#and to allegheny national forest??? this is like. a five hour drive at least.

[livvyofthelake]

cassie and holly it does not take an hour to drive from luray virginia to PENNSYLVANIA. that is not how geography works be so serious right now i know you know this.

[cravingmarvel]

American Money: Chapter One - Summertime

Bucky Barnes AU

Bucky Barnes x Fem!Reader

Word count: 2610

Warnings: death. criminal acts, graphic scenes including blood and injuries

Summary: Going on a road trip with your best friend Bucky to Lake Erie  ended quicker than you thought it would. The car crash turned yours and Bucky’s life around from living in Manhattan, to staying at different motels every night and running from the police.

“How did this happen?” A question only two people can answer. And one of them is dead.

A/N: This has been long awaited... I came up with this idea while going back home from my holiday in Bavaria. A lot of research has been going into this series and I’m scared to upload this tbh. This is obviously part one of my entry of @flannelplanet 3k follower spooky writing challenge! The prompt I chose is not in this chapter lmao but it will be in chapter two! I’m always nervous to upload something. This time is no different. I hope you guys like this as much as I looked writing this. Chapter Two is already finished so.. yeah.. enjoy :)

Prompt: “Orange isn’t just for Weasely’s.”

The tears in my eyes blurred my vision terribly, rolling down my cheeks like they’ve done for the past three hours. My eyes fixed on the dark road in front of me, the trees disappearing beside me. Only the moon and the bag of money accompanying me on my journey. I didn’t want to look, but my eyes flickered up to the review mirror of the Cadillac.

There he is, lying on the floor. Blood and dirt coating his messy brown hair. The ringing in my ears tuned out the sirens, but I could clearly see the blurry red and blue lights through my tears.

And I screamed, I yelled out to no one. Hitting the steering wheel, adverting my gaze back on the road. How did this happen?

Just how?

Five Days Earlier - Friday

“God, I love this song.” Bucky turned the volume up way too loud and waved his arms around in a poor attempt of dancing in the passenger seat.

I took my left hand off the steering wheel and lazily draped it out of the window. We drove through some very nature lenient road on our way to Lake Erie, the place we’ve been going to every year since we became friends, which was a very long time ago. I remember going there with Bucky’s parents when we were young, before we started to drive there on our own.

It’s a day worth of driving, but we’ve always had a lot of fun on the way there. So much so that the road trip there seemed to be the main event. We were passing through Allegheny National Forest, leaving Sheffield a few miles behind us. The heavy trees on either side preventing the morning sun to pass through, leaving a cold trace in the air from the night.

“Do you think we’ll be there by eleven am?” Bucky turned the volume down a little, glancing down to the watch on his right wrist.

“I hope so. Kind of tired of driving through the forest.” I took my arm away and rolled up the window, gripping the steering wheel with both hands now.

“Do you want me to take over?” He asked me, but it’s only been about three hours since I took over, so I declined his offer.

“Can you hand me one of those granola bars?” I held my hand out to Bucky, still looking at the road in front of me. Bucky placed the opened granola bar in my hand, and I started eating.

“You can eat a thousand of those if you wanted to, doll.”

“Absolutely! One of my favourite foods.”

“I know, I’m the one providing you with those things.” He looked at me

“I don’t know what you have against granola bars.” I said, taking a bite while looking over to Bucky.

He looked away again and chuckled slightly. “There is nothing worse that granola bars. Honestly the only thing worse than that is Pineapple on pizza.”

“I agree with you on the pineapple on pizza part.”

Within a split second and without realising it, my body was thrown forward, my head hitting the steering wheel so hard that I thought I would pass out. My car came to a sudden halt, stopping right in front of the car that crashed into mine. A black Mercedes, the driver’s head on his steering wheel. Blood appeared to be coating the black leather, running down his forehead. The hairs on my body rising with every second that passed. The sweat on my face dripping onto my hands. A shiver ran down my spine.

From the corner of my eyes, I saw Bucky getting out and walk towards the victim’s vehicle. He stood in front of it for a few seconds before turning around to face me, his complexion worryingly pale. Bucky got back into my car, but I couldn’t bring myself to ask him if the man was ok. I couldn’t believe what had just happened.

“Drive.” Bucky spoke in a cold tone, his body stiff. The air in my car seemed non-existent, thickened by the atmosphere.

“What?” I asked him in disbelieve. Looking over to him, I saw the sweat that had started to roll down his face.

“Drive, y/n, drive.” He said once again without giving me a proper reason. I couldn’t understand why.

Despite all efforts to disobey him, I started the engine and slowly drove past the Mercedes. I didn’t pay attention to where I’m going nor did I look at the man once again. All I could do is drive.

“Bucky what do we do now? Do we call the police?”

“No, this wasn’t our fault.”

“But he needs help, if we just leave him then- “

“That’s none of our concern, y/n. Let’s look for a motel and drive back to Manhattan tomorrow using a different route.” His voice cracking every few words.

Still confused and shocked, I drove for what seemed like hours. The signs telling us that we were going in the direction of Chicago, a place we weren’t planning on going to.

After a while the world gave me a sign that it was in fact still turning and the sun started to lower on the horizon, speeding towards its’s hideout.

“Over there.” I followed Bucky’s finger pointing to a Motel. “Let’s stay there for the night.”

I followed my best friends’ instructions and left the not so busy highway, pulling into the Motel. Bucky got out, handling everything while I sat in my car leaning back. This felt like a bizarre nightmare.

He came back and gestured for me to get out with a wave of his hand. “We got room number twelve. They didn’t have a room with separate beds though.”

“That’s alright.”

“Ok, let’s go check it out.”

I followed him to our noble estate for the night, walking up the metal staircase and into the corridor looking over the parking lot. The room wasn’t too bad and cleaner than I expected.

“This is quite alright for one night.” I looked over to Bucky to see what he was thinking and from his facial expression, he also wasn’t too appalled of the room.

We placed our suitcases on the floor and got into our pyjamas, laying on the bed next to each other. With nothing to do I stared up to the ceiling, my mind wandering off to the black Mercedes. I questioned everything I did. From hitting that man with my car, to driving away without calling the cops or an ambulance. And I realised what I have done.

“I’m a criminal.” I spoke softly, quiet. Like I didn’t even believe in the words I spoke. As if someone forced me to say it. Quiet, as if saying it a little too loudly would make it even more real.

“No, you’re not.” Bucky rolled over to his side, facing me. “He drove way too fast to see he was even coming.” He put his left hand on mine, his lips curling up to a sad smile.

I closed my eyes, focusing on his warm hand. Tomorrow we’ll drive back to Manhattan and everything we’ll be alright. The police will find that man and report that he was at fault. There is no way someone would find out we were even there.

Saturday – Day One

I woke up to noises in the room and opened my eyes. Bucky stood at the foot of the bed closing our suitcases, already fully dressed. He noticed that I was awake and turned the TV of.

“Are we leaving already?”

“Do you want to stay?” Bucky smiled at me, knowing my answer.

“No, absolutely not. It’s just really early, can we at least have breakfast first?” I sat up and rubbed my eyes.

“Y/n, look.” Bucky sat next to me on the edge of the bed. “This morning I saw on the news that they’ve found that man and they think someone had something to do with it.”

“What? But they could never find out it’s us, could they?”

“I’m not sure. That’s why we must be careful. I think It’s best we don’t go back to Manhattan.”

I threw the blanket away from my legs and stared at Bucky in disbelieve. “What do you mean ‘not go back’ where should we go according to you?”

“Los Angeles.”

I got out of bed, walking up and down the room. “Are you insane, why LA?”

He stood up from the bed as well and started walking towards me. “Y/n, it’s really far away- “

“yeah no shit.”

“Look, it’s really far away and not that long of a drive. Like six days.”

“Oh yeah that’s not long at all. Totally not expensive either. Bucky we can’t just leave everything behind. It’s not like people aren’t going to be wondering where we are.”

“Then we’ll just tell them that we’ve decided to stay at Lake Erie. Everyone knows how much we love it there.”

“That’s just ridiculous! Bucky, we must go back. Do you really want to leave everything we’ve built behind?”

“If not going to jail is the option? Yes!”

“We spend the last three years working on our own Café, bringing our dream to life and now you want to leave all that behind?”

“I know this is upsetting and not going back to our dream is the last thing I want to do, but we’ve killed someone. We committed a crime.”

“Then let’s turn our self in.”

“No.”

“Oh my god. This is now the second most frustrating conversation I’ve had with you in years.”

“Oh, you mean the number one most frustrating conversation we’ve had was about what espresso beans we should use.” Bucky started chuckling, making me even more frustrated that he didn’t take this as seriously right now.

“Stop, this is a serious matter. Let’s just say we go to Los Angeles, what then?”

“I have a friend there, Sam, he can help us out.”

“Help us out with what?”

“Built a new life or get out of America.”

My mind was going a hundred miles per hour at this point. All of this just didn’t seem real. Getting out of Manhattan, my hometown, the Café I’ve worked on so hard just left to collect dust, for someone to take it and turn it into a bar? No way. All the friends- well, I don’t have a lot of those, but still.

Bucky walked over to me, gently grabbing my shoulders. “Look, this isn’t easy, for both of us. But we must do this. If we stick together, we can get to Los Angeles in six days.” Bucky wrapped his arms around me, hugging me tightly.

We packed our suitcases back in the truck of my Honda and drove back on the highway. Chicago was our next destination for now and we had about two hours to get there. The music from the radio occupied my brain with something other than the man I killed.

“We definitely have to stock up on supplies in Chicago. We need some food to survive this journey.”

I looked over to Bucky, who was making a list of things we need for our trip on his phone.

“What are we going to do about electricity?”

“We just have to be really sparingly about using our phones. When and if we sleep at a motel, we can just charge it there.” Bucky said, still looking down at his phone.

“Use sparingly, huh? How about you use the pen and notebook that I have in my bag to make that list of yours.” I turned my head to look at Bucky, a smug smile on my face.

“Fuck off.” Bucky laughed, rummaging through my bag for something to write with, along with my notebook.

‘A man about thirty-two, has been found dead a few miles from Sheffield in Allegheny National Forest on Friday. His black Mercedes appeared to have crushed with a car driving the opposite direction. The driver of the other car has left the crime scene without contacting the authorities and is now being searched for.’

A cold sweat collected on my back, running down my spine. A sharp pain in my chest made it almost impossible to breathe. Immediately without warning, my body temperature rose rapidly.

“Pull over, y/n.” Bucky’s voice ringing in my ears, I pulled over. His face just as pale as mine, he held my hands. “It’s going to be alright.”

I couldn’t get a word out, telling him to just stop saying that. The police are looking for me. Bucky turned the radio off and I was grateful for that, but the damage has been done. I couldn’t stop repeating the words in my head. This was the first time I heard about this with my own ears.

“I’m driving now, get into the passenger seat.” Bucky got out of the car and opened my door. I struggled to get out, my legs almost giving in. He wrapped his arms around my body and all I could do is let go. His shirt collecting my tears.

I sat down in the passenger seat while Bucky drove my car. The rest of the way to Chicago was horrible. I’ve never done anything remotely close to committing a crime. This didn’t feel real. I’m just glad to have Bucky with me. He’s always been the one to keep the situation calm. No matter what came up in my life, he was always the one to calm me down. Even when all our plans seemed to fail to open the Café, he was the one handling everything.

“We’re almost there.” Bucky looked over to me and I could see that he was tired. I knew he wouldn’t admit it, but I knew this was just as difficult for him as it is for me. He finally had his life together after the death of his parents, getting back onto his feet.

The city of Chicago was right in front of us, skyscrapers welcoming us. I’ve never been to Chicago and to be honest, I don’t want to stay here. All I want is to go home.

We drove through the city for a little while, looking for a supermarket. We pulled over and decided to go into one that wasn’t too busy. After all, we (or more like me) are still criminals.

Upon walking in, I already felt like someone was about to call the police on us, even if not even the police know what the person who killed that man looks like.

We stocked up on a few supplies like water, food and cigarettes. I usually don’t smoke, but in situations like this, I just can’t help myself.

We stayed at a hotel more on the outside of the city. The place seemed to be a little run down, but we didn’t mind. The room though, oh god. The awful floral print on the bedding just screamed for us to get out and the view on a dumpster didn’t make up for it either.

“We need to plan where to go next.” Bucky pulled out a map that we bought at the store and we started to plan our trip.

We knew that we had to pull over for brakes and stay at Motels time after time, so the best solution was to drive for about five days. Our next stop being Omaha, Nebraska.

We got into our beds and I fell asleep instantly. The past two days felt like a nightmare that I am going to wake up from tomorrow and instead of sleeping in a shabby hotel in Chicago, I’m staying at our usual resort at Lake Erie.