#they haven't surfaced very significantly yet because we just haven't gotten there

[meyerlansky]

Hi, I'm always thinking about this part of "Let It Sleep" because it hurts my feelings so much and i know it hurts Curt too (re your commentary ~curt has two priorities: don't die, and keep bucky happy.) :

"He chokes on the rest of it. Swallows it, rather than trying to get the words out. Buck knows, anyhow. “The kind of pilot that got eight guys landed safe, Curt,” he says, voice still low but solid now. “That’s not nothing. ‘Specially not to them.”

But none of them are Dickie. He could keep arguing, jab at Buck’s soft spots—spot. It’s Bucky, just Bucky, and it’d be so easy, because for all his talk about the men, getting as many home safe as they can, Norm Smith sure as shit wasn’t Bucky either."

So my question is, how do you think Curt would've reacted if Bucky had died instead - when he wasn't even supposed to be on that mission? Like Lucky Bucky praying just hard enough next to that window for God to save his boys while quietly bleeding out and nobody notices until they land and have to carry him out? What if that had been waiting for Curt when he finally lands?

As always, love your writing and hope you have a great weekend!❤️🖤❤️🖤

"hope you have a great weekend!" like i am not writhing in agony on my FLOOR, you DEMON. how would curt react if bucky died on the regensburg mission? hm, there's a word, what is it............ oh yeah,

BADLY.

crank's probably his first target—and lmao poor crank catching undeserved war-widow grief-fueled rage from SOMEONE no matter what he does—because how do you not fucking notice? how do you pay so little attention to BUCKY, of all people, that you don't notice the life and the light bleeding away? curt's not biased, not at all, everyone has a bucky radar or they fucking SHOULD, how do you not NOTICE, curt fucking felt it in his BONES when dickie bled out TWO FEET AWAY FROM HIM and he loves—loved, fuck—dickie like a brother but dickie wasn't LOUD MOUTH SQUAD LEADER MORALE BOOSTER BUCKY who only goes quiet when something's fucking WRONG, so how can you not NOTICE

and if it's jack or bill that wrangles him away from laying into crank it might be... fine. it'd probably be the best outcome possible, anyway. jack and bill he'd walk away from with a shove and some cursing. but if it's gale?

the thing is, in LiSitS curt's got guilt about dickie because HE was flying. one of his guys, one of the NINE MEN he's responsible for, dickie getting hit is [by his rationale] ON HIM. curt's grief in LiSitS is internalized because he blames himself, so all his anger is pointed inwards and eats at his energy to lash out, even when he WANTS to pick that fight with gale. he'd feel better [or thinks he'd feel better at least—who's to say if he actually would] if he lashed out, but he doesn't deserve to feel better, because it was his fault. but he wouldn't blame himself if it was bucky, in a different fort, when he wasn't supposed to be there at all, because he's not responsible for bucky the same way he's responsible for his crew. so he'd blame the whole command structure, be angry at everyone major or higher, be furious at harding for letting bucky talk his way onto mugwump, but bucky got on that plane for gale. he died FOR GALE. and guess who's right fucking there in telerghma to catch that first burst of grief-fueled rage!

so at least in algeria, there's no grieving together, there's no "it's what bucky would've wanted", there's no "it's not worth picking a fight" like curt thinks wrt needling gale in LiSitS. by LiSitS/the end of DCtCtC, curt likes gale as a person and finds him attractive, but doesn't LOVE him independent of bucky yet. what MAKES it not worth jabbing at gale's soft spot in that LiSitS convo, aside from the internalized grief thing i mentioned, is that bucky wouldn't be happy if curt went for gale's weak spot to make himself feel better, might even pick gale over curt at that point. but BUCKY'S NOT FUCKING HERE TO BE HAPPY OR UNHAPPY ANYMORE and WHOSE FUCKING FAULT IS THAT

he might get over blaming gale if he has some space. he might not. but the immediate aftermath would NOT be pretty, and i don't know that they'd get past it down the line either.