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rambleonwaywardson · 1 month

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Clegan Olympics AU - "Pour Toujours"

Masterpost Read on AO3 - Sous Le Ciel de Paris

Author's note: This will be the last chapter of the main story, but it's longer than the others :). I will add an epilogue when I can get around to it, and I might continue doing drabbles when I have the time because I love them so much. For now, thank you so much to everyone who has read and supported this little AU throughout this Olympic season. It's been a lot of fun, and I hope you've fallen in love with these versions of the characters as much as I have.

Let's get on with some much needed damage control!

---

Believe it or not, John knows he fucked up. And he knows he fucked up bad.

So he doesn’t really expect anyone to pick up when he calls Marge the day after the equestrian team was scheduled to land back stateside. He called Gale twice last night and got no answer. He knows he deserves that.

He also knows he deserves the irritated “What do you want” when Marge answers her phone, but he’s shocked to hear someone’s voice on the other end of the line at all.

“I fucked up,” he stammers out.

She laughs mirthlessly. “Oh you figured that out did you?”

He tries desperately to explain what happened even though he knows it sounds weak. Even though he knows it doesn’t even begin to make up for the heartbreak he caused Gale. The heartbreak he caused himself. He tries to explain the way things ended in Paris, that he panicked, that he couldn’t think or breathe, that he felt paralyzed by the way everything crashed down around him and he was out of energy to hold it up. He tries to tell her, “It wasn’t just Gale. I wasn’t talking to anyone, Marge.”

That’s when she stops him, and he doesn’t know if it’s because she’s fed up with him and his stupidity or because those were the words that made her believe him. He knows the equestrians continued hanging out with the gymnasts long after he left. He’s glad for that, really. He’s happy that this ragtag bunch of Olympians found a lasting friendship with each other that would survive with or without him. He is. But he also wonders if they talked about him. He wonders what they said.

He wonders if he was simply the villain in this story, or if anyone came to his defense. He doesn’t know which possibility hurts more.

“I’m not the one you need to apologize to,” she tells him. She’s angry, but he hears sympathy in her voice, and that gives him the smallest bit of hope for fixing the mess he left in his wake.

“He won’t answer me.” Texts. Calls. Nothing.

“I know.”

Bucky nods and bites at his lip nervously. Of course Gale tells Marge about it. She probably knows every single thing that happened. She’s probably the one that had to pick up the pieces, listen to Gale wonder whether or not he should keep trying or simply let Bucky go.

“Can you tell me where to find him?”

“You did to him exactly what he told you he was afraid of,” she accuses, instead of answering him. The frustration rises in her voice once again, and Bucky knows all he can do is sit there and hear it. He’ll take the blows, because they’re entirely his to take. He knows he deserves worse.

“You let him get close to you,” Marge admonishes him. “You let him love you. God, John, he was so in love with you. Then when things got a little hard, you asked him for sex one more time and then you fucking left. You left, just like he was so worried you would, and you told him you’d call. But you didn’t. You just fucking disappeared. Do you know what that did to him?”

Bucky squeezes his eyes shut. Because he knows. He knows. And it breaks his heart to think of Gale hurting and confused and blindsided like that. It breaks his heart to know he caused it. “I’m sorry,” he whispers, but it comes out so quiet he doesn’t know if she hears him.

“He was sitting there, wondering what he did wrong, John. Wondering why he wasn’t good enough. Not understanding why you left. Not understanding if any of it was fucking real.” Marge scoffs. “I saw you together. Even I thought you would be good for him. And then you fucked it all up in the blink of an eye.”

“I know,” Bucky says, stronger this time. He wonders if Marge can hear the way his voice is thick with regret, tight with pain, the way it shakes because he wants nothing more than to put the pieces back together like they were before he blew it all up in their faces. “I hate myself for it, Marge. I never meant to hurt him, I was just so… fuck. I… I love him, Marge. You have to believe me. I love him.”

“Then why did you do it?”

Why?

That question rings in Bucky’s ears, resounding through his empty apartment like a ghost knocking on his walls. Why did he do it?

Why?

He sighs and puts his head in his hand, because he’s trying to work through it himself. He’s been trying to work through it ever since he left, and he keeps coming up short because there’s just so much. Too much to put together into any coherent explanation. Too much to sort through in his anxious angry brain. And none of it is an excuse and yet all of it is a reason.

He opens his mouth to speak, to try to explain, but before he can, Marge cuts him off. “Don’t answer that.” She sounds as defeated as he does, sad and angry and hurt. Tired. He wonders how much damage control she’s had to run in the last week. It makes him feel sick. “I’m so pissed at you,” she all but growls. “But I understand, too.”

Understand?

How can she understand when he barely does?

Bucky squeezes his eyes shut against tears that are threatening to break free. He has never in his life been a crying type, but he’s barely been sleeping. He’s eating like shit, his knee is killing him with every move he makes, and his anxiety is at a peak. He misses Gale so much, and he’s filled with so much regret that it threatens to tear him in half, and he thinks that might be better than sitting here in this depressed sludge of his mind for one more moment.

He takes a deep breath in a pathetic attempt to control the nervous energy coursing through him. He glances at the medal boxes just sitting on his kitchen table. He hasn’t figured out where to display them, yet, so they sit there and taunt him with the globally celebrated feats that he might never be capable of again. Sure, they called him the greatest male gymnast of all time. But if he goes out now, like this, he’ll be nothing but a washed up has-been who stood on top of the world stage for one golden moment.

Beside one of the boxes is a photograph – a legitimate, printed photograph. The one of him and Gale on that last good night before his rings final, when they sat cuddled together on his bed in the Village with their friends gathered in celebration. They each have a medal around their necks, Gale’s arm wrapped around him, holding him close. They look so happy. Bucky doesn’t think he’s ever been that happy in his entire life.

Curt, in dramatic fashion, had the photo printed when he came home after closing, and he left it here for Bucky to stare at, in hopes it would remind him of what he needed to do.

It worked.

“Where can I find him?” Bucky asks again. He presses his fingers to his lips and sniffs quietly, hoping she can’t hear it. “Please, Marge. I need to find him.”

Marge hesitates for a long moment, and Bucky fully expects her to hang up on him. He wouldn’t blame her. But then she sighs. He can picture her pinching the bridge of her nose, closing her eyes, gathering all her mental strength. “I’m going to help you for one reason and one reason only,” she states. “He has never been as happy as he was with you. So I’ll give you one chance to get your head out of your goddamn ass.”

She gives him an address that he scrambles to write down, not even giving him a chance to repeat it back, like she’s decided that if he didn’t bother to listen carefully enough the first time then he’s not worth the trouble after all. He’s about to thank her profusely when she says, “Come today or not at all.” And she hangs up.

He calls Curt immediately.

Curtis Biddick is the only person that Bucky has interacted with since coming home other than their coach and their team doctor. And that’s because Curt didn’t give him a choice. Because Curt knows he’s a goddamn self-destructive idiot that needs to be defused every hour on the hour so he doesn’t implode his own life. He stayed in Paris through closing, even though he did offer to go home with Bucky (to which Bucky said “fuck no” because he was not about to take this time away from his best friend).

Curt texted and called him every day all the way from France, reminding him to eat or ice or heat or drink water. He sent him random shit to try to make him laugh, asked how he was doing, if he’d checked in with his therapist (to which he said no and Curt forced him to schedule an appointment right there and then). And if Bucky didn’t answer his calls, he’d call their coach to see if Bucky was in the gym. If he was, he’d insist on talking to him, and if he wasn’t he’d tell their coach to drop by Bucky’s apartment.

Bucky doesn’t think he deserves that kind of concern either, and he told Curt as much. But Curt looked like he wanted to slap him in the face through their facetime call, and he told Bucky that he may be stupid, but he still deserves someone to care about him.

His therapist says the same thing.

Bucky can’t really comprehend that. He doesn’t see where in this equation he deserves any kindness.

Even so, Curt was the one to confront Bucky about what he did to Gale. He was the one to tell him how much it destroyed the young equestrian, leaving him adrift and despondent. “He wasn’t the same the rest of the week,” he said. “Tried to hide it I think, but Benny said he was a wreck every night. Had to be dragged outta the room some days. Lost interest in a lotta things that he was used to doin’ with you, literally anything in the Village.”

Curt was the one to emphasize the fact that everyone else was there to pick up the pieces of Bucky’s mess when he couldn’t be bothered. And he was the one to yell and rage at Bucky and tell him he was being ridiculous and selfish and flat out stupid. When he arrived home, the first thing he did was stop by Bucky’s apartment, thrust that photograph at him, and say, “John Clarence Egan, quit the goddamn pouting and call your boyfriend right fucking now.”

So Bucky did. He called Gale right there while Curt watched. Gale just didn’t pick up.

And why would he? Why should he? After days of nothing, in what world would Gale be won over by a single phone call? Bucky may not really know what to do about this whole love thing, but he knows it doesn’t come cheap.

So now, even though he doesn’t owe Bucky a thing and Bucky probably owes him his life in exchange, Curt agrees to drop everything and drive Bucky the hour and a half to the address Marge gave him since the doctor wouldn't clear him to drive. “You don’t deserve me,” Curt tells him when he shows up at Bucky’s door for about the fifth time in two days. Bucky wholeheartedly agrees, and then Curt pulls him into a tight hug, and Bucky thinks maybe things will be okay.

He keeps zoning out on the way there, thinking about all of it. The event finals, the sprain, the doctor telling him he might be done. He thinks about Gale’s face when Bucky said he was leaving, the way it fell even as he tried not to show how much those words hurt. He thinks about Gale trying to make light of the situation, and Bucky just… didn’t. He thinks about Gale texting him with less and less frequency because Bucky couldn’t dig himself out of his hole. The guilt hangs over him like a storm cloud.

He thinks about Gale, and their time together in Paris, like a montage in a romance movie set to sappy music. Meeting him on the plane, seeing that beautiful blonde haired angel glance over at him so shyly. He thinks about the way they fell into each other’s lives like they were always meant to be there, like they were made for one another. He thinks about nights spent walking together under the beautiful Paris sky. Taking silly pictures and videos everywhere they went. Standing with his arms wrapped around Gale on top of the Eiffel Tower, looking out over a city of lights.

He thinks about Gale’s arms around him, the feeling of his soft hair rubbing against his cheek when he buried his face in Bucky’s neck. He thinks about the sound of Gale’s heartbeat as they lay together in bed, little moments where nothing mattered but the two of them. He thinks about Gale’s little half smiles, and the times he let himself laugh so freely because of something stupid Bucky said. He thinks about the way he’d look at Bucky like he was an amusing puzzle he had to figure out, but also like he was the most beautiful thing he’d ever set eyes on.

He thinks about Gale until it makes him want to cry again, because what on Earth has he done?

“You were right, Curt,” he says out of nowhere when they’re about 15 minutes out. “I think I made the biggest mistake of my life.”

Curt reaches over to pat his knee. He tells him that all they can do is try.

Bucky knows that none of it can justify what he did, but he was a complete mess after event finals.

“It’s time to start thinking about what comes next, John,” the doctor told him that day in Paris, after he won gold on rings. He won gold, and in the same breath he fucked up his knee again. He was told his career might be over. Again.

“What do you mean?” he asked, even though he knew full well what she meant and it made him feel physically sick, the world tilting off-kilter around him, the ground simply falling out from beneath his feet.

“We have to see what the damage is, but we have to prepare for the possibility that your knee may never be strong enough to be competitive again. I’m sorry, John.”

Bucky felt like he was wading through quicksand after that, a ticking time bomb strapped to his back, weighing him down, counting down the seconds until self-destruction, except he didn’t know when that would be. He was getting kicked out of the Village anyways, since his events were over. The doctor told him he needed an MRI when he got back to the states, and he couldn’t stand waiting for it. He couldn’t stand the idea of trying to keep up with the energy of Paris when he couldn’t even walk and this possibility of an end was looming over him everywhere he went.

He felt hollow.

Broken.

Scared.

He doesn’t like to feel scared. He doesn’t like to feel broken. He needed that MRI asap because he thought it was the only thing that could stop making him feel those things.

Looking around the Village that day, he saw all the athletes celebrating and walking and running and biking and laughing… and he was stumbling his way back to his building alone, on crutches, trying not to fall apart. His swollen knee throbbed with every hobbled step.

Who is he, if he isn’t a gymnast? What’s left for him to do?

The pain made him feel sick and the anxiety made him feel sick and the world swirling around him with the bright colors of the Paris Olympics made him feel sick. And then there was Gale. He wanted to see Gale, needed to see Gale. But his brain was all fucked at that point and he couldn’t think straight and he was so damn angry at everything.

At life. At the sport. At the doctors. At these other gymnasts and athletes who didn’t have to face a premature end to their careers for the second time. But mostly, he was angry at himself. He hated himself more than anything else.

What is he worth, if he’s not a gymnast? To the world? To other people?

To Gale?

So many people before only wanted him for his body or for his fame. So they could say they slept with World Champion gymnast John Egan, or that they went out with an Olympic medalist, like it gave them bragging rights to fuck an athlete that they didn’t actually bother to get to know. Like he was nothing more than a name and a piece of ass with a sweet smile and a few medals on his wall.

He went along with it for a while. And over time, he started to believe that maybe that was all he was worth after all. Maybe he didn’t get that happy ending. Maybe he was married to his sport and everything else had to be secondary. Maybe he wasn’t worth getting to know. Maybe he didn’t deserve someone good, someone who loved him for him.

Maybe he deserved all the bullshit he got.

But that’s the thing: he knows Gale isn’t like that. He knows what Gale gave him was real and whole and for all the right reasons. He knows Gale cared about him in a way that no one else ever did. He knows it in his bones, better than he’s known anything in his entire life. Gale is the absolute antithesis of everything and everyone that spent years tearing Bucky down, and for the first time in Bucky’s life, he actually felt like he might get a happy ending after all.

But after finals, Bucky was so lost in his own twisted mind, his own past, his own pain, that it didn’t matter what, rationally, he knew to be true.

As far as he could tell, if he wasn’t a gymnast, he wasn’t anything.

It broke his heart to tell Gale he was leaving. It broke his heart to say goodbye. He had to walk away as fast as he could so Gale wouldn’t see him cry, hear the quiet sob that wrenched its way out of his chest. Because he didn’t want to leave. It was the last thing he wanted. But he’d already decided he had to.

When he made it home, he went to the gym once a day to see the kids there, talk to his coach, and check in with the doctor. Other than those few hours, he didn’t talk to a single person. He went quiet, just slipped away into the darkness. All his friends were still in Paris, living it up without him anyway. He answered Curt’s texts when he could stand the guilt, picked up the phone because he knew Curt would just send their coach to bang on his door if he didn’t.

He stared at his phone every time he got a message from Gale, and he couldn’t bring himself to answer.

And even now, he doesn’t know why. Everything just hurt too damn much and nothing made sense and maybe, somewhere, he really, legitimately thought Gale would be better off without him. He thought he didn’t deserve someone as beautiful and lovely as Gale Cleven. Because the truth is, not calling Gale hurt more than calling him would have, but maybe he deserved the hurt.

He stayed alone in his apartment for most of the day every day. It’s a walk-up – not exactly easy to get in and out of on crutches. He ordered takeout for dinner every night because he couldn’t be bothered to cook and didn’t want to deal with the hassle of going out, and he didn’t eat much other than that. Mostly, he moped around, agonizing over his past and his future and debating over whether or not he should call Gale or if he’d fucked it up too bad at that point. All he wanted was to fall asleep in Gale’s arms, but he knew he didn’t deserve it.

He slept a lot anyways, avoiding the life that tried to continue on around him.

He got drunk one night as he watched the Olympics on TV and scrolled social media. Looking at all the posts about his re-injury and all the posts about his disappearance. All the posts wondering what happened and all the posts agonizing over a suspected “Clegan” breakup. He woke up sick the next morning. Didn’t do that again because, if nothing else, he refused to dip back into the way he went off the rails after losing his sister.

His sister. Who would be so disappointed in him, if she could see what had transpired in the last several days. His sister, whose death he still blames himself for. The only person other than Curt who ever knew how to ground him. Who made him so afraid of losing people he loved, so afraid that the people he loved would leave.

He also knows she’d smack him and tell him to get his act together.

The day of closing ceremonies, he got his MRI results back. A full MCL tear. Getting that news helped Bucky to think clearly for the first time since he came home. It provided perspective on the situation, gave him something solid to wrap his head around after days of everything floating about as a “what if, what then.”

An MCL tear. Of the outcomes that were possible, this one is among the most manageable. The team doctor remains concerned that his knee may never be stable enough to compete. But she also told him that, if he lets his knee heal and sticks with a strict recovery regimen, it’s possible he’ll come back as strong as ever. Not guaranteed, but possible.

Having that news gave him something to focus on, something to hope for. It helped get his feet back on solid ground, shoved breath back into his lungs. It finally slowed the way his head had been spinning like a nausea-inducing carnival ride ever since he left Paris.

During closing ceremonies, he pulled out the Team USA outfit and put it on – that badass racing jacket that he’d really been looking forward to wearing as he walked with Gale and his friends into the Stade de France. He took a picture of himself in it to post on social media, saying he may be at home, but he’s still celebrating his country with pride. He even managed to watch the ceremony on TV, and he saw his friends walk out into the stadium in the exact same outfit. His whole team was there – Curt, Croz, Alex, Brady – along with Benny, Marge… and Gale.

He froze, leaning forward to get a better look at the screen, when he saw Gale walk out, the camera focused right on him. He looked like an angel as he smiled and laughed, his hair messily styled and his eyes bright. That racing jacket fit him perfectly, and Bucky knew they would’ve been the hottest couple in that whole stadium if he’d stayed.

He wishes he’d stayed.

The whole world fell in love with Gale Cleven this summer, but not a single person fell as hard as Bucky did.

Bucky thought about texting Gale, telling him he looked great and he was glad to see him having fun. But then he realized how long it had been, how long he’d spent not texting because he couldn’t get his shit together. And he realized that Gale looked legitimately happy out there without him, and maybe it was better for Bucky just to… not. Better for everyone to move on.

And then Curt came home and absolutely fumed at him over his stupidity. He told Bucky that Gale was heartbroken, that even though he made the best of the ceremony, he wanted nothing more than for Bucky to text. That he wanted nothing more than to make sure he was okay. That as much as he was hurt, he was so goddamn worried, too. And that bit of information made Bucky shatter again.

He fucked it all up, and he is painfully aware of all of it. He regrets every second. Not that any of it is an excuse. But that’s what happened.

“Bucky?”

Bucky realizes that Curt is saying his name, and he blinks and shakes his head, trying to snap out of it. He realizes that he’s sitting in the passenger seat of Curt’s car, gripping his good knee so tightly with his fingers that his knuckles are bright white. He looks at Curt.

“We’re here,” Curt says. He motions forward, through the windshield, and Bucky follows his gaze.

They’re parked in front of a massive horse barn with a sign out front that reads Harding Eventing. Underneath, in smaller lettering, it says A U.S. Equestrian Facility. Lush green fields stretch out across the Earth on all sides, lined with black wooden double fences. To their left is another barn structure with windows lining the walls from end to end. The doors are wide open to reveal an indoor arena, a few horses and riders working inside. Beyond that is a perfectly maintained outdoor arena, enclosed by a low white fence with a blue judge’s box at the far end. Behind where they’ve parked the car, there’s a cross country course that stretches out further than Bucky can see.

The farm is buzzing with activity, horses being ridden around the grounds or walked in and out of the barn, grounds staff doing maintenance work on fences or gardens, people shuttling equipment inside from the trailers that had yet to be fully unpacked after arriving home from the airport yesterday. Bucky spots Kenny, carrying a covered dressage saddle inside that he presumes is Gale’s.

Bucky opens the passenger side door and steps out onto the gravel driveway, taking it all in with a deep breath that smells like hay and sweet grain. Curt comes around from the other side and hands him his crutches.

“John Egan,” a vaguely familiar – and very displeased – voice calls. “The heartbreaker.”

Bucky looks up in time to see Neil Harding sauntering over to them from the indoor ring, a scowl on his face. Bucky tries to hold his head high and stand up straight, but the crutches make it difficult. He doesn’t smile in greeting, because he’s sure Chick knows everything.

He would be right. “Give me one reason I shouldn’t kick you off my property right now,” Chick says. He stops in front of Bucky, standing tall with his arms crossed over his chest in a way Bucky can’t. It makes Bucky feel small for once in his life. Chick glances at his brace and crutches, but there’s not a lick of sympathy on his face. Not that he was expecting any.

“Marge told me to come,” he replies.

Chick works his jaw as he stares at him, then glances at Curt. “Gale’s not here. You’re gonna have to wait.”

Bucky frowns. “Where is he?”

Chick motions to the woods beyond the edge of the farm property. “Somewhere out there. Been gone all morning.” He narrows his eyes at Bucky, his voice pitching low. “That’s what he does, you know. When he’s upset.”

Bucky nods, because Gale told him that before. Told him that when he can’t stand the world anymore, when everything hurts too much, he takes his horse, and he goes out into the wild unknown. Just like he did as a kid growing up in the mountains. Just him and his horse and the Earth beneath their feet. No worries. No pain. Just the breath in his lungs and the sounds of the woods.

He’s been out there all day because of Bucky.

“How long has he been gone?”

Harding checks his watch. It’s 1pm. “About five hours now.”

Oh. “Do you know when he’ll be back?”

Harding shakes his head and shrugs. “Never know with him. You can ask Marge. She might have an idea.” He points into the barn and watches as Bucky and Curt make their way towards it. “John?” He says. Bucky turns back around, resting his weight on one crutch. “I’ll let him decide, because I know how much he loved you. But know that if I had it my way, you wouldn’t step foot on this property again.”

Bucky nods tersely, meeting Chick’s gaze. He’ll fight for Gale as much as he can, but in the end, if Gale doesn’t want him, he’ll go. No matter how much it hurts.

He turns to go into the barn.

Marge is standing against the door of one of the stalls in the middle of the long aisleway, chatting with someone on the other side. She looks up when she hears the tell-tale clomping of Bucky’s crutches on the rubber-matted floor, and she walks down the aisle to meet them halfway. She offers him a weak smile, and he feels relieved to have someone here not acting like they hate him, even though he wouldn’t blame her if she did.

“Hey, Marge!” Curt says excitedly, walking up behind Bucky. “Long time no see.” As in, a couple days.

Marge smiles a bit brighter at Curt and pulls him in for a hug. Then she glances over at Bucky, and she sighs, rolling her eyes. “Come here,” she says. He swallows and frowns, looking at her skeptically, but she holds her arms out, waiting, and he hops forward. Awkwardly, he wraps one arm around her while trying not to hit her with the crutch. She doesn’t seem to care, though. She hugs him tight and whispers in his ear, “I’m pissed at you. But are you doing okay?”

“Could be better,” he whispers back, and she rubs his upper back comfortingly before letting him go.

When she steps away, Bucky realizes that Benny has stepped out of the stall she’d been standing next to, and he’s watching Marge hug him with distaste. Bucky nods to him. “Benny.”

Benny glares back, looking like he wants to say something but he doesn’t know what. Or like he wants to generally stab John in the neck. Who can really say. Instead, he looks at Curt. “Hey! What’s up, man?”

I deserve that, Bucky thinks.

Marge takes pity on him, though and pulls him aside so Benny and Curt can talk. “Gale’s been out all day,” she tells him. “Brooding.”

“I know,” Bucky says quietly. “Chick told me.” Then a terrifying thought pops into his head. “How do you know if he’s safe?”

For half a second, the entire planet is going up in flames around him. If he loses one more person he loves because he was caught up in his own shit…

Marge puts a hand on his shoulder, though, seeing his panic. She pulls out her phone and opens an app, waving it at Bucky. “We have a ride tracker. We turn it on when one of us goes out on the trails. It tells me his location, and it senses if he falls or something so I can get him help.”

“Has that ever happened?” Bucky asks nervously.

“Once,” Marge shrugs. “He was fine, though. Fell off into the creek and broke a rib.” That… doesn’t make Bucky feel better. Marge points to Gale’s location on the app. “He’s heading home. I’d say 30 minutes, an hour at most, if he doesn’t decide to wander off somewhere else.”

—

Marge is kind enough to show Bucky around the immediate farm area – the barn and the indoor and outdoor arenas where they train and host the occasional event or dressage show. She even takes him into the tack room. “Basically that whole corner is Gale’s,” she says, motioning to a collection of saddle and bridle racks bolted into the wall in three-high columns. There’s two dressage saddles, two jump saddles, and even a western saddle. One of the racks sits empty, awaiting Gale’s return. Next to a cabinet full of saddle pads, polo wraps, and support boots, there’s an assortment of ribbons hanging on the wall, ranging in color and size, many of them pretty blue first places.

“Whoa.” Bucky looks around, eyes wide at the amount of no doubt expensive equipment, meticulously organized and near spotless. “I didn’t know he had all this.”

“Not that you deserve to know,” Marge says behind him. “But Chick took Gale in when we were in college. Gave him a place to live in exchange for farm work. Horses to learn on. Prospects to train. Everything he could need to succeed. We all ride here, but the place belongs to the two of them.”

Bucky runs a hand across one of the dressage saddles, which he recognizes from that day Gale rode for him. “I’m glad he has someone like that.” A father figure. Someone to learn from and go to for help, someone who can show him the way after he spent so long fearing his own father and having to figure this life out on his own. No wonder Chick looked like he wanted Bucky’s head on a pike.

As he looks at all of the ribbons on the wall, Bucky notices that, stuck to the cabinet of saddle pads and wraps beside him, there’s a number of photographs. All of them include Gale and one horse or another. One picture, newly taped up in the middle, is from Paris: Gale, Whiskey… and John. Together. Gale has a medal around his neck, and he’s laughing as Whiskey tries to play with it and Bucky kisses him on the cheek. It was taken by Kenny right after Gale's final jumping round.

Bucky lightly rubs a thumb over the photo, and Marge watches him, but she doesn’t say a word about it. Gale’s only been back for a day. And yet he chose to stick this up there, where he can see it every time he gets his tack. Even after what Bucky did to him.

Bucky feels so guilty, and at the same time, he feels butterflies in his stomach.

When he steps back again, Marge starts to ask if he wants to see the beginning of the cross-country course, but then she looks at his crutches and thinks better of it. She asks if he needs to sit, but he says no even though his knee is killing him.

So instead she takes him to Whiskey’s stall, which is marked with a brass plate engraved with the name “Hundred Proof.” There’s two pretty Olympic ribbons hanging on the outer wall along with a framed photo of Gale and Whiskey in front of Versailles. Someone, presumably Marge, taped two cut-out paper Olympic medals beside the ribbons, since Gale’s actual medals are no doubt being kept somewhere safe.

The mare seems to recognize Bucky, the only other living thing here that doesn’t hate his guts right now, and he’s grateful for it. She stretches her head through the open top half of her stall door and nuzzles his arm, making him laugh and apologize for not bringing muffins this time.

“Gale didn’t take her out with him?” he asks.

Marge shakes her head. “They all get a couple weeks off after the games. And Gale never takes her out in the woods for too long anyway. He wishes he could, but he can’t risk her getting hurt out there.”

Bucky tries to reach his hand up to scratch the mare’s nose without losing his balance on the crutches. When it’s just a bit too precarious, he carefully leans one of his crutches against the wall so he has free motion with one arm. Whiskey bumps his shoulder, as if to say, What the fuck did you do?

Bucky smiles sadly and closes his eyes as he pets the side of her face. “I’m sorry, girl,” he whispers. “I’m so sorry.” He thinks about Gale, and the way he always goes to the horses when he’s upset. The way he tells them everything.

He wonders how much Whiskey knows, how much he’s told her, how many tears have been cried into that soft mane because of him. Or was Bucky not worth Gale’s tears?

Everyone keeps saying Gale was heartbroken when he left. Is that true?

Marge lets him stand there for a good while, just petting this horse that he at one point hoped would be a permanent fixture in his life. Gale once told him that horses are the best therapy, that they can absorb everything you’re feeling and just leech the pain away by their presence alone. It does make Bucky feel better, even as he feels the guilt enveloping him. I’m sorry, he thinks, over and over and over.

Then Marge tells him, “He’s back.”

They leave Whiskey’s stall and walk back out to the front of the barn, where sure enough, Bucky can see a horse and rider coming up the path from the woods beyond the outdoor ring. At first glance, he wouldn’t have known it was Gale, but as they come closer, a silhouette becoming real, he realizes he knows the set of those shoulders, the motion of those hips as the horse walks towards them.

Gale isn’t on a massive warmblood decked out in English tack. And he’s not dressed in the riding clothes Bucky is used to seeing him in – the tight riding pants and polo shirt cinched with a belt. Shiny black tall boots and a sleek Charles Owen helmet. Instead, he’s on a smaller gray horse in western tack with a saddle bag strapped to the back of the saddle, a water bottle jammed into the front pocket. He’s dressed in faded jeans, brown cowboy boots, and a white t-shirt that clings to his sweaty upper body. A black cowboy hat hides his face in shadow.

In any other circumstance, Bucky would be absolutely drooling over this look.

Even through the shadow, though, he can see the way Gale’s eyes narrow, the way he hesitates when he sees him standing there with Marge. He can see the moment the surprise shifts to anger. When he hops down off the horse and pulls the reins over her head, Bucky waves awkwardly anyways.

Gale looks at Marge. “You could’ve asked.”

She crosses her arms defensively. “You disappeared for the entire morning. He called.”

He looks at Bucky. “You called her?”

Bucky nods and opens his mouth to say something, but Gale puts a hand up to stop him. “I don’t wanna hear it, John.”

Bucky feels the little bit of hope that had been holding his heart together crack apart again. “Gale, I-”

“John, please.”

He hears the pain in Gale’s voice, and it kills him. He stands there, watching as this man he’s in love with walks right on past without a second glance, leading the little gray horse towards the barn. “Wait, can you…” But Gale won’t hear it, just keeps on walking.

“Gale, please.”

Nothing.

“I love you!” Bucky blurts out into the peaceful quiet of the farm, because if nothing else, he at least needs to speak that into the world. Gale stops, the mare halting beside him. Bucky goes on. “I love you so fucking much, Gale. And I-”

Gale takes his hat off and whips around. His face is angrier than Bucky’s ever seen in the few weeks they’ve known each other, and he points the hat at Bucky. “Don’t say that, John,” he warns. The mare jumps a bit beside him at the sudden motion, and the few people nearby try to act like they’re not watching them. Watching this train wreck, wondering what’s about to happen. “You don’t get to come here and say that to me. You don’t.”

“Gale,” Marge says calmly, stepping towards him.

Gale turns on her, still full of anger. But something in his expression fades into pure hurt. “Why did you let him come here?”

Marge reaches out and pushes away the hat that he’s pointing at her, and Bucky watches him deflate the littlest bit. Gale takes a deep breath as he puts the hat back on his head, and he puts his hand on the mare’s shoulder. He mutters an apology to her and strokes her neck, calming her down.

“Cause you’re both idiots,” Marge tells him. She looks at Bucky when she says it, too. “You’re both being stupid. I know he hurt you, Gale. I’m mad as hell at him for it. But he was hurting, too, and you know that.”

Bucky… didn’t expect that. At all.

“He left,” Gale says quietly. He won’t look at Bucky. He won’t even look at Marge. He looks only at his horse.

Marge puts a hand on his shoulder. “He came back.”

“He threw me out like a piece of trash. Like he never gave a damn about me at all.”

Bucky might actually cry right now. He takes a deep breath and swallows against the lump in his throat to keep it from happening.

“I think you should hear him out,” Marge suggests. “Please?”

Gale glances back over at Bucky, who shuffles his feet and winces when he trips on a piece of gravel, sending a burst of pain through his knee that he’s momentarily worried will cause the tears to fall. Gale’s mouth does a weird thing where it kind of wants to smile at Bucky’s clumsiness, but he won’t let it, forcing it to frown instead. “Fine. It’ll have to wait until I get Lucy taken care of, though.”

Bucky nods hurriedly. “That’s fine,” he insists, cringing at the way his voice goes all high and desperate.

Gale nods once, turns on his heel, and starts heading for the barn again. Bucky scrambles to follow, tripping over the gravel on his crutches, and if Gale notices, he just keeps right on going without so much as looking over his shoulder to see if Bucky’s okay. Marge reaches out to steady him instead. “I’m gonna go meet Benny and Curt in the ring.” She points to the outdoor, where Benny is walking around in a circle on a horse that Bucky doesn’t recognize, chatting with Curt, who stands in the middle. “Don’t… say anything stupid.”

Bucky holds back a scoff. He’s the king of saying something stupid.

By the time he finally manages to hobble into the barn, Gale already has the gray mare, Lucy, hooked up to the cross-ties in the wash stall at the end of the aisle, bridle replaced with a leather halter. He’s heaving the saddle onto a saddle rack attached to the wall outside the wash stall. The saddle bags lay in a pile on the floor beneath it, empty water bottle discarded and tipped over on the rubber matting.

Bucky leans against the wall, peering into the wide open wash stall with its temperature-controlled hose, overhead heating lamp, and cabinets full of supplies. These horses really are living in luxury. He looks at Gale again, taking in this rugged western cowboy version of him. “Didn’t know you still rode western, too.”

“Mmm,” Gale nods as he runs his hands all over Lucy’s body, checking for anything abnormal. “More comfortable for long rides.”

“You really just… go out there for hours at a time?”

“Yep.”

“Don’t you need food? Water?”

Gale motions to the saddle bags. “Snacks. Horse treats. Water. First aid. We take a lot of breaks, too. Wade in the creek to cool off.”

Bucky stares at Gale’s hat, which is admittedly a really great look on him. “Shouldn’t you wear a helmet?”

Gale doesn’t so much as glance at him. “You don’t get to lecture me about safety.”

He walks around Lucy to grab the hose and adjust the water temperature. He sprays his hand first, waiting for it to get cold enough in this summer heat. Then he aims the stream of water at the mare, washing off the sweat and the dirt from the trails. He ignores Bucky as he does so, working his way down one side from Lucy’s neck to her back to her hind end. Then he moves to the other side to do the same. Bucky watches his every move.

“So, who’s this?” He asks.

Gale finally glances over at him, if only for a second, and it makes Bucky’s breath catch when those pretty eyes meet his. “Her name is Lucy. Lucy In The Sky. She’s an off-track thoroughbred. Little side project for me.”

“Side project?”

Gale frowns, like Bucky is a pesky fly that won’t leave him alone. He really doesn’t want to be dealing with him right now, but he doesn’t have a good reason not to answer questions about the horse, at least. He sighs as he wets a rag and starts using it to wipe the sweat off Lucy’s face, which she wholeheartedly protests against by throwing her head up higher in the air. He shushes her and gently guides her nose back down as he wipes around her ears. “She came through a local rescue after she came off the track last year. I’m entering her in the Thoroughbred Makeover in October. A competition for retraining retired racehorses. We’re doing eventing, but she’s been good with western tack, too. Been taking advantage of that I guess.”

Before Bucky can say anything, he goes on. And that’s okay. Bucky’s heart feels light when he sees the way Gale smiles a little bit, playfully rubbing at Lucy’s nose the same way he does with Whiskey. “She’ll never be Olympic level. She’s already seven years old and needs too much work. But she’s a good girl. Sound mind. Adaptable. That’s why I take her on the trails. She’ll go far for the right person.”

“Not you?” Bucky asks.

Gale shrugs. “We’ll see. Thinking of selling her. A lot of the makeover horses are trained to sell. But I don’t know if I can bring myself to.” Not after Apollo, goes unsaid.

Bucky holds tight to the sound of Gale’s voice, feeling calm and safe just listening to him talk even though he knows, if he doesn’t manage to make this right, it might be the last time he ever hears that beautiful sound. They continue in silence after that, Gale using a sweat scraper to get all the excess water off the mare while Bucky stands there and bites his tongue. Finally, unable to hold it in anymore, he sighs and says, “Gale, I-”

“Not yet,” Gale cuts him off.

Bucky nods and bites down on the inside of his cheek, trying not to bounce or twitch with the anxiety running through him.

It’s another ten minutes before Gale so much as speaks to him. Kenny comes by and asks if Gale wants him to take Lucy to her stall, but he shakes his head. “Can you get Whiskey ready for the farrier?” he asks instead. Kenny nods. Then he waves awkwardly to Bucky, who awkwardly waves back, and he slips away without making eye contact. Because apparently everyone here knows that something bad happened last week in Paris.

Gale walks Lucy back to her stall without another word, and Bucky follows. It’s the stall next to Whiskey’s, where Kenny is picking the other horse’s hooves out, and the two mares nuzzle each other as Lucy walks past. Once inside Lucy’s stall, Gale grabs some colorful bell boots that he straps over her hooves to protect her shoes, then sprays her all over with the bottle of fly spray hanging on the door.

With one final scratch on the forehead, Gale tells Lucy to be good, closes the door, and he walks away again, putting a hand out to signal that Bucky should wait. He comes back a minute later with Lucy’s saddle and a small bucket of water. After he sets the bucket on the floor, he smoothly flips up another saddle rack by Lucy’s stall and slides the saddle onto it. A western saddle is a whole different beast from the English saddles Bucky saw in Paris. Bigger and more ornate, with patterns carved and stitched into the smooth leather.

Gale looks at Bucky as he points to the tack box in front of the stall. “Can you open that up and grab the saddle soap sitting in the tray?”

Bucky nods, glad to be helpful, and does as he’s asked. When he opens the box, there’s a small tray laying across the top filled with various treats, grooming supplies, clippers, and whatever else Bucky can’t identify. Beneath it is all sorts of equipment. Lead ropes, a folded saddle pad, rolled up polo wraps, a grooming kit, a collection of various medical supplies for both horse and rider, a helmet. It takes a second to locate the little jar of saddle soap in the tray, but he does. He hands it to Gale, who unscrews the lid to reveal a small sponge, which he dunks in the water bucket before rubbing it around in the soap. He sets to work scrubbing the saddle.

“I threw some jolly ranchers in there this morning,” he says. “You can give them each one if they’re not melted.”

Bucky can’t hide his amusement, not that Gale’s looking at him. Muffins. Sour patch kids. Now jolly ranchers. Gale adds, “Whiskey likes green. Lucy likes red.” Because of course they have favorite flavors.

Gale reaches a hand towards him, making a grabbing motion. Bucky rolls his eyes. “Color?”

“Blue.”

Bucky searches for the candy in the tray, picking out the correct colors and unwrapping them. He drops the blue one in Gale’s waiting hand. Both mares stick their heads out of their stalls when they hear the crinkling, and Bucky smiles as they pluck them out of his palm, lips twitching. First Lucy, then Whiskey, who shoves him in the shoulder again after she’s done. Kenny chastises her as he clips a lead rope to her halter. Bucky thinks he sees Gale smile the littlest bit, too.

The groom opens the stall door and leads Whiskey out, down the aisle to the other end of the barn, and Bucky just stands there quietly on his crutches, watching Gale work. After a minute, Gale pauses, shifting the candy to one side of his mouth and biting down until it breaks in half. He looks back up at Bucky and motions to the box in exasperation. “You can sit down, Bucky. I know you’re in pain. I can see it all over your face.”

Bucky doesn’t know if he should smile or frown, but he nods. He closes the box and sits down, sighing in relief now that he can get the crutches out from under his arms and rest his legs – one in pain because it’s ruined, the other in pain from compensating.

He thinks about the fact that Gale just called him “Bucky,” not “John.” He wonders if that means anything.

They’re silent for a while again before Gale says, “I trusted you, John.” He doesn’t look up from the saddle, but his hand slows down as he says it, like admitting that fact takes up too much bandwidth in his brain.

“I-”

“No.” Gale puts a hand up. He scrubs at the saddle hard with the other, making soapy water dribble down across the leather. “I’m gonna talk this time. And you’re gonna listen.”

Bucky nods, shutting his mouth.

“I trusted you. I don’t take that lightly. I told you I wasn’t a fling kinda guy. I told you I didn’t just wanna mess around. I told you everything, John. Maybe I was naive to do that. But I… I thought we had something. I thought…” he shakes his head, and the hand holding the sponge drops away from the saddle. He lets the sponge fall into the bucket of water as he stands up straight again, hands on his hips. He takes the cowboy hat off his head and sets it on the box next to Bucky, and he wipes his arm across his sweaty forehead.

He looks Bucky in the eye. “You said you were in love with me on national television. And then you left. You fuckin’ ghosted me. Do you know how much that hurt?”

“I know,” John says, his voice rushed and tight, panic rising up in him again as he’s faced with the very real possibility that he broke this beyond repair.

“You ended up being exactly who I wanted to avoid,” Gale says sadly, and that… that is a knife to the heart.

Bucky shakes his head, biting his lip as he takes a quivering breath. He reaches a hand out before he thinks better of it, and it drops lamely back into his lap. “No,” he says. “No. I’m not. At least, I swear I don’t want to be. Buck, I’m so sorry. I can’t tell you how… God, it was the biggest mistake of my life, leaving you that way. I knew it when I left, but I felt like I had to. I have felt awful every single day, but…”

He runs a hand over his face, frustrated at the way his eyes feel wet again and his face feels hot. He looks at Gale desperately, and Gale stares back, waiting. So Bucky takes a deep breath, and he tells him everything.

He tells him about the doctor in Paris. About the potential for his career to be over. He tells him everything that was going through his mind then, the fear and the worry and the dread and the self-hatred. Self-deprecating words pounding around in his brain, screaming at him that everything was over. He tells him about going home, feeling sick with anger and regret, and the misery he felt every time he so much as thought about Paris or the Olympics. He tells him how he ghosted everyone, hiding away in his apartment. He tells Gale how he thought about him every single day, wondering if he should call or if it was too late. He tells him about Curt finally trying to talk some sense into him.

He tells him how much all of it hurt, and he couldn’t process any of it anymore. Couldn’t hold himself up. Couldn’t live under the expectations and the pity of a sport so focused on John Egan and his comeback. He couldn’t cope with the fear of losing Gale, along with everything and everyone else, so he pushed him away instead.

“I’m not… the most emotionally well-rounded,” he admits meekly at the end. “I… I blew it all up, huh? That’s what I do, Gale. I self-destruct. Ask Curt, he’s been dealin’ with me for years.”

Some of the fight has gone out of Gale’s stance in the time it took for Bucky to beg and plead and sort through all the fucked up emotions he’s been feeling in the last week. Bucky feels like he’s been talking for hours; he doesn’t know how long it’s actually been. A good ten minutes at least. “I wanted to be there for you,” Gale says. “I loved you.”

Bucky nods and rubs a hand over his face. He tries not to get stuck on the word “loved,” past tense. Not present. “I know. Now. I couldn’t really understand that before.”

“I was a wreck after you left.”

Bucky looks up at that, and he feels a wave of emotions crash into him when he sees the pained expression on Gale’s face. Pity and sadness and betrayal. But also love.

“The others held me up. I tried to have a good time, and I did. But I… I was a mess. Couldn’t think straight. Marge and Benny probably had to pull me up off the ground a few times. Whiskey probably got sick of me cryin’ on her.” Gale looks embarrassed to admit it, and it pains Bucky to hear it. But he’s glad that Gale is telling him, in a way. “And even then,” Gale chuckles, shaking his head as he closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. “Even then, I just kept worryin’ about you. Hopin’ you were okay. All alone here.”

Regret sinks deeper into Bucky’s chest. He knows he should’ve called. Should’ve at least told Gale he was alright.

Except he wasn’t. Neither of them were.

Because the moment they met, they became parts of a whole. And Bucky went and ripped them apart in a way that would never let them be whole on their own again.

Bucky scoots over on the tack box, dragging his crutches around to lean them against the wall of the stall beside him. Gale hesitates, but he grabs his hat, puts it back on, and sits down. Their shoulders press together. They can hear each other’s breathing. Uncertain. They both stare at the floor below, avoiding eye contact again. “I really, really didn’t mean to hurt you,” Bucky says quietly.

“You told me you didn’t know how to do this,” Gale recalls. “Relationships.”

“That’s not an excuse,” Bucky insists. He never thought it was an excuse, even when he couldn’t get his head on straight.

“No,” Gale agrees. “But you have to learn somehow.”

Bucky glances over at Gale’s knee, where his hand is resting, palm up, waiting. He looks up at Gale’s face – the way he’s biting nervously at his lower lip like he’s the one that needs forgiving – then back at his hand. Carefully, Bucky twines their fingers together, and he closes his eyes in pure, unfiltered relief at the feeling of Gale.

“I don’t deserve your forgiveness,” he thinks aloud.

Gale shrugs. “That’s not for you to decide.” Then he admits, “I missed you at closing. We all did. Even other athletes kept askin’ me about you.”

“Looked like you were having fun.” All the athletes seemed psyched for the celebrations at the end of the Games, decked out in their closing ceremony uniforms, many of them wearing their medals. All the countries were hanging out and having their picture-perfect moment together in the Stade de France, celebrating each other with breathtaking musical and dance performances to wow the world. It was a whole massive party over there, Paris style. Bucky is still disappointed that he made himself miss it, but he isn’t sure if being there would have been better or not.

Would Gale and his friends and the magic of Paris have pulled him out of his little mental storm cloud? If he’d stayed?

Gale shrugs. “It was fun. We had a great time.” Then he looks at Bucky, and Bucky looks back. Blue on blue. “I still wished you were there every second.”

“I wished I was, too.”

Gale swallows and nods, letting that sit. Then he motions to Bucky’s screwed up knee with his free hand. “What’s the verdict?”

“MCL tear.” Bucky presses lightly on the joint, feeling the sharp twinge of pain. “Shouldn’t need surgery this time.” He sees the question in Gale’s eyes when he says that, and he smiles weakly, but it doesn’t hold. “If I’m lucky, and if I behave myself, it’ll probably heal well enough to keep competing. Big ifs, but I’m gonna give it all I’ve got.”

“Give it enough time to heal this time,” Gale advises.

Bucky nods. “I plan to. I’ve got four years this time instead of one.”

Gale hesitates, flicking his eyes away, then back to Bucky, away again. “I want you in LA with me,” he finally says. “We’ve both got more medals to win.”

Bucky’s heart swells, and he smiles, for real this time. “I want that, too.”

When Gale’s eyes find his once more, he squeezes Bucky’s hand. “Can you say it again?”

Bucky furrows his brow. “Say what?”

“That…” Gale bites his lip. “That you…”

Bucky’s smile goes crooked in that cute, dorky way that Gale first fell in love with. He reaches his free hand up to take Gale’s hat off his head, so he can see those perfect blue eyes. Then he strokes back the strands of sweaty hair stuck to Gale’s forehead, and he rubs his thumb across his jaw. “Gale Cleven,” he says, taking a deep breath. “I love you. I love you so much. Je t’aime pour toujours.”

Gale quirks an eyebrow, surprised at the french. “Pour toujours? That’s a long time.”

Bucky squeezes his hand. “I will love you for as long as you let me. If you’ll take me back.”

Gale’s eyes flutter closed, and the corner of his mouth quirks up in a smile. When he opens his eyes again, Bucky knows for certain that everything is going to be okay. Gale’s fingers play with the soft curls behind his ear, and he looks at him like no one has ever looked at Bucky before – with deep, dedicated love. “For forever?” he asks.

Bucky nods. “Pour toujours,” he repeats. His pronunciation is a bit off, even though Gale can tell he spent a long time practicing, and that makes Gale smile.

“Ever the drama queen,” he teases.

“I mean it, doll,” Bucky insists. He leans in and kisses Gale gently, softly. With love and care. A promise. Everything that the kiss before he left Paris wasn’t. When he pulls away, he says, “Meeting you on that plane was the best thing that ever happened to me.”

Gale rests his forehead against Bucky’s, then he untangles their fingers and stands up. Bucky watches, worried for a moment, but Gale extends his hand towards him. Bucky takes it, letting himself be pulled to his feet. Gale steadies him, making sure his knee is okay, and then he closes any remaining distance between them. He wraps his arms around Bucky, nuzzling against his neck like the shape of it was made just for him. Bucky’s hands instinctively move down to hold Gale’s waist, like they belong there. And they both just rest against each other, holding each other up. Putting each other back together, right in the middle of one of US Equestrian’s greatest training barns.

The summer heat is suffocating, and it smells like hay and grain. Gale is sweaty against him. Birds chirp in the overhead rafters. Lucy is stretching her head out as far as she can over her stall door in an attempt to nuzzle at Bucky’s hair, and she knocks his crutches over in the process, momentarily scaring them all. Bucky can hear voices and the clip-clop of hooves as Curt, Benny, and his horse walk back into the barn. But he and Gale stay right where they are, and Bucky wouldn’t have it any other way.

“I love you, too,” Gale whispers against Bucky’s shoulder. “I’m still mad at you, just so you know. But I love you so much it hurts.”

Bucky squeezes his eyes shut and buries his nose in Gale’s soft hair. “It doesn’t have to hurt anymore. I’m here. I’m not leaving. I promise.”

He wants to stand here and hang on tight forever.

Pour toujours.

And for the first time, he really, fully believes that forever with Gale Cleven is exactly what he wants. Not only that, but it’s something he deserves. It’s something they both deserve. And it’s something that they can have, if they choose.

Paris was only their beginning. This, right here, is the start of their future.

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mishasminion360 · 7 months

Text

How Do You Do It?

Jack Daniels x fem!reader

Warnings: Mild language; words said in anger; stress-induced anxiety; mild angst; self-doubt; but lots of fluff, I swear.

Summary: Being a new mother and a homemaker are two difficult jobs to juggle at the same time, and even more of a challenge when your husband is constantly away. When Jack returns from his latest assignment to find you overtaxed and irritable, he decides to make it up to you by spending a day in your shoes.

A/N: What a busy summer/early fall. So much has changed in such a short time. Change is weird sometimes and brings a lot of stress. Had my first-ever panic attack. Zero stars; do not recommend. But even the stressful, scary parts of our lives can be inspiring. This fic is proof of that 😝

P.S. As you can see I began this fic in the fall of 2023 and look how late I’m posting it! I’m sorry for the long hiatus, folks, but believe me when I say it was necessary.

How is it that your husband is the secret agent, but the weight of the world always feels like it’s been thrust upon your shoulders?

The day you found out you were expecting was one of the happiest of your life. You and Jack had been over the moon and spent the entire adventure of pregnancy fantasizing about all the joys of parenthood that would arrive along with your bundle of joy. You weren’t kidding yourselves; you knew that a baby brought big changes and more than a few challenges. You just weren’t aware of just how high those hurdles would be until you were thrown into the race.

The roles of wife, homemaker, and now mother all seem to merge into one monstrous, never-ending task; and your duties seemed all the more daunting when you were left to fulfill them alone.

Jack is nothing short of attentive and dedicated when he’s at home. The problem is that “home” is usually the last place one will find him. As of late, his job with the Statesmen pulls and pushes him this way and that into parts unknown where he’s embroiled in espionage for some indeterminate period, leaving you with a house to maintain, meals to prepare, clothes to launder, and a colicky infant to soothe.

You’re trapped inside a pressure cooker and the temperature is nearing critical.

***

“Baby Shark” is on its 25th iteration, every “doo doo doo” is like a bat to the back of your head. You dance topless in the living room with your wailing son clutched to your naked chest. You’d tossed your t-shirt into the wash twenty minutes ago, covered—like the two before it—in your baby boy’s milky vomit.

Your sanity is a mere thread, frayed, delicate, and seconds away from completely unraveling. Your head is pounding and back aching, and you’re trying to convince yourself that the flush of heat you feel just beneath your skin is not a fever. You can’t afford to be sick now. Not when you are all your son has; when you are all you have.

“Daddy’s home, darlin’!”

The sound of his voice, the familiar clip-clop of his boots on the hardwood floor, should fill you with after hardly having heard it for a solid week. Instead, it has your already tepid body simmering with frustration.

“Hey there, Mama Mare.” The affectionate term oozes from between his grinning lips with all the smooth, sweet ease of honey. “Give this ol’ cowboy some sugar. He missed you.”

His lips are on yours and then detaching themselves before your mouth can even register it’d just been in contact with another; far quicker and more careless than the long overdue reunion kiss you’d been anticipating. The brief little smooch held about as much passion as a handshake.

“There’s my little cowpoke!”

Jack lifts his squalling son from your arms and little John’s cries instantly cease. Of course they do. Of freaking course.

“Well, now, you didn’t have to get all dressed up on my account, honeybee.”

You snap to attention after possibly having fallen asleep on your feet for a split second to see that Jack’s devilish gaze has zeroed in on your bared tits.

“You certainly know how to welcome a fella home.”

While he’s busy ogling your non-seductive nudity, your own eyes have locked onto the trail of muddy prints stretching from the front door, each filthy footfall a perfect imprint of the sole of Jack’s boots. Yet another mess you’ll have to clean up; another chore added to the already heavy burden you’re shouldering.

“How’s about after dinner we mosey on upstairs, put this little buckaroo to bed, then I show you just how much I missed you?”

You don’t even know how to respond to him right now, so you don’t. You simply turn your back and walk away, seething in a silent rage as you stomp your way upstairs to put on the thickest, ugliest sweatshirt you can find that leaves everything up to the imagination.

John starts to wail once again, but that’s Jack’s problem now. You have about a million other tasks to accomplish—make that a million and one, thanks to his filthy freaking boots.

You slip into the master bath and toss back a couple of Advil for your pounding headache and by the time you re-emerge, Jack is pacing around your bed, hands on his hips and a pensive scowl on his face.

You take a deep breath through your nose and the words tumble from your lips in a sigh. “I haven’t started dinner yet. Give me just a few minutes and I can—“

“Did I say somethin’ wrong?” he blurts. “‘Cause you gave me a look back there that reminded me of an angry steer about to trample a rodeo clown.”

“Just forget it,” you mutter, brushing past him toward the door. His hand wraps around your wrist before you can cross the threshold.

“I ain’t forgettin’ nothin’,” he drawls as he turns you to face him. “Sugar, what’s wrong? No use lyin’ because I can tell somethin’s stuck in your craw.”

Oh, it’s stuck alright. Like a bug in a windshield.

“Jesus, Jack,” you sigh. “Maybe it’s the fact that I’ve had a total of five non-consecutive hours of sleep this week. Or it could be the fact that the house is a mess or that I’m down to my last pair of clean underwear. All the chores have been put on hold so I could tend to our son while you’ve been off playing ‘secret agent man’ in God only knows where.”

His mustache twitches and his jaw ticks.

“Honeybee, why didn’t you tell me you’ve been strugglin’? I would have—“

“Because I shouldn’t have to tell you!” you snap. “You should know me well enough by now to tell when I’m not okay! You should already have some inkling of how hard it is to raise a child and that the process usually goes much smoother when both parents are involved. But I guess I’m just a fool for assuming. Getting shot at is far less hazardous to your health than changing a dirty diaper after all.”

When the red finally clears from your vision you see that Jack’s has become clouded with a look you’d only bore witness to once and concluded that you never wanted to see again. His mirthful brown eyes dulled by a deeply rooted pain planted long ago by a cruel twist of fate. He’d been robbed of his first chance to be a husband and father and you’d just accused him of squandering his second.

“Sugar, I’m….I’m sorry.”

Shit. It’s not fair. You have been miserable for an entire week and you can’t stand to see him miserable for even a millisecond.

“No, I’m sorry,” you insist, voice and legs quivering. You lower yourself to the bed before exhaustion and gravity get the better of you. “I’m just so tired. Tired and frustrated.”

He drops to the bed beside you and pulls you into one of his signature hugs you’ve missed so much. The tightest of embraces that only he can give.

“I know you’re working hard to provide for our family,” you sob. “I know that but still I….I feel so alone, Jack.”

Before even a single southern-drenched syllable can leave his mouth, a sharp wail blasts from the baby monitor and your body reacts instinctively and urgently. You shoot up and out of Jack’s arms like a rocket.

“Let me check on him and then I’ll start dinner,” you say with a sniffle.

“I’ll get him, darlin’,” Jack insists, gently grasping you by the wrist and halting your minimal progress toward the door.

“But he probably needs—“

“I will get him.”

His hands are on your shoulders now—firm yet gentle—and grounding, comforting.

“Please, let me take care of my boy so you can take care of you, honeybee. And then, later, I’d like to take care of you, too. If you’ll let me.”

You can only muster a nod before he’s striding out of the room. Taking advantage of the first minute you’ve had to yourself in a week, you slip into the shower and let the warm spray unclench every muscle coiled tight with stress.

By the time you emerge, John is sleeping peacefully and a pizza’s been ordered. Jack dotes on you the entire evening, giving your aching feet a rub down with his skillful hands and cuddling you close as you both zone out to some ridiculous reality TV. His mere presence is a balm to your weary soul.

Whenever the baby cries in the middle of the night and your body moves on instinct Jack stills you, urges you back to the mattress, and takes on the challenge himself. It’s the best night’s sleep you’ve had in you can’t remember how long.

***

And surprisingly enough, you don’t manage to sleep any later than 9 a.m. The smell of extra greasy bacon lures you from bed, a siren’s call to your stomach.

John bounces in his high chair, babbling around a mouthful of mashed banana, most of which appears to have ended up on his face, shirt, and chubby little fists. Jack is an even more astonishing sight than your messy son, strutting about the kitchen in your frilly apron topping his off-white Henley and faded Wranglers.

“Well, good mornin’, sugar,” he cries, grabbing your hips to tug you in for a kiss. “Though I wasn’t expectin’ to see you up so soon.”

“How did you expect me to stay asleep when something smells incredible?”

“That would be my famous chocolate chip, peanut butter, and banana flapjacks.”

In true Southern gentlemanly fashion, he pulls out a chair and eases you into it before setting a towering stack of syrup-soaked pancakes before you, coffee and bacon following suit.

“Better eat quick now, darlin’,” Jack urges as he takes a seat with his plate. “You’ve got a busy day ahead of you.”

As if you could forget. That laundry is begging for attention, the house hasn’t had a good dusting in you can’t recall how long, and Johnny already needs a bath—

“I made you an appointment for noon.”

Your train of thought instantly stalls on the tracks.

“Appointment?”

Jack grins over the brim of his steaming mug.

“Honey, you need a break. Figured you might enjoy yourself a little spa day.”

You can hardly believe your ears.

“Spa day?”

“Yes, ma’am. Massage, mud baths, whatever the heck they do with seaweed, the whole nine yards,” he explains proudly. “I even called up your buddy from work and asked if she’d like to join you. And it’s all on me.”

“But Jack, what about John? And the house, the laundry, the cooking?”

“Gimme some credit, sugar,” he chuckles. “I think I can keep the homestead standin’ and our baby boy breathin’ for a day. Besides, it’s high time I start puttin’ in my fair share of help around here, isn’t it?”

You’re not sure if you want to thank him or burst into tears. Maybe both.

“You do so much, honeybee,” he says warmly, voice as smooth, rich, and sweet as the syrup sluiced atop your pancakes. “You move mountains every day to make this house a home. How’s about lettin’ someone do somethin’ for you for a change?”

You scarf down the rest of your pancakes before kissing him with sticky lips and racing up the stairs to get ready for your big day out.

***

You feel rejuvenated and refreshed. Brand fucking new. A far cry from the husk of a woman who’d left the house this morning. Wrapped in seaweed and slathered with mud you’d been returned to the earth and reborn at full strength, like a phoenix risen from the ash.

You'd been reunited with an inner strength and power you'd all but forgotten. And thank God for that, because you're going to need every bit of it to face the chaos you come walking back into upon your return home.

You can hear John’s piercing wails before you’ve cut the engine and opened the driver’s side door. You can smell the smoke before you've even reached the front steps.

Inside all hell has broken loose. Gray tendrils of smoke slither through the air, teasing the detector into screaming its warning. Your baby boy is giving it some stiff competition with his own cries as Jack struggles to bounce him on one arm while he tries to fan away the smoke with the other. Both gestures prove futile.

“It’s okay, buckeroo. You’re okay. Don’t cry. Please, please don’t cry.”

Jack looks so frazzled. The situation is far from funny so the last thing you should do is laugh at his expense. But dammit if you don’t anyway.

“Do you need some help there, cowboy?”

His frantic eyes find you through the haze and pierce you with a desperate, wordless plea. You take the inconsolable infant from your husband’s arm and soothe him into silence as Jack does the same to the smoke alarm.

“There now, Johnny. See? Everything’s okay. Daddy made the bad sound stop.”

“He just stopped cryin’ for you. Just like that.”

Something in his eyes burns. Something in his voice cracks.

“I couldn't bring him any kind of comfort. He didn't….want nothin’ to do with me.”

Your weary cowpoke sags into one of the chairs at the kitchen table and buries his face in his hands with an exasperated sigh.

“You were right, darlin’. I'm useless.”

You settle John into his high chair with a teething ring to distract him before turning your attention to your distressed husband.

“To be fair, I never said you were useless.”

“You may as well have,” he sighs. “And if you weren’t thinkin’ it before you’ll be thinkin’ it now.”

You smirk. “Rough day?”

“Oh darlin’, you don’t even know the half of it.”

He begins to recount the day’s challenges, his voice raising in pitch as goes from describing one hurdle to the next. He almost seems on the verge of tears.

“And I got so distracted while tryin’ to get our fussy boy to eat his dinner that I failed to hear the timer and let ours burn. Hence the fiasco you came home to. And when John started bellowing for his supper I was in the middle of the laundry and I forgot to separate the colorful items from the rest, so my new red jockeys turned our bathroom towels pink and….and I just failed so miserably today, sugar. I’m so sorry.”

You laugh, unable to help it. It’s all you can do at this point. “Welcome to my world, sweetheart.”

“How on Earth do you do it, sugar?”

If you’re being honest, you ask yourself that question at least once a day, and not always with the same emotional connotation behind it.

“There’s just something inside of me that encourages me to power through the difficulties. A force, a reminder.”

“An iron will for damn sure,” he scoffs.

“No, that’s not it,” you chuckle. “It’s love, Jack. For you and our boy. That’s what keeps me going.”

He looks at your have cradling his own, a gesture of both dominance and comfort. In this moment he believes that he is made of inferiority.

“I love you both to the moon and back, yet I can’t even do a load of laundry.”

“Jack you do enough. I have not, do not, and never will doubt your love for me and John,” you reassure him. “Acts of service just happen to be my particular love language, not yours.”

“Then what is mine?”

You lift his hands and kiss both sets of his knuckles. “Words of affirmation.”

His acts of service are for the world, but his words are just for you.

“But ain’t actions supposed to speak louder?”

“For others, maybe,” you shrug. “But that’s only because no one else speaks as loudly as you.”

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