Without You

We scrambled to the door to grab a handful of the loaf of bread the guard had tossed us. Initially after our return from the experiment, the other soldiers who we had befriended and fought beside were unwilling to share the food with us, but they had soon realised that we had not changed and things thankfully returned to normal. The loaf was torn into equal parts that were passed around and I took mine to the opposite corner to eat, wanting to be alone. It was still a challenge to process what had happened, and I couldn’t grasp it all yet. Hell, I doubted if I ever would. How could I have endured such pain but not feel any different afterwards? Surely something about me had to have changed?

There was movement next to me and I looked up to see Bucky sitting down, a weak smile across his lips. At least I wasn’t completely alone. He was just as lost and troubled as I was.

“How are you doing?” he asked and I shrugged.

“Fine, I suppose,” I muttered. “You?” I tore off a chunk of bread to eat.

“All right,” he agreed in the same downhearted tone I had used.

“Do you think we’ll ever get out of here?” I asked.

I was surprised to see Bucky smile at my hopeless question.

“I have faith,” he replied. I was glad he had hope, even if I didn’t.

“Do you think they’ll inject us again?” I questioned in a hushed voice.

Bucky hesitated and my heart sank.

“I don’t want to think about it,” he answered lowly. I ate more bread as I thought over how I should word my next statement to not offend him.

“You shouldn’t have volunteered. It only made them take you as well, and now we’ve both suffered,” I said, finally voicing what had been eating away at my conscious since I awoke from the awful experience.

“I wasn’t just going to stand by and watch as they took you,” he replied, a hint of anger in his tone.

“You should have.”

“But I didn’t. There’re thousands of men like me, but only one woman like you. I wanted to try to preserve that.”

I heard the care in his voice and I stared intently at my portion of bread to avoid looking at Bucky. As much as I wanted to question the emotion, to hear confirmation straight from his lips, I couldn’t find the courage. It was too scary, a far more daunting task than fighting on the battlefronts.

So I remained quiet. Bucky held out his torn section of bread into my view, gesturing for me to take it.

“Don’t be rid-“

“I’m not hungry,” he interrupted before I could give a slur of friendly insults.

I raised my eyebrows as I finally met his eyes, knowing that he had to be lying. The portions of food we received were scarce, only just enough to keep us alive, and other cells of prisoners had even begun fighting each other for larger portions.

“Please,” Bucky insisted, resting the bread on top of the chunk I already had. His hand brushed against mine and my heart skipped a beat as he lingered before wrapping his arms around his waist to hug himself.

As I was finally mentally admitting to myself what I was feeling, those pathetic womanly emotions I had shut out my entire life, the door blasted open and a man with a shield appeared from the dust.