Chapter Text
The first thing you notice is that he doesn’t see your office. Not really.
His eyes pass over the bookshelves, the diplomas, the neutral toned couch you chose specifically because it doesn’t provoke anything. No memory, no feeling, no edge to grasp onto.
He doesn’t linger on the window either, though most patients you’ve had would. They check the view, the height, the openness it gives the office.
He checks the exits. The door, the window for a slight second. The distance between them, the angle of your desk. The chair he’s about to sit in.
All of it calculated within two seconds, and you don’t interrupt him.
You’ve learned that silence, in these first moments, tells you more than an intake form could sometimes. It says a lot about a person.
After he finished observing the whole room, his attention finally switched to me.
‘’Mr. Barnes,’’ you say, your tone even, not overly warm, not cold. Just neutral and professional. ‘’You can sit wherever you’re the most comfortable.’’
It was a lie technically. There’s a chair angled slightly towards yours, close enough for conversation, far enough for personal space. It’s intentional, just like everything else in this office is.
He doesn’t hesitate. He takes that chair, of course he does.
He lowers himself into it like he’s following instructions already given, not ones you actually spoke. His back is straight, rigid. His hands rest on his knees, palms down, fingers slightly curled into them.
You notice the gloves immediately. Dark leather, worn but not carelessly so. It’s over 80 degrees outside, but you don’t comment on it, not yet.
You take your seat across from him, crossing one leg over the other, your clipboard resting lightly against your thigh. Not as a barrier, but not entirely open either. There’s a balance to this, there always is.
‘’James,’’ you begin, offering him the choice without forcing it, ‘’do you prefer James or Bucky?’’
Nothing, not even a glimmer. His gaze isn’t even on you. It hovers somewhere just past your shoulder, as if looking at you would give his thoughts away or as if it would take too much.
You make a small note.
Avoidance of direct eye contact. On edge. Controlled posture
‘’Alright,’’ you say after a moment, not bothered by the silence. ‘’We’ll leave that open for now.’’
The clock on the wall ticks. It’s subtle, designed not to be intrusive but in a quiet room like this, it’s hard to ignore it.
You let a few seconds pass, before speaking again.
‘’I understand this appointment is part of your pardon conditions,’’ you continue, your voice anchored. ‘’My role isn’t to evaluate you for punishment. I’m not here to report every word you say. This space is-’’
‘’Mandatory.’’
The word cuts through the room. It’s the first time he’s spoken. His voice is lower than what you expected. Rough. Not loud, but there’s a sternness that hides beneath it.
You don’t react beyond a small nod. ‘’Yes,’’ you agree. ‘’It is.’’
You wait a beat.
‘’But what you do with that time is still yours.’’
That gets something. Not a look, no not that, but a shift, subtle but there. His fingers press slightly harder into his knees, the leather of his gloves creasing under the tension.
A choice
A foreign concept, maybe. You don’t push it.
‘’Have you been to therapy before?’’ You ask.
You are met with silence again, this time it felt different, more deliberate.
You watch the way his jaw tightens, the muscle twitching just beneath the skin. His shoulders don’t move, but they seem to grow a bit more tense like he’s holding something back.
You’ve seen that before, people who don’t trust their own reactions. People who learned that one word alone can cost them something important.
‘’Okay,’’ you say gently, letting him off the hook without making it too obvious. ‘’We don’t have to start there.’’
You slightly shift in your chair, just enough to break some of the stillness that wove in the air without disrupting it entirely.
‘’Then maybe something simpler,’’ you offer. ‘’How are you finding it being back in-’’
A sharp exhale, not quite a laugh, not quite a scoff.
You lift your gaze to him more directly. He’s finally looking at you now, and there is absolutely nothing soft within it, nothing open.
His eyes are… empty isn’t the right word. Empty implies absence, this is something else. Something shut, locked.
‘’How am I finding it?’’ he repeats, his tone flat, almost clinical in its imitation.
You hold his gaze.
‘’Yes.’’
Another second of silence follows, longer than the others. The clock ticks, once, twice, three times. And then, nothing.
He looks away again, conversation over.
You don’t chase it, you don’t fill the silence either. You let it sit between you, heavy but not suffocating. Through experience, you learned that forcing words into spaces like this only teaches the patient that silence isn’t allowed. For some people, someone like him, silence might be the only thing that ever was, the only thing that was truly his.
Minutes pass.
Five. Ten. Fifteen.
You ask a few more questions, simple ones, neutral. Things that don’t require vulnerability to answer.
He doesn’t respond, not verbally at least, but you watch.
The way his gaze flicks to the door every time someone passes in the hallway.
The way his right hand, the one in the glove, flexes once, twice, as if trying to forget something it doesn’t want to remember.
Or the way he never fully relaxes into the chair.
You adjust your approach, less questions, more presence.
‘’You don’t have to talk,’’ you say at one point, breaking the long silence. ‘’Not until you’re ready.’’
Yet again no response, though this time his breathing shifts, just slightly but you notice.
And then, just as the session begins to close in on its end, just as you start to consider how to warp it without pushing him. He speaks.
‘’I’ve been brainwashed,’’ he says without warning, without build up. Just dropped into the room like there is no weight behind what he said.
Your pen stills, and you don’t interrupt.
‘’Frozen,’’ he continues, his voice just as flat as before, but there is something in it, a distance.
‘’And used as a target for seventy years.’’
Seventy years. He says it like it’s just a number, like it hasn’t carved him hollow from the inside out.
Your chest tightens at it, but you don’t show it.
When his gaze meets yours again, there is no deflection beneath it, no emptiness not entirely, but something sharper. Testing.
‘’What could you possibly say,’’ he asks, his voice quieter now, but more dangerous for it, ‘’that I haven’t heard in a basement in Siberia?’’
The question hangs there. A challenge, a warning, perhaps even a dismissal.
You take a breath, not too deep because that would be too noticeable, but just enough.
‘’I don’t know,’’ you say honestly.
That wasn’t what he expected, you can tell. Most people would rush to fill that space, offer reassurance, promise healing, say something hopeful or practical, but you don’t.
‘’But I’m not in a basement,’’ you continue, your voice steady, grounded. ‘’And I’m not here to control you.’’
His eyes narrow slightly, not in anger but in evaluation. Good.
‘’I’m here to listen,’’ you add. ‘’If you wish to speak.’’
Silence again, it feels less closed this time, a little less final.
The session ends, you don’t rush to stand, neither does he.
For a moment you both just sit there, then he finally moves.
He stands in one smooth motion, and then he’s gone.
You let out a deep breath, and for the first time since he walked in, the room feels like yours again, like your control has returned to you.
You glance down at your notes, then back at the door.
James Buchanan Barnes, extreme hypervigilance, avoidance of eye contact, on edge, defensive compliance, still fighting.