#this is just supposed to be a footnote in the backstory of the AU

[ceiling-karasu]

World Building continued: Backstory for the wars involving Flower Hill, Teikoku, and Usuhan Jiyeog, and subsequent occupations.

Apologies in advance for this being so long. I wanted to know how widespread Japanese weasels are in real life, and found something interesting I could use.

Japanese weasels originate from three areas of Japan, that being Honshu, Kyushu, and Shikoku.

Coincidentally, Japan famously has three Ceremonial Regalia in the form of a sword, magatama beads, and a mirror. These items are not seen by anyone other than the royal family and certain priests (images on the internet are recreations of what they could possibly look like, and those seen in public are symbolic stand-ins), but they symbolize the authority of the royal family.

Which allows me to make a backstory for my AU to help explain the wars and occupations, very loosely based off of events and locations in history, especially since animal biology limits certain events from happening.

In the past, there was an Emperor, who preferred for Teikoku to be in isolation. Under his rule, and of those before him, are smaller prefectures run by princes, lords, or other lessor royal families.

Contact with the United States Alliance and other nations led to a period of aggression and imperialism surrounding the empire of Teikoku, as they strove to fight against a stagnating economy that believed in its own superiority in the world, as well as a strict caste system preventing innovation.

Eventually, after some time, three princes are sent out to conquer the final few neighboring islands, so that may join the empire, and provide a larger force for when they make a move for the peninsula and the mainland.

The three princes are named after their prefectures, and the Emperor has given them each one of the Imperial Regalia as proof of their superiority.

The Sword

Honshu is the main island of Japan, and is also known as the dragonfly island. Teikoku will call it Tonbo, which refers to dragonflies, which are fierce and deadly creatures. As such, their Imperial Regalia is the sword, Yūki no ken (the sword of valor), and is based off of Kusanagi-no-Tsurugi (Grass-Cutter). Tonbo is the main physical fighting force of Teikoku.

The Magatama Jewels

Kyushu is smaller than Honshu, but it had a lot of trade circuits around the ocean and the mountains. So I will make a prefecture named Kairo (Circuit), and have the area be responsible for trade and roads around the empire, as well as in the fighting forces. I would use the famous Magatama jewels (Benevolence) to symbolize their rule.

The Mirror

Shikoku means four provinces, and is the least populated area of the three areas. Shikoku also has a lot of temples (perhaps run by green pheasants, the national symbol of Japan), which draws in a lot of pilgrims. But they also maintain a lot of gateways to other prefectures. So maybe Genkan for entryway. They are responsible for planning and strategizing for the other two. They can have the Michi no kagami, mirror of the path to represent wisdom/truth, based on the Yata no Kagami.

VERY loosely taking inspiration from The Tale of the Heike, a collection of Japanese epic poetry with many translations and retelling (actually written down 200 years after said events supposedly happened), which says that the royal families that held these Regalia were defeated in a naval battle, and threw themselves and the treasures into the sea. Subsequent legends suggest that many search and diving parties have been led to recover the Regalia.

In my AU, I hold that the items were thrown into the sea, with the princes believing that they could return for them later even if they were captured, although they managed to escape. It was a complete disgrace for the Emperor, as without the Ceremonial Regalia, the legitimacy of the entire palace was thrown into question.

And then the box holding the Magatama washed up on the shores of the peninsula.

It is returned as a gesture of good will, but as no good deed goes unpunished, Teikoku believes that they must have taken the other Imperial Regalia for themselves, starting a land invasion. The small army is annihilated by farmers, fresh out of overthrowing their own monarchy, wielding guns, which Teikoku has never seen before.

Which results in a larger army being sent, which is also defeated and the princes captured and possibly executed by the hedgehog army in the north of the country. At this point, without the authority of the Ceremonial Regalia, and increasing economical desperation, the country is forced to undergo a reformation. While there is still an Emperor, he does not hold as much political power as he once did.

Teikoku left behind settlements of soldiers and colonists controlling the southern portion of the peninsula, which they name Usuhan Jiyeog, who take up ruler-ship and fish farming.

The hedgehogs use the proof of their power in defending their areas to take control of what they would name Flower Hill.

It is a strongly held belief that before they backed away from Usuhan Jiyeog, the Emperor promised that anyone who managed to retrieve the Ceremonial Regalia from Flower Hill would be reinstated as the next emperor, and be rewarded with power beyond their wildest dreams.

Did the other two, heavier, items, even wash up on the shores of the peninsula like the jewels, locked in an airtight box? Or did they sink to the bottom, as they were heavier? Who is to say...

But alongside the greed, desperation for power, and food production issues, the temptation of finding the supposedly stolen Imperial Regalia locked away in some distant stronghold is a good enough reason as any to attempt to occupy Flower Hill.

Now, I'm not about to retcon what I have already written and say that Commander Jogjebi wanted the sword and mirror, and Huinjogjebi is a weasel of science who would likely not be interested anyway. But claiming that Flower Hill stole precious items and symbols of their country in the past, and them not being able to disprove it, is enough of an excuse to make quite a few countries in the international courts turn a blind eye to the happenings surrounding Flower Hill.

Oil Production

I did figure out the oil and gas situation. I did go ahead and give the Jindo Empire a large amount of oil. The Venezuela country below the United States Alliance is now the República de Cultivos Oleaginosos, and is trying to prevent the wolves' country from occupying their regions.

Meanwhile, the vast majority of the world's oil in my AU is being produced in this country.

While it used to be many different nations in the past, the leaders understood that their vast oil and gas reserves would result in large scale invasions, and agreed to band together into the Equatorial Allegiance.

[attyrocious]

Hi! I have a question about the band au: do you have any thoughts about Law’s backstory in relation to Doflamingo’s band and ending up with Cora? Hope you have a nice day!

(this has been in my inbox for like a week now dsjfhk apologies) anyway yeah i have some, though im more of a crumb leaver in terms of story telling so if anything, this is like, a view of events from an outsider's perspective.

ive mentioned before that law was a PR stunt for doffy, as in poor little orphan boy with a supposed terminal illness and a penchant for rock music gets the charity of the magnanimous rockstar doflamingo, who's totally recovered from a scandalous bender of sorts. took him as a protege, paraded him around his tours with Donquixotes.

then some time later its announced that their bassist, corazon, is leaving the band and has been absent from the limelight ever since. their charity case boy, like most insignificant footnotes in celebrity news, just kinda disappeared from the tabloids too. doffy and the Donquixotes are still legends in the rocks scene and the man never changed. the end

[desultory-novice]

“Summer”

This is the last joke I’ll make about how cold it is on Shiver Star.

[Apologies AU] “Apologies”   “One Sneeze”   “Summer”  [You Are Here] “A Walk in the Snow”   “The Swordsman” “Wonderful Gift” "Damnation" "Salvation" "Unstoppable" "Brightest Star"

[Bonus Illust] “Ugly Scarf”   [Bonus Illust] "That's...Funny..." [Bonus Illust] "Full Regalia" (DMS "Gijinka") [Bonus Illust] "Was I A Good Brother?" [Relevant] “Vestige” (script-only)

[Bonus Text] Noir Facts!

[Dark Matter Painter AU] "It wasn't supposed to go this way...!" "You're a good knight!" "The Body Remembers"

I liked the idea of “Welcome to the New World” being something of a  propaganda song. But it must get kinda grating when you’re still stuck on old earth. Doesn’t stop it from playing on the radio every.single.morning.

-

Thanks for the positive reception to Noir, everyone, given I made him nearly entirely out of whole cloth based on a footnote in a design sheet. I’ll be sure to make him suffer take good care of him.

Also, I know everyone’s in a hurry to get to Popstar and have the two siblings meet again (and watch me destroy everyone’s hearts) but that’s going to require just a little bit of backstory first. Don’t worry, the backstory will destroy your heart too.

[actualbampot]

Hi there, first just wanted to say big fan of your work! Always impressed by your prose and drawings, both are amazing without a doubt!

Second, I was wondering if there was any thoughts you had on Cinder and Ruby in Strict Machine (or outside of that fic) which you haven’t been able to write at or haven’t had the context to write for yet?

Hope your day is going well!

I managed to completely miss this. That's very sweet, thank you. I think it's less what I don't have the context to write, and more what I don't have the context to SHOW (The WIP document is still bigger than what has been published so far). I've been trying to be strict in keeping what I share systematic, so as not to spoil anything.

Something that I don't really talk about, is that I come under a lot of fire for making this story a younger character x older character pairing.

So, I fully intended to write ONLY Chapter 1 and be done with it, then when I started getting some unsavoury feedback I thought, you know what? Fuck it. I kept writing out of spite, and I tied Cinder and Ruby's age gap purely into background subtext because I wanted to subvert these expectations. I don't think myself ignorant to the fact that there's subsets of media that really lean into predatory, unhealthy aspects of this kind of theme, but Strict Machine always had very little to do and with age, and more to do with two complicated people at different points in their lives that struggle to navigate this inexplainable attraction to each other.

So when I get slated for being that one person 'that writes an age gap AU for Ruby x SheWhoMustNotBeNamed' with all of the attached implications, I know for a fact that they didn't even bother reading it.

-

Anyway, as for things I haven't been able to write/had no context to write:

Neo owns her own clothing brand, Harajuku, which has been around since before the inception of Adel. She and Cinder are, quote unquote 'very old friends', which Ruby finds baffling since Neo looks so young, and there's a rumor that Neo has a semblance at play when she makes public appearances. Coco doesn't really like her, and she was supposed to be a tension point of jealousy for Ruby.

Demobaza is one of my absolute favourite irl fashion brands (check them out here!). I wanted to fit it into this AU as a Vacuo clothing brand owned by Carmine Esclados. The target audience would have been Hunters and Huntresses.

Cinder is absolutely terrified of flying, and she's been banned from certain airlines for ignoring safety procedures on aircrafts. I started writing this to distract myself when we landed and took off from Austin airport for RTX- both times in the middle of storms.

Cinder' s connection to Willow was fully intended to be a footnote in Cinder's backstory and nothing more, but after I blocked out a few pages, I realized I could weave it in. So...we'll see?

Velvet is an incredibly talented photographer and one of a few that can photograph in 'Hard Light' successfully, and the reason why she landed the job as Cinder's assistant before Ruby. In my draft of Cinder and Ruby's private tutoring session, Cinder explains this as she struggles to set up a Hard Light camera for Ruby to use, but @fanfictionsrookie's version of this chapter was so amazingly written that I binned mine.

Cinder was originally going to own Tucksons coffee which explained why she was so familiar with the waiting staff in Chapter 1, but it didn't lend to anything beyond that, so I cut it.

Cinder and Ruby were originally going to kiss during their argument at the Lakeshore shoot, but I rewrote it to an 'almost kiss' to make their first kiss more impactful.

Maybe this was a bit too thorough.. Hope this answered..SOMETHING. :)

[gurguliare]

Hi, I'm not sure if tumblr swallowed my ask, so to be safe: how do you think utena would work if the characters had non-conditional immortality? As in death from old age simply wasn't a concern both within and without Ohtori, an equivalence to Tolkien's elves or, say, vampires (which is a bit different). Idk, I'm just wondering how it would mesh with Utena's concerns with adolescence and the acceptance of change/lack of eternity, as well as like, adding a degree of plausibility to Anthy and Akio

Hey, sorry—your other ask wasn’t eaten, I just couldn’t think of an interesting answer. Here are a few reasons why I think this AU wouldn’t work:

First off, I’m not sure “plausible” is the word you want here. “Internally consistent” is probably closer.  This isn’t (just) me being a pedantic douche; plausibility in one direction threatens to obscure plausibility in another. By which I mean, “teenagers held in thrall of some bullshit they KNOW makes no sense but which is insidious in part because it is, on its face, nonthreateningly absurd” … is not a scenario unique to shoujo allegory. Regardless of what you think of Akio and Anthy’s supposed backstory, the inbuilt vampirism of Ohtori and its pet myths is already literal. Impossible things happen at Ohtori, but not in a way that offers the viewer analytical distance, by safely encoding the characters’ struggles in escapist fantasy violence. If you try to reframe the garbage into worldbuilding, you miss the point that inconsistency is a manipulator’s game, and is a significant chunk of what keeps the cast engrossed in pointless attempts to “learn” his language, which doesn’t actually exist.

Am I making sense? Craft discussions of the supernatural in fiction often dwell narrowly on suspension of disbelief, to the point that earning belief can seem like the end-all and be-all of fantasy, and fantastic fiction divisible into two classes: fantasy which is immersive because rule-bound and predictable, and fantasy which is immersive because deliberately mysterious, in a manner that does homage to the mysteries, the unexplainable errata, of human experience or the natural world. According to that view of the genre, fantasy has to seem authorless to succeed. If that’s true, Utena isn’t fantasy. Fabulous occurrences in Utena have an author. Utena is a story about fantasy, and about fantasy as it exists everywhere in the real world: a tool of predatory deception, which dangles rules only to break them, making an addictive treadmill of the search for authentic meaning. (Footnote here that some magic in Ohtori seems to have been appropriated by Akio, rather than invented by him; or it originates with other people as a genuinely self-protective response to his dominion. I’m not out to tell you that Anthy isn’t magic. But it’s once again a case where viewer response, and consistency, feel kinda irrelevant.)

There’s another element to this, which is Utena’s interest in change and death. I say “death” rather than “eternity” because eternity as a keyword in Utena is incredibly vague, which is a clue that it’s being invoked in negative reaction to something else, and, yes! that something is death. Tolkien’s work derives a lot of tension from the screwy interactions between love and fear of loss, and takes as its essential premise that the world is redeemable and has yet to be redeemed. Because of that, it’s useful for him to consider multiple failure modes, in the form of elves, humans, Valar, etc.; fakey-fake hypotheticals allow him to block in and define his ideal reality (and its ideally well-adjusted inhabitants.) But Utena isn’t interested in grappling with the validity, or lack thereof, of human desire to escape death. Despite the revolutionary patois, Utena only cares about the world that exists. Death is an important presence in the story because the fact of death is what makes self-delusion a legitimately appealing alternative. It’s not that anyone likes spouting crap about shiny things, day in, day out. It’s not that people can’t see that the system is broken. But the hope is that a higher plan will show you something your own reason couldn’t, because all your reason showed you was oblivion. The devouring need to believe that exceptions exist, that the inevitable doesn’t apply, drives a lot of unlucky teenagers into the arms of—well—shirtless night drives. 

More correctly, someone like Akio encourages and cultivates the devouring need, turning it from the first reflex of shock into a habit, and a self-sustaining narrative. Also it goes back and forth, once fantasy has been set up in opposition to supposedly unbearable reality; characters start to nurse their trauma as justification for seeking comfort, which embeds it more deeply into their identity, which creates a stronger impetus toward the only form of escapism they’ve encountered, even as that separation from reality also hurts them in other ways (and damages their ability to speak honestly.) And, you know, part of the horror is that it happens to Utena, even though Utena has, of all the characters, the healthiest second-order response to grief—but that doesn’t immunize her. Having experienced real compassion, she remains as vulnerable as anyone else to solipsism and fear. 

My concern with making everyone vampires is that a sense of intensely hollow futility is not preserved if death and loss are elective, or if anyone is ultimately outside death’s reach. The story blurs its own lines if Akio has something besides fantasy to offer as a sop to his victims. 

(If Akio’s and Anthy’s immortality worries you, it may also be worth noting that Anthy was a child when Utena first met her. Okay, so six thousand years have passed from Anthy’s perspective in the meantime; is that really a surprise?)

[justsomebucky]

Lesson Learned

Summary: AU. Reader and Bucky Barnes are best friends. Will a figure from the past ruin everything, or will they see what’s right in front of them?

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x fem!reader

Word Count: 3,484

Warnings: language, angst, fluff, drinking, fables are difficult, the grass isn’t always greener, cheesy like Hallmark movies, yadda yadda

A/N: This is my last submission for the lovely Nikki’s ( @soldatbarnes​) writing challenge. My prompt was the word Fable (and I have listed my selected one below the cut). I have suffered through this.Thanks to @sebbytrash for helping.

The Astronomer An astronomer used to go out at night to observe the stars. One evening, as he wandered through the suburbs with his whole attention fixed on the sky, he fell accidentally into a deep well. While he lamented and bewailed his sores and bruises, and cried loudly for help, a neighbor ran to the well, and learning what had happened said: "Hark ye, old fellow, why, in striving to pry into what is in heaven, do you not manage to see what is on earth?'

--------

“Do you ever look up at the sky and think of all the endless possibilities in life? Maybe wonder where you could’ve ended up instead of here?”

You turned your head and looked up at the glittering night sky. Where exactly was he going with this? “You mean another planet?”

Bucky Barnes, your best friend in the world, gave a big belly laugh. “No, I mean as in another city, or another country…do you ever picture yourself having a life someplace else? Do you think you were meant to be living a different life?”

Your eyes flickered back down to the water, where slivers of moonlight glistened off the small waves. The two of you had picked this table because of its location on the deck, and now you wished you were inside, sharing elbow room with an overwhelming Friday crowd.

You couldn’t explain it, but his question made you anxious, and your fight-or-flight mode was ready to send you flying.

“Of course it crosses my mind sometimes,” you replied, trying to keep a casual tone. “I think everyone thinks about it…but how can you really know?”

He nodded but didn’t answer, taking a quick swig of his beer as he lost himself in thought again.

Your brows furrowed as you considered his original question. Was he having some regrets about his choices?

This was new, or news to you at least. Bucky normally seemed pretty content in his life here, and had since the day you met him two years ago. He had a good job, lots of friends, a decent apartment…he even had a little cat he lovingly called Luke Skywalker.

In fact, it was a vast improvement from how he’d been the first time you set eyes on him.

Everything about that night had been filled with laughter and fun. You’d been out celebrating your friend Rochelle’s engagement to the love of her life, Dean. Carley, your roommate back at uni, brought her husband Richard, leaving you as the only one flying solo. Normally, you hated showing up alone to parties when you knew everyone else would be paired off.

That night was a special exception, obviously.

And though you wouldn’t realize it until later, that night had a bit of magic left to try to align the universe in your favor, too.

Your entire life shifted on its axis the day Bucky Barnes entered your life.

The little celebration had already been in full swing for at least an hour. You’d wandered to the bar for another round of drinks (on you, of course, because everyone took turns). Every bit of it was fairly normal.

You’d looked over at him, then. It was just a quick glance the first time, then a few more, and another as you felt drawn in his direction. At the time you figured it was just the two rum and cokes in your system doing all the thinking for you.

Maybe you looked that many times because you’d never seen someone so handsome in that dinky restaurant by the water before. Maybe it was the look in his sad blue-grey eyes as he stared at nothing that tugged on your heartstrings. Those could certainly be contributors to why you chose to approach him that night.

Anyway, you felt an urgent need to introduce yourself, reasons be damned.

That night was supposed to be happy, filled with laughter and joy, not misery. Why should someone be so miserable if you could help them? You wanted to see him happy.

You had scooted a little closer while you waited for your drinks, though not so far as to make him feel like you were a creeper. His eyes had met yours in confusion, but at least he wasn’t put off by your presence. Conversation started, and though at first he was a man of few words, you managed to get his tragic backstory.

It turned out that a woman named Natasha had left him for the other coast, intent on making it big in the entertainment industry. She told him she didn’t want him along for the ride even though Bucky was willing to go with her. They didn’t have a future, she’d said.

That very night, he sat there by himself, drinking and wallowing under the weight of a year-long relationship that came crashing down over his head in mere minutes. This Natasha woman had decided, without his input, that his life was going to change forever because of her own needs.

She just threw him away.

So yeah, you spared him a few more minutes of your time and even a drink on your tab before you invited him over to the engagement party. At first he refused, but once you got Carley and Rochelle in on it, he said he couldn’t possibly turn three lovely ladies down.

The fact that he was smiling by the end of that night made your whole damn week better. He was easy to like, and as the months went on, even easier to love.

You realized you were in love with him after about seven months or so, but there was never any a-ha moment. It just became a fact of life, a little footnote of information that you kept to yourself.

Not that you would ever tell him…you didn’t want to then, and couldn’t imagine telling him in the near future. Things worked well between the two of you and you didn’t want to mess it up.

It wasn’t worth the risk of losing him.

For all his intuitiveness, Bucky didn’t seem to notice the atmosphere shifting around him as you recalled your affection. He didn’t notice the way your eyes lingered or how your hands fidgeted nervously.

You looked away, focusing on a small boat parked nearby as it shimmied on the water. “Is there a reason you’re asking, Buck?”

Bucky cleared his throat. “Actually, yeah…remember Natasha?”

Your eyes narrowed almost instantly. Of course you remembered her. “You mean the woman who left you two years ago after breaking your heart into a million pieces?”

When he didn’t answer, you looked back at him. “Am I wrong?”

“She’s back in town,” he continued, overlooking the truth of the situation. “She wanted to get together, catch up a little.”

“And you told her no, right?”

Didn’t he? Surely he wouldn’t agree to meet with her after everything she did to him. What kind of madman would even consider it?

“I had drinks with her last night,” Bucky admitted quietly, swirling the last of his beer once before chugging it.

So that’s where he had been when you tried to reach him. He had been suspiciously quiet all day.

That’s who he was with on the night he usually reserved for you, for movies or game night or anything as long as the two of you were together.

Your eyes flitted back to the water. You weren’t sure if it was mortification or betrayal you were feeling…maybe a little of both.

“And?”

He sighed. “She’s well…she’s thinking about moving back to the city.”

A low hum sounded in your throat. Of course she was.

“Couldn’t cut it out west?”

“She said she’s sick of the weather.”

“There’s always Canada.”

“Y/N…”

“Bucky,” you mimicked, meeting his sharp gaze again. “What ever happened to ‘I don’t ever want to see her again,’ and ‘she ruined my life’?”

He gave a shrug and set his beer bottle down. “We’ve both grown up a little.”

The truth was more likely that Natasha needed a place to crash until she got her own place here. Maybe she wanted to borrow some money, maybe she needed some…casual familiar relief…but there was no way in hell that she should be able to just go back to something she so easily left behind without having to own up to her mistakes first.

You sat up a little, giving him your full attention. “Did she apologize?”

“Sort of.” Bucky looked away.

Your eyes narrowed. “How does one sort of apologize? That’s like saying you sort of breathe, you sort of exist, you sort of-“

“I get it, all right? I just need some time to think.” Bucky slid out of his chair and stood, gesturing to your drink. “Want another one?”

Yeah, definitely not. The more liquid courage you had the greater the chance of spilling your guts to him, and after his little Natasha revelation, that was out of the question.

“Actually, I have to be up early tomorrow.”

It was the most see-through excuse ever, but you didn’t care. Why should you care if he didn’t care enough about himself to move on from that destructive relationship.

He’d made so much progress...it hurt to see him so willing to throw it all away.

Bucky nodded, running a hand over the light stubble on his jawline. “Do you need a lift, or-“

“I’m fine,” you interrupted, grabbing your bag and jacket while forcing a smile to your face. “Have a good night Bucky.”

You didn’t wait for his reply before bolting for the exit. It wasn’t mature and certainly wasn’t how you would have liked to handle it, but if you didn’t get out of there quick, you were going to get emotional.

---

Days passed before you even bothered to open the text messages you’d been getting from Bucky.

The silent treatment was so, so childish, but you honestly didn’t know what to say to him. You didn’t know how to explain why you left so abruptly that night, and you sure as hell didn’t know how to explain why you were so angry, so emotional over this whole situation without revealing your secret.

Your heart was screaming for you to just talk to him, but your fear was keeping you quiet.

So you did what you were used to doing. You closed yourself off from the rest of the world. You went to work, you came home, and you repeated the process, just going through the motions to keep your head above water.

The thing was, your heart was aching. Every day it felt like a larger weight stacked on your shoulders. The sun shined a little less brightly, your bed wasn’t as soft, and your smiles were halfhearted. It was pretty melodramatic after only a week, but you just couldn’t help it.

It was like a part of you went missing, which was really ridiculous, since you never felt like that before Bucky came into your life.

When Friday night arrived, you sat on your couch in your small apartment and finally broke down, opening the growing number of unread texts from your best friend.

The further you read, the more the text started to blur as a week’s worth of unhinged emotions finally caught up to you.

Hope you made it home safely.

Hey, I know you hate Sunday nights, so I found this picture of a dog for you.

Have a great Monday, Y/N.

Hey did you see this video? Thought it might make you smile.

Those were just the starters.

Happy Hump Day!

I guess you’re really mad at me, huh? : /

Is there anything I can do?

Y/N, can we talk? Maybe over pizza and a Thor movie? Get it? Thorsday?

Or maybe we could go to the movies if you don’t want to talk?

Okay, well, when you decide you want to talk, I’ll be here.

I just really miss you.

That’s the one that got you. The last message had a time stamp of earlier that afternoon.

He was still making an effort to talk, so you decided to make the effort, too.

If he wanted to go be with Natasha again, so be it. It didn’t mean he would be out of your life, just less accessible. Maybe they were meant to be, maybe it was fated for her to come back in his life. Two years was enough time to grow as a person, if the person really wanted to, right?

You weren’t even involved, you didn’t even know her. This was their battle, their reunion, and you didn’t need to forgive someone on someone else’s behalf.

You didn’t even factor into Bucky’s equation.

“Dammit,” you muttered, setting your phone down on the coffee table in front of you.

You were jealous.

Bucky had been just yours for two whole years. The two of you did everything together, and the thought of him spending time with her, well…

It kind of made you sick to your stomach.

Two years of spending all that time together really did a number on your brain. It was so damn cliché to fall for your best friend. It was stupid and so utterly useless. If he had wanted more from you, he’d had two years to make a move. Hell, you had two years to make a move and you chickened out.

Besides, your jealousy didn’t change anything. It didn’t make you more important than Natasha to Bucky. It didn’t make him want to be with you.

All it did was make you feel awful.

You squeezed your eyes shut, letting your head fall back against the couch cushion with a loud groan.

The decision was basically made for you. It was time to be a better, more supportive friend. It was selfish to try to hold onto someone who wanted to be free. If that’s what he needed from you, you weren’t going to let your dumb feelings get in the way.

You’d get over him eventually.

Your eyes opened and you quickly typed out a message to Bucky, asking him to meet you at the restaurant by the water, and you even added a little note at the end that made your heart twist.

Feel free to bring Natasha.

---

You didn’t dress differently or prepare any sort of speech to give him. There were only two words resting on the tip of your tongue at the moment, and they were long overdue.

So that night, nearly two years to the day that you met, it was your turn to sit at the bar by yourself, looking forlorn and more than a little lost.

This time it was Bucky who approached you, silently taking the barstool beside you as he waved to the bartender and ordered a beer.

When you didn’t hear anyone else order, you turned your eyes toward your best friend.

He was alone. Bucky’s blue-grey eyes were as calm as the water behind you as he locked eyes with you. He said nothing, merely waiting for you to say what was on your mind.

“I’m sorry.”

Bucky didn’t react for a second or two, but when the corner of his mouth lifted you knew you were forgiven.

“I’m sorry, too.”

You protested almost immediately, knowing that he wasn’t at fault here, but he was having none of it.

“Look, Y/N.” He placed a gentle hand on your arm that was resting on the bar top. “I get it, you were just looking out for me. Natasha did a number on me and seeing her again, well…it kind of made my brain go haywire.”

All you could do was nod to encourage him to continue. This is what you were here for, after all, to listen and be supportive.

“I started thinking about how life could be if I was somewhere else. Did I make all the right choices? Did I choose the right path? I kept looking up and away instead of here and now.”

You shrugged one shoulder, trying to seem casual about the whole thing while internally you were screeching. “Like I said last week, Bucky, everyone does that.”

“Not you,” he countered, turning his body a little more to face you. “You never have. You marched right up to me the first night we met, and told me to keep living, to keep existing for me and to make the most of what I had. You made me laugh, you made me happy again, and I’ll be forever grateful.”

“That’s what friends are for.” Your leg started involuntarily shaking against the barstool and you had to make an effort to stop despite your nerves being shot.

“And that brings me to my next point, Y/N.”

Bucky pulled his hand from your arm and stood, this time leaning over on the bar right in front of you. You found yourself a little more than flustered by his presence in your personal space.

Your leg wasn’t shaking anymore, but that was because you could no longer feel it.

“What next point?” you managed to ask, tightening your grip on your own drink.

“It’s so stupid, really…I was so busy looking at every other possibility that I didn’t see what was right in front of me until it wasn’t there anymore.”

Ah, of course. He meant your company, your friendship. Old reliable Y/N. Yeah, you knew how that felt…it had totally thrown you to go a week without him.

“I’m sorry,” you repeated, feeling your face heat up with embarrassment. “I won’t be an ass like that again, I promise.”

“I don’t think you’re quite understanding.” Bucky shifted a little so his face was closer to yours. “I know now that every choice I made was for a reason.”

You stared in wide-eyed confusion. What the hell was happening? Everything behind him faded to a blur as you zeroed in on his face.

“One week without you crushed me, Y/N,” he explained, his eyes softening a little. “Sure, Nat was back, but all she did was make me realize what I already had. Your absence wasn’t worth it. It won’t ever be worth it.”

“Can you please just speak plainly?”

If you were reading him right (and you knew you were after two years of being in his company), things were about to monumentally shift in your relationship again.

“I’m saying that life without you doesn’t make sense to me, and I don’t want to experience it ever again. I’m saying my life choices led me to you, and I’ll never regret it. I’m saying the past two years have been the best years of my life. I should have been looking in front of me this whole time.”

Bucky was silent while he waited for you to process this information.

“Are you sure you aren’t confusing yourself?” You needed him to check and re-check before you could believe that he came upon this huge revelation. “Because having a friendship you can rely on that suddenly isn’t there can be an emotional thing, too, and I-“

“This is going to sound stupid, but I think that’s why I haven’t dated in over a year. I think…” He paused, as if trying to collect his thoughts. “I think Nat’s arrival made me realize that I’ve been acting like you and I were already in a relationship, without putting both feet in.”

You pondered that for a second. Neither of you had dated anyone in about a year, now that you thought about it. And really, you hadn’t felt the need to.

“I took you for granted, Y/N, and I’m sorry. But I want to do right by you now. I want us to be together.”

“Bucky, this is a big step, a huge change. Are you sure?” Any sliver of calm you hoped to retain was gone, replaced by a buzzing excitement that might very well have been borderline panic. “Because I don’t want to be hurt again in a week if you realize you were just lonely.”

A little smile appeared on his lips. “I am one-hundred percent sure. How do you feel about it?”

You stared at him, not wanting to miss any slight reaction. “Bucky, I’ve been sure for a while. I just figured…well, I assumed you friend-zoned me.”

Admitting that was such a relief. You’d held your feelings in for so long to spare the friendship, to spare yourself from any awkwardness, but now you felt the tension melting away. Now, at least, the truth was out in the open.  

“But now,” you continued, feeling empowered. “Even though we went about this the wrong way, we both learned a lesson here. I think…no, I know I want this.”

Bucky’s smile widened. It was his ‘Y/N smile,’ the one he reserved for you that sparked all your romantic feelings. It was the smile that made you feel like you were the most important person in his life.

Apparently, you were.

“This is probably the right time to kiss, don’t you think?” His eyes were sparkling now, with flecks of gold reflecting from the holiday lights above you. “You know, just to make it official.”

“It’s always good to make things official,” you mumbled, right before he leaned over to press his lips to yours.

When he pulled away a moment later, you were pretty sure you were giving him your best ‘Bucky smile.’