The Notebook

He didn't remember much. The Smithsonian filled in a few blank spots but otherwise it was a magnificently immense void.

His mind, or what was left of it, began to grasp at straws, like a rope or maybe a train door bar, or a red leather gloved hand attached to a man who was so familiar like his own flesh and blood.

Who was he?

The man on the bridge. The man on the train. The man on the collapsing helicarier.

Who was the man?

Hell, who was he?

One morning, it came to him. Write. You need to write, his mind told him in a tiny lost whisper from a very far distance struggling to bubble to the surface from under the grotesque slime of seventy years of mental abuse.

He stole a notebook. It was from a little kid walking home from school. He didn't mean to frighten the child, but it was the fastest and easiest way to get what he desperately craved; a notebook to write in.

The child stood, transfixed in place by the icy glare of the Winter Soldier. A whimper escaped his lips as Bucky rummaged through his backpack roughly looking for any thing with a spiral bound spine.

He knew he was doing wrong. A woman's voice scolded him, "James! How many times have I told you to get your hand out of that cookie jar! I don't wash my fingers to the bone so you can be a greedy pest!" The sound of two girl's voices was in the background… his sisters playing.

WRITE THAT DOWN! His mind implored him. Before it gets away! WRITE IT DOWN!

Almost panicked, Bucky ripped a notebook from the child's back pack and dove back in for the pencil pouch. Seizing the two items, he ran away from the child who still remained frozen still, terrified of what happened.

Heart hammering, he knew he should be deeply ashamed. Stealing from children. Scaring them to death.

He was done with death. I don't do that any more.

But now, he had a new mission; to reclaim his memories.

He needed to write them down. In a notebook before he forgot again. Or before anyone could take them from him again.