wish that i could wind (like a spiral stair through time)
sambucky | G | 6.6k | complete | @winterfalconevents bingo square: bedside vigil
His alarm goes off at exactly five AM, just like it has every morning since he and Sam first moved in together.
His eyes pop open as soon as he hears the first wisp of sound, a habit he’s never quite unlearned from a war that happened 170-something years ago, and he briefly wonders if he’ll ever be able to get a full night’s rest without the sounds of crickets and car alarms and stray cats meowing in the night waking him up at least once an hour.
He’s getting too old for this.
The same could be said for the alarm clock, he thinks as he gently turns it off; he’s afraid too much force might finally be the straw that breaks the camel’s back, might be the end for that old clock Sam had given him a couple months before he’d died at the ripe old age of eighty-nine.
“Five o’clock sharp every morning, baby,” he’d said, over half a century ago now, his voice weak and his bones weaker, holding onto Bucky’s far less wrinkled hand with all the strength he still had. “Early morning exercise is important for old men like us: keeps us living longer.”
Bucky has lived fifty-two years, three months, and twelve days longer than Sam had ever gotten to, and, running his hand over Sam’s side of the bed, his favorite blanket kept pristine even after all these years, he thinks living longer is the last thing he’d ever want.
He still gets up at five to exercise every day, though.
After all, Sam had asked him to, and who is Bucky to deny Sam anything he asks, even all these years later.
