once more when Sarah started to clear the table. While doing the dishes, she thought about her previous birthdays. The most recent one had been the first time she hadn't spent it with her family, having moved to the U.S. only three months before it. She remembered the Skype conversation she'd had with her mother and father and Aidan, the image of her mother actually crying as they wished her a happy birthday.
With a pang of guilt she imagined how they might feel after failing to get a hold of her. And then she pictured what their reaction must be if they contacted Olivia about her whereabouts, while Liv was under the impression that Sarah was in England, with them, introducing them to her 'new boyfriend'…
She forced her mind to return to reality, deciding it wouldn't do her any good to dwell on what might be happening far, far away, in a life that was no longer hers.

As she put the pan back into the kitchen cabinet, Sarah's eyes fell on several bottles of liquor that'd been stashed all the way in the back, which she had discovered on the night that James had come back when she was searching for something to clean his wound with. She had completely forgotten about them afterwards, but now that she saw the bottles again she suddenly realised how much she'd been longing for a drink.
She took out a bottle that still had the most in it and brought it to the table along with two glasses. James looked up as she filled both their glasses, slid one towards him, and took the seat opposite him.
"I changed my mind about celebrating," she said in answer to the questioning look he gave her. He still looked rather befuddled when she held her glass up to him, but copied her almost immediately. "Cheers," she said, bringing the glass to her lips and downing it in one go. She winced a little as the rum burned in her throat, then picked up the bottle again for a refill. James frowned and smirked simultaneously whilst taking a slightly more moderate sip. Sarah looked down into her glass, swirling the amber contents around with both her hands.
"This'd feel more like a party if there was some music," she muttered, glancing over her shoulder at the old record player that stood on the floor next to the bookcase. She took another sip before walking over to it and crouching down to look through the collection of records stacked beside it.
The Pretty Things, Bowie, Procol Harum, Rare Earth, The Moody Blues… the list went on and on. Sarah couldn't help but smile to herself, thinking what an immense stroke of luck it was that they decided to hide out in a place that'd been owned by people with such an impeccable taste in music.
She took out the eponymous Procol Harum album and, after fidgeting with the needle for a second, put it on the turntable. A Whiter Shade of Pale began to play while she returned to her seat opposite James, who had evidently not touched his drink after the first sip. Sarah reached for her glass and said: "I think you might like this." James turned his head to look at the record player, softly tapping his glass with the tip of one of his metal fingers.
Sarah closed her eyes for an instant as she listened to Gary Brooker's voice. It seemed as if she hadn't heard music in years, and now that the alcohol was slowly taking effect she felt wonderfully hazy.
"They sound like they don't really know what they're doing," James concluded after a few minutes, finally taking a second sip. Sarah laughed.
"I take it you've been just as underexposed to music as you were to films?"
He merely looked back at her, his face blank. Sarah shook her head, still smiling slightly, and poured herself another healthy measure of rum, then made her way over to the record player again.
"In my day," James said, as if thinking out loud, "they made music that you could actually dance to." Sarah grinned, flipping through the albums.
"Okay, well… This might be a little more to your taste," she replaced Procol Harum with Billie Holiday's Lady in Satin. She sat and watched the spinning record for a while, still crouched down, as a trumpet sounded the opening notes of the first song. When Billie's voice came in she straightened up, swaying slightly on the spot in time to the music.
"I think this qualifies as music you can dance to," she raised her eyebrow at James before twirling herself around, trying not to laugh too much. One corner of his mouth twitched up while he watched her, turning a little in his chair so he didn't have to keep looking over his shoulder.
"If that's what's considered dancing nowadays..."
Sarah came to stand beside him, one hand on her hip, grasping her glass with the other.
"Oh, and you can do it better, can you?" she said, pretending to sound affronted.
"Of course."
"Well, come on then," she gestured at the empty space beside her, "why don't you show me how it's done?"
She smiled at him and he looked back with the same half-grin in place, but after a moment he pressed his lips together, the faintly happy glimmer in his eyes disappearing as he cast them down and shaking his head.
"Oh, please…" she urged, trying to keep her voice light, but it seemed to cost her some effort when seeing a sudden shadow pass over his face. He took another sip while Sarah picked up the bottle and took a few paces back into the room, saying: "Would've been an excellent birthday gift…" She poured some more rum into her glass whilst attempting another twirl.

"You didn't tell me how old you've become," he said, getting to his feet as well, holding his hand out for the bottle when he was a few steps away from her.
"I'm twenty-six," she replied.
James set the bottle back on the table, raised his glass as if to toast her, then lifted it to his lips.
"Speaking of ageing," said Sarah, "how old are you?"
Bucky pressed his lips together, bowing his head slightly, then answered: "Ninety-seven."
Sarah couldn't help but gape a little, even though it shouldn't have come as a shock to her. James had been a Howling Commando with her grandfather -who had been ninety-four when he passed away- and, from what he'd told her about what had happened to him after falling off the train, she inferred that Hydra must have kept him alive with some kind of freezing method similar to Captain America getting stuck in the ice. But to actually hear him say it, out loud, while he hardly looked much older than her was… mildly disconcerting.

Still slightly baffled, Sarah cast around for something to break the momentary awkward silence with.
"H-how old were you when you… You know… When you fell?"
"Year older than you are now."
Sarah bit her lip, tearing her eyes away from him and fixing them on the space between their feet instead.
Her mind seemed to wander off by itself and she imagined how she would feel if, this time next year, she were to plummet to -what she'd believe to be- her death, only to awaken decades later to find herself under the absolute control of the organisation she'd tried to root out year before.
She began to see just how unnaturally cruel Hydra had treated James: her surprise at hearing him talk about something so ordinary as birthdays, the fact that she expected him not to care about something so trivially human as that, that was because she only knew him as that which Hydra had turned him into.
They had left so many marks on him -both figuratively and literally- that it seemed almost impossible that he would ever fully recover who he'd been before, even now that he was no longer under their command. Not only had they taken away his identity and his memories, but even his body belonged to them, as he would forever have their metal arm attached to him.
But despite the fact that he had regained a great deal of his memories, and his struggle to re-establish his identity, it seemed that Hydra had successfully deprived him of the possibility to ever live life on his own terms.

It felt like it had taken hours for this realisation to dawn on her, but in reality only a few seconds had passed since James had answered her question.
"Do you miss being him?" she asked tentatively. He took a moment to think, running a hand through his hair as he did so.
"I guess it's the same as when you grow up," he began slowly, leaning back against the table, "and you remember what you were like at a certain age, and you want to go back to how things were then... But then you realise that you still are that kid, and that kid went through all the same changes in life as you did..." He deliberated for a second. "So you know that you can't go back to how you were then, but you can think back to how it was. And sometimes that's enough."
Sarah nodded, then came to stand next to him by the table, putting her glass down.
"Did you have plans for the future, back then?"
He shrugged, "I had a lot of plans, but that's the thing about the future... Everything can change."
"Do you have plans now?"
James bit his lip, "More a plan. Or rather, something I need to do."
Sarah looked up at him, frowning slightly. She knew what he was talking about, and it made her a little nervous.
"Why don't you just run away from it all? Have a quiet life someplace where they can't get to you, replace the memories of Hydra with better ones?"
He smirked, "I don't know if you noticed it, but I've been on the run for a while now. It might be time for me to stop running."
Sarah felt her heart beat a little faster. So that's what he's planning...
"But you don't have to do it..." she muttered, "It wasn't you who did all tho-,"
"I know I wasn't the only one responsible," he cut across her, "but I need to do this. I mean... you're talking about a place where they can't get to me, but don't you see that there will never be such a place as long as they continue to exist?" He looked at her, a searching, pleading look in his eyes. "They made me into a weapon, their weapon. And now I might still be a weapon, but I'm no longer theirs: I'm my own person again, I'm the one in control again, and I can actually try to take them down. For good. "

Sarah's heart was still beating a little faster than usual. His answer didn't surprise her, but that didn't make it any less daunting.
"So you're gonna go through with it?" she muttered, not looking at him. "I've been wondering if this was what you were planning, but I secretly hoped I was wrong."
He looked confused, "What do you-,"
"You've been acting so secretive and distant and taciturn ever since you came back," she said, "That's how I knew you were up to something: that's exactly how you were acting when you started sneaking out at night, back in my apartment. You know, I get that you didn't always tell me everything before because you knew I wouldn't understand, or that I would panic, or do something stupid. But things are different now: I've learned a lot in the past couple of months, and I know I still have a lot more to learn... I know I'm still a lousy fighter and a less than average shot and a useless bundle of nerves sometimes, and I can see why you'd feel responsible for me and why you'd want to shield me from the truth… But you should know by now that you're not helping either of us by keeping things from me... I mean, I feel like I have to keep reminding you that we're in this together, and that means we need to share with each other."
She took a breath, trying to keep her voice steady.
"You might think you're doing me a favour, that you're protecting me if you do everything by yourself, but I don't think you have any idea how terrifying it is not to know! But if we would work together we can help each other, we can share the responsibilities, share the worries... We would both care for ourselves and for each other, instead of taking turns between being caregiver or caretaker. But I think the most important thing is that both of us would make the decisions... And especially if they're big decisions, or potentially dangerous ones...." As she took another deep breath her eyes were suddenly burning with hot tears. "I know that you're never going to be happy until you've torn Hydra apart, and that nothing I say or do will stop you from going after them, but when you do, and I know you'll probably want to do it soon, you can't just leave me on my own without telling me where you're going and why, or without telling me you're going at all... I mean, if we can't have safety or certainty, can we at least have honesty and inclusion?"

Bucky stared at her, his eyes wide an his mouth slightly open, clearly at a loss for words. After a moment he sighed and ran a hand over his mouth before sweeping it through his hair.
"Okay, well..." he stammered, "I admit that I've been a little... withdrawn lately, but it's not because I'm planning to sneak out without you knowing about it." He heaved another great sigh and shot a glance at Sarah, her shoulders trembling with the effort she was making to keep herself from crying.
"Look, I'm sorry..." he said, shaking his head, "I just... I needed to get some things sorted out in my head and I can't..."
James ran both his hands through his hair, letting out a groan and muttering something to himself that didn't sound like English. Sarah stared at him, as nerve-racked and emotional as she had been only a few seconds ago she now felt close to paralysed. But she wasn't afraid that he might do something to her, no: it was the fact that she'd never seen him express emotions on such a scale. He had started to pace up and down in front of her, although his gaze was fixed on the floor.
"As usual, you're right about so many things, except what I just said..." he said quietly, "And I'm sorry, for still not telling you everything and for always taking the upper hand and not including your input in decisions... And, yes, I can be a little overprotective sometimes, but I just want you to be safe, and I don't want you to be worried, or upset, or..." another sigh, "Things are different for me too, now. I mean, there's certain things... I need to do and there are certain things that I ...want. But I know I can't have both. And I've been trying to get my head to make the right choices, because for a while now I can't seem to control my own selfishness."
He stopped in his tracks, still looking at the floor, his dark hair obscuring his face.
"Like you said: I'm never going to be happy until I've torn Hydra apart. That's true. But if I do stop running, and if I really want to go for it, I'll lose something that has actually made me happy for a while now, something that doesn't entail violence, or danger, or darkness..." James lifted his head and glanced at Sarah, who was still frozen to the spot, staring at him in a kind of stunned disbelief.
"But the thing is..." he continued, "I know I can't have them both. And I also know that the latter form of happiness isn't actually mine to have. The first, that's what is meant for me."
He looked up at her again. "It's difficult to let go of something when you really want it, though."

Sarah was still not entirely sure if she was really hearing what she thought she was hearing. Was she romanticising again, or was this really happening?

"Who says that you can't have them both?" she managed to utter, once she had located her voice, which had momentarily disappeared. She had also regained the use of her legs, and walked over to him. When she was right in front of him she halted, staring up at him.
"Anyone with a shred of human decency would say that."
"What do you say, though?"
He pressed his lips together as they looked at each other.
"And isn't it also important what I say?" she muttered, closing the distance between them.
As soon as those words had passed her lips his expression changed somewhat; almost as if, now that they were both on the same page, a calm had settled over him.
"You know I don't include your input in my decisions... I just include what I think would be best for you, but so far neither one of us has actually done what's best for you."
Sarah grinned, "Can you please let me decide what's best for me?"
He sighed -half smiling, half frowning- raising his right hand and, after a moment's hesitation, reached for her face and touched his fingers to her cheek. As he leaned in closer he shook his head slightly and Sarah couldn't help but smile a little as well. His lips were inches away from hers, his metal hand in her hair, when he muttered: "You make terrible choices."