This is not the first moment it's occurred to me that I'm screwing this up spectacularly.

"Bucky-" I start, knowing as I do that I've already lost this round, in the ways that count. I didn't say what I meant to, what I needed to. It's like watching an iron door slam shut and searching desperately for anything to keep it wedged open.

"The fact that you were alive meant there was a chance where there hadn't been one, before."