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A Bucky Barnes Winter Soldier Fic - The Constant	By : TheConstant1944 Category: Marvel Verse Comics > Captain America Views: 2391 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own any Marvel characters. They are solely owned by Marvel and MCU. No money is made from this story.

Chapter List
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Chapter Four
The Nurse – The Little Girl

Russia 1919 – 1944
On a visit to Russia in 1919, an English man named Arthur Bowman fell in love with Anna Alkaev's beauty and grace, not knowing that they hid a terrible insanity which ran in her family. Once he learnt the truth it was too late.
He was in love, and would die for her.
Anna's parents had died, leaving her alone. She had no siblings, no money, no prospects. She had been in need of a knight, and one came along and won her heart.
Arthur married Anna, and stayed to live and work in Russia. He obtained a job teaching languages - mainly English - at the local academy whilst she, well...she was too delicate to work. Anna had been brought up in a well-educated rich family, and had forgotten many things - but not that she was once able to afford luxuries. Arthur was not rich, but thanks to a small inheritance, they were not poor either. They got by, and could afford a few more luxuries than most could.
When they had been married for four years, Anna fell pregnant. The baby was not planned and the pregnancy nearly killed her. When Arthur was asked to consider who should die, the mother or the child there was no hesitancy in his answer. The mother must live.
Fortunately that call did not have to be made, and on the 10^th of March 1920 they had a little baby girl. Both mother and daughter survived, but it was the start of a terrible depression for Anna, one she never got over.
One that she always blamed on the baby girl.
There would be no more children.
For the first few years, Arthur was able to afford a part time nanny - but this did not continue. He could not find one that was willing to put up with Anna's dark moods and in the end they were left to look after their child themselves.
*
When she is five years old, the little girl begins to realise her mother is not like the other childrens'. Her mother is delicate, both in mind and body, and her husband worships her.
The little girl is taught how to look after herself. Her father tries to do as much as he can, and on days when her mother is well it is almost like being part of a family - almost.
Her mother is prone to fits of unreality.
One really cold day in winter, her mother takes her into the town; she wants a new outfit for her daughter. The little girl stands shyly in the tailors whilst her mother looks over the dresses she is being shown, but none will do.
“They are all to heavy,” her mother sighs as the shop keeper brings a new rail of children's dresses through to the main part of the shop for her to look at. He has a supply kept in the back for the clientèle that can afford that little extra. Anna has taken the family's food money, but does not realise it - at the moment her mind is elsewhere in time.
“Let me see that one,” she says, pointing to a beautiful summer dress.
“Sorry, Madame, I did not realise you were looking for one for the summer.” The shop keeper apologises and, without any delay, the little girl is despatched into the dressing room with the female shop assistant to be changed into the dress.
When she comes out, her mother exclaims at how beautiful she looks and says she will take the dress. The shop assistant goes to usher the little girl into the back to change, but Anna stops her. “She will wear it now.”
“But...the weather, it is far to cold!” the shop assistant tries to argue, but Anna will not hear of it. She bundles together her daughter's old dress and coat and gives it to the assistant, telling her to get rid of them. She pays and walks out holding the little girl's hand.
The cold wind hits the little girl straight away, and she gasps at how it takes her breath away.
As she is pulled through the town, people stop to stare at the mother leading her child in the snow and cold wearing only a short sleeved dress. The little girl's teeth can't stop chattering.
She tries to tell her mother. “Mamma I'm so cold.” But her mother's mind is elsewhere. She is not being intentionally cruel to her daughter. She is just a little touched, and believes she is walking out on a summers day with her beautiful child. Her own warm attire keeps the truth of the real weather from her already fragile mind. A local woman stops Anna and starts shouting at her at how she is mistreating her child, at how she is not fit to be a mother. Upset now, and totally unaware of what the woman means, Anna hurries home, tugging the little girl who is desperately trying to keep up without falling over.
Anna leads her daughter into the house and then leaves her in the kitchen, shuts the door, and forgets her. She rushes to her bedroom to cry. By the time Arthur comes home she will be in such a fit of depression that she will not come out for days.
The little girl sits on a stool waiting for her father to come home. She dare not change into warmer clothes. She always does what her mother wants.
Arthur comes home to a cold, dark house, a daughter so cold she is nearly blue, and a crying wife, and he does not know how much longer he can cope.
He ushers the little girl into her bedroom and tells her to change; gets a fire going in the kitchen and sees to his wife. Two hours later he guilty remembers the little girl and calls her down to eat some soup. She is quiet and looks at her father with big wide eyes. He knows he is lucky she is stronger in health than her mother; thankfully, she does not go down with pneumonia.
Whatever it is that is wrong, the little girl believes she is the cause of it. Her parents are teaching her the art of guilt well.
Less than a year ago, she had tried to help her mother by cutting her own hair shorter, because her mother had been cross with her over the amount of time it took every morning to brush it ready for school. But one look at what she had done, and her mother had screamed at her; hit her across the face, and then wept. The little girl had sat on the floor where she had fallen, frightened, not knowing what she had done so wrong to cause this. Her father had rushed in from the other room and had told her off; told her she had made her mother ill.
When she told her father what she had done, he dragged her to apologise to her mother, and her mother made her promise she would never cut her hair again.
“You will be the death of me,” her mother had wept, “I try to love you but you are so bad, so naughty, how can you do this to me?”
The little girl has never forgotten the trouble she caused, and tries never again to do anything to upset her mother and father. She is obedient, and tries to be a good child in every way she can. She so desperately wants her parents to love her the way she can see they love each other.
But the next day, her father receives a message to say he needs to come to the school. His little girl has been fighting. She does not tell him that it is because the other girls were teasing her, because their mothers have told them about her being made to walk home in the snow. Children are cruel. Arthur has a talk with his daughter and berates her for her misbehaviour. He doesn't ask her why she was fighting - not because he doesn't care, but because he doesn't think to ask.
At the age of six he teaches her to cook the family meal after school every day.
He has to.
The little girl had arrived home after school and found her mother incapacitated. Hungry, she had tried to cook the meal herself. Arthur had come home to a meal so bad he could not eat it; raw carrots and burnt mince meat. She had tried her best. He teaches her some basic meals, and when Anna is indisposed the little girl comes home, starts the fire and cooks the meals, cleans and washes up afterwards.
Six months later he adds cleaning to her duties - then following that, washing and ironing. She begins to fall asleep in class and the teachers are forever telling her she is bad, telling the headmaster that she shouldn't be allowed to be with the other children. No one at school sees the burns she suffers, or the bruises from when Anna has told her off.
The little girl knows that no one would care.
At the age of six, this poor child has the weight of the world on her shoulders.
At the age of seven she is banned from school for fighting again. She has hit and bloodied a boy twice her size who called her mother a gagara - a loon. A message is sent to her father and he is asked to come and fetch her. He is so angry he shouts at her. Doesn't she know he has enough problems? Why must she always add to them? He tries to argue with the headmaster, but he says he will not have her in the school any more. He will use any excuse to get this child out of his school - with a mother like hers no imagining what she has inherited, what she could do to the other children. “I have to think of them,” he tells Arthur.
And of course, the headmaster is thinking of his scores with the Commissariat for Education. He doesn't want anything to hold his grades back or show the school in a bad light.
She follows her father home, trailing behind him, desperately wanting to take his hand. He stops and reaches for hers. She reaches up and takes his, feeling his fingers curl around hers and she tries to hold on tightly - but it is simply to walk her across the busy road and once across he lets go of her. She is alone again. When asked by her father why she hit the boy, she says nothing. She knows how much it would hurt him to hear what the boy said.
She is an intensely loyal child, especially to her parents. They are all she has.
*
Arthur has started drinking.
His hours at the academy are reduced, and he starts to take in private pupils to make up the difference in wage.
He home tutors his daughter. She already speaks English as well as her father does. He teaches her more languages just the basics, not in-depth like English - but enough to get by on. He also continues teaching her mathematics, rudimentary geography and history. She is a good pupil, enjoys this rare time she has alone with her father. To see him passionate about something that means a lot to him. When he is teaching her he almost seems to forget the worries of the world and becomes a kinder, more attentive man.
Until her mother finds out, and then the lessons are reduced, Arthur, for once, though thinks of his daughter and continues them when he can and in secret, creating a silent bond between them.
He allows her to read the books in his study and every so often a package will arrive from fellow bibliophiles of his, containing literature from other countries. These she finds fascinating and he will sit with her and show her what has been sent. She starts to learn of other cultures and the outside world although her knowledge is restricted mostly to fiction.
His little girl grows up quickly and continues to run the household. They both care for her mother, who is getting progressively worse. Anna has moments of violence towards the girl, becomes insanely jealous as the girl gets older, accuses them of plotting behind her back, of wanting to get rid of her.
Arthur is devastated; he loves his wife more than life itself. How can she think such things? But sometimes it is all he can do to drag Anna away from her beating their daughter, to shut her away and try to pick up the pieces.
Yet there are times now that the young girl can appease her mother, calm her. It makes no sense and so they learn to take one day at a time.
*
When the girl turns 16, she is feeling totally isolated from the world. Without friends. Without worth.
Her father and mother have each other, and she has no one.
*
(Authors note: To see poster use: http://i.imgur.com/4goz5q3.jpg )
On her way home from the shops she sees a poster. A young Soviet woman in white with a red cross on her bag, serving her country. It gives her an idea. She speaks to her father about training to become a nurse at the local hospital, with the thought of being able to look after her mother.
He agrees it is a good idea. She is accepted. The hospital finds her to be hard working, intelligent, compassionate. She has no problem with the work, studies hard, passes her exams.
But, when her training is complete, nurses are needed for the war. So instead, she finds herself volunteering for duty at the front in the field camps.
Anything to escape her home, the house, her parents.
Feeling guilty, she leaves, never knowing exactly where she will be or if she will be back - but the money she gets is sent home to her father. She writes them letters but never receives anything back. She knows her father is busy.
At the age of 24 she falls in love with an American who is brought into the field camp where she is working. She does not even realise at first how much he means to her until, like everything else she has ever known, he is snatched away from her.
She tried desperately not to fall for him, but from the first moment she first saw him she lost her heart.
In that way she is so very much like her father.
She cannot protect the American. He is taken. She has let him down. She is sent home where there is no help for her oncoming depression. She has come full circle. She is back with her parents in a house full of love, but there is none spare for her.
She could not care for the one person who in such a short time became everything to her.
She cannot escape being alone.
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A Bucky Barnes Winter Soldier Fic - The Constant