Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Eddie figures out he’s gay after seven grueling sessions with Frank, unpacking all of his relationship issues from Shannon to Ana to Marisol to Kim. At least at that point he's pretty sure it's the direction Frank is trying to take their discussion in, and, rationally speaking, the man (much to Eddie's chagrin) has yet to misconstrue a single damn conclusion to the issues they've talked about. Naturally, Eddie decides that this time, Frank has to be wrong. 

Eddie admits to himself that he is gay after another three sessions, a painful trip down memory lane to his childhood (read: suddenly realizing his childhood best friend was quite a bit more than that to him), and several hours of crying in his bedroom.

It takes two more sessions for him to admit it to Frank, who just smiles at him softly, asks “And why do you think that?” and, after 45 minutes of another, even more painful trip down memory lane (read: figuring out how him being gay played into his relationship with Shannon), writes him a referral to a specialist for dealing with trauma related to queer issues.

Eddie figures out he's in love with Buck after stepping out of his thirteenth session with Frank, shaking slightly, referral in hand, when he sees Buck in the parking lot, smiling at him from the driver's seat of his jeep. His blue eyes glitter in the sunlight, and Eddie can't decide which he wants to kiss first: the pink of his birthmark or the pink of his lips, and he thinks oh, and then yeah that tracks because of course it's Buck – Buck, who takes him to therapy, who waits in the car for him and who is already back to talking Eddie's ears off about some article he just read because he knows Eddie needs that kind of distraction after a hard session. Of course it's Buck – how could it not be?

Naturally, as he steps into the car, Eddie decides that Buck can never, never find out about this because Buck is good, so fucking good, and if Eddie ruins one more good thing he might as well call it quits and hurl himself off the Golden. 

Don't tell Frank he thought that. 

*

Life ever since realizing he's gay and utterly in love with his best friend has honestly not been all that different, except of course for the infinite stream of slaps in the face entitled ‘How didn't I figure this out sooner?’. It's a bit like a cross between learning about a new word and acquiring a heart disease because suddenly he's running into it at every corner, but instead of a feeling of moderate whimsy he's getting heart palpitations out of it. 

Like today, for example, when they’re on a call at a little girl’s birthday party. One of the kids had accidentally pushed over a candle that had then fallen onto a heap of discarded wrapping paper; the resulting fire is relatively innocuous, what with the party being held outside, but the five-year-old guests are all quite a bit shaken up.

After putting out the flames, Eddie turns to see that Buck has already made it his number one priority to cheer up each and every single kid, starting with the little birthday girl that’s already back to excitedly telling him what kind of presents she got. She’s pulling him along by his hand as she shows them off, Buck not only appraising every gift with oohs and aahs, but also commending the kids that gifted them to her for their thoughtfulness and taste. 

They’re all enraptured by him, and to be honest, so is Eddie. Next to the horde of five year olds Buck looks like a gentle giant, and he seems so genuinely interested in every little boy and girl’s opinions and thoughts that it kind of hurts Eddie to look at. 

“Look who finally found someone his age to hang out!” Chim quips from somewhere behind him, but Eddie can’t even bring himself to join in on the teasing because he has to concentrate all his mental capabilities on committing these images to his memory, as randomly taking pictures of Buck with children neither he nor Eddie have any family ties to would probably come off as pretty weird. 

Needless to say, it takes them longer than usual to get going again because if the kids got their way, Buck wouldn’t leave at all. He makes sure to personally say goodbye to all of them, dealing out high-fives and hugs to all who want them. 

Eddie’s heart aches at the sight of Buck with one of the little girls in his arms, and he finds himself wondering whether Chris would like a little sibling, until, of course, the thought of Chris and how much Eddie’s fucked up the one kid he already has stops him in his daydreaming. 

“And remember,” Buck says after having ultimately finished the last round of goodbyes, “always be careful when fire is around, okay?” A dozen small faces nod seriously and then Buck gives them a little salute which the kids try their best to emulate and Eddie has the distinct feeling that if this goes on for any longer, he’ll have to explain to his dentist why he’s got a shit ton of new cavities. 

Thankfully, Buck finally gets up and turns around to, not so thankfully, greet Eddie with a blinding smile that has him almost trip as he turns to hide the flush that colors his cheeks at that. Forget about cavities, if Eddie looks at that smile one second longer he’s going to full-body melt. 

Of course, he can’t help stealing some further glances of it as they go to join Chim and the moms he’s currently giving the standard fire safety talk to. Eddie’s only human, after all.

A couple hours later, back at the station, Eddie and Buck are taking turns spotting each other in the gym when they’re called to the hangar by one of the guys from B-shift whose name Eddie always forgets (Adam? Aaron? Eddie has no clue. In his defense, the guy is only here to fill in for Hen, who is taking the shift off to spend the day with Karen, Denny and Mara).

 Or, well, Aaron (Adam?) calls Buck and Eddie comes with. Kind of the same thing though.

"Someone asked for you," he says, pointing over his shoulder to a woman holding a big tupperware container in her hands. It's one of the moms from the birthday party call, and Eddie immediately moves to take the container out of her hands because she's visibly pregnant and that thing looks heavy. 

"Leftover birthday cake," she says as she hands it over, smiling at them, "as a thank-you for earlier today."

“No need to thank us, it’s our job," says Buck, hands on his hips and a confident grin on his face that makes Eddie go a little weak in the knees.

"Though we are not opposed to cake," Chimney cuts in, startling him because he had not noticed Chim following them here, but that may very well be on Eddie for having been a bit preoccupied by the sight of Buck walking in front of him. 

“No, seriously, thank you so much,” the woman insists, looking intently at Buck, who ducks his head sheepishly.

"It's nothing,” he says, “and, uh, my partner here put out the fire, I didn’t even really do anything.”

The woman shakes her head. “I’m not talking about the fire, though thanks for that too, of course" – she smiles at Eddie, Eddie smiles back – "I’m talking about what you did with the kids. Right before you arrived we all were basically on the verge of a breakdown there, but thanks to you they went back to having fun like nothing even happened. I think some of them were actually jealous that Lilly got to have firefighters at her party. You were amazing with them. Do you have kids yourself?”

“Oh, uh, no, not really,” stammers Buck and that feels so wrong that Eddie almost speaks up because at this point, Buck is a second dad to Chris in all but name, but he isn’t sure if that would be weird to say, especially with Chimney here. 

“Well, you’d make a great dad,” she says.

“Oh, uh, thank– thank you,” Buck stutters, blushing profusely and Eddie feels overcome with a strange sense of vindication, maybe even pride, because, yeah, Buck is amazing and he’d most certainly be an fantastic dad as well (is one, already, really) and he deserves to have people tell him that.

“And I, uh, I’d love to have kids one day, I think,” Buck adds on, “I, uh, I love kids. I mean, it’s not always easy, I know that of course…”

“Oh, it’s hell half the time,” she laughs, “but at the end of the day, you know, it’s amazing.”

She pats her baby bump at that and the way she’s smiling makes her kind of seem like she’s glowing in the way people always say pregnant women are, and Buck is glowing back and there is the slightest twitch to his hand, as though he wants to reach for his own belly and Eddie. Well. Eddie has to turn his eye to try and tune out the thoughts that cross his mind at that, due to them being not only indecent but also entirely anatomically impossible and, frankly, really embarrassing.

Then Buck says, “Yeah, I can imagine,” and there is just a hint of something, yearning maybe, in his voice and yeah, that’s it, Eddie’s going for a walk. He smiles at the woman one last time, dumps the tupperware containers in Chimney’s arms and marches off to the showers because he needs an ice cold one, stat .

When he finally comes back, the woman is gone and Buck and Chim have migrated to the loft. 

“You’re too late,” Chim tells him, “Cake’s all gone. You really shouldn’t have run off like that, that stuff was great. What was that about anyway?”

Before Eddie can make up an excuse, Buck jumps up from the couch he’s lounging on.

“Eddie’s got no time for your nosy questions, Chim,” he says, “he has to come get the slice I saved him from the back of the fridge before someone else discovers it,” and then he’s already pulling Eddie along by his arm, only letting go when they’ve arrived in the firehouse kitchen.

“I’m sorry,” says Buck as he’s sorting through the fridge, “all that talk about kids must’ve got you thinking about him, huh?"

“Yeah,” says Eddie, because while it might not have been the actual reason he ran away from that conversation, it isn’t a lie either. 

“I miss him,” he adds quietly. 

“I’m really sorry,” says Buck, sounding genuinely rueful, “I should have realized and changed topics.”

Eddie scoffs. “Come on, Buck, it isn’t your job to make other people tread on eggshells around me,” he argues, but Buck shakes his head violently. 

“I should’ve noticed, I mean I know how hard this is on you and I should have thought about it.” 

Eddie wants to disagree, but then Buck turns to face him, and he’s standing in front of a fridge that’s, frankly, in a complete state of disarray now that he’s rifled through it to find the plastic box with a slice of pink birthday cake he’s holding, the slice that he saved and hid specifically for Eddie, and he’s looking at Eddie with his big blue eyes as though he actually did something wrong here and isn’t just freaking out over things he can’t control, and Eddie can’t say anything because he thinks no one has ever loved him this much and he doesn’t know how to open his mouth without everything he feels just spilling right out of him. 

There is a moment of quiet, and Eddie thinks, oh god he’s going to figure it out, but then the bell rings and Buck groans and gets to work on fixing the absolute mess he’s made of the fridge in record time while Eddie storms down the stairs to suit up. 

The topic doesn’t really come up again, but Eddie can tell Buck’s worrying about it the entire time they’re out on call, so when they get back to the station and he goes to collect his piece of cake, he brings two forks instead of one, holding the second one out to Buck until he relents and takes it. 

Sitting on the couch, knees touching, as they quietly take turns scraping off minimal bits of the admittedly great birthday cake so that the other person can have more, they slowly go back to normal.

*

After taking about a dozen wrong turns and walking the same set of stairs first up, then down, and then up again because, turns out, he wasn’t being insane, some idiot just numbered the rooms on the second floor starting with 3.01 and the one’s on the third starting with 2.01, Eddie finally manages to find his new therapist’s office. 

It is, all in all, not that much different from Frank’s. In fact, Eddie’s pretty sure he’s sitting on the same brand of armchair, this one’s just colored light blue instead of tan. The room as a whole looks like it was designed with the intention of being as simple and welcoming as possible (as opposed to the rest of the building, which Eddie reckons might as well have been drawn up by M.C. fucking Escher). 

Eddie’s new therapist, Dr Rosewood, is a woman in her fifties or sixties with plenty of laugh lines and graying hair that’s captured in a loose bun at the back of her head. 

Dr Rosewood introduces herself as Esther, she/her, and asks him what he wants out of his time with her. Eddie says he doesn’t know. They've got only eight sessions lined up – more if Eddie needs them, but he's not really planning on that – so it would probably be best if he could figure it out. Figure everything out, really. Primarily himself. 

“Some clarity, maybe,” he says after a moment of deliberation.

“What do you mean by that?” Esther asks and from then on the next hour passes in a blur. 

They lay the groundwork for their future sessions – Frank had, with Eddie’s permission, forwarded Esther some information about his struggles and history, so they start with a rough recapitulation of his notes, before Esther steers the conversation towards his childhood. 

She asks him about the expectations his parents put on him, what it was like growing up in the late nineties in Texas, what his plans for life had been before getting Shannon pregnant. 

Who he’d been before he was a father and a husband and a soldier. 

Eddie confesses he doesn’t remember. 

He walks out of his appointment with Esther feeling simultaneously heavier and lighter than before – unearthing feelings and memories that you’ve buried for a good twenty to thirty years will do that to you. It’s painful to admit who he was, is, but never accepted himself to be. It's freeing as well. Soothes an ache in his chest he wasn’t aware was there. 

In the end, everything in life is ambivalent, so it’s okay to feel conflicting feelings about it. At least that’s what Frank said and Esther seconded, so Eddie guesses there has to be some kind of truth in it. 

It’s why he can go sit in his car and think about how Chris is the light of his life, the one good thing he brought into this world and how he’d never want to change a thing about him, while also mourning who he might have been if Shannon had never gotten pregnant, without having a complete breakdown.

Sure, it takes him ten minutes to get his breathing under control enough that he feels good to drive, and the entire way he’s gripping the steering wheel so hard his knuckles turn white whilst loudly singing along to whatever pop-song’s playing on the radio to drown out the nauseating sense of GuiltGuiltGuilt drumming in his head, his chest, his stomach, his whole body. 

But he gets home. 

There, he collapses on his couch and does what his therapists (plural, oh man he’s cooked) told him to do when he’s feeling awful about himself – sit with the feeling for a moment. 

Breathe in.

Breathe out. 

It’s okay, he tells himself. 

Breathe in.

Breathe out. 

He’s allowed to think and feel in contradicting ways. That doesn’t make him a bad person. 

Breathe in.

Breathe out. 

Mourning something and feeling regret that it happened are different things. 

Breathe in.

Breathe out. 

He’s not wishing Chris away and he never will. Even if he could, he’d never go back and change things. 

Breathe in.

Breathe out. 

Eddie puts his head in his hands then and just exists for a moment. Allows himself to try and escape from the unrelenting noise of his thoughts. 

He doesn’t know how long he’s been sitting there when the chime of his phone rips him out of his trance. 

heyy 🤗🤗 how’d it go? 👀

A smile breaks out on Eddie's face. It's a recurrent hit of the ‘Should've figured it out sooner’-parade – the whole smiling-whenever-buck-texts-him thing.

Good. Feel like a bus ran me over, though.   

do you need us to come over to check you out for broken bones??🚒🚑🚨🚨

I doubt Gerrard would appreciate you stealing the engine to check for injuries inflicted by a metaphor.

simile

What?

you said you feel ‘like’

that makes it a simile

https://www.merriam-webster.com/grammar/metaphor-vs-simile  

Nerd.

you just don’t know english!!

whoops gotta go 🚨🔔🚨

Eddie’s grinning at his phone like a lovelorn idiot. Maybe because he is one. 

Gerrard’s put them on separate shifts this week, quoting ‘scheduling issues’ even though they all know he’s just doing it to be a dick. 

Work without Buck is dull, but he’s got Ravi to pair up with so he isn’t at immediate risk of dying because he’s dealing with someone incompetent at his side ( “Buck insinuated that if you get hurt while working with me, he’d get the chainsaw out again,” Ravi had told him first things first on Monday). And Buck’s been texting him non-stop anyway, so it's almost like he's still right there. Almost.

There is a part of him that's a bit relieved that Buck’s at work right now because if he wasn’t, he would have insisted on driving him to therapy and Eddie’s not sure he would have managed going to sit in the car next to Buck after his session and not spill the beans about what kind of therapist he’s actually seeing now. 

Because he hasn’t actually told Buck anything about Dr Rosewood – hasn’t even mentioned her by name because on the website of the building she works at it says LGBTQIA+ Specialist underneath her name and that might make some things abundantly clear that Eddie doesn’t want all that clear at this point. Especially considering he hasn’t come out to Buck yet. 

He knows, of course, that Buck would be nothing but supportive, would probably be really excited, pull him into a big bear hug and then start sending him twice as many of the articles about queer issues he’s been forwarding Eddie ever since he came out himself. The issue is that Eddie hasn’t quite figured out how to tell Buck that he’s gay without also telling him how unequivocally and overwhelmingly in love he is with him, and Eddie’s not exactly in the mood to blow his entire life up again. 

So really, he’s kind of hoping that Buck just believed him when he claimed Frank referred him to a therapist that focuses on relationship counseling for singles, and that he doesn’t ask any further questions until Eddie knows just how he’s going to reveal the fact that he’s gay without causing irreparable damage to their friendship. 

*

Ever since Chris left, Buck’s been over at Eddie’s even more often than before. Eddie both loves and loathes it because when he watches Buck rummage through his kitchen as though it’s his own while he’s cooking dinner, he can pretend for a moment that he gets to have him. That Chris is just at a sleepover, and that they’re both happy to have a night just to themselves. That Eddie could walk up, hug him from behind and press a kiss to his jaw. That maybe, he’ll never leave.

God, Eddie wishes Buck never left. He always does of course, but Eddie can’t help dreaming of a world where Buck just… forgets that’s a thing he does. Just stays forever. 

It’s such a selfish thought. Eddie already gets so much of Buck. It’s just… it’s just that, in a way, the kitchen feels empty without him in it. 

Buck’s absence is, paradoxically, only so noticeable because it is incomplete. There’s an imprint of him left here; the Kiss the Cook apron that he left here one day and never took back to the loft, the panda-face coasters from the zoo gift shop because of course Buck folded as soon as Chris asked, the fucking Hildy coffee machine that must’ve cost him a fortune. Hell, Buck’s own appointments are on the calendar on Eddie’s refrigerator.

Buck is already everywhere in Eddie’s kitchen all the time, but Eddie is greedy, so goddamn greedy. 

(If he were allowed, Eddie would offer to open up his ribcage so that Buck could crawl in and take up residence in the empty space right next to Eddie’s heart – the one that over years he has unknowingly carved out for himself there. A cruel irony, that by fixing the holes in his bedroom wall, Buck would deepen the ones in his chest.)

“So, sessions are going well?” 

“Yeah,” Eddie says, “therapist’s good, I guess.”

“Wow,” replies Buck as he’s pulling one of those specialty pans that Eddie has no memory of buying out of a cupboard. 

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Just never thought I’d hear you of all people admit something like that,” says Buck and shoots Eddie a teasing look over his shoulder as he fiddles with the knobs on the stove. 

“Yeah, well, maybe therapy had an actual effect on me,” Eddie muses.

“Don't get too hopeful!” 

Eddie’s chuckle is drowned out by the crackle of oil and water meeting as Buck drops the vegetables in the pan. 

“I’m, uh, really happy for you, though,” Buck says after a while, turning away from the sizzling pan to look at him. 

Eddie raises a quizzical eyebrow. “You mean for driving my kid out of state and having so much trauma to unpack it warrants two therapists?”

Buck’s eyes widen, his face flushing a beautiful shade of pink that Eddie wants to paint his whole house in just to look at it some more. “No no! You, uh, that’s not what I’m talking about, I mean, like, I’m happy you’re, uh, working it out, you know? That stuff takes a lot of, ah, courage, and determination, and–”

“It’s fine, Buck,” Eddie cuts in, “I was just joking.” 

“No, Eddie, I mean it, I’m proud of you, you know? You need to know that. All of this,” –he gestures wildly with the spatula in his hand, Eddie can see some onion flying through the air– “is kind of fucked up, but it’s like, not your fault. Or. Uh. I– I’m not saying that what you did was right, you made, uh, you made a mistake, but really it was kind of out of your control, and you’re doing your best to fix it and that’s what counts, you know? Like, you’re doing everything you can to get yourself back on track again, and I, I really… just, I’m proud of you, okay?”

He’s got that sincere look on his face, the one that lays everything about him bare, makes Eddie feel like he’s staring right into Buck, a window right to the bottom of the ocean of his eyes. It’s too much, it’s never enough. 

Eddie has to tear his gaze away. Blink for a moment. 

“Thanks,” he quietly tells Buck, who's still standing with his back to the stove, looking at him, and then, “Buck, the zucchini’s burning.”

Buck yelps and Eddie laughs as he’s wildly cursing while scraping around in the pan and everything’s fine again.

Later, sitting on the couch and watching some Netflix show about glass blowers that Buck’s really gotten into, Eddie repeats it.

“Thanks,” he says, eyes fixed on the TV.

Buck turns to him, eyebrows scrunched together.

“What for?”

God, that he even has to ask. Here he is, sitting on Eddie’s couch after cooking him dinner, staying longer than intended under the guise of wanting to watch another episode when the both of them know he’s just doing it to keep Eddie some company because the house is so damn lonely with just him in it. He’s probably missing out on time with Tommy; lately he’s been spending quite a lot of nights at his actual boyfriend’s place, maybe today too (Eddie doesn’t know, hadn’t been masochist enough to ask).

Point is, Buck is here, he’s always here when Eddie needs him and offers everything he has, offers up himself, really, without Eddie ever having to ask. 

How do you put that into words?

“Everything,” Eddie tries. It’s not enough. Never will be.

Next to him a soft smile washes over Buck’s face.

“You know I like hanging out with you, right? And, uh, taking care of you, too.”

Eddie’s blinking away tears again. Fuck.

“You shouldn’t have to.”

Buck shakes his head. “Don’t care. I’m always going to. You should have known what you were getting into before becoming my best friend.”

Eddie bites the inside of his cheek, nods silently. 

“Maybe should have warned me beforehand,” he says, trying not to sound as choked up as he is, and Buck grins at him, and fuck he’s so pretty.

“Now where’s the fun in that?” he teases and Eddie wants to kiss the smile off his face, wants to trace Buck’s dimples with his fingers, Eddie wants, wants, oh fuck does he want and he finds himself slightly leaning in and– shit, fuck, abort, abort–

Eddie jumps up. 

“Bathroom,” he stutters out, “I, uh, gotta go. Don’t pause for me.”  

He knows Buck’s watching him with concern as he leaves the room, is probably a bit worried, and Eddie never, never wants Buck worried, but, fuck, if he doesn’t get away right now, he’s going to do something he’ll regret.

Death grip on the sink, staring at himself in the mirror, Eddie is trying to slow his breathing to a normal pace. He needs to get this under control, goddamnit. He can’t afford to lose Buck. 

“Have you had any issues with that realization?” Esther had asked him after he’d told her about his feelings for Buck. 

“No,” he’d replied , “it’s honestly been the easiest part of all of this.”

Eddie can’t help feeling more and more like a liar.

He’s overflowing. He never used to understand what people meant when they said they were so in love they wanted to shout it from the rooftops, but, fuck, a rooftop wouldn’t be enough right now, he thinks. Eddie needs to make a service announcement. Send out an emergency alert to all the phones in SoCal. Maybe the entire country.

Oh he is so screwed.

Forcefully relaxing his hands on the sink. Stern look at himself in the mirror. 

Deep breaths. He can do this.

Eddie flushes the empty toilet, unlocks the door, goes to join Buck on the couch again, whose smile greets Eddie as soon as he rounds the corner.

“I paused,” Buck confesses when Eddie drops back onto the cushions next to him, “I know you don’t want to miss the final showing before the critiques.”

Buck shuffles around a bit before pressing play again, and then their legs are touching slightly and Buck starts making fun of someone’s godawful sculpture, his laugh ringing out ever so sweetly and Eddie feels like he has a spiritual experience.

Deep breaths. He can do this.

(He so can’t fucking do this.)

*

Nearing the end of his third session with Esther, Eddie begrudgingly confesses to having some issues with his feelings for Buck.

“I just don't know where to put them, I guess,” he admits. He only tells her because he still hasn’t managed to learn how to be normal around Buck again and he’s afraid that one of these days the man’s going to figure out why Eddie’s blushing like a fucking school girl whenever Buck pulls off a complicated rescue, or works out in the firehouse gym, or rambles on about something he read on Wikipedia yesterday, or does anything, really. 

“I keep feeling like I’m… just overwhelmed with them. I don’t even know where it’s coming from, like this isn’t even new, I just didn’t realize before. But now, whenever I look at him I just,” – he makes a non-committal hand gesture – “short circuit. I guess.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“Well for one my hands always reach for him, even more than before. It’s like he’s a fucking magnet or something. And I can’t be around him without feeling like I have to think about every damn word that’s about to come out of my mouth.”

He drags a hand over his face.

“I had to make up excuses to leave a room on three separate occasions last week because I felt like I was going to… I dunno… explode if I looked at him any longer without telling him.”

“And you can’t tell him?”

Eddie snorts. Shakes his head

“Why not?”

Because he deserves so much better. Because he should have someone who doesn’t need fixing, someone who won’t drag him down. Because he is the one good thing Eddie hasn’t fucked up yet.

Because Eddie can’t weigh him down even more.

Because…

“It wouldn’t be a choice.” 

He says it so quietly, if Esther didn’t have a therapist’s patented ‘ go on, I’m listening’ expression on her face, he’d have assumed she didn’t even hear it. 

“If I told him he’d… he’d follow my lead. He’d bend over backwards to make me comfortable. To make things work. I… I’m not saying there wouldn’t maybe be love… it’s just… I need him to choose this. Not out of duty, but conviction.”

The thing is – Eddie wants. God, he wants. If Buck reached out just the slightest bit more, gave Eddie a single digit to hold onto, he’d never let go. He’d sink his teeth into Buck’s skin and bleed him dry, could not stop himself from doing so. He’d take, take, take, until there was nothing left to give. 

Eddie sometimes wonders if it is in his nature to love like this. If he will only ever know how to consume, to taint, to doom. If maybe they’d all be better off if he stopped trying so damn hard to be good, if he just gave up and laid down in his garden, staring at the sky until his body surrendered to the grass and the earth took him in as its own.

The scratch of Esther’s pen on her notebook brings him back to the present. 

“We’ll talk about this,” she says, as she scribbles away, “but I’m afraid there are only five minutes left on the clock and I have a feeling this would be a bit of a longer conversation.”

He checks his watch and yeah, she’s right. Saved by the bell, he thinks.

Esther clicks her pen and looks up at him.

“So telling Buck is out of the question,” she says and he can hear a silent for now there that they’ll definitely be debating in a coming session, “which makes your current objective what exactly? Keeping your feelings hidden?”

He shrugs. “Pretty much. I don’t want him to notice anything is off.”

“Have you considered talking to other people about your situation?”

“Can’t. Basically everyone I know knows Buck, too. He’s going to find out if I tell anyone.”

“Which means you plan on keeping all of this to yourself?” asks Esther, raising an eyebrow. 

Eddie nods. Esther goes back a couple pages in her notebook.

“When we discussed Frank’s notes, we briefly brushed upon you having a tendency to repress thoughts, emotions, and experiences,” she says. 

“I guess I’ve had issues with bottling things up in the past,” he concedes. 

Esther clicks her pen.

“The things people bottle up, they don’t always have to be negative. Sometimes it’s happy feelings, good thoughts, that get muddled up with bad feelings like shame or guilt and are subsequently pushed down just the same. It might help if you had an outlet for these feelings. Somewhere to put them down, acknowledge them, and then accept them as a part of you,” she continues on. 

“What, like a diary?” Eddie jokes. 

Esther shrugs. 

“Sure,” she says, pen already flying across another sheet of paper, “but I think there might be some added benefit if you had the opportunity to listen to some other perspectives as well.” 

He leaves the session with an extensive list of options and spaces Esther suggested he might use to air out some of his feelings. 

It’s about the length of a regular, letter-sized sheet of paper and as soon as Eddie’s back home, he sits down with his laptop, a cup of coffee, and a pen and makes it his mission to find reasons to eliminate every single point on that list. He’s not trying to be deliberately obstructive, really, he isn’t, but his first and foremost priority is Buck not catching a whiff of what’s going on and that’s going to rule out most if not all of Esther’s suggestions. 

The option of writing notes, or even a diary he immediately discards, the chance of Buck finding them far too high. For similar reasons he crosses out any and all apps Esther recommended him. If there is evidence on his phone, there is a possibility that Buck will see it, and that is a no-go. 

The message boards he strikes off the list one by one, for varying concerns over privacy and traceability. He doesn’t want to sign up with his email, he doesn’t want to create any accounts and he sure as hell doesn’t want to put any identifying information on some website that’s just free for everyone to see. 

There is one point on the list, though, for which no matter how much digging Eddie does, he finds no rational reason to discard. 

QUEERING THE MAP, it says, in big bold letters. A website. Completely anonymous. No sign ups, no follow ups, no nothing. All you have to do is tap on some place, any place, on a map of the whole wide world, write about your queer experiences in that place, or really just anything, and send it off.

Niche enough that he’s pretty sure Buck doesn’t know about it; popular enough that it’s unlikely he’d stumble across Eddie’s entries if he did. As long as Eddie doesn’t do anything stupid and tag any places that could expose who wrote the message, like his house or the loft, he ought to be fine.

But, like, it’s a map. Eddie’s not going to get any real help from a fucking map . He’ll give it the courtesy of a five minute look-over. Afterwards, he can cast it aside like everything else. 

He’s just about to open it up on his laptop, when he receives a text from Chris and promptly drops everything he was doing to think of the best reply he can give to a slightly blurry image of a stray cat lounging in the sun on his parents’ patio. 

They’re still on fragile ground, but it’s been getting better, so much fucking better. Eddie almost cried during their first video call a few weeks back, the only reason he didn’t was because Buck was right there with him, a steady presence for him to hold on to, and, occasionally, hide behind when he was getting sniffly again. 

By the time he’s finished typing up a reply (mostly made up of carefully chosen emojis), it’s almost seven and he has to shut off his laptop and go hide the list in his nightstand because Buck’s coming over in half an hour to make dinner and if he saw anything out of place he’d start asking questions Eddie really doesn’t want to answer. 

He can worry about all of this tomorrow. 

*

Eddie pretty much forgets about the website until about two weeks later, when he's cowering between bottles of antiseptic and oxygen tanks on the ground of the firehouse's storage closet. It's 11pm and he's doing his best to hide from everyone. Mostly Buck, out of fear he'll do something stupid like kiss him on the mouth or tell him he's the most beautiful, most wonderful, most everything person on the planet and that Eddie would very much like put his arms around him and never let go, but also everyone else because he's kind of having a hard shift right now and he can't exactly tell anyone why.

It's stupid, anyway, because this kind of thing shouldn't bother him, it certainly wouldn't have bothered him as much a couple weeks ago, and he doesn't actually give a fuck about Gerrard's opinion of him, the man's the scum of the earth and if Eddie didn't have a job to lose he'd kick his ass in the parking lot in a heartbeat, therapy be damned. 

Talking about therapy, for the past half hour Eddie has been scrolling through the document in his notepad titled ‘emergency hotfixes’ that's filled with all of the emergency resources and tips therapy (and, of course, Buck) has provided him with in the last couple years, and so far, he hasn't found anything pertaining to issues like “My captain basically called me a faggot for crying over a dead kid and I can't talk about it to anyone lest they find out I actually am one” or “My best friend, who I am in love with, keeps giving me reasons to fall further in love with him and it's kind of killing me”, so his chances of stepping out of the closet (ha-ha) in the next couple hours appear rather slim. 

He kind of wishes he could go back to more-repressed-Eddie. That guy would have just grit his teeth and pushed on through, no hiding necessary. He would, however, probably also be well on his way to starring as the main character in Blowing Up Your Life 2: Electric Boogaloo, so maybe it's for the best he’s trying not to be that guy anymore. He's all about embracing his emotions and letting himself feel these days. Even if said emotions make him feel like he just downed one of the bottles of rubbing alcohol on the shelf behind him. 

The real problem is, Eddie’s been embracing his emotions for as long as he’s been sitting in this damn closet, and so far it’s done fuck all to get him feel ready to walk out of it. 

Additionally, it seems he's having another run in with his good old friend and favorite type of feelings, meaning the contradictory kind, because on the one hand he wants no one to know about any of this ever, on the other he feels… well fuck. 

He feels lonely. 

It's a different kind of lonely than the one he and Frank talked about right after Chris left for Texas – that lonely was an open stab wound in his chest, prominently painful and bleeding profusely. An aching reminder of his loss. The loneliness he's feeling right now is one he discussed with Esther just a few days ago – a kind of cold pressure pushing from all around him, as though he's stuck in a mound of snow after an avalanche, cut off from the rest of the world. 

Like I'm all on my own, he'd revealed to Esther in their fourth session, unable to meet her eyes as he talked, like there's no one else who feels like this. Like I'm broken, drowning in a sea full of healthy people. 

Maybe there's other people out there like you, Esther had offered, maybe your eye just isn't trained to see them. Maybe some of them don't want to be seen.

She’d asked him then whether he had taken a look at any of the websites, apps, or online-communities she had recommended to him. 

Didn’t get around to it yet, Eddie had said, not in the mood to explain to her that he’d basically thrown out the whole list out of fear Buck might find out about it because telling a therapist something like that is like going swimming in shark-infested waters with an open wound, and, to be honest, he hadn’t really felt like getting bitten that day. 

Once again, Esther had encouraged him to check some of them out. A sense of community, she’d said, might help. 

He’d written it off. Maybe because he reckoned he’d already ruled out all of the sites that could make an actual difference. All that was left was… a map. Yeah, sure, that’ll help him get over his crippling sense of loneliness, recurring feelings of dread and the distinct impression that there’s something innately wrong with him. A map. Sure. 

Now, sitting in a supply closet in the dead of night, ashamedly yearning for some kind of connection, a map doesn’t sound half bad. 

Hell, if it’ll help him get out, he’ll turn his life around and become a fucking cartographer. 

It takes him a moment to remember the URL, but then he’s got it again and soon he’s greeted by the city of Montreal, which, just a second later, is all but completely blacked out by a myriad of little location markers. 

With still kind of shaky fingers (it’s been what now… an hour? Man, he really ought to get it together already), Eddie zooms out until he’s got a good chunk of North America in view. Or, well, the sea of black dots populating it. 

He taps on a random spot on screen and a little speech bubble pops up.

met another trans person, it says.

Cool, thinks Eddie, this doesn’t help me in the slightest. 

He half-debates just closing the tab again and finally striking QUEERING THE MAP off Esther's list as well. If he was feeling a little more petty and a little less pathetic right now, he might’ve just done it. But his ass is starting to hurt from sitting on the concrete floor and the lid of some storage box has been poking into his back for a while now and he’d really really like to just be able to get out of here without feeling at an immediate risk of coming apart at the seams the moment someone looks at him. 

So instead of calling it quits just yet, Eddie zooms in a little bit again and just sort of scrolls his way through the US. 

There’s all kinds of posts, ranging from recountings of sexual adventures Eddie had no interest in knowing, to heartfelt anecdotes about struggles with identity and life in a seemingly hostile world. 

Some people just share their own stories, but many others also directly address people they’re writing about as though it was just meant for them. It all seems a bit sappy, until Eddie comes across an entry by someone whose lover died of HIV and he finds himself having to blink away tears. 

From then on, everything else just feels a bit more… serious. Suddenly, there’s a face behind every single post, no matter how inconsequential it might seem to him at first. 

He reads his way through these people’s tales – their milestones, their confessions, their cries for a world that is kinder to them, and, fuck. He’s one of them now, isn’t he? That’s his story as well. Somewhere, in fucking Oregon, a guy and his boyfriend got called fags and went home crying and that’s kinda him now, right? 

There’s a girl in Utah who's fallen in love with her best friend and knows it isn’t requited, but she can’t bring herself to stop loving her, and that’s Eddie, too. 

He’s the guy in Florida who’s never kissed another man, and keeps wondering if he’s actually gay or just deluding himself. 

He’s the mother in Virginia who didn’t figure out she was a lesbian until her forties and still has to figure out what to tell her kids.

He’s the person in Montana that’s only just getting to know themselves for who they really are after living half a life that, in a sense, wasn’t really theirs. 

He is, kind of, all of them, and fuck there’s so many. And for every depressing story he finds himself relating to, there’s a dozen happy memories etched into the map and he can’t help but hope that maybe, one day, he can be one of those people as well. A little happy dot on planet earth. Entirely unremarkable, but in a good sense. 

When, about half an hour later, Eddie turns off his phone again, he feels a little better. Just the tiniest bit. The map probably doesn’t have anything to do with it anyway. 

It also doesn’t have a part in him getting up, dusting his pants off, and (after listening to make sure no one will see him walk out) finally opening the door to make his way to the bunks to get at least a little bit of shut-eye before the next call. He’s just tired and the fucking storage closet was getting stuffy.

…okay, the map wasn’t a half bad idea. It was kind of nice to read through. But that’s about it. Eddie doubts he’ll go back to it. Much less actually make a post of his own or something like that. 

*

Eddie makes his first entry two days later in his bed at 3 AM. He hasn’t managed to get a wink of sleep in the past four hours, instead lying motionlessly and staring up at his bedroom ceiling. He’s thinking about growing up in El Paso again. To be more precise, he’s thinking about Andy. 

They’d met in elementary school when Andy was put in Eddie’s class. His parents had just moved to Texas. The teacher sat Andy next to Eddie because Eddie didn’t really have any friends back then, and by recess they were inseparable. 

They shared everything – when Eddie’s mom packed him leftover Tres Leches, Andy would get half of it. When Andy got new pens (the glittery, sparkly ones that Eddie knew his mom would never buy him) Andy would let him use them as if they were his own. 

Middle school brought them even closer. They were over at each other’s places all the time, sat next to each other in every class, and hogged the landline for hours talking to each other whenever some circumstance kept them apart for a day. 

Eddie remembers long summer days spent at the lake, lying in the shade, Andy next to him, the both of them, sharing whatever fruits and snacks their moms had packed them and dozing off in comfortable silence. He remembers thinking that if what they say at church is true, and there was a garden Eden where everything was perfect, this is what Adam and Eve must have felt like before they were cast out of paradise.

In the first year of highschool, Andy’s mother died. Undiagnosed brain tumor – she simply fell asleep and never woke up again. Eddie remembers holding a crying Andy in his arms, as they lay wrapped in a cocoon of blankets on his bed. He remembers shedding some tears of his own as Andy wept into his sweater, even though his father had drummed it into him that a real man ought to have control of his feelings. 

A week after the funeral they met at the lake. 

They sat in the grass, staring out onto the water and talked about nothing, until Andy said I need to tell you something and Eddie said okay.

We’re moving back to Massachusetts, Andy said then, and Eddie said what. 

Everything’s packed. We’re flying back tomorrow, Andy said, and Eddie said what.

Dad got a job at his old company, Andy said, and Eddie said why didn’t you tell me.

I didn’t know how, Andy said, and Eddie said fuck you, even though he usually never did because his mom hated that kind of language. 

Fuck you, Eddie said and pushed Andy away from him. 

I’m sorry, said Andy, and Eddie said I don’t care.

Then he got up and ran away. 

He arrived home almost like he always did after a trip to the lake – heart pounding, though this time not with elan, but anger; hair damp, though this time not with lake water, but sweat; face sticky, though this time not with fruit juices, but tears. 

When Andy came to say goodbye the next day, Eddie locked himself in his room and didn’t come out until he watched Andy’s dad’s car leave their driveway through the window in his room. 

Later, when he set foot out of his room again to grab a glass of water, he found a note on the kitchen table. Boston numbers, it said up top, in Andy’s ever so neat cursive, always a stark contrast to Eddie’s own chicken scrawl writing. There, written out in glitter pen, were Andy’s new address and phone number. 

Eddie tore the note up and threw it in the trash. 

That night, he tossed and turned in his bed for hours, guilt eating a hole in his stomach, until he finally got up so he could go fish the note out of the trash and tape it back together. 

When he got there, the trash can was empty. So was their garbage cart. A quick look at the schedule hanging in their kitchen revealed that today had been pick-up day.

The note was gone. 

So Eddie walked back to his room, laid in his bed and stared at the ceiling until his alarm rang out. 

Twenty years later, with his eyes set on a different, albeit similarly depressing ceiling, Eddie understands why he felt the way he did back then. Understands that Andy wasn’t just his first best friend, but also his first love. That he may have a history conflating the two. 

He has no idea if Andy had felt similarly – they’d never talked again. They hadn’t really had any other friends, so no one else in his class knew where Andy had moved. Their parents hadn’t been close either, and with Andy’s dad shutting himself off from everyone following the death of his wife, his parents couldn’t tell him whereto in Massachusetts Andy and his dad were moving. 

Eddie kind of wishes he could talk to Andy one last time. Apologize. Maybe even explain. 

He finds himself opening the site on his phone as if on autopilot. It loads for a moment, then there’s the pink map and a moment later it’s overtaken by black little markers. 

It takes Eddie a good while to navigate his way to the lake he and Andy used to bathe in. When he does, he just sort of stares at it for a good minute. There’s no marker there yet, he notes with a bit of disappointment. Not that he really expected there to be. 

It all seems a little bit stupid anyway. Writing something that likely no one else will ever read. Over half a million posts, it said on Wikipedia. Probably more than that by now. 

Then again –  Eddie’s index finger ghosts over the plus sign at the top right corner of the screen – what’s one more?

The whole writing-process comes a lot easier to him than he thought it would. Maybe it’s the sleep deprivation, maybe it’s his fucked up emotional state, who knows, but about a minute later he’s got a post all written out, finger hovering over the send button as he reads it back. 

We used to swim here every summer growing up and I always wished that things would stay like that forever. I didn’t know what that meant back then. I’m sorry for snapping at you when you told me you were going back to the East Coast. I’m sorry I didn’t say goodbye. I regretted it that same day. I think I just didn’t want to live a life without you. I’m sorry I threw your note away. I promise I tried to find it again. Find you again. I’m sorry I failed.

Eddie’s crying, he realizes, as he hits send. He turns off his phone and puts it back on his nightstand. Closes his eyes and tries to visualize Andy’s face. His freckles. His lopsided grin. The slight gap in his teeth that he could whistle through. Wonders if he still does that. 

Four hours later, the sound of his alarm going off rouses Eddie from the most restful sleep he’s had in a long time. 

Chapter Text

Surprisingly, they don’t actually get any head’s up that Gerrard is out –  they just come to work one day and are greeted by Captain Ramirez, who then goes on to give them the happy news. 

There’s whooping and cheering and an immediate discussion about what might have been the straw that broke the camel’s back. Ravi, Hen, and Chimney compare the number and severity of incident reports they’ve filed like they’re trading pokemon cards until Hen has to step out to take a call. When she comes back in, there’s a blinding smile on her face and tears in her eyes. 

“Karen just called,” she says, voice wavering with emotion, “she said Mara can come home.”

Eddie takes part in the ensuing group hug, pats Hen on the back and stays long enough to hear half of an explanation for what’s going on – something about a corrupt councilwoman getting found out and the ensuing ripple effects – and then he has to go get some air because Hen really doesn’t need him to rain on her parade right now.

Conflicting feelings , at it again, because he’s happy for Hen and Karen, God he is, but he just can’t bear listening to someone else’s kid coming home right now. It’s selfish of him, he knows. He should be in there, celebrating with the others, but he’s not sure he could manage a convincing poker face. And it’s stupid, so fucking stupid, because Mara never chose to leave, Hen and Karen didn’t fuck up in the worst fucking way possible, and they’re all so happy to be together again and how pathetic is he to feel hurt by something like that?

He's up on the roof, staring out into the distance, thinking of nothing in particular, when he hears footsteps behind him. He doesn't have to turn to know who it is; Eddie knows the rhythm of that gait, the space between those steps, as though it's the beat of his own heart. 

He doesn't look over when Buck settles next to him. They stand there for a moment, saying nothing, and Eddie tries to focus on the soft sound of Buck’s breathing. Wonders if he could hear Buck’s heartbeat as well if he just had enough time to learn how to filter out the noise around them. 

It takes Buck a good five minutes to break the silence. 

“He'll come back,” he says.

Eddie says nothing. Rationally speaking, he knows Buck is right. Irrationally speaking, he's just waiting for Chris to send a message telling Eddie not to bother at all. 

He had, of course, talked to Frank about these thoughts, and Frank had repeatedly reassured him that parents and their teenage children always face issues, that Eddie had not broken things beyond fixing. That, in time, he and Chris would find back to another. 

Eddie has to remind himself of this everyday, repeat it like a prayer every night before he goes to sleep and every morning right after he wakes up. 

“He wants to be home before school starts,” Buck continues.

Right again; Chris had said so while the three of them were facetiming last week. Eddie had done his best to keep it together until the call ended. Then he'd sobbed into Buck's shirt for two hours straight. 

“He loves you,” Buck says then, and Eddie doesn’t know if it’s worse if he’s right or not. 

If Chris still loves him, the stakes for Eddie not fucking up again are even higher. If Chris doesn’t…  Eddie can’t say what that would mean for him. Partly because it’s such an abhorrent scenario, he doesn’t have the words to describe it. Partly because his therapists don’t like it when he talks about falling asleep and never waking up again, and he’s been doing so well at cutting back on those kinds of thoughts. 

It’s just. 

Eddie wants him back. So fucking much. But if he fucks this up again… yeah, there might be no getting back from that for him. 

Out of the corner of his eye, Eddie can see Buck turning towards him. He can’t quite bring himself to meet Buck’s eyes when the other man puts a hand on his shoulder and squeezes.

“He’ll come back,” he says again, because he knows Eddie has to be told over and over again so that it’ll maybe really sink in one day. 

“What if he shouldn’t?”

It’s nothing but a whisper; Buck frowns anyway. 

“What do you mean?”

“What if I just hurt him again? What if it’s better for him to stay there?”

“Hey, no, stop right there, you are an amazing dad. The best place for him to be is with you.”

Hearing Buck say it is nice, but still, Eddie can’t help the doubt creeping in. It’s what his parents keep telling him: it’s not the right environment, not the right time. What if Eddie’s still not stable enough? What if he never is? 

What if it’s healthier for Chris if Eddie loves him from afar?

Sometimes Eddie wonders if, for him, the same rules should apply to people as to the roses in his mother’s garden. You see, Eddie has always loved those roses more than is good for him. 

Once, when he was five, he was so enamored with the blossoms, he cut off all the ones he could reach so that he could keep them in his room forever. He had the sense to hide them underneath the loose floorboard in his room, even managed to act convincingly innocent enough to fool his furious mother, who couldn’t make sense of what had happened.

The ruse didn’t last very long; his mom found out about it the next day, when Eddie came to her with an armful of wilting roses, crying at her to fix whatever was wrong. 

Because that’s the thing with roses: they die when you try to keep them for yourself. They need water, and nutrients, and air, and if you can’t give them that, you shouldn’t take them. At least that’s what his mother had told him while she scolded him. 

He can look at the roses; he can appreciate them and love them from a distance. But he can’t ever keep them because they aren’t his to have, no matter how much he wants them. 

“Eddie? H-hey, come on, talk to me.”

Eddie can’t help yielding to the concerned tone in Buck’s voice. He finally turns to look him straight in the eyes, despite knowing his own must be glassy with unshed tears by now. 

“I’m scared,” Eddie admits. “Scared I’ll fuck up again.”

In some paradoxical way, the tenderness of Buck’s expression at his words hits Eddie harder than anything else could have – he feels fractured, almost, fissures spreading through his body from where Buck’s thumb is digging into his clavicle. If Buck let go now, Eddie might just fall apart completely. 

Buck doesn’t let go.

“You told me once that it doesn’t matter how often you fail, but how often you try again,” he says, instead. “So, yeah, you’re going to fuck up again. I mean, probably not in this caliber. All this stuff with Kim? Don’t get me wrong, that was messed up, but that was also kind of a one-time scenario. You ran into the spitting image of your dead wife, of course you went a little crazy. But the important thing is that you always keep trying.”

Eddie says nothing. Probably still looks pretty unconvinced, if Buck’s expression is anything to go by. 

“Eddie, I-I’m serious. These past few weeks you’ve been doing so much better.” 

If he wasn’t still threatening to come apart at the edges and split into feather-edged fragments of himself, Eddie might’ve let out a bit of a defeated laugh at that. But a laugh turns into a sob way too easily, so he measures himself and carefully monitors every sound that leaves his lips.

“I was doing better before. Still managed to end up here.”

Buck’s mouth ticks up the slightest bit. “Yeah, uh, my therapist calls that a relapse and she’s pretty insistent that it’s par for the course.”

Eddie rolls his eyes at him. Can’t help a little smile of his own. It’s brittle, but it’s there. 

“Listen, Eddie, the fact that you’re this scared? That means you care. When I was Chris’ age, I would have died for a father that cared this much. That kid is so lucky to have you. You’re on the right path – you’re talking to him about this. I mean I-I can’t tell you what exactly he said to me about it, but that stuff you told him about how much you were still struggling with the memory of her? He didn’t know that and, I, uh, I think that it meant a lot to him to hear it from you.”

God, that had been some fucked up video-call. Lots of tears involved. It had taken Eddie a good couple weeks to work up the courage to mention Shannon at all, and then forcing his way through a full conversation about her with Chris? After what happened with Kim? Excruciating. 

But Buck is right; ever since they talked about her, things have been better. Chris hasn’t forgiven him, of course, but he seems to be a bit more… understanding, maybe. In hindsight, it’s crazy how little they’ve spoken about her since her death. Not that they haven’t at all, just that whenever they did, it was mostly through little remarks, like ‘ Your mom would’ve loved this’ or ‘I wish mom was here to see this’ . Even when they visited her grave, they talked to , not about her. 

If Eddie wants to be a good father, he has to be ready to have those uncomfortable conversations. Be honest with his son about what’s going on in his own head. That honesty extends from a past Chris doesn’t remember, to a future Eddie so desperately wants him to be a part of. It means letting Chris in and telling him what kind of life Eddie’s had, and what kind he’s going to lead. 

He’s been mulling over the thought of telling Chris for a while now; maybe it’s time he finally did it. 

After all, the word no longer feels all that alien on his tongue. The first couple times he’d tried it out, lying in his bed and just silently mouthing it over and over, it had felt like hopeless first attempts at some foreign language. It had taken him another couple weeks from being able to speak it in the privacy of his bedroom, the curtains drawn and his voice just above a whisper, to looking at himself in the mirror and just stating it as fact. 

But now? He can’t just state it as fact – he feels it as one too.

Eddie is gay. 

He just is.

So he might as well tell his son about it. 

“Thank you, Buck,” he says because, really, he can’t say it enough these days. 

Buck’s smile is like the sunrise on the 22nd of December – a promise that the night doesn’t last forever. That as long as Eddie lives, the light will return, no matter how long he’s been sitting in the dark. That the sun will always be there, even if he can’t see it. 

When the bell rings seconds later, Eddie feels whole. 

*

Two days later,  at their usual badge and ladder joint, Bobby announces that he's coming back to the 118. Immediately, the mood in their booth turns from already upbeat to absolutely ecstatic. Bobby repeatedly reminds them that it’ll take another two weeks for the change to go through, but it does nothing to dampen their high spirits. Someone orders a round of shots and before Eddie knows it, he's gone from slightly buzzed to definitely a little drunk and is basking in the agonizingly delightful heat of Buck's arm on his shoulder. 

Their collective conversation has long since split into two separate discussions, one about the ocean and marine life, and another that Eddie hasn't really paid any attention to in the past hour, even though, content-wise, he'd probably consider it far more interesting. The last time Eddie checked at least, there was some talk going on about baseball, which, to Eddie, does rank above carpet sharks in terms of interest (however strange they may supposedly look), but, crucially, Buck isn’t talking about baseball right now (he is, instead, excitedly showing everyone a picture of an admittedly funny-looking shark) and why should Eddie listen to anyone but Buck?

Eddie loves listening to Buck talk. Eddie wants a radio station that’s just Buck talking. And Buck laughing. And Buck smiling. And Buck driving him around. Okay, so maybe Eddie just wants Buck in his car with him at all times, but sue him, who wouldn’t?

Really, Eddie wants Buck everywhere, all the time.

Eddie would like a little Buck that he could put into his ear like an airpod. A constant stream of facts and jokes to accompany him wherever he goes. Or a little Buck-metronome so that he could carry Buck's heartbeat with him always. Or a Buck-blanket to fall asleep with, Eddie thinks, relishing in the warmth pressed against his side and the weight of Buck's arm on his shoulders. 

It is only once Eddie considers a Buck-cologne that he realizes that for the past ten minutes he's been basically smooshing his face into Buck's armpit. Oops.

He sits up a little too abruptly, prompting Buck and Karen, currently immersed in a debate about what’s scarier, outer space or the deep sea ( “There’s basically nothing out there, Buck.” “Yeah, that’s what makes it so much worse!” ) to turn their heads to him. 

“You okay?” asks the former, worry lines forming on his forehead that Eddie wants to trace with his fingers, maybe smooth out in the process. 

“Yeah, just nodded off there for a second,” says Eddie, dragging a hand over his face, partly for emphasis, partly so he doesn’t lose what little control he has left and reaches out.  

“After what? Three beers and a shot? Look who’s getting old,” snorts Karen.

Eddie considers trying to defend his honor, but currently he can only think of two avenues he could take here, either a) correct Karen because it’s been at least three shots already and that has to count for something, or b) admit that it isn’t actually alcohol that's getting him sleepy but rather the warm presence of Buck next to him, and neither option appears like it would be particularly successful at averting further embarrassment.

So instead of saying anything, Eddie just shrugs in defeat. 

Buck lights up. “Hey, now that you’re awake again, you can be our tie-breaker! A non-partial third opinion!” 

“Non-partial, sure,” Karen mutters under her breath, earning a snort from Hen and a worried glance from Eddie to Buck, who doesn’t seem to have noticed anything, though. 

“What’s scarier: the bottom of the ocean or the endlessness of outer space?”

“There’s practically nothing there, Buck,” Karen reiterates, “you know what to expect. Meanwhile, in the ocean, you could run into a giant squid or some other monstrosity that we haven’t even discovered yet.”

As Buck makes his case yet again, fueled by passion and apparently more alcohol than Eddie initially suspected ( “Yeah, but, like, humans are animals, not minerals, right? Everything in the ocean is like us. All you have for company in space is, like, rocks. Rocks!” ), Eddie thinks about fear. Karen is right; the bottom of the ocean is scary because there could be fucking anything down there and it’s frankly really creepy that there are things no one knows about still on this planet. But space? Endless loneliness? Something so vast yet so empty it goes right back to being confining? No direction to go in, inescapable, yawning nothingness at all sides? Yeah, there’s a clear winner here. 

“Space,” says Eddie, interrupting Buck, who immediately goes on to raise his arms with a victorious shout as Karen grumbles on about favoritism. 

Before Eddie even has the time to consider how adorable Buck looks right now, a big arm pulls him in and he’s squashed against the man’s side again. Warmth encompasses him and Eddie feels so home he thinks he might implode about it. Buck’s got a tight hold on him, one of his hands curling against Eddie’s chest as he squeezes the everloving hell out of him in what Eddie supposes is a bit of an overenthusiastic victory-hug considering the stakes of the discussion. Not that he’s complaining, exactly, Eddie really, really likes this, even if it’s taking his everything to keep his heart from jack-hammering out of his ribcage. He can keep it together, he’s got this under control .

Then he looks up at the smile on Buck's face, and it's Eddie’s favorite smile of his, the kind that showcases his dimples in the best of ways, the kind that makes Eddie feel all gooey inside and has him promptly excusing himself to the bathroom before he does something stupid like lean in and try to get a taste of said perfect smile.

Bunched up in a stall of the bar's frankly disgusting men's room, Eddie tries to find a way to keep himself from exploding as soon as he returns to their booth. The shots were a big mistake; he feels loose-lipped and dizzy and there are all these incriminating words and sounds trying to claw their way up his trachea into his larynx and swallowing them back down is getting harder by the minute. 

Hysterically, he contemplates just calling an Uber and disappearing into the night, but then everyone would be worried about him and he hates that. Besides, he really wants to stay, will greedily drink up whatever further time and warmth Buck can give him. It’s not that he doesn’t usually get those from Buck; it’s just that it’s so much easier to let himself enjoy them while he’s drunk – there’s less inhibition, less concern for what the others might think of him for being so needy, for letting himself be drawn to Buck like a moth to flame. 

Fuck, Eddie’s gonna go fucking crazy because Buck is so much more potent, more addictive than the tequila he’s had tonight, and Eddie doesn’t even have him, only gets the slightest touch of him. There’s gotta be some aphrodisiac in that man’s cologne, thinks Eddie, stupidly, because Buck doesn’t even use cologne, and Eddie should really stop himself from spiraling about how good that man smells. 

He gives himself a little slap to the face. Giggles. Yeah, that was definitely one shot too many. 

Okay. Game-plan time. If he can’t leave, he needs an outlet, a valve he can open to let some of the pressure out. Eddie kind of just wants to scream for a moment, but that might not be the most stealthy approach. Punching something is out of the question because he doesn’t do that anymore and he also under no circumstances wants to touch the rancid stall dividers with his bare skin. No running, no punching, no screaming, damn, he’s all out of his usual options. 

He checks his watch. Shit. He’s got like, three minutes tops before Buck is gonna get worried. Eddie can’t take a fussy Buck right now. That might literally kill him. 

Fuck. Eddie just– he needs to get these damn words out. Regain some space to breathe in his chest, so that he doesn’t exhale an I love you into Buck’s ear. 

Yeah, okay, he’s got no other choice.

He opens his Notes app first, probably out of some fucked up sense of embarrassment at the possibility of random people reading about him pitifully yearning after his best friend, but then he remembers that Buck knows the passcode to his phone and okay, fuck it, who fucking cares anyway. 

He pulls up the map on his phone, waits more or less patiently as it loads, and then triangulates the bar they’re in at what may very well be an award-winning speed. A glance at his phone’s clock reveals that thanks to the shoddy internet connection in this restroom, Eddie’s got a maximum of two minutes before he needs to get back, so he better make them count. 

You are so pretty , he types, just letting his thoughts flow as freely as he can, it hurts to look at you sometimes. It's like staring at the sun. Still, I never wanna stop. I’d look at you until my eyes gave out. I'll always want more of you. Your face, your mind, your voice. I think if you started to talk now and didn't stop until I was dead, it wouldn't have been enough. 

A tad dramatic maybe, but there’s only one minute left on his imaginary Buck-timer so he doesn’t have time to edit. He hits post and, man , it’s like he suddenly gained a pair of second lungs or something with how much easier it is to breathe. He feels like a kettle someone took the lid off to let the hot air escape – shrill ringing in his ears and boiling pressure in his chest now replaced by a warm, contented blubbering. Eddie finally gets out of that fucking stall, washes his hands, and walks out of the men’s room with a renewed spring in his step. 

When he scoots back into their booth and settles next to Buck again, he allows himself a moment to look at him and take in how beautiful, how gorgeous the man next to him really is, before collapsing into his side, pretending to be a little more tired than he actually is, so that he'll be close enough to feel the vibrations of Bucks voice reverberating in his body as he goes off about some weird type of deep sea algae. 

*

Eddie comes out to Chris on a Tuesday. They’re doing one of their bi-weekly video calls, when he says, “Hey Chris? I, uh, need to tell you something. And it’s okay if it changes things for you and about your plans to come back before school starts. I just… you have a right to know about it before you come back. And in general, also.”

Chris looks a bit concerned, Eddie thinks, but he says “Sure,” so Eddie takes a deep breath and tries his best to smile. 

This is the right decision and the best chance he's going to get, he reminds himself. He’d discussed how to broach the topic with Chris in his and Esther’s fifth session just a couple days ago, and today is one of the rare days where it’s just Chris and Eddie on the phone because Buck couldn't in good conscience pass up on another date invite by Tommy considering their schedules align once every blue moon. (Eddie does not feel smug about being chosen over Tommy nine times out of ten. Nuh uh. No way.)

So, anyway, today’s the day. He can do this.

“Well, I’ve been going to therapy,” Eddie says.

“I know that,” Christopher interjects, a hint of playfulness in his annoyance that makes Eddie laugh and loosens his nerves a little bit.

“Yeah, yeah, I know that you know that. What I meant is that I’ve been going to extra therapy with a different therapist that Frank recommended to me. For, uh, different issues.”

“ Okay ,” Chris says, drawing out the y a little bit. 

“And together, Esther – she’s, uh, my new therapist – and Frank have helped me, ah, figure out why I’ve always had so much… trouble dating.” 

Eddie’s getting a little jittery again. Chris looks intrigued now, all feigned annoyance gone from his face. 

Okay, steady breaths. He can do this. 

“The thing is…” Eddie starts and promptly has to look away from the screen for a moment, blink some tears out of his eyes, take a shuddering breath in. Out. Then he turns back, smiles. He can do this. 

“The thing is, I think I’ve always been trying to force a connection where for me, there just wasn’t one. I… I was always hoping for the love to just come to me if I stuck around long enough. That if I found a woman that was perfect on paper and just waited long enough, then, eventually, I’d feel that spark and be happy with her. I only just realized that that’s not really how you’re supposed to feel about the person you’re with.

“And I think it took me so long to understand that because that’s the way I’ve felt about relationships my entire life. Esther, she, uh, helped me unpack that. She helped me see that I did love all of my girlfriends and I did love your mom, I loved her so much, I just… I wasn’t in love with them. Because I couldn’t be. Because… because I’m gay.”

Christopher looks at him for a moment. Blinks. Eddie breathes in. Braces for impact. 

“Okay,” says Chris. 

Relief blossoms in Eddie's chest.  He exhales shakily. Feels a tentative smile stretching across his face. “Yeah?” he asks.

“I’m not homophobic, dad,” Chris grumbles then and Eddie lets out a sound mixed between a laugh and a sob and fights to regain a bit of control over his tear ducts. 

“It’s okay if it’s different because I’m your dad, though,” he says after a few moments of heavy duty blinking to stop himself from bawling like a little baby, “I’d get that. I promise.”

“I’m… going to need some time to think about everything,” Chris concedes. 

Eddie nods, reverently. They’ve got all the time in the world.

“And I’m still mad,” Chris adds.

“Yeah, of course,” Eddie reassures him,” I didn’t expect this to just, uh, fix everything and it certainly doesn’t justify my behavior. I just… you deserved to know. I didn’t want to just drop it on you once you come back. And if you have any questions about it, feel free to ask, okay?”

“I will,” says Chris, and then, “did you know that abuelo knows the lyrics to, like, every Celia Cruz song? He always sings along when he thinks no one is listening.”

And Eddie bursts out laughing and knows they’ll be okay. 

*

With the Grant-Nash home burnt down and Bobby and Athena's rental lacking space, their usual barbeques with the team and their families have mostly been initiated by either Hen and Karen or Chim and Maddie offering to host. It's honestly been kind of a nice change of pace – not that Bobby's cooking isn't great (Eddie still devours anything and everything Bobby brings to the buffet), but they’ve been treated to such a wide breadth of delicious dishes in the past few weeks, it would feel blasphemous not to acknowledge it. 

Now that Gerrard's finally gone, Mara is with the Wilsons again and Bobby's coming back, they’re all due for a party. They’ve actually got the perfect date coming up: miraculously, everyone is off shift this weekend. Finding a place is proving more difficult than expected, though. 

Originally, the Hans had planned to invite everybody, but when Chim comes in late on Wednesday, complaining about insurance hotlines and burst pipes while switching out of wet clothes, it’s pretty obvious that that plan just fell through. There’s no major damage to their house, thankfully, but they’ll have to stay at the Lees’ for a couple of days while the issue is fixed. 

They all briefly discuss alternatives over breakfast, but more or less come up blank. The Wilsons are still occupied with the custody situation of Mara, Bobby and Athena’s rental hasn’t spontaneously gained a garden, and it would in fact be illegal for Ravi to temporarily evict someone just to throw a party at their place. 

At some point Ravi had asked whether they couldn't just host it at Eddie’s. “Do you want us to end up with food poisoning?” had been Chim's response, to agreeing nods and mutters of the rest of the team, and then no one had bothered to ask again. Eddie’s got a hunch, of course, that it isn’t actually the food they’re mainly concerned about – he is an actually okay cook at this point, thank you very much – no, he’s pretty damn sure they’re trying to tread lightly around him because of Chris. Buck must’ve asked them to; Eddie hasn’t really told anyone but him and his therapists about the entire situation. 

It’s nice, though, not having to explain that he doesn’t want to host because he’d feel so damn pathetic for being alone in his house and standing in the kitchen, cooking up loads of (despite all his improvement still pretty mediocre) food entirely on his own, with no one there to critique his choice of recipes or tell him about some video game he understands nothing about or laugh at him when he inevitably burns something. 

In any case, by the time the bell goes off and they move out for the first emergency of the shift, it’s pretty clear that their celebratory team get-together will have to be postponed until further notice because nobody has both enough room and time to spare. 

The thing is, Eddie knows that ever since they’ve pivoted from a fixed location to a more lax hosting system, Buck’s been aching to get to invite everyone himself. It should be obvious to anyone who knows him; Buck loves to cook and he loves to provide and even more than cooking and providing he loves planning an event to perfection. 

During their discussion today he'd been uncharacteristically quiet, hovering at the edges and looking like he was biting his tongue whenever the topic came up afterward, most likely in an attempt to keep himself from offering something he can’t actually supply – Eddie knows that because Eddie knows Buck like the back of his hand, knows he wants so badly to be useful to the people he loves, knows he needs to find a solution to everyone’s problems all the time even if it isn’t possible. Eddie knows Buck’s gloom mood is less caused by disappointment at things not working out, and more disappointment at himself for not being able to make it work. 

Point is: Buck would love to host one of these barbeques. 

Obviously he can’t do it at the loft for lack of space, but, well. Buck’s got a boyfriend. A boyfriend who has also been enjoying the Wilsons’ and the Hans’ hospitality for the past two months. And Eddie’s been to Tommy’s place – it’s not the biggest, but with the garden, it’s definitely big enough. 

Of course, this would certainly be a capital S Step for Buck and Tommy, that step pointing in a direction that Eddie, had he a say in the matter, would prefer Buck not to go in. But Buck’s needs rank firmly above Eddie's wants in terms of importance, so ten hours into their twentyfour, Eddie decides to bite the bullet.

“Why don’t you host?” Eddie asks after slumping down on the couch next to Buck who’s currently staring into his phone, probably on his way down another Wikipedia rabbit hole.

Buck’s eyebrows scrunch together as he looks up at Eddie. “There aren't even enough chairs for everyone at the loft.” 

“Did I say you should host it at the loft?” Eddie says, raising an eyebrow and earning a bemused look from Buck that he doesn’t quite buy in return. 

“Unless you suggest I find a new place in two days, I don’t exactly have anything else to offer,” Buck answers with an air of levity that comes off as just the slightest bit forced. Most people who know him would be able to tell that there’s something bothering him; Eddie alone is able to discern that it’s something further than just his disappointment in the unsuitability of his own apartment. He’s got a feeling it might have to do something with the same topic he wants to steer the conversation to. 

“Well, as far as I’ve been informed, you do have a boyfriend,” he says and watches Buck deflate the tiniest bit. 

Jackpot. Or, well, not Jackpot because Eddie doesn’t ever want Buck to feel bad. Anyway. Time to prod a little bit further and figure out what the root of the problem is. 

“I’ve been to Tommy’s, you know. Big garden.” He gives Buck a meaningful look. 

Buck’s shoulders slump and he drops his phone in his lap as he lets himself sink further into the cushions. 

“Yeah,” he sighs, staring up at the ceiling, “I know. I thought about asking him, but when we were at Hen and Karen’s last month he mentioned he couldn’t imagine having this many people at his house.”

And you didn’t break up with him right then and there? Is something Eddie would say, if he had just slightly less control over his impulses. 

“I think he doesn’t really like people just waltzing into his space like that?” continues Buck, meeting Eddie’s eyes again. “And having to plan it all in two days doesn’t make it easier. I mean, I think I could figure it out, and I’d love to do it, but I don’t want to push him, you know?”

“Host it at mine, then,” says Eddie. It slips out just like that because, in the end, it really is that simple; to Eddie at least. 

“I– what?”

Eddie doesn’t even think about backtracking his offer. 

“Host it at mine.”

Buck looks – not necessarily opposed to the idea, just kind of perplexed, a little bit stirred maybe. 

“I– Eddie. It’s– that’s– it’s not my place–” he stutters, “it’s your house, I–”

“ Buck ,” Eddie interrupts him, “you know my kitchen better than I do. Half the appliances are ones you picked out. You’ve got a key. You’re not a guest. Haven’t been for a damn long time.”

Buck looks at Eddie like he just handed him something infinitely fragile, a baby chick maybe, or a kitten, or perhaps he can read minds and knows it’s Eddie’s heart, the same one he already keeps on the keyring in his pocket. There is such beauty in the awestruck expression on his face, from the tilt of his eyebrows to the slight quiver of his lips, Eddie wants to dissolve in it.

“Are you sure it’s okay? Because I– I get if you don’t actually want to do it without Chris there and that’s completely valid.” God, even with the option of the one thing he’s so obviously aching to do right in front of him, Buck still tries to put Eddie’s well-being first. He can’t fucking deal with this. What is he even supposed to say? That anything is okay with Eddie if Buck asks? Fuck. 

“Well, it wouldn’t really be me doing it, right?” Eddie tries. “You’re hosting. Probably shouldn’t let me near the kitchen or Chim won’t touch the food.” It’s supposed to be a joke (of course Eddie will help, if just to get to look at Buck in his kitchen some more), but he must’ve delivered it so deadpan that Buck, in his never-ending quest to make things as comfortable for Eddie as possible, just takes it at face value.

“Of course,” he says, nodding fervently, “Tommy and I will take care of all the food and stuff, you can just sit back and relax.”

Oh. Right. In the heat of the moment, Eddie had kind of forgotten about Tommy. Buck’s actual boyfriend. Who he actually wants to do this with. 

“Is he going to be okay with this?” Eddie asks and immediately cringes at his phrasing because, honestly, fuck Tommy if he isn’t. 

Buck waves him off. “I’ll tell him you offered up your place, but none of us wanted to eat your food so I volunteered to cook. He won’t question it.” 

“Hey! I’m not that bad!” 

Buck grins at his mock-offense. “Oh yeah? Tell that to last week’s attempt at risotto.”

At that, Eddie play-shoves Buck off the couch because he can hardly explain to him that he only forgot to stir the damn thing because he was busy staring at Buck’s ass in his new, sinfully short work-out pants. If Buck didn’t want him to ruin both the pot and dinner, he shouldn’t have been leaning on Eddie’s counters like that. 

Laughing, Buck capitalizes on the second that Eddie is distracted by the memory of just how tightly the nylon hugged his behind to pull him down onto the ground with him. Eddie yelps, tumbling over and landing directly on top of Buck, face-planting into the other man’s chest. 

Something flutters in Eddie’s heart, and he allows himself a moment of I want to stay here forever before it turns into I hope we fuse together and are never alone again and he has to forcibly create a bit of distance between his face and Buck’s pecs. He props himself up with his right, his head now hovering about a foot above Buck’s. 

Eddie is not prepared for the sight beneath him. 

Buck’s cheeks are slightly flushed and his mouth is open in what might’ve been quiet laughter once, but is decidedly more ambiguous now. His eyes, wide with surprise, but teasing still, have an added shine of curiosity to them, and his arms are slack with surrender as he stares up at Eddie. Their legs are tangled still, and Eddie wonders just how easy it would be to pin Buck’s hands above his head and straddle him properly. 

For a split second they stare at each other, then Eddie breaks out of his stupor and tries his best at looking casual while he scrambles up as fast as he can before this gets really embarrassing for him. 

“You better get to planning,” he says as he straightens (ha!) his uniform, “you’ve only got two days left,” because Eddie knows nothing gets Buck distracted quicker than the prospect of an imminent deadline and responsibility, and he desperately needs Buck distracted from whatever the hell that just was before he starts asking questions. 

Thankfully, Eddie can tell his diversion worked out exactly as intended because Buck is already staring off into space, clearly lost in thought. By the time he’s getting up again, he’s rambling on about getting everyone’s allergy information and drink preferences.

He turns to walk over to Bobby’s office that’s currently manned by Captain Ramirez before stopping in his tracks, a flash of disappointment on his face as, instead of walking any further, he grabs his phone. Eddie doesn’t really get what that’s about, until he sees Buck opening the Notes app and it hits him. 

Ever since a particularly tense altercation over Buck’s style of doing inventory last year, Bobby keeps all station clipboards under lock in a drawer in his office. No one knows which one, and Eddie can guess that Buck doesn’t exactly want to interrupt Captain Ramirez while he’s doing paperwork to ask him whether he can search the drawers for a clipboard to give out for non duty purposes. 

In the interest of harmony, Eddie should be glad that Buck has no clipboard at his disposal right now; even though he’s only at a fraction of his usual power, Notes app Buck is still a menace. But Buck looks genuinely upset about it and he never wants Buck upset, even over little things like this. 

And because Eddie is and always has been a sucker, he walks over to the rickety armchair that no one ever sits in because it’s so lumpy and lifts up the seat cushion to retrieve the singular specimen that survived the great clipboard purge of 2023. 

“Here. If you cause too much trouble I’ll confiscate it again,” he says as he hands it over to Buck, who looks at him as if he’s the second coming of Christ. If Eddie didn’t know better, he’d think Buck’s more moved by this stupid clipboard than anything else Eddie has ever done for him, what with how reverently he accepts it. 

“Go on, the bell could ring any moment,” Eddie tells him because if Buck stands here for a second longer with that cute dumbfounded look on his face, he might do something drastic.

Finally, Buck gets going, though not before giving him a blinding smile that makes his heart skip a beat.

“And don’t tell anyone where you got it,” Eddie tacks on, Buck turning around to reply with an overly enthusiastic mock-salute before he rushes down the stairs. 

This was a mistake, thinks Eddie lamely, but he finds he doesn’t really care all that much.

He saunters over to the edge of the loft and leans on the railing. As Eddie looks down at Buck practically skipping over to Chimney with his clipboard in hand, a smile blossoms on his face that he knows one could probably only describe as besotted. 

I love you, thinks Eddie. I love you, I love you, I love you.  

He’s threatening to spill over again, bleed it out of his mouth, his fingertips, bright red love staining his skin and giving him away, so as he’s watching Buck down in the hangar he gets out his phone and opens the browser. 

We met here for the first time , he types, because the fire station itself is so important, it was only a matter of time until he wrote something about it. I don’t think I could have fathomed back then what you would come to mean to me. I didn't know love like that then. You’ve cared for me more and better than anyone else ever has and ever will. You make my every day brighter by being in it and I wish I could spend the rest of my life making you happy. 

He posts the entry just in time to catch Buck breaking off in a sprint to get away from Hen, clipboard raised high above his head as he flees. Chimney, who just noticed Eddie’s staring and must’ve put two and two together, shoots him a death glare. Eddie waves back, grinning from ear to ear as he returns to watching Hen chase Buck across the hangar. 

*

If you’d asked Eddie two and a half months ago what he thinks of Tommy Kinard, he’d have told you that Tommy’s an awesome guy who’s great to hang with. 

Two-and-a-half-months-ago-Eddie, present day Eddie decides, is an idiot. 

It’s not that Tommy’s an asshole or anything, it’s just, how can he be dating Buck and not know that when he tells you to ‘show up at four’ what he actually means is ‘be here three thirty at the latest’? 

Now, Eddie doesn’t have a problem with having Buck to himself for an extra half hour or so, delights in it actually, even if it means chopping carrots that were Tommy’s to dice (Eddie’d chop vegetables until he drops dead if that meant getting to keep Buck for himself), but he is getting a little pissed at Tommy for just… neglecting Buck like this. 

Anyone with a brain should know that something like this is very important to Buck, and that he’ll try to micromanage every detail and if it kills him. 

“Buck, if you keep pacing you’re going to wear a hole in the floor,” says Eddie for the umpteenth time, at this point not even bothering to look up from the chopping board because they’ve been doing this song and dance for the past ten minutes.

“I know I know, it’s just… he hasn’t even read my texts!”

“I’m sure Tommy’s fine.”

It goes unspoken that that’s the problem – not that Eddie’s wishing harm on the guy, just, an accident or an injury would at least be a proper excuse for being late. 

He glances at his watch. Five past four. Not good. For Tommy, anyway. 

Out of the corner of his eye, Eddie can see movement again.

“Buck.”

A groan. The movement stops. 

“Come on, sit down for a moment.”

“You know I can’t! My planning’s all out of whack now, I need to figure out how it’s going to work without the extra pair of hands!”

Eddie takes the knife, uses it to brush the carrots off the chopping board and into a bowl (dull side down because the first time Buck saw Eddie using the sharp side of a kitchen knife to scrape across a chopping board he almost fainted), then turns to look at Buck, who’s still staring at the phone in his hands as if he could telepathically force it to make Tommy call him.

“Hey,” says Eddie, puts a hand on Buck’s arm and waits until their eyes meet to continue, “we’ll figure it out, okay?”

Buck looks like a mix between a kicked puppy and insanely-pissed-off-but-feeling-very-guilty-about-it.

“You weren’t even supposed to have to help,” he replies.

“Come on Buck, we both knew I wouldn’t just sit around and watch you work,” says Eddie as he moves to check what item is next on the itinerary Buck agonized over for two whole days, “and besides, I’m sure he'll show up eventually.”

Tommy arrives as Eddie’s setting up the garden furniture. He comes out to greet him with a stack of tablecloths pinned underneath his arm and a beer in hand, expression nonplussed. 

“You do not wanna be in there right now,” he tells Eddie as he starts unfolding the cloths and putting them on tables. 

Eddie does his best to act nonchalant, asking “What do you mean?” when he’s pretty damn sure he knows what Tommy’s talking about, is already feeling irritated about it, in fact.

“Evan is… having a bit of a moment. He practically chased me out of the kitchen immediately after I said hello.”

“Well,” replies Eddie, trying to keep his tone as neutral as possible, “you are a bit late.” Seventeen minutes, to be precise. Forty-seven, if you’re measuring in Buck-time.

Tommy sighs. “Yeah, I know. I was working on my car and kind of forgot the time.”

Lousy excuse. Eddie has to bite his tongue to stop himself from asking about how he managed to miss Buck’s texts. Does Tommy not have a special notification sound just for Buck so he always knows it’s him before unlocking his phone? Is his contact not marked as an exception for every do-not-disturb list his phone has to offer? Does he not periodically check for new messages by Buck in case he missed one despite everything?

Because. Well. Eddie does. And he isn’t even Buck’s boyfriend.

“I better go back inside and ask him what else I can do,” Tommy says once he’s got all the table cloths spread out, “don’t wanna be caught slacking.”

Eddie does not tell him that since Buck is very busy in the kitchen right now, he’s probably got a good five minutes before Buck notices, and another six or so before he comes to actively shout at him to do something. This kind of information should be privy to those who've actually made an effort to learn it. 

Halfway to the door, Tommy pauses. “It’s just…” he starts. His face twists a bit. “Is he always like this?”

Like this? Like this? 

“Like what?” asks Eddie, perhaps coming off a little bit too defensive, if Tommy's expression is anything to go by.

“Just, like… I dunno,”– Tommy gestures broadly from the meticulously planned-out seating arrangement Eddie’s setting up to the house in which Buck, like a man possessed, is currently cooking up a feast that could feed an army –“ this .”

“Part of the charm,” says Eddie, shrugging to try and hide the fact he’s fuming inside. 

Tommy gives him a funny look.

“I guess,” he says. Doesn’t really sound convinced.

Oh, Eddie would love to hash this out right here and now. Give Tommy a piece of his damn mind. But, you know, Eddie actually cares about Buck and doesn’t want to ruin this for him by creating awkward tension that’ll last the entire evening.

So instead of doing anything, he just watches Tommy step inside and close the door behind him. 

Like this . Jesus Christ. As though Buck was something to put up with. 

As though his enthusiasm and care were something to belittle.

Eddie’s fingers are twitching. Looking for an outlet. 

His phone is in his hand before he knows it. 

Then he’s looking at his house on that damn pink map. He hesitates. 

Isn’t this the one thing he didn’t want? Have his entries connected to his actual home?

But. Well. Eddie is pissed. And, realistically speaking, what’s gonna happen? He’ll just put the marker on the street in front of his house. A little bit of plausible deniability. It’s not like he’s posting his fucking social security number, anyway.

I could love you better than him, he types. He doesn’t know you like I do. You deserve everything in the world and he is an idiot for not seeing that. 

He wants to write more, really air out his grievances, but a look at the time shows him it’s almost four thirty and he doesn’t want to leave Buck hanging. 

Eddie sends off the post as is, carries the last chair into position, and makes his way back inside to go deal with Buck’s imminent freak-out at realizing that their guests will be arriving in an hour, since he’s pretty sure Tommy can't be trusted with that task. 

The actual barbeque, despite Buck’s initial worrying, ends up going great, of course.

Everyone’s in a stellar mood anyway, now that things are back to how they’re supposed to be, with Gerrard gone, Bobby at the 118 and Mara with the Wilsons. The food is, as expected, amazing, and Buck is, deservedly, showered in compliments for his cooking.

Eddie’s having a pretty good time himself, even if he’s spending most of it trying not to look at the once again reconciled Buck and Tommy. 

He’s standing at the buffet, feigning interest in the pasta salad Maddie brought so he doesn’t have to watch the two of them softly swaying to the music playing on Buck’s bluetooth speaker, when Karen appears at his side.

She’s got a wine glass in hand and a mischievous glint to her eye. Eddie only decides against running because his only path away from Karen is one toward Buck and Tommy.

“Sooo…” she starts, a slight smile painting her lips, “I was just informed that Mr Boyfriend over there”– she nods toward Tommy; Eddie, pointedly, does not look –“actually has a house with a garden and everything.”

“Yeah,” says Eddie, eyes once again transfixed on the pasta salad.

“Enough space for a good fifteen, twenty people,” she continues. 

“Probably.” The garden’s actually a bit bigger than Eddie’s. A whole lot uglier though. Mostly dry grass and the occasional shrub. Nothing to write home about. 

“Well, you know that did get me wondering… why Buck is hosting at your house and not Tommy’s?”

Eddie shrugs, but he can’t help feeling a little smug about it.

“He said Tommy doesn’t like that many people at his place.”

“ Oh ,” says Karen, voice tilting slightly up, one eyebrow raised. “Does he not know that Buck here is definitely planning on hosting something like this again?”

“I think he’s starting to figure it out,” says Eddie, tone a smidgen more spiteful than he intended.

Karen snorts. “He better.”

Eddie just sort of nods because, yeah, Buck deserves a partner that understands and cares for him, but there’s a selfish part of him that's kind of hoping Tommy never does and Eddie will get to keep Buck in his house forever. 

He should really learn to let go of that thought, though, because even if this thing with Tommy doesn't work out, one day there’ll be a boyfriend or girlfriend that finally treats Buck right. It's one of those inevitable things – there’s death, taxes, and the eventual forever-partner for Buck. There's no escaping it; after all, there’s 3.8 million people in LA and Buck is just so damn lovable (Eddie should know), he’s bound to run into someone who actually sees and values him for who he is eventually. 

They just stand there for a moment then and say nothing, Karen sipping her wine and Eddie now studiously examining Bobby’s coleslaw as he ignores the looks she keeps giving him. Minutes pass, and listen, Eddie’s not an idiot, he knows Karen is waiting for him to say something, maybe make a little dig at Tommy, but he keeps his mouth shut because anything he could say would just make his actual feelings on the matter even more obvious than they already are. He's going to play the role of the supportive best friend. Better get some practice in now; he’s going to need it for the rest of his life. 

Eddie ought to be above gossiping anyway – Tommy is no Abby that left Buck behind, or Taylor that is selling out all their secrets for personal gain, isn't even a Natalia that is only interested in Buck’s near death experiences. No, he’s just Tommy, who’s maybe a bit dismissive, but still an okay guy in the grand scheme of things. Eddie already had his outlet in the form of an anonymous little vent post, so he can keep it together and do the right thing, that is to keep his damn mouth shut .

Then, of course, he makes the mistake of stealing another glance at Buck and Tommy on their makeshift dance floor, looking like a picture-perfect couple. Next to him, Karen coos. 

“You know, he was twenty minutes late for preparations because he forgot about the time ,” says Eddie because really, who has ever been hurt by a little bit of gossip, and, if anything, this is less him gossiping and more him providing important context information for the situation at hand. 

“ Oh? ” says Karen, but all Eddie hears is the starting shot to a race he probably shouldn’t be participating in.

“Mhm,” he replies, “Said he was busy working on his car. Didn’t even notice Buck blowing up his phone.”

“Really?” Karen asks, and then, in a blatant fish for information, “And Buck wasn’t bothered by that at all?”

Eddie’s responding laugh is devoid of humor. “Oh he was pissed . You know him, he had a fifty-step plan for how things were supposed to go, and Tommy thoroughly screwed that up. It’s crazy, right? I mean you’d think he’d want to be as involved in the process as possible, just to make up for not offering up his own place.”

“Yeah,” says Karen, “I’d certainly start… thinking about stuff.” Eddie’s too fired up to notice how her tone has shifted.

“And you know what he did when he finally arrived? He asked if Buck was always ‘like this’ . Like it's something bad! I mean, he’s dating the guy, he should like him for who he is, right? Buck is an all-in type of guy! He goes full throttle on everything, that's one of his best qualities! How can he be his boyfriend and not like that about him? It’s like he doesn’t even like him. He certainly isn’t putting any effort into their relationship. When he and I started hanging out, he took me to fucking Vegas. You know where he takes Buck? The movies. The fucking movies. I mean what is this, the eighties? Is he going to teach Buck how to drive a stick shift car next? Fuck, that’d probably be more exciting.”

In an act of masochism, Eddie sets his gaze on the two lovebirds again. Tell me one thing more than this , sings Bryan Ferry as Tommy twirls a laughing Buck to the music. Oh, Eddie could think of plenty. 

“Buck is the kind of guy that wants to try something new every week. He needs something to do, like geo-caching, or rock-climbing, or maybe some kind of elaborate scavenger hunt date, or literally anything other than sitting quietly in one place for two hours. If he really knew Buck, he’d know that he gets twitchy watching a movie if he doesn’t get to make remarks about it all the way through. Like, that should be obvious, right? That’s just how Buck is. He can’t stop talking over what’s happening on screen and then you have to rewind the last five minutes because nobody was paying attention to the plot. That’s what makes watching a movie with him so fun. How does he not get that? I mean, he should get that, right? Right?”

Suddenly Eddie notices that Karen has gone quiet. When he turns to look at her, the expression on her face is hard to read; he can make out intrigue, some concern, pity maybe. 

Shit. He’s said too much.

“You know, if you want to talk about anything…” Karen starts, her voice soft and eyes sincere and it’s too much for him to take right now.

“Yeah, uh, I don’t,” Eddie lies. 

They awkwardly stare at each other for another second, then Karen opens her mouth to say something and Eddie swiftly makes his escape pretending he heard someone call his name.

He cannot deal with this right now. Realistically, he knows that he’s going to have to come out to everyone at some point, and that there will definitely be people who’ll have no problem figuring out what that means in relation to how he is with Buck, but he doesn’t think he’s ready for that quite yet. 

Eddie avoids Karen for the rest of the evening, ducking away whenever their eyes meet by accident. He’s not proud of it, but he doesn’t know what else to do. 

It’s only at the very end, when almost everyone else has left, that she manages to corner him again. Hen, Denny, and Mara are already on their way to the car, when Karen asks to come back inside to pick up a tupperware box she ‘forgot’. Through gritted teeth, Eddie tells her, “Of course,” before leading her into the kitchen. 

Karen doesn’t even say anything at first, just quietly sorts through the pile of plastic containers on the counter. Eddie, meanwhile, can’t stop checking that no one is about to come in, in case she does end up making a comment about their conversation earlier this evening. He’s so preoccupied with it, he almost misses that Karen’s got her box back in her hands. 

When he does notice, he freezes. Takes a deep breath. Meets her gaze. 

She’s looking at him with that same unreadable expression on her face as before. Her head’s slightly tilted, like she’s trying to figure him out. Eddie juts out his chin a bit; he’s waiting for her to make some kind of move. Ask a question he won’t want to answer. Make an assumption that’s far too close to the truth. He’s actively bracing for it, tensing his shoulders and steeling his insides in preparation for the incoming blow. It’s why he’s so stupefied when she just walks past him without a word. 

The entire trek to the front door he’s almost tempted to say something himself because even though he’s relieved that she apparently isn’t interested in squeezing him for information right now, the idea that she could just bring it up again out of nowhere isn’t exactly comforting.

Once they step out onto the porch, though, and Karen hits him with a soft, reassuring smile that communicates a kind of sympathy that is hard to put into words, he knows everything is going to be fine. And when Karen hugs him goodbye a little tighter than usual, he just lets himself relax into her embrace without a second thought.  

“You know,” she says once they part, “that Merlot was really good. I’m sure Hen would love to try it, if you brought some over one of these days.”

“I’ll think about it,” says Eddie, and it’s the truth. 

Leaning against a wall, he watches her get into the car and waves to the Wilsons as they roll out of his driveway. 

After their car rounds the corner, Eddie takes another minute to calm his breathing again. Get his pulse under control. This was fine; maybe good, even. Talking to Karen and Hen about all of this one of these days… that could be nice. He’ll see if he takes them up on the offer. 

Eddie steps back inside, happy to have averted what he thought would have been a bitter end to an otherwise pretty sweet evening, only to be faced with the actual bitter end of said sweet evening.

You see, just before he closes the door behind him, he hears Buck and Tommy’s hushed voices in the kitchen. They’re the only people still left because Tommy’s driving home with Buck so he won’t have to pay for another Uber, and Buck, of course, won’t leave before everyone else has gone. 

Eddie doesn’t exactly mean to eavesdrop on their conversation, but with the three beers and the long overdue rant he’s had tonight, Eddie isn’t exactly master of his own impulses. 

“I think he can handle the rest himself, Evan. Don’t you want to go home?”

There’s no reply – only some subdued clinking sounds which Eddie can’t exactly place until he moves a bit further down the hall, where, thanks to an ajar door, he can peep into the kitchen unnoticed. 

Tommy’s standing off to the side, arms crossed and Buck – Buck’s already elbow deep into the sink. A wave of smugness overtakes Eddie. Buck would rather wash dishes at Eddie’s than go home with Tommy. That’s gotta count for something.

“Evan–” Tommy starts again, but Buck cuts in, water sloshing as he deposits another stack of plates in it with a little too much force.

“I already told you. The leftovers need to be packed up and labeled, two of the tablecloths need to be treated with stain remover and thrown into the wash, and there’s a mountain of dirty dishes still outside. It’ll be quicker if we do it together.”

Of course he’s made a list of everything in his head already. God, Eddie could kiss him. He can’t, of course, but he would. If he could. Whatever. 

Anyway, all of what’s left to do sounds like it could be kind of nice; maybe they can put on some more music, or a podcast, and just unwind while cleaning up. 

Tommy doesn’t seem to agree. 

“You’ve done enough already. I’m sure Eddie will gladly take care of the rest.”

Eddie has to fight the urge to huff. Gladly is a bit of a stretch. He could manage it on his own, sure, but he’d only do it gladly if Buck is involved as well.

Buck drops the sponge he was just holding (a Scrub Mommy because apparently they’re better at cleaning than the Daddy version, which had sounded vaguely sexist to Eddie even though Buck had assured him it isn’t) back into the water so he can raise a gloved hand to press against his temple as he turns to his boyfriend. 

“Tommy, I-I told him we’d be hosting and he wouldn’t have to worry about a thing. What kind of hosts are we to leave him to clean up by himself?”

Of course Buck’s worried he hasn’t done enough. He’s always so fucking considerate. Eddie might cry about it one of these days. 

“This is his house, though, and you’ve had a long day. He’s not going to expect you to stick around.”

Well, expect is a pretty strong word, especially considering Eddie hadn’t really spared a thought for what the eventual clean-up might look like, but he also didn’t expect Buck to leave, either. 

Maybe that’s because in Eddie’s mental image of this house, there’s always some hazy version of Buck hovering at the edges. Not as steady a presence as Eddie would like it to be, but there nonetheless. 

His house, Tommy had said, like it was just Eddie’s . As if it wouldn’t be Buck’s too, if he wanted it to be. It would take nothing more than a confirmation, a single word, really, for this place to swallow him whole, gently close its maw around him and keep him forever.

“It’s not about what he expects, ” Buck starts, and Eddie feels a pulse of vindication in his veins because maybe Buck gets what Tommy just doesn’t, but then Buck breaks off into a lengthy yawn and that’s what it takes for Eddie to come to his senses. 

It forces him to remember that Buck spent his entire afternoon cooking, coordinating, and catastrophizing, before fully throwing himself into the evening itself, where he was first manning the grill, then dancing, and never really sat down for more than five minutes at a time. He must be bone-tired by now. 

God, that’s why Tommy wants to get him home, right? To finally get Buck to rest. 

And what is Eddie doing?

He’s letting these fantasies, these delusions of how he might treat Buck better mess with his head. He’s being greedy again, trying to tie Buck to himself, even though it’s hurting him. 

Eddie has to stop being so fucking selfish and do the right thing. 

He sneaks back to the front door, closes it loud enough to be heard in the kitchen and walks back in. When he sets foot in the kitchen, Buck’s focus is back on the plates in the sink and Tommy’s got a dish towel in hand, acting like he’s been helping out all along. What a jackass. 

“Okay, coast is looking pretty clear now, huh?” Eddie says, hoping the smile he’s putting on reaches his eyes. 

Buck turns to him. “Yeah,” he grins, “just a bit of clean up left.”

He looks so genuinely happy here, elbows deep in the rank dishwater, Eddie is tempted to just let him keep at it and not say another word. But up close, he can see the fatigue in the shadows on Buck’s face, and it’s so late already, and Eddie can’t keep stealing all this time from Buck just because he knows Buck will never tell him no. 

“Good,” he says, arms propped up on his hips and gaze drifting to the piles of dirty dishes on the counter so he doesn’t have to look Buck in the eyes while he lies to him. “I’m pretty sure I can manage that myself. You guys can head out.”

Buck’s face drops. “No, i-it’s– Eddie, of course we’ll help!”

In the corner of his eye, Eddie sees Tommy relax, the beginnings of an I-told-you-so expression forming on his face. 

Fuck that guy, really. 

“Buck,” says Eddie anyway, “you guys can go. I’ll just put the rest of the dishes in the sink and go to sleep.”

“If they aren’t done today all the gunk will dry,” Buck protests. “You hate doing the dishes a day late.”

True. Scraping off all the dried food residue is a sensory nightmare. 

“I’ll rinse them,” Eddie replies, trying to be placating. He really doesn’t need Buck giving him even more reasons to keep him here. 

There’s a tick in Buck’s jaw, a mix of confusion and concern in his eyes as he studies Eddie.

From the side, Tommy pipes up again. “Evan, babe, he said it’s fine.”

Buck sends him an irritated look over his shoulder, wrinkling his nose like he smelled something rank. Still, he starts to peel off the pink rubber gloves he’s wearing, the ones Eddie always orders online because Buck insists they last longer than any of the brands Target carries. 

Tommy accepts it as capitulation. “I’ll go get our stuff,” he says, and then he’s off. 

Before Buck can try to make his case again, Eddie mumbles something about bringing in the tablecloths before slipping out into the garden. He doesn’t know how long his decision to let Buck go would last if he had to defend it to the man himself any longer. 

When he comes back inside a minute later, bundle of fabric in his arms, Buck is still in the damn kitchen. 

Eddie can feel his eyes on him as he unceremoniously drops the cloths on the floor. They all need to be washed anyway. Who cares anymore, right? 

“You can go,” says Eddie, because even without looking up, he knows Buck is still fucking staring at him. 

“Are you sure?” 

Eddie surrenders to the tone in Buck’s voice. Of course he does. His eyes snap up, and then he’s looking at Buck again. Like he always is. 

Buck’s standing in the doorway, dish towel still thrown over his shoulder and a hand on the doorframe like he’s trying to stake a claim on it. Eddie silences the parts of himself that wish he would. 

“Buck,” he says, tone harsher than he means it to be, “leave.”

It’s the wrong thing to say; he knows it the moment the words have left his mouth. Buck flinches slightly, then blinks at him, eyes big and brows furrowed. 

Eddie feels terrible. He can’t tear his gaze from Buck’s expression, tinged with rejection, even though the sight of it makes Eddie’s heart ache in the worst way. He put that expression there; he hurt Buck. He can’t do anything fucking right. And, even worse, behind all the pain and rejection there’s still all this concern haunting Buck’s face, all this worry and devotion Eddie has done nothing to deserve. 

Within just a few seconds of looking at Buck like this, Eddie’s resolve is utterly and completely broken down, jagged edges lovingly worn down by the current in Buck’s ocean eyes, until all that remains is smooth sand. A piece of seaglass, maybe. 

If he asked now, Eddie wouldn’t be able to deny him anything. 

Buck opens his mouth, seems to be searching for words as he hesitantly wets his lips. 

Ask to stay, Eddie thinks, selfishly. 

Ask to stay and I will never let you go. 

Buck breathes in, is gearing up to say something, and Eddie can’t help himself, he wishes, he wants –

“Evan?” 

Tommy’s voice is like a bucket of ice-cold reality dropped over both their heads. Whatever spell they had just found themselves under, it’s broken now. 

“Are you coming?”

Buck’s gaze drops to the floor. His hand lingers on the doorframe for a moment. Then he pulls away.

“Yeah. Coming.”

Their goodbyes are short, and Eddie steps back inside before he can watch the jeep leave his driveway. If it takes him extra effort not to punch the drywall in the hall on his way to the kitchen, that’s between him and God. 

Five minutes later, as he’s sorting through the tablecloths to figure out which of them need extra anti-stain-treatment, he gets a message from Buck.

send me a text when you’re done okay??

He can’t help a little bittersweet smile blossoming on his face. There’s that concern again. Buck’s always so fucking concerned, no matter how much Eddie screws up. 

Will do.

 Sorry for snapping at you earlier.  

dw about it, i should’ve known you’d need space after the house being that full 💙

A blue heart – Buck never sends blue hearts, always opting for either the full on red or one made up of a ‘less than’ sign and a three if he’s feeling quirky. Another thing Eddie’s managed to fuck up. He can’t even try to look out for Buck’s wellbeing without hurting him. How fucking ironic. 

Buck’s wrong, anyway. Or, well, he’s wrong now, he was right, before Eddie lied and told him he wasn’t. 

Eddie doesn’t need space right now. 

With Chris gone, Eddie’s had enough space to last him a lifetime. 

In silence, all alone in this stupid fucking house, Eddie goes to find the stain remover. 

About two hours later, with the dirty tablecloths in the washer, all leftovers safely stored in the fridge, and a mountain of dirty dishes in his kitchen that’ll haunt him tomorrow, Eddie collapses into the last chair still standing in his garden and gets out his phone. 

All finished up. Gonna go sleep now. 

He feels a little bit pathetic. 

Everybody else is back at home with their partners, maybe even their children, and here he is, alone in a house that’s too big for him, texting the guy he’s desperately in love with who just left with his actual boyfriend because Eddie told him to. 

What a fucking joke. 

Eddie waits for a couple minutes, but there’s no answer. Buck’s probably already passed out in his bed. As he should be.

Or… or maybe he’s preoccupied. Tommy went with him after all. Maybe he–they– 

Stop.  

He can’t keep going down that fucking road. 

Buck isn’t his. He needs to learn to accept that. 

Still his head is whirring with all these images, these phantasms and wants, transforming from one into another, fluid and blurred, visions of muscle, skin, and sweat, tinged with jealousy and desire. 

Eddie presses the balls of his hands into his eyes and focuses on the fractals dancing behind his eyelids. 

Sitting in a lone lawn-chair in his yard with his head in his hands, it’ll take him another hour before he actually drags himself to bed.

*

In their sixth session, Esther finally decides to tackle the elephant in the room.

It’s his fault really; he gives her an in. 

“I just kept having this stupid thought that I would treat Buck better. Love the parts of him Tommy doesn’t.” 

He’s just trying to gain insight on how he can stop himself from getting selfish around Buck. Eddie always wants more than Buck already gives him, wants to keep him all for himself, and it only gets worse whenever he comes to believe, just for a moment, that Buck might be better off with him. It’s a stupid thought, and he just wants to learn to control himself when it pops into his head. With how indulgent Esther has been of his desire to keep their discussions focussed on quick, practical fixes for his problems, he really doesn’t expect the curveball she throws him now. 

“Is that why you think Buck would want to be with you if you told him about your feelings?”

“I– what?”

“In an earlier session, you said if you told him, it wouldn't be a choice. Is this why?” She sounds curious, almost. 

“No, it’s– I’m not better than Tommy,” Eddie half-laughs, “the opposite really. Buck, he, he... he just cares so damn much, you know? And he has this habit of kind of making things about himself when they aren't, really. Whenever he sees something broken, he's always looking for ways to fix it, even if it isn't his responsibility to.”

“And you are something broken?”

“No,” says Eddie, mostly out of hope that this answer will get her to drop it. With all the therapy he’s had in the past months, this is still a touchy subject. He and Frank had had extensive discussions on the matter. Clashing opinions at times. Esther knows that; she’s been through their notes. From the way she’s raising her eyebrows at him now, it’s clear she wants a rehash anyway. 

“I know–” He drags a hand over his face. Starts again. Full honesty and all that. “For a while there, I thought being with Shannon had broken me. Because I– I just never had that kind of connection with a woman again. It was like I kept waiting for myself to feel the right things, fall in love, but it just never came. I was in relationships with these great women and I just kept feeling like I wasn’t actually present for any of it. Like I was on the outside looking in, and whenever they said or did something that should have meant something to me, I never reacted out of gut instinct. It was like… like training vocabulary. Or some fucking matching game. In hindsight – before it all, Shannon and I, we were friends, you know? The romance, it was on top of everything, and that made it easier. I already cared about her so much, it seemed like the natural next step. I thought that was what it was supposed to be like. It's– look, I know I'm not broken for not being able to love my exes, okay?”

“But?” 

“But I still hurt them. All of them.”

Esther nods, begins to note something down. “People hurt each other in relationships,” she says, “It isn't good, but it happens.”

Eddie huffs. This isn’t some stupid lover’s quarrel he’s talking about. Esther looks up at him. 

“I mean it, Eddie. These things happen, everyday, everywhere,” she reiterates, sincere but seemingly unfazed. She doesn’t fucking get it. 

“Shannon wanted to go to college, you know? Get a degree. Instead she got a baby, a ring, and an empty house. I chained her to that fucking house and then I ran away.”

“Does that make you broken? Running away?”

“No,” says Eddie, because he was just a kid back then, fresh out of school and terrified. It had taken him a while to understand that, the realization only really settling in once Frank had asked him to imagine Christopher in a similar situation in five years time and Eddie hadn’t been able to get the image out of his head for a whole week. 

Running away hadn't been right, and he'd been a bad husband and a worse father, but he’d also been a kid. 

“And the traumas you’ve suffered in your line of work? Do those make you broken?”

“No,” says Eddie, because apart from a handful of scars and the occasional nightmare, he’s managed to avoid or work his way back from most lasting damage. These days, he can take a helicopter to Vegas, hold his breath underwater, and walk down an open street, all without experiencing an overwhelming sense of doom. Thunderstorms get him twitchy, sure, and just because he can take a stroll through the park even though there’s plenty of vantage points on the roofs of nearby buildings doesn’t mean he likes doing it, but he’s okay . 

In some distant world, universes away (but still yesterday, always yesterday) another version of himself had taken a bat to all he owned. In hopes of what, Eddie could never really say. Control, probably. The end of all things, maybe, or perhaps just a new start; really not much difference between those two. He’s always been explosive that way. It’s never just been one thing bleeding into another for him, no, there’s a snap, the line breaks, he’s in free fall, and then all that was before is gone, and there’s no time to worry or to mourn because he has a job to do, people are depending on him, because he’s a husband, he’s a father, he’s a soldier, he’s a widower, he’s a fucking bomb waiting to go off and the only thing he can do for anyone around him is try to find the timer so he can tell them when to take cover. 

“It isn't just about being broken, is it?” Esther asks then, and Eddie pretends he doesn’t understand.

She clicks her pen. Shuts her notebook. 

“Do you break people?” Esther asks, her gaze on him the weight of forty feet of mud, “By loving them and inviting them to love you in return?” 

Eddie can't meet her eyes.

It’s– 

He’s–

Eddie is eighteen and he wants this moment to last forever. He’s lying in the bed of his dad’s truck, staring up at the night sky. Shannon is next to him, head resting on his shoulder as she tells him about the colleges she sent applications to; she can’t wait to get out of Texas. None of it matters. Minutes ago, they conceived a child that neither of them is ready to have. 

Eddie is nineteen and he just wants to fix what he’s broken. His mother isn’t talking to him. His father keeps telling him he needs to step up. Two days from now, he’ll be sitting in the recruiter’s office and sign away his life to the army. It’s kind of funny – he knows Shannon won’t forgive him for this, but it still hurts him when she never does. 

Eddie is twenty and more than anything he wants to be a good father. With the example Ramon Diaz has set for him, it’s no surprise he fucks it up again and again. 

Eddie is twenty-four and he just wants some damn time. He doesn’t see that Shannon has already given him years of hers. 

Eddie is twenty-six and, fuck, he wants his kid to have his mom back in his life, but he also wants to protect him from the possibility of her leaving again. Somehow he’ll manage to fail at both. 

Eddie is twenty-seven and he wants to hear his wife talk to him one last time. He’ll know it didn’t change anything, know she was practically dead by the time they came to the scene, but still for years to come he’ll wonder if she’d have had a chance if he hadn’t wanted to say goodbye to her. 

Eddie is twenty-eight and he wants to move on, if not for his own, then for Chris’ sake. Ana is a wonderful woman; he’ll lead her on for half a year before he faces the fact that wanting to be in a relationship and wanting to be in this relationship are two different things.

Eddie is twenty-nine and he wants to do what’s best for his son. Once again, he forgets to ask what that might be. 

Eddie is thirty and more than anything he wants to fix whatever is wrong with him. Chris needs someone he can depend on, someone who has things under control. Sitting on the floor of his demolished bedroom, clutching a baseball bat and bawling his eyes out as his son calls for him to open the door because he’s scared, Eddie thinks he’s never been more ashamed.

Eddie is thirty-one and he wants to love again. He’s looking for magic – his relationship with Marisol is anything but that. It’s stale, rehearsed, a feeble imitation of a real connection, and he keeps thinking of reasons to break up with her even though the sex is great and she continues to put up with him as he fucks up again and again. 

Eddie is thirty-two and he wants to pretend, just for a moment. It’s the sweetest form of torture, seeing what she could’ve been. Weeks from now, his life will be in shambles; he’ll be a liar, a cheater, and a terrible father. In some funny way, he knows this already. But standing in front of her, watching her chest rise and fall, fuck, hearing her voice – he can’t stop himself. He wants this far too badly. 

Eddie is five and he loves his mother’s roses so, so much. But now his arms are scratched to hell and there are browning petals all over his floor. He has learned his lesson: he will never touch those roses again. 

Eddie is thirty-two and he’s sitting in a blue armchair, holding his head in his hands as he cries. He’s been doing it a lot lately; crying, that is. It’s like there’s some old forgotten dam breaking inside of him every day. Primeval glaciers melting in the glare of a newly risen sun. 

“I just feel like– like I keep letting people down,” he chokes out. “Whatever I do, however I try to make it work, I fuck it all up again.”

A pathetic little sniffle escapes him. God, he fucking hates therapy.

“I– In church, they used to say that everything has a purpose. That it’s all on a path that’s been laid out for us. I don’t believe that. I just–”

He wipes across his eyes with the back of his hand. Blinks hard a few times.

“It’s the American dream, isn’t it?” he says, and he knows he isn’t making any goddamn sense anymore, but it’s the only way he knows how to explain it. “You just have to want something hard enough, dig your heels in and work for it, and you can be anything. And I wanted to believe in it so bad. I hated all this predetermination talk, every ‘test of God’ and ‘divine intervention’ my tías would discuss with my mom over tea, original sin and all its baggage. I don’t want to believe in any of that, it’s stupid and I know that, but I–”

He chokes back another sob. Hates the sound of it. 

“All that wanting and all that trying, it hasn’t mattered, has it? I wanted to make things work with Shannon, but when I tried I made everything worse – I ran away, and then she ran away, and I hated her for leaving, and I hated myself for hating her, and when she was finally back in my life again and I tried to make it work she didn’t want me and then she fucking died . And I wanted to be a good dad to Chris, but, fuck , look at me. I fucked up so bad , my son is in a different fucking state. They both trusted me, loved me even, and I let them down.

I’ve tried, again and again and again, and it just isn’t working out, is it? And you and Frank and everyone else, you all tell me I’m not broken for it, but that’s worse . Because that means there’s nothing to fix.”

He inhales shakily. Looks Esther in the eyes for the first time in minutes. 

“If I’m not broken, then this is just who I am.”

“Do you really believe that?” Esther’s tone is analytic, devoid of pity, but not of kindness. It grounds him a bit. 

“No. Yes. I don't know. Sometimes, I guess.” He runs a hand through his hair. Takes another deep breath. 

“Like, rationally, I don’t believe in God or in the universe or in ‘purpose’. But I keep having this fear that this is just never going to end. That I’m just like this.”

You see, if Eddie's broken, then it's just people cutting themselves on the shards of his shattered self as they try to hold onto him. If he isn’t, that means he's driving the knife into their hands himself. 

“These thoughts, when do they typically crop up?”

Always, Eddie wants to say, but that isn’t actually true anymore. 

“When I fuck up,” says Eddie because that’s the easy half of it. 

“And?”

Fucking therapists. Damn bastards always have to know when to prod further. 

“I guess when I… want things or people too much. And when I think they might want me in return. It’s… like, you know, Christopher is going to come back. And I keep wondering if I should tell him not to because I’m scared I might just be acting out of selfishness and it would actually be better for him to stay there.”

“You want to protect him from yourself, even though he himself decided he wants to be back?”

Eddie nods. “Yeah, I think so.”

And, because for some fucking reason he’s feeling generous, he adds, “I mean his well-being was pretty much the biggest reason I went back to therapy.”

“In hopes of?”

He shrugs defeatedly. “Fixing whatever is wrong with me, I guess.”

“You do know that no person is ever ‘fixed’? The same way nobody is ever ‘broken’?”

Eddie bites the corner of his mouth. He knows, is the thing. Depending on his state of mind, it’s a solace or perdition. 

“These terms aren’t useful in therapy because there is no definable threshold for going from  being ‘fixed’ to being ‘broken’ or the other way around. By adhering to this dichotomy, we are setting ourselves up to fail – every action, every thought that does not directly align with our definition of ‘fixed’ is suddenly evidence of us being ‘broken’. Instead of having the aim to ‘fix’ people, therapy is supposed to help us lead happier, healthier lives.” 

It sounds like something straight out of a fucking brochure. Eddie-from-two-years-ago would’ve checked out now, if he hadn’t already. But Eddie-from-today knows this shit is important.

“You’re trying to say I’ll never be as ready as I want to be for him to return?”

“I’m saying that everybody has personal issues that they’re working through. Our goal isn’t to eliminate any and all issues, but to learn how to deal with them in a productive and healthy manner. From what I can gather from our sessions and the notes I was given, you are not and never have been an active ‘risk’ to your son.”

It’s nothing, really – he ‘hasn’t been a risk’, big fucking achievement – but it makes him feel a little better anyway. 

“To get back to our original line of questioning,”– and there goes Eddie’s slightly improved mood again –“what ‘broken’ thing would there be then that you think Buck would feel he’d to fix?”

“Well if he knew I love him it would break our current relationship, wouldn’t it? We couldn’t go back to what we were before then. And I think he’d just… try to accommodate me. In any way possible.”

Eddie can see it right in front of his eyes if he just concentrates hard enough. This delicate dance of just how much he can ask, how much of his game he can give away, finally coming to an end. Buck, as always, asking what he can do for Eddie. How he can make this easier on him. Hell, if Eddie asked, he might even break up with Tommy for him. Would live his life in celibacy so as not to upset Eddie. In some fucked up way, Buck’s always been a sure thing like that – Eddie knows that if he tells Buck to jump, nine times out of ten he’ll ask how high. It’s scary to have that kind of sway on a person; intoxicating as well. 

“So that’s why you’d need him to come to you? Before the issue of your own feelings arises, so to say?”

“I guess. I just… I need to be sure it’s what he really wants for himself.”

“Does he know he can want you like that?”

Eddie frowns. “What?”

“You said you need Buck to choose you. Does he know you are a choice he can make?”

“I don’t understand.”

Esther’s eyes flit over her notes. “As far as I am aware, you haven’t come out to Buck yet; does he know he could be with you if he wanted to?”

Yes, Eddie wants to say, but that would be a lie. But No feels wrong as well because Buck should know that Eddie would treasure any part of him that he’s given, right? There literally can’t be enough Buck in his life.

“I… don’t know,” he says. 

“Are you perhaps keeping him from finding out he can choose you?”

Eddie laughs, nervously. He doesn’t really know why. “Why would I do that?”

“To protect him.”

His head snaps to the side like he’s been struck. The worst thing is, he can’t even deny it. Already knew it, maybe, on some level. If Buck doesn’t come to him, Eddie won’t get to taint him with his touch – won’t hurt him the way he’s hurt the people that have wanted him like that before.

Esther’s voice is gentle as she talks to him. “You keep making yourself out to be a burden. I think if you asked the people in your life whether you are one, they’d disagree. Most of all, Buck.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Well,” says Esther. He can hear her thumbing through her notebook. “If the notes I’ve been given and your personal accounts are to be trusted, he’s been at your side for almost every other personal crisis you’ve been through. Just today you’ve told me that if you hadn’t sent him away, he would’ve stayed to help clean up your house, despite what his boyfriend said or how exhausted he may have been.”

Eddie shrugs. It’s just what Buck always does, right? It’s who he is. He helps, he fixes, he cares. 

Really, he’s always there when Eddie needs him; doesn’t even seem to resent Eddie for it, even if he has every right to do so. 

Buck enjoys cooking for him when Eddie has no mind to figure out what to do with the stuff left in his fridge. Relishes the time spent on Eddie’s couch, watching stupid TV competition shows when Eddie’s too depressed to go out. Appreciates it when Eddie asks him to help with a problem he’s having. 

Buck will talk to his son when Eddie doesn’t know how. Will help him patch up the drywall in his bedroom. Will break down every locked door that stands between them.

Buck is always there. Telling Eddie he’s doing a good job. Putting Eddie’s needs above his own. Sticking around when everyone else has left.

He’s always there.

Esther shuts her notebook. Clicks her pen. 

Eddie can’t look up at her. He knows what’s coming, is the thing. 

“You keep saying you need him to choose you,” says Esther. “Do you really believe that? Or are you perhaps scared to acknowledge he already has?”

For a moment there is complete silence. Eddie doesn’t dare breathe. 

Then their session-timer goes off, and Eddie grabs his things and flees the room like the devil is on his heels.

Chapter Text

Breathe in. 

Breathe in.

Breathe. Fucking. In. 

It’s the simplest fucking thing, and he can’t do it, he can’t do it, his chest is too tight, and his walls are too close, and his ceiling is too low, and there’s no damn air left in this room anyway so he may as well just fucking suffocate. 

Breathe. In. 

Asphyxiating during a panic attack on the floor of his bedroom, what a way to go out. 

He almost doesn’t care how embarrassing that would be; he’s not particularly proud of himself right now anyway. This is not the first time Eddie's raced home from a therapy session, but even he can admit that locking himself in his bedroom with all the blinds drawn and praying for ego death is definitely not the most mature way to deal with all of this.

But he just– he can’t think about this right now. He can’t. He’d rather put his damn head through a wall. Preferably a load-bearing one. 

Breathe out. 

Breathe out, goddamnit. 

It’s the implications. They weigh on his ribcage like the oaken lid of a fucking coffin. The implications, and the consequences to be drawn. Because there are consequences, so obvious fucking consequences–

Breathe in.

Therapists, what a fucking rotten lot, they throw around all these phrases and theories like they weigh less than air without thinking about the fucking consequences.

He’s been pacing in circles, eyes pressed shut with the heels of his hands for five minutes, or maybe ten, (an hour?), when the ping of a new notification pierces through the cotton in his ears: Esther’s sent him an email entitled ‘Resources to look into’.

At the sight of it, he’s violently overcome with the urge to throw his phone into the next best wall because jesus fucking christ, Eddie doesn’t need any fucking resources right now, he needs to disappear for a good three to five business days and cease thinking as a whole. 

Breathe out.  

He’s barely saved himself from wrecking both his phone and drywall, when a second notification hits his already so very fragile sanity.

heyy 🤗 what are we thinking about beef stir fry for dinner??👀

Holy fuck, Eddie should have never budged to Buck’s puppy eyes and turned on his location-share. The bastard probably kept checking his phone to figure out when Eddie was home from therapy so he could send that message at just the right time to take his mind off the session, little does he know, he’s doing the complete fucking opposite because– 

just– 

fuck, how dare he be this considerate? 

How fucking dare he care this much? 

He can’t care this much, he shouldn’t, because he’s proving Esther right, goddamnit, and that– she can’t–

Esther can’t be fucking right about this.

She can’t because–

Breathe. Please, breathe.  

Because that would be nothing short of a death sentence. 

Because Eddie could’ve gladly dwelt in limbo forever, waiting for Buck to come to him, would’ve been content with things staying the same until the very end because no one ever made a damn move, but now it’s up to him again, the ball’s in his fucking court, barrelling towards him, really, and Eddie?

Eddie is not going to do a damn thing about it. 

Esther wants him to say the quiet part out loud? Fine! He’ll fucking say it: Eddie can’t let Buck choose him.

Not like this, not when he made the choice like this, unconscious, unwilling, has simply crept in the direction over years until he’s now finally standing in Eddie’s line of fire, trusting he won’t shoot, even though the years in the fucking warzone that is Eddie’s life have turned his trigger finger twitchy, oh so twitchy. 

He can’t allow that. 

All that talk about not being broken, about normal relationships facing issues all the time? About the time never being right because he’ll never be done fixing himself? Bullshit. Doesn’t matter. He can fucking see Frank and Esther’s disappointed expressions at that (Eddie should’ve never, ever gotten a second therapist, one is far too fucking much already), but he resolutely does not give a shit. He’s not a fucking fool – he knows he’s damaged goods. 

No matter how much blood, sweat, and tears Buck would bring into a relationship, it would never be enough. It just doesn’t work that way for Eddie. 

He doesn’t get what he wants, shouldn’t, because every time that’s happened, he grasped on so tightly it broke. 

So yeah, fuck Frank, fuck Esther, fuck therapy as a whole, Eddie’s not going to screw over Buck’s life just because he’s ‘allowed to want things for himself’. They don’t know Buck, don’t know he would never say no, would carve himself open, splay out his insides for Eddie to huddle in for warmth, if he just asked. If he just wanted. 

Fuck. 

What does ‘wanting things’ matter anyway, when the one thing he wants even more than Buck, is for him to be happy?

Breathe. 

Just breathe. 

It’s the consequences, always the fucking consequences of it all, that get him. 

Because he can’t just go on like normal, can he? He can’t give Buck an in, open up the possibility of something happening, not when their everything is on the line – if Eddie fucks things up with Buck, he can forget ever seeing Chris face to face again, hell, can forget ever seeing Chris’s face again at all. Breaking the one parental figure he still has, the only one that Eddie hasn’t driven away yet, no, he definitely can’t fucking do that. He’s got to prune this sprout right now, rip out this, this weed before it can properly set root in the foundation of who they are, cancerous growth feeding on Buck’s flesh until there’s nothing more to give. 

Call it love, call it want, call it whatever you fucking will – Eddie’s got to put a stop to this before it kills the both of them. 

Draw a line in the sand. Reinforce it with a metric ton of steel. Let no wave of selfish desire ever wash it away again. 

Breathe. Just fucking breathe. 

So, Eddie texts Buck a cheap excuse about wanting to eat dinner alone and go to bed early, and when he feels a nausea-inducing kind of longing flood his senses, instead of writing ‘I’m sorry, I love you, come over and make beef stir-fry in my kitchen so I can look at you some more’, he opens the stupid map.

He hates himself for it, oh how he does, feels like a child typing out his grievances like this, especially when he used to be able to just put whatever was bothering him away for a future version of himself to trip on. But in some screwed way, he needs this. A tiny confession to log his decision, set it into stone, the marker a monument to his dedication. The first fencepost of the mile-high barricade he’s gotta build. 

It’s better for you not to have me, he writes. I promise you, I will move on. 

He stares at the text bubble for a moment, breathing hard; it is, ironically, positioned right next to the one declaring how much better he’d do as Buck’s boyfriend. 

What. A fucking. Joke. 

Sure, Tommy doesn’t get Buck like Eddie does, but then, who ever does? And just because Eddie knows to show up extra early when Buck’s planning something that doesn’t automatically mean he’s ‘certified boyfriend material’ – his knowledge of Buck’s quirks might give him an edge in a spur-of-the-moment comparison, but it isn’t nearly enough to balance out the fucking boulder’s worth of baggage that Eddie brings to the table, baggage that he’s been pushing around like Sisyphus all his life, never getting anywhere but back to the godforsaken vale he came from. 

He would never forgive himself if he were to trap Buck down there with himself, doom him to a lifetime of “It’s just a relapse”s and “We’ll figure it out”s that’ll wear him down to the very bone, have him hoping for betterment that will never come, not when Buck could have anyone, has the whole damn world right there for the taking.

Consequences. Always fucking consequences. 

Because if what Esther’s saying is true, and Buck’s going to commit himself to his own damnation once Eddie makes himself known as an option, then the simple consequence is that Eddie’s just not going to do that. 

If it’s truly up to him to make a choice, then he’s going to do what's right. What he should do. No matter how much it hurts him. There is no place for self-centeredness here. 

He’ll keep his fucking mouth shut. Tight as he can. Keep all of this to himself, a secret held under lock in the caverns of his heart.

He’s not going to come out to Buck.

He’s not going to say a single fucking thing.

And, even more importantly, he’s going to stop accepting all of the time and love and dedication Buck devotes to him every day. So much effort, so much care, wasted on someone who can never repay it; ocean’s worth of love poured into a bottomless cup. He should’ve put a stop to it years ago.

*

Eddie, of course, fails spectacularly at holding onto his new resolution the moment he is actually put in front of Buck. Turns out, even granite-like resolve, built up over the course of an entire restless night, is still nothing but clay to Buck’s gentle hands. 

It starts like this: as soon as Eddie enters the firestation the next day, Buck greets him with that thousand watt smile of his and a coffee that he’s picked up specifically for him. And what’s Eddie supposed to do? Reject the cup and risk putting a dent in Buck’s mood? 

So, sipping his latte, Eddie promises himself that he’ll stick to his guns the next time Buck goes out of his way to do something for him. 

The coffee was already bought before Eddie could do anything about it anyway. 

It doesn’t count. 

Neither does the fact that Buck’s apparently convinced Bobby to drop by and make his secret-recipe omelet for breakfast back at the station, even though he isn’t even due to be back on the job for another week. It probably doesn’t even have anything to do with Eddie at all – just because that omelet is his favorite breakfast food of Bobby’s doesn’t mean that the other’s won’t enjoy it, so it could very well just be a coincidence that he chose this one. (Eddie chooses to disregard the way Buck looked at him when Bobby announced what he was making, eyes trained on Eddie’s face like he was checking for a reaction, perhaps. He probably just imagined it anyway.) 

At the table, Buck keeps filling up Eddie’s plate whenever he’s restocking his own, but that’s just what they always do – stopping Buck from doing it now, in front of the whole team, after years of routine, would be way more trouble than it’s worth, so it’s another moot point. 

Agreeing to let Buck spot him in the gym isn’t relevant either because Eddie isn’t insane enough to lift weights without a spot, and he pays the favor back immediately by spotting Buck in return and trying his absolute best to not let his eyes wander across the flexing muscles of Buck’s exposed arms, glistening with sweat. If the following shower is spent with his gaze firmly fixed on the tiled wall before him so neither it nor his thoughts wander to the stall next to him, then that’s completely unrelated. 

Eddie finally admits that things aren’t exactly going to plan when Buck chooses to assist him with any and all chores, even latrine duty, and Eddie doesn’t even make an attempt to put up a fight, but by then he’s also been so softened up by the hours spent in Buck’s orbit, he’s started toying with the idea that his mindset going into the day was maybe just kind of over-dramatic. Because just going cold-turkey on Evan ‘Acts-of-service-are-my-love-language’ Buckley’s casual displays of affections is a neither practical nor sensical approach to this problem, right? 

With the way he’s focusing on them now, he’s making a lot of things worse, actually – more than ever, he’s noticing the way Buck both thoughtfully and unthinkingly cares for him, and it puts such a sweet, lovesick taste in Eddie’s mouth that it makes him genuinely nauseous. 

To that comes the fact that the entire shift is quiet (see that, Chim? Quiet, quiet, quiet, quiet. No such thing as thought crime), so he doesn’t even get to take his mind off Buck with the help of a particularly gruesome med call or even a damn cat in a tree. 

Instead, Eddie’s sitting on the couch, left side pressed into Buck’s right from shoulder to toe, devoting all his processing power to winning at Mario Kart because he can’t afford to spare a single thought to the heat of Buck’s body against his own if he wants to remain sane for the rest of their twentyfour. 

Just as they’re entering the third lap of the last course, Eddie leading by a considerable margin, they’re interrupted by Bobby calling out from the hangar to inform Buck that he’s got a visitor. 

Both their heads turn from the screen, curious to see who will make their way up the stairs, and– it’s Tommy. Great. 

Eddie can admit he’s being a little bitchy when he forgoes a high-five with Tommy for trying (and failing) to recapture his lead against the COM players that overtook him in the short moment he was distracted. Keeping his eyes glued to the screen is probably better for them both, though, because Eddie doubts Tommy would appreciate him shooting daggers in the back of his skull when he kisses Buck hello. 

He can’t pinpoint exactly when his friendship with Tommy turned from non-stop hanging out with him for an entire week’s worth of freetime to the current state of affairs, that is, Eddie semi-erneastly deliberating whether or not he’d pull Tommy off the street if he saw a truck gunning for him, but the why of it all seems pretty obvious at least. It’s unfair, he knows, because Tommy hasn’t actually done anything; it’s just that ever since going from ‘my pal Tommy’ to ‘Buck’s boyfriend’ in Eddie’s mind, his presence has turned indescribably grating. 

It’s probably got something to do with the fact that there were little to no expectations attached to the first categorisation, while there’s a whole list of conditions and requirements longer than the line at the DMV before a potential romantic partner of Buck’s gains Eddie’s blessing. 

And while Tommy has not done anything too egregious to completely ruin his chances of getting Eddie’s stamp of approval yet (last week’s faux pas with the BBQ preparations shall go unmentioned on account of Eddie never wanting to think of that evening ever again), he’s certainly not been overperforming either. It mostly comes down to the fact that while Buck’s excitable as a puppy, Tommy is just… not that. Kind of the opposite, really. 

Which could be fine – he doesn’t have to be the same as Buck (Lord knows Eddie wouldn’t survive if there were two Bucks on this planet), but he could at least put some fucking effort into their conversations, instead of whatever the fuck he keeps doing when Buck opens his mouth. 

Eddie’s sure he can’t be the only one who thinks that way, because once you notice, it’s absolutely maddening – Buck will start talking about something he read about, and Tommy will barely grace it with a twitch of his mouth, maybe a blasé ‘Huh, didn’t know that, Evan’, before he moves on with whatever excruciatingly boring topic he was talking about beforehand. No follow-up questions, no ‘tell me more’ s, no nothing, not even a singular appreciative smile. Just utter apathy.  

Eddie can’t understand, can’t come even close to fucking comprehending just how dull of an individual you have to be to not be enamoured by Buck’s tangents. Yet Tommy, mankind's blandest enigma, apparently isn’t.

And today it’s no different – while helping Bobby out with lunch, Eddie finds himself having to pick up all of Tommy’s slack when Buck goes off on a rant about how some German king had to trick his peasants into liking potatoes when they were first introduced to Europe. Not like it’s a hardship to do so; it comes naturally to Eddie to smile along, ask the appropriate questions at the appropriate times, just listen, because there’s nothing he would rather spend eternity doing. 

Tommy, meanwhile, says nothing. Barely smiles.

It’s so fucking baffling, it almost brings Eddie to tears of anger, because how can you have the best fucking thing in the world all for yourself and not cherish it? Not even fucking like it, from the way it looks most times? If Eddie was Tommy, that is, relatively emotionally regulated and not Mr. I-will-blow-up-my-life-and-drag-you-all-down-with-me-just-you-wait, he’d be so fucking happy he’d probably cry every morning after waking up, and every night when he went to sleep, and one time in between, just for good measure. 

He isn’t, of course, is a whole lot worse than the disinterested raise of an eyebrow or a demeaning huff of breath, should probably, no, definitely not run his mouth, but it’s just so easy to forget when he’s caught up in his own head like today, so distracted, hopped-up, twisted all around, treacherous thoughts slinking past the walls he’s built up in his head, taking a stroll through the inside of his mouth, testing the reinforcements in his jaw, probing his tongue for weakness, a bit of give, just a little, tiny margin–

The thing is, Eddie really tries to be civil – he does. After all, the whole Tommy situation is what tripped him the last time. He knows he can’t keep getting drunk off of this self-righteous dislike of Tommy, can’t keep waiving his own failings when comparing himself to the man he kind of wishes he was when he’s hot and sweaty in the middle of the night, mind betraying him the moment he reaches down to take the edge off (so much about ‘no thought-crime’). 

But he also can’t just sit there and do nothing when Tommy’s actively screwing up Buck’s afternoon coffee, so much so that Eddie can tell by sound alone, because Buck’s preferred creamer always makes a different kind of plop when you finish pouring, something to do with the consistency of it, and that was definitely not enough sugar if he really only heard a singular cube of it going in. And there’s no one but them in the kitchen right now, which means that Eddie’s the only one that can save Buck from the disastrous cup of coffee coming his way, so he’s gotta do something, right?

In hindsight, going “Can’t you do a single thing right?” may have not been the most eloquent way of phrasing his critique of Tommy’s abilities as Buck’s personal barista. 

It takes a singular perplexed look of Tommy’s to send Eddie fleeing the scene. He’s past the rest of the team lounging on the couches in a blink, doesn’t know how loud he said what he just said, whether someone might have heard, oh God please let no one have heard, knows Tommy might tell someone so it’s redundant to hope anyway. 

Dangerous, this was so fucking dangerous, stupid as well, and also just an all-around shitty thing to do, and he keeps getting into situations like these, can’t keep his fucking mouth shut for single day, Jesus Christ, he can’t even make it through a singular fucking day. Eddie gave his mind an inch and it took the whole mile and then some, planned out an entire road trip down the highway to ‘screwing up your life for good’ city. 

He’s got to get this under control, wrangle the covetous beast scratching at his innards into submission, stop his greedy hands from reaching out to grab what isn’t his, just– refocus. Get away from it all. 

It’s Hen who eventually finds him cowering in the storage closet, his go-to hideaway these days, it seems. Pretty undignified, all things considered, but Eddie would be lying if he said it didn’t help to have just darkness and the burning smell of rubbing alcohol as company for a while.

“What are you doing here?” she asks when she sees him, eyes narrowing.

“What are you doing here?” Eddie retorts, wittily. Sue him, he’s not quite back to full mental capacity yet. 

“Restocking the ambulance,” Hen answers, unimpressed. “Or, you know, my job. ”

“Hm,” says Eddie. He shifts on the ground a little – it hasn’t gotten any softer since the last time he was a coward. Hen doesn’t stop staring at him, eyebrows knit together and mouth turned to a slight frown. 

“You okay?” she asks then, as if the answer isn’t fucking obvious. 

“Peachy, just peachy,” Eddie replies, examining a crack in the concrete right in front of his feet because he doesn’t have to look up to know that Hen’s eyebrows are raised to her non-existent hairline.

“Uh huh,” she says, and then, “Tommy went home half an hour ago and Buck’s taking a nap in the bunkroom. You wanna help me restock or are you going to keep staring holes in our oxygen tanks?”

Eddie splits the remaining fourteen hours of their shift evenly between pretending to be asleep in the bunkroom and being glued to Hen’s side like he’s a fucking pimple patch. She raises a suspicious eyebrow every now and then, but doesn’t say anything or send him away, which is a win in Eddie’s book. It’s easier to filter everything he says through her presence, keep Buck at arm’s distance before he spins out of control with jealousy and want again. A short term solution for a long term problem he’s once again failed to tackle appropriately. 

He pays for it in looks from Buck, filled with concern and tinged with hurt; a steep price, but one he’ll shoulder if he must. It’s bearable, however much it aches him to keep the distance. 

His true reckoning comes the moment they’re off shift.

Eddie’s expertly managed to avoid a one-on-one with Buck for the entire day, but his truck’s parked right next to Buck’s jeep, so he’s got no method of dodging Buck when he stands right in front of Eddie’s driver side door, eyes big and hands fidgeting.

“We-We’re cool, right?” he asks once Eddie’s made it to him.

“What?”

Buck rubs at his neck, sheepishly looking to the ground. “You were just, uh, distant, today, which is, like, totally fine, I just wanted to know if it’s about the text you sent the other day, because if you really need more space, you really just have to say it, I-I don’t want to push you, you know?”

It’s– fuck, Eddie should say he needs space, right? If he wants to stick to his plan, setting up some boundaries would be a good thing. Eddie– Eddie should be rejoicing at this. Right? He should want to tell Buck that they need a bit of distance, that would make everything so much easier. But he doesn’t, he doesn’t, oh god, how he doesn’t, especially not when Buck seems so hurt over this, and he can’t just crush Buck’s mood even further, he needs to make this right, he needs to–

Stop. 

He can’t do this again. 

“Yeah, we’re cool,” he forces out, voice sounding hollow and fake to himself. He can’t allow himself anything more, much more dangerous words risking to stumble out of him if he doesn’t cut this off right now. 

Buck’s eyes don’t lift from the ground. “You really should tell me, though, if I’m overbearing. I– I know I can be a lot.”

“Buck,” says Eddie, the name punched out of him by the heartbreaking expression on the face of the man in front of him. He has to stop all else that wants to tag along and make its way out of his mouth, though, so the word rings out all alone, and, laden with so much unsaid, it buckles under the pressure and simply disappears into the air around them as if it was never said at all. 

Still, Buck has raised his head again, eyes catching the LA morning sun in the most breathtaking way, blue irides reflecting the cloudless sky above, posing a beautiful contrast to the pastel pink of his skin. His gaze is trained on Eddie, waiting, expecting, but giving him the honest answer to the unspoken plea he’s making would only dig the hole they’re in even deeper – Eddie’s given in once today and said something dangerous and stupid, so he shouldn’t try his luck again. 

“Just– we’re cool, okay?”

Eddie puts a hand on his shoulder for emphasis, tries his best at an earnest smile, and then hugs Buck goodbye, a short strong squeeze because he can’t trust his hands not to wander if he leaves them on his back for too long. 

Before anything more can be said, he steps around Buck and jumps in his truck so he can drive off like the coward he is. 

He gets Hen’s text while stuck in traffic, waiting for the 133 to get a car accident somewhere on the street ahead of him sorted out. 

Karen told me she invited you to wine & whine night. 7pm at ours tonight, bring that wine from the BBQ she’s been raving about. 

Eddie surprises himself by genuinely contemplating the offer. He’s not an idiot; he knows Hen has sniffed him out and wants to dig for further info, probably offer some comfort and guidance on the way. He’s in the mood for neither – but even though he really does not want to talk about the Buck of it all, the thought of sharing the other revelation he’s had about himself (the one that starts with ‘I’ and ends with ‘am gay’) with someone other than his therapist or his kid actually kind of… excites him?

Not that he actually plans on doing that, but just it being an option feels nice, somehow. Doesn’t scare him anymore. And he does kind of owe Hen for letting him stick around for the entire day. She’d probably be way less lenient next time if he didn’t even make an attempt to explain himself.

There’s a bit of movement on the road again, just enough space to switch lanes, and Eddie decides that fuck it, it’s fine, and gets in line to take a detour to the fancy wine shop where he’d first picket up the Merlot that Buck had been hellbent on having at the barbeque last week.

He’s had a shit day, he’s allowed to go drown his worries in wine with some good friends. 

*

“So…” says Hen, swaying the wine in her glass in circles. There’s an edge to the tone of her voice, balancing on the tipping point between teasing and empathy. It’s obvious where she wants to take the conversation. 

Eddie’s got to applaud her endurance – two whole hours have passed from when he showed up at the Wilsons’ front door, bottle of wine in hand and a nervous fluttering in his stomach. By now, they’re a solid two and a half glasses in, and while Eddie’s managed to shake his beginning jitters, he is starting to feel a little tingly from the alcohol. 

It’s relaxing his muscles in a way they haven’t for the past couple of days, making him feel lighter and more susceptible to the occasional snicker, as evidenced by the sheer amount of giggles he let out over the course of Karen regaling them with stories about all the scientific in-fighting at the lab. 

Still doesn’t make him much more ready to face this conversation, though. 

“So, what?” he asks, tilting his head up at her from the spot on the ground he’s taken residence up on. They’ve pushed the couch table to the side, more room to stretch their legs and less likelihood to tip over the truly obscene charcuterie board the Wilson’s have put together, the one Karen’s currently busy restocking in the kitchen.

“So, are we going to talk about the elephant in the room?” Hen continues on, undeterred.

“And that would be?” he asks.

“Well,” she says, mock-pondering, “maybe the fact that you spent half of yesterday’s shift looking at Tommy like you were hoping for him to drop dead? Or that whatever you said to him after lunch had him acting all pissy until he finally left?”

Eddie groans and drops his face into his hands. It all sounds even more childish out of someone else’s mouth. 

“What do I hear about Eddie pissing Tommy off?” Karen asks, coming back at just the right point in time to bear witness to Eddie’s imminent humiliation. 

“I just told him he was making Buck’s coffee wrong,” he mumbles out from behind the heels of his hands. 

“And he got annoyed about that?” Karen asks, frown evident in the tone of her voice. 

“Well, I may have phrased it a little differently.”

“A lot differently, if Ravi is to be believed,” Hen adds with a snort.

Eddie shrinks a little further in on himself. “He heard that?”

“Well, he got it from Michaels, who got it from Hernandez, who got it from Olson, who was just on his way to grab something from the fridge when you stormed past.”

“And you just believed him and his little game of telephone?” Eddie asks, trying to sound incredulous, even though he knows it comes out sounding more like defeat. 

Hen shrugs. “Ravi sources his gossip very diligently.”

“So you’re telling me,” Karen cuts in, “that you just stood in the kitchen, looking over Tommy’s shoulder until he made a mistake with the coffee and then told him off about it?”

“I wasn’t even looking at him, okay?” Eddie says, only realizing that he’s dug himself even deeper when he sees Karen’s eyes narrow. 

“How did you know that he was doing it wrong, then?”

“I just knew, it just… sounds different.” 

Karen’s eyebrows shoot up her forehead. “It sounds different?”

“Anyway,” says Hen, “I think I have a right to know at least a little bit about what went on there considering I spent the rest of my shift doubling as your emotional support coworker.” She puts her arm around Karen who’s just settled next to her again. “Not to mention that I wasted half an hour of my life having to convince Olson that you aren’t secretly homophobic.”

“Well, that would be kind of hypocritical of me,” Eddie remarks before he can stop himself, praying the levity in his voice doesn’t sound as fake to them as it does to himself. Immediately, the humor in Hen’s face softens. 

There’s something expectant gathering in her and Karen’s eyes, something that’s probably been a long time coming. Seeing it up-close like this is kind of strange – he had sort of guessed that they might have a clue, but it’s a different thing to get the actual confirmation. Makes him wonder how long he’s been carrying this around with himself in the open for others to notice, while he still wasn’t ready to look at it. 

“Because…?” Hen asks, soft and open-ended. Eddie swallows. 

“Because I’m gay.” 

The words still haven’t lost all their novelty on his tongue, but it’s become a nice kind of novelty, warm and welcoming, with an aftertaste of new beginning. It feels good to say them out loud, focus on the way they fill out his mouth and yet remain so simple, so plain and easy. 

Hen smiles at him, eyes crinkling. Then she pulls him up onto the couch, right into a crushing hug. And if Eddie’s eyes water as her hand rubs across his back, then that’s probably just because of the alcohol. Karen joins in then, and for a moment they are just a big knot of warmth and love. When they all pull apart again, Eddie feels lighter, as if, in the matter of seconds, the both of them osmotically soaked up some of the weight on his shoulders. 

“What, no ‘finally’ for me?” he jokes when no one says anything immediately afterwards, causing Hen to laugh and slap his arm.

“I was trying to be nice, okay?”

“So you did suspect it?” Eddie asks, laying his head to the side. He might as well get the whole spiel now. 

“Well…” Hen and Karen share a capital L Look. 

Eddie snorts. “That obvious?”

Hen waves him off. “I’m not saying obvious, but you always talked about dating like someone was forcing you to do it. And you mentioned your girlfriends so little, whenever one of them happened to drop by the station, I didn’t even notice they were there for you until you walked over so you could awkwardly stand next to them, as if you were waiting for them to leave.”

“Those were some beautiful women,” Karen sighs. Eddie drinks a big gulp of wine at that because yeah, he wasted months of the time of those gorgeous women who all stuck around even when he didn’t seem committed to them at all. Bit of an asshole move. 

“And the way you always look at Buck?” Hen adds. 

Karen nods fervently. “Like he’s a thousand miles away, even though he’s right in front of you. It’s infuriating to watch. Oh, and how you never got along with any of his girlfriends? And then–”

“Blew up my life after he came out to me?” he interjects. 

“Yeah,” says Hen, “that.”

Eddie nods solemnly and then drains the rest of his glass. It goes down smoothly, only a slight burn at the back of his throat that grounds him in the moment, reminds him of who and where he is – a gay man in his thirties, sitting on the floor of his friends’ living room and drowning his worries in wine. Not the most dignified position to be in, but he’s been off worse, he wagers. 

“Well, feels good to be proven right,” Hen says after a couple seconds of amicable silence have passed.

Eddie smiles up at her, lopsided. “About what? Me being gay or me being in love with Buck?”

“Are you? In love with Buck?” Karen asks, as if it isn’t obvious. 

“Take a wild fucking guess,” Eddie replies, to which she puts up her hands. 

“Okay, okay, just wanted to make sure.”

“No,” says Eddie, smirk on his face, “you just wanted to hear me say it.” 

Karen grins unashamedly, tips her head to the side. “Maybe.” 

Then she holds out her glass for Eddie to refill. He stretches to grab the opened bottle from the table, but upon lifting it, finds it’s almost empty. Sighing dramatically, he tops off Hen’s glass with the remaining liquid, and then gets to uncorking another bottle of the fancy stuff. 

Karen yawns as Eddie twists the corkscrew, five, six times, and then levers the bottle open with a little plop. He can’t blame her, he’s getting a little sluggish himself, having to focus extra hard on not spilling anything on the carpet as he pours the both of them another glass. 

I’ve been wondering, though,” says Karen once she’s taken a generous gulp of wine, “will one of you need to swap stations once you’re properly together?” She turns to Hen, eyebrows drawn together. “I mean, there’s regulations about that, right?”

Hen wrinkles her nose, corners of her mouth turning down in a meh- sort of expression. “I’m sure Bobby would find some way around them. He’s a real wizard with the paperwork.”

“Will probably still take forever,” laments Karen, letting her head loll back until it hits the back rest. 

Eddie shrugs, staring at the reflections in his wine glass. “Doesn’t matter anyway… I’m not gonna make a move.”

“What?” Karen shrieks, almost falling off the sofa, were it not for Hen’s arm snapping out and reeling her back in. “You’re not going to tell him?”

He runs a hand through his hair, sighing. “I mean… what do I have to offer?”

“Are you kidding me right now?” Hen deadpans.

“Oh my God,” moans Karen, still clinging onto Hen’s arm, “you're like all the pretty girls in highschool that kept saying they were ugly so they'd get compliments, only you, like, actually believe it.”

“I’m not fishing for compliments! I’ve got so much shit to work through, it’s not fair to put all of that on him. I don’t want to weigh him down any further than I already do.”

Hen tilts her head and raises a brow, like what he just said was a particularly stupid brand of bullshit. “Come on Eddie, you know better than anyone that Buck starts, like, wagging his tail when people let him help. He loves being there for people.”

“And you can’t let him waste anymore time with Tommy, I swear to God,” adds Karen, rolling her eyes.

“Come on, Tommy’s… he’s…” Eddie’s trying his damn best to come up with a flattering adjective, but he can’t find one for the life of him. 

“He’s boooring,” Karen cuts in.

Hen nods empathetically. 

“If that man were a spice, he’d be flour. He is plainer than white bread.”

Eddie can’t help chuckling. He shouldn’t, but with the wine making everything funnier than it ought to be anyway, he can’t avoid it. 

“The three things I know about him,” Karen says, “is that he’s a pilot, is dating Buck, and has this fascinating ability to suck the fun out of a room just by sitting there.”

This time a full-on laugh breaks out of Eddie. 

“You do have to admit it though, right?” Karen asks, teasing glint in her eyes. 

“Yeah,” he says, and before he can think better of it, he adds on, “you’d think a guy that does martial arts and flies helicopters for a living would be interesting to talk to, right?”

Hen raises a quizzical eyebrow even as she grins. “Weren’t you the guy who hung out with him for a week straight?”

Eddie shrugs. “We didn’t talk all that much to be honest. Just about cars and Muay Thai and stuff, the rest of our time we spent beating the shit out of each other in his garage.”

“Not exactly a talkative guy, is he?” snorts Karen. “I shared a table with him for half an hour at the barbeque last week. I swear, that man considers it offensive to tell him about something actually interesting.”

Eddie snaps his finger at her, nodding along, because despite how much he might rationally know that Tommy’s not as bad as his head’s making him out to be, it’s incredibly gratifying to finally have someone else notice the same annoying habits of his. “He’s always so dismissive! Like okay, I guess you don’t care about anything? Cool for you?”

“Just watching Buck yesterday get shut down again and again before he can go off on a rant…” Hen shakes her head. 

“Really Eddie, you’d do Buck a favor if you got him out of that relationship,” Karen says then, and, like a candle snuffed out, Eddie’s good mood dies down. 

He drags a hand over his face.

“It’s not that easy, okay?”

Hen and Karen look entirely unconvinced, eyebrows raised and the slight hint of a smile tugging at their mouths. If this was literally any other conversation, Eddie would make fun of them for how they keep adapting each other’s mannerisms and are going to morph into one singular person if this keeps going on, but, well, it isn’t. 

It’s an honest conversation, maybe a little too honest for his liking, but the tingling sensation of the wine traveling through the blood vessels of his body eases his mind, lets him speak more freely than during the day. And he needs to speak, explain the predicament he’s caught in, because he understands that it might be entirely invisible to an outsider, and he’s so tired of not being understood. 

“No, seriously. I’ve got so much shit to deal with, every day I stumble upon some other unresolved issue I didn’t even know I had. I fucked up yesterday, and I fucked up at the barbeque, and I keep fucking up all over the place, and I– I can’t trust myself with him. Not like this. And like, I– I know I’m gay, it’s literally the only thing that makes sense about everything, but I also don’t really know for sure, do I? I’ve never actually been with a guy.”

He pinches the bridge of his nose. His face feels hot and dry, owed both to tonight’s embarrassments and the amount of histamines flushing his system. Damn red wine. 

“And God knows I can’t put this on Chris. He isn’t even back home yet, and he’ll go running right back to Texas when he finds me shacked up with the one parent figure in his life he actually still trusts.”

Hen and Karen are quiet, eyebrows slanted, eyes soft. This isn’t even half of it, Eddie thinks. 

“So, yeah. I’m not going to say anything.”

For a couple of breaths, they all just sort of sit there. Then Hen raises a hand to her temple to rub soothing circles into it with her thumb. 

“Jesus. Has all of it been like this for you?”

“Like” – Eddie accidentally lets out a little hic that probably kind of undermines his whole speech and has Karen giggling into her wineglass – “like what?”

“So…. depressing. Don’t get me wrong, I understand having a hard journey coming to terms with everything, and the whole Buck thing is obviously complicated as hell, but this is just…” She shakes her head. 

“Have you looked at, like, any other guys?” Karen chimes in. 

Eddie shrugs. “Haven’t really had the time.”

Hen tsks. 

“You,” says Karen, pointing at Eddie with a slightly wobbly finger. Eddie goes a little cross-eyed to keep the tip of it in focus as Karen moves it closer. 

“You,” she repeats, finger ghosting over Eddie’s nose, “need to go out. ”

O-u-t. Eddie echoes the word in silence, mouth moving along to the letters. 

“Let loose a little,” Karen continues. “Reap the rewards of your handsome face and late-onset homosexuality.” 

“Definitely not late-onset,” he adds half-heartedly. 

“Weirdly close childhood best friend?” Hen asks. 

“Weirdly close childhood best friend,” Eddie confirms. 

“Point still stands,” shrugs Karen, and she kind of has a point. 

Out. Go and test some things, let loose, maybe make room to move on. That… actually doesn’t seem like all that bad of an idea. At least to three-glasses-of-wine Eddie. 

*

Eddie’s sixth entry to the map is riddled with typos, but considering he is typing it up in some gay bar's restroom, absolutely hammered, it's a miracle he manages to send it off at all, much less correctly mark where he is at this very moment. I kidsed w huy here and i wishrd itbwas you, it reads. Not exactly Eddie’s pièce de résistance, but with the amount of shots Karen’s managed to goad him into doing, it may as well be nobel prize worthy. 

The entry’s sentiment kinda goes against the whole “looking at other guys’ thing Eddie’s been trying for the evening, but who fucking cares, it’s the truth. 

Once he stumbles back out into the hallway, he’s immediately pulled along by Hen and Karen. “What took you so long?” Karen slurs, tone of voice still mostly amused, but bordering on annoyed. “There wasn’t even a line!”

Eddie responds with a noise that’s unintelligible even to him, probably because he’s currently mostly focussed on keeping his balance as they’re making their way to the exit again. 

They’re on their fourth (fifth?) bar, hopping their way through WeHo in an effort to get Eddie acquainted with all the trendy gay bars in one night, and maybe help him pick up a hot guy along the way. With how it’s going so far, the only thing that Eddie’ll have picked by the end of their tour is a nasty case of alcohol poisoning. 

Sure, there was the guy in the restroom just now, but that was more of a spur of the moment thing; he’d only caught Eddie’s interest because he’d been just the right amount of inches taller, and in the dim glow emanating from the light fixture above the sink, his face was shadowy enough for Eddie’s traitorous mind to project another’s upon it. 

The moment he'd pulled away and asked if Eddie would like to take their business into a stall, or maybe somewhere else entirely, the tone and inflection of his voice had been so jarringly off, it had Eddie full-on frozen in place until the guy took the hint and stalked out of the restroom again. So yeah, not exactly what they came here for. Whatever. 

“Here,” Hen says, pressing something into his hands that takes Eddie a good while to discern as a water bottle, “I think it’s time you slowed down a little. We’re barely halfway through the night.” If Eddie’s brain was still capable of comprehending the concept of time, that would probably mean something to him – as things are right now, it seems said ability went out of the window shortly after Karen dug the shot glasses out of their hiding place in the back of Eddie’s highest kitchen cabinet. 

Still, he manages to stick to Hen’s orders and refrains from ordering any more of the fruity (Eddie giggles whenever word crosses his mind) cocktails he’s found he loves during their little tour. Just water for him; that, and copious amounts of dancing, laughing, and sweating. 

Three bars later, it’s one am, and he’s miraculously starting to sober again – most of the earlier buzz could probably be attributed to the truly extensive pregaming they’d partaken in – so his mind is clear enough for him to pick up on the signs the guy from across the bar is sending him. And since the booze has lowered Eddie’s inhibitions to about shin height, not quite tripping hazard yet, but way more comfortable to step over than usual, he’s been looking right back. For a good while now, actually. 

Who can blame him? There’s a lot to see. 

Glossy black hair tied into a little ponytail, showing off his undercut, his right eyebrow pierced, a carefully tempered amount of stubble accentuating the line of his jaw; from the way it looks, he’s got about an inch on Eddie and while he definitely isn’t as broad, he’s got to hit the gym every now and then with how that v-neck t-shirt clings to the muscles of his arms; same with that too tight pair black jeans that Eddie finds he wouldn’t mind peeling him out of.

He’s smiling over at Eddie every now and then, much to Hen and Karen’s delight. They’ve been egging Eddie on to make a move for almost the entire duration they’ve sat here, fighting against the thrum of the bass as they take turns shouting bad pick up lines for him to try into his ears. Eddie’s been laughing along, pretending to mull over the most egregious contenders that leave Karen and Hen’s lips, but he’s feeling pretty content with the position he’s in, that is, about five feet away from his current object of desire. 

This game they’re playing is delightfully new to Eddie – not that he’s never made eyed at someone across the room (he went to his fair share of highschool parties), but this time, it’s not just the alcohol making Eddie feel tingly all over whenever they’re eyes meet for a split second, just enough time to see the hint of a crinkle at the corners before they avert their gazes. 

They’re two sine curves, crossing intermittently just to drift apart for a moment until they're inevitably drawn back to another. Eddie wonders for just how long they could keep this up; if it was up to him, they’d certainly outlast most of the other patrons here. 

That thought experiment ends up staying theoretical, though, because the next time Eddie’s gaze sheepishly drops to the wood veneer of the bar again, Karen gasps next to him.

“Oh my god, it’s happening! He’s coming over!”

When Eddie raises his head at that, she tugs it right down again. 

“Don’t look yet!” she scolds him, Hen laughing next to her. “You need to let him flounder for a little bit!”

In total, he ends up having about five seconds to act coy before the man’s right in front of them and Karen elbows Eddie in the ribs with way more force than necessary in an effort to get him to look up from his hands. 

When he does, he’s greeted by a flirty smile and a hand held out to him. 

“Hey,” the man says, “I’m Nate. Wanna dance?”

Eddie bites his lip, lets his eyes wander across Nate once again, partly out of actual interest, mostly to buy himself some more time to decide. He’s been pretty content leaning back the past couple bars, not trying to force himself to pick someone up and instead enjoying his time with Hen and Karen. It’s getting late anyway, the last call’s in half an hour, so Eddie could just call it a night. 

Maybe that would be for the best – not that Nate isn’t hot, he very much is, but should Eddie really risk ending the evening on a potential low note if he’s had fun so far? Shouldn’t he be happy with the night he’s had? He doesn’t even know what exactly he’d want out of this anyway – shouldn’t he wait for clarity before jumping into murky waters, unsure of what awaits him? 

Suddenly, he’s shoved forward by someone (probably Karen), and all but stumbles off his stool, right into the other man’s chest. Nate steadies him with one arm on his shoulder, the other on his waist, and when Eddie blinks up into the ocean blue of his eyes, he’s made his decision.

Backed by not so subtle cheers and whoops from Hen and Karen, he lets himself be drawn onto the dance floor, Nate leading them close enough to the speakers that Eddie can feel the thump of the beat in his chest like it’s a pacemaker. 

Once there, he just sort of sways along to the music, doesn’t really know what to do – he’s never been that great of a dancer, not when it comes to the club-side of dancing, anyway. He did some line-dancing in highschool and knows the base steps to all essential ballroom dance types, but he hasn’t been particularly graced when it comes to just moving along to the beat on his own. 

Thankfully, Nate seems to pick up on this pretty quickly, and instead of losing interest, he simply moves in closer to guide Eddie’s movements to mirror his own. Every touch of his fingers on Eddie’s skin feels like sparks, jolts of energy traveling through his central nervous system at near impossible speeds, the neurons in his brain emitting whatever transmitters code for more, right now. 

They keep moving closer, hands grasping tighter, and when a bare minute later their hips are flush against another, Eddie realizes he’s seriously been missing out, because there’s a kind of fire alight in his gut that no partner of his has ever managed to stir so easily. 

It’s this fact that ends up making it so easy to send Hen and Karen a text reading headed out the back, don’t wait for me when Nate whispers in his ear that he could use some fresh air, the heat of his breath against Eddie’s neck sending shivers down his spine. He fumbles with his phone just a second longer so that his location is shared with Hen (if Nate ends up shanking him in some alleyway, at least they’ll know where to look for his body) and then follows him across the floor. 

They stumble out the back door, into the empty alley, and Nate immediately has Eddie pressed up against the wall, which is doing things to his insides, desire spreading through veins and muscles like wildfire. Nate’s got his arms on both sides of Eddie’s head, leaning forward until their foreheads almost touch. 

“Can I kiss you?” he breathes, eyes dark and lidded, and Eddie can’t help but lock his hands behind the other man’s neck, pulling him into a kiss that’s all desire, heat, and want, and fuck he should have been doing this years ago. Just this, just kissing feels so obscenely good, it seems selfish, blasphemous almost. 

That tongue sneaking past his lips, that leg wedged in between his thighs, God, that hand tracing over the muscles of his back until it reaches his ass, cups it and squeezes, it’s all so much, so good, he feels a fool to only realize just now what kind of nauseating, world-ending hunger a simple kiss could rouse and still at the same time. 

Eddie used to believe that he just preferred being the one to give in bed, pleasure his partner like there’s no tomorrow while he was content to find his own release somewhere along the way, but it seems that, while certainly not completely untrue, his previous assumptions were clouded in a haze of ignorance – because Eddie’s always liked sex, he’s got a healthy libido, thank you very much, but he’s never felt so alight with need before.

He’s drunk off it, decidedly more than off the alcohol, hasn’t got the mind to take over control because he’s so lost in desire, falling into the sensation of Nate’s mouth, hands, hips against his own, a thrilling descent, like the controlled fall of a rappel down a cliffside. 

That appears to be a pretty apt metaphor, considering Eddie could swear he almost feels the sting of the straps of his harness digging into his thighs when the vibration of his phone in his pocket rips him out of the moment like a line pulled taut at the last second. It shouldn’t capture his attention this easily, really, it’s barely noticeable over the muffled noise of the club and the, uh, other distraction in his pants right now, but Eddie was part of one of the last generations of soldiers that got taught morse-code before the army started phasing it out, so while the amplitude of the oscillations in his pocket may not gather much interest of his, the pattern does.

Long-short-short-short.  

It’s a remnant of Buck and Chris's brief morse-code phase – they’d spent about a week communicating in nothing but arrhythmic beeps and hums, neither of them actually understanding the other unless they tempered themselves to a painfully sluggish speed. When Buck had found out that it was possible to change the pattern of the notification vibrations of their phones, he and Chris had immediately taken to updating all of the contact-specific notifications in Buck’s, and, inexplicably, Eddie’s phone.

Long story short, long-short-short-short means that Buck just sent him a message, and the only thing that perhaps would’ve gotten Eddie to dig his phone out of his pocket faster would’ve been Chris’s long-short-long-short. 

The tension taking over his body doesn’t go unnoticed – Nate breaks their kiss, draws away, putting almost a foot of distance between them. A questioning look in his eyes, he blinks at Eddie as if to ask what’s wrong. 

“Just– got a text. One sec.”

Eddie pulls out his phone, and the first thing Nate gets to see when it lights up is the message why did you turn off your location share? plastered across his lock-screen, that is, a picture of Chris and Buck at the zoo from when Chris would still let Buck pick him up. 

Immediately, Nate steps back completely, running a hand through his disheveled hair.

“Shit, you got a boyfriend?”

“No, no,” Eddie replies, waving Nate off as he dismisses the notification to lower the chances of accidentally tapping on it and opening not just the chat, but with it an entire can of worms he does not want to deal with semi-drunk. Nate, Eddie notices once he looks up, doesn’t seem entirely convinced. 

“He’s…” Eddie stares off into the distance, scratches his head. How can he even explain who Buck is? “He’s… it’s…” Eddie groans. “I don’t know. He’s the most important person I know, and I’m in love with him, but he’s got a boyfriend and he doesn’t even know I’m gay. His actual boyfriend’s kind of a dick, but that shouldn’t matter, right? He’d be off way worse with me. But yeah, anyway, definitely not my boyfriend. ” He feels vaguely embarrassed at just dumping all that on some stranger, until he runs his own words back in his head and realizes the confusion coloring Nate's face is not owed to the content of Eddie’s rambles, but the fact that he drifted off into Spanish. Oops.

Nate narrows his eyes, blinks a couple times. Then, with an atrocious accent, he asks, “¿Complicado?”

Eddie barks out a laugh. “Sí,” he replies, “muy complicado.”

“But you’re not, like, cheating on him, right?”

“I wish,” Eddie says, then cringes at his phrasing. “I mean– if he was my boyfriend I certainly wouldn’t be out here.”  

Nate gives him a considering look-over and seems to deem his answer satisfactory. He steps a little closer again, bites his lip. “Do you wanna…” – he makes a rather crude gesture that gets a little snort out of Eddie – “or is the mood kinda ruined now?”

A wry smile tugs at the corner of Eddie’s lips. “I got a feeling I won't exactly be able to keep my mind off him.”

Nate casually braces an arm on the wall right above Eddie’s shoulder, halfway back to caging him in. He tilts his head slightly. The glow of a nearby neon-sign bathes the left side of his face in an alluring shade of pink, a singular notch of shadow carved by the dimple in his cheek as he grins. “I wouldn't mind you screaming the wrong name. I'm considerate like that.”

Eddie chuckles. “Tempting, but I think it's better if I go home.”

Playfully sighing, Nate withdraws his arm from the wall again. Eddie mourns a little after the heat that leaves with him. It’s better this way though; there’s not much point in continuing this, considering the fire that previously was coursing through his veins has just been expertly extinguished by a singular reminder of who he’s actually burning for. 

“Okay,” Nate says. “Offer still stands though.” He pats his pockets. “In fact,” he adds on, pulling out his own phone, “here’s my number. In case you find yourself looking for company some other night.”

Eddie duly saves Nate’s number, snapping a picture of him in the halflight to add to his contact information for good measure. They make cursory smalltalk as they order their Ubers (turns out Nate’s a diving instructor, who’d’ve thought), but eventually their chatter ebbs off again, because as much as they may seem to have found a match in the physical, they just don’t seem to share that many interests and are definitely not in the right state of mind to carry a proper conversation. 

Sitting on the curb as they’re waiting for their respective rides, Eddie finds his head slowly tipping off to the side until it’s resting on Nate’s shoulder. A content silence stretches between them; quiet companionship, a bit of comfort and calm. It’s nice, for as long as it lasts, a bubble of peace shielding them against the noise of the occasional car passing by.

“So what’s he like?” Nate asks eventually, head leaning against Eddie’s. 

“Hm?”

“The guy you’re pining after.”

Involuntarily, Eddie smiles. Thinking of Buck just seems to have that effect on him. 

“Best person I know,” he says, knowing just how much he sounds like a sap. “He’s got a heart the size of the pacific ocean and I’m one of the lucky fish allowed to swim in it. He’s always been there for me. Saved my life when I was shot on the job. Takes care of my son like he’s his own, which he honestly kind of is at this point. He’s just… amazing. Sometimes he gets it in his head that he doesn’t matter and it’s just so infuriating because he’s everything, he just doesn’t see it, and I wish I could shake some sense into him. But, you know, I can’t really say anything.”

“Yeah…” Nate yawns, nodding solemnly. “In love with a straight guy. We’ve all been there.”

Eddie frowns before he remembers that Nate didn’t catch anything of what he said earlier.

“He’s not straight.”

Nate’s head snaps up from Eddie’s shoulder. He’s staring at Eddie like he just told him that the sun rises in the north, actually. “What?”

“My friend,” Eddie clarifies. He’s bi.”

Nate gapes at him. 

“Dude, what are you waiting for?”

Eddie chuckles weakly, shakes his head. “He’s got a boyfriend and I’m… a total mess.” 

This apparently doesn’t satisfy Nate, whose bafflement in fact only seems to increase, judging from the way his brows twist together. “Who the fuck cares, man, go and bag your guy. This is, like, disney-level shit. I doubt the dude he’s dating is more of a smokeshow than you.”

“It’s just– He’s so important, you know? I can’t afford to fuck this up.”

“So you’re just gonna do nothing?” Nate asks, seeming almost personally offended.

Before Eddie can get into the intricacies of why it would be a bad idea for him and Buck to get together, Nate’s phone goes off with the notification that his uber’s here. 

“You’re an idiot,” Nate says, shaking his head as he rises. “Anyway, you’ve got my number. I'm not above being a heartache booty-call. Though I hope you don’t need it.”

He flashes Eddie a last smile, winks, and then slides into the backseat of the sleek black car that’s come to pick him up. Eddie watches it disappear into the night. Then he’s alone. 

Well, not really alone, there’s still the occasional passerby and the dull thump of the club off in the distance, but it’s alone enough. For a moment, Nate’s words echo around his head, but he shakes them loose. There’s no point in dwelling on them. Nate didn’t have all relevant context information; he can’t assess the situation properly. 

Eddie checks his phone, if just to take his mind off things, carefully avoiding the string of texts he’s gotten from Buck as he navigates his way to go read the message Hen’s sent him declaring that she and Karen have made it home. He informs her that his uber’s on the way as well and that he won’t be splitting the cost with anyone. She sends him a heart and doesn’t ask any follow-up questions, just reminds him to check in when he’s back in his own four walls.

For a second, his thumb hovers over his chat with Buck, weakness seeping from his traitorous heart into the blood in his arteries. Before it reaches vessels in his hand and he does something stupid like hit Buck with the all-time classic drunk love-confession text, Eddie opens Instagram instead. 

There, he gets to see a picture of Buck and Tommy, hands locked across a candle-lit table at some fancy restaurant. Not exactly the distraction he was hoping for. However, like a car crash, he can’t look away, keeps staring at the picture even though it makes him feel cheated in a way that’s really not merited. There’s an itch at the back of his mind that he’s been resolutely ignoring for a good while now. Here, in the comfort of the residual alcohol coursing through his veins, he finds he can finally look at it head-on. 

It’s just all so stupid – maybe, if Eddie had blown his life up a little earlier, he wouldn’t be sitting here alone right now. If he’d had his shit figured out a month or two sooner, he could be the guy across from Buck, holding his hand. He reminds himself that that’s not what he wants – Buck’s supposed to stay happy – but in the veil of the night, it’s easier to let himself indulge in the thought. 

Matter of time he started thinking about it, anyway. He reckons it’s been nagging at him before he really knew that it did. Maybe all that bitterness toward Tommy is just repackaged resentment for his own fucked up timing. Maybe he can just shout that out into the world and get it out of his system. Maybe then he can be back to normal again. 

He stares at his phone, contemplating. Technically, his last entry was before midnight, which means that if he were to make another right now, it wouldn’t be his second today. A small victory, he supposes. 

With humiliating habituality, he pulls up the map. 

You told me you couldn't stop thinking about him, he writes, and I didn't understand why I hated that so much. Later you said that all it took for you to understand yourself was him kissing you. For a moment I wondered what you’d have done if I had kissed you. Maybe if I had, I would have you now. I said that you coming out wouldn't change anything between us and I think I already knew back then that I was telling a lie. 

He sends it off and closes the map. No point in looking at it. No point in looking back as a whole, really. He can’t change what happened, can’t force that past version of himself to get his shit together quicker. 

Would he even want that? 

Okay, stupid question, obviously he wants it, to such a degree it genuinely turns his stomach sometimes, but should he want it? Shouldn’t he want what’s best for everyone involved? Shouldn't he be over this already? Shouldn't he–

Another long-short-short-short rips him out of his trance and has him staring at the messages accumulating on his lockscreen again. 

Between the ‘ where are you?’ s and ‘ are you okay?’ s, it doesn’t take a genius to realize that Buck’s getting himself worked up about this. He’s probably about ten minutes away from putting out a missing report. Eddie can see it in his mind’s eye, Buck alone in the loft, calling everyone they know to find out if they can tell him Eddie’s whereabouts, growing more worried by the minute.

Helplessly, Eddie opens their chat. 

The three dots indicating that Buck’s typing appear, disappear, reappear, and disappear again, the cycle repeating for about thirty seconds until the message ‘ ????’ graces Eddie’s screen, quickly followed by ‘ eddie is that you??’.

Yes, he writes back, everything’s fine. Omw home. Stop worrying. 

Buck’s typing again, but thankfully Eddie’s uber arrives before he’s finished, allowing him to be a coward and turn off his phone completely before he has to read another heartbreakingly concerned message. 

Staring out the window, he quietly wishes he was just a little more brave. 

*

Eddie wakes up on his couch, feeling like his head is being split open by a halligan. The sunlight streaming in through the windows assails his eyes with vicious intensity once he tries to open them, punching a pained groan out of him. Yeah, he’s never touching a drop of alcohol in his life ever again. 

Once he’s found the will inside himself to try and reclaim his sense of sight again, he blinks a couple times and finds he must either be dreaming, or still pretty drunk, because instead of the off-white of his ceiling, he’s staring up into the deep blue of Buck’s eyes.

“Buck?” he blurts out, voice uncomfortably hoarse with sleep and dehydration. “ What are you doing here?”

“You can’t just do that,” Buck replies, nonsensically. 

“Do what?” 

Buck throws up his arms and steps out of Eddie's field of vision. “Disappear! You–you could have been mugged, or kidnapped, or bleeding out in some alley and I wouldn’t have known!”  

Eddie tries to turn his head to see where Buck’s wandering off to, but the moment he does, a painful crick in his neck decides to make itself known, denying him the needed range of movement. So, with another outpouring of groans, Eddie starts taking stock of his limbs so he can get to work on transitioning into an upright position. There’s a vague ache haunting his muscles, dull and weary. From somewhere off to Eddie’s right, Buck’s voice gets distant, then closer again. 

“No one had any idea where you were, I would’ve had nothing to go off to find you,” Buck rants as Eddie wrestles with the bout of nausea overcoming him once he lifts his back from the couch and aligns shoulders with hips again. 

“Not to mention the alcohol – Eddie you could have suffocated on your own vomit, and if I hadn’t kept an eye on you no one would have been there to help!”

“You watched me sleep?” Eddie asks, squinting up at Buck, who doesn’t dignify the question with a response, instead setting a glass of water and an aspirin on the couch table with a gentleness that seems near incompatible with the tone of his voice. 

“I just– I don’t understand, ” he says when he’s got his face turned to Eddie again, expression equal parts desperate and exasperated. “All of a sudden you don’t answer my texts for hours at a time and if you do, it’s to cancel on our plans, at the station you act like I’m not even there, and now this? Eddie, did I do something wrong?”

No, Eddie wants to say, never. I just can’t look at you without loving you and that scares me. Instead he pops the aspirin and takes slow sips of the water because he knows Buck won’t fault him for staying quiet if Eddie’s letting him take care of him as compensation. He needs a moment to collect himself, shed as much of the morning rawness as possible before he says something he can’t take back.

Buck watches like a hawk as Eddie takes his due time finishing the glass, gaze trained noticeably less on Eddie’s face than the bob of his throat, as if there’s more truth to be found in it than in Eddie’s eyes. Maybe he’s not too far off about that. Eventually, once Eddie’s set the glass back on the table with a dull clink , their eyes meet again. 

“I’m worried about you Eddie,” Buck says, a brittle quality to the tone of his voice. 

Eddie sighs, pinches the bridge of his nose. “I’m fine, okay? I just got a headache.”

“You’re closing off again. I-I don’t know how to reach you when you get like this.”

Eddie looks up, and Buck looks… scared. Eddie can’t blame him for it. He’s feeling a bit scared himself, if he’s being honest. 

“I promise, Buck. I’m doing okay. I was just out for the night.”

“Then why did you turn off your location?” Buck presses. 

Eddie drops his head into his hands, groaning. He can’t budge. He’s caught in the worst of dilemmas, because there’s no way to get out of this without hurting Buck in one way or another; either Eddie refuses to answer and he will feel left out, or Eddie tells him the truth and everything they are will come crashing down. The end of everything, right here in Eddie’s living room.

He’s got no choice, really.

“I just wanted some privacy,” he grits out, peering up through the spaces in between his fingers.

Buck recoils like he’s been struck. “Y-you said we were cool,” he stammers, expression crumpled.

Eddie pulls his hands from his face, tenses them into fists once he realizes they were on their way to cradle Buck’s despairing face. 

“And we are, I swear, I was just drunk and stupid and…” he sighs, massaging his temples in a desperate attempt to alleviate the pressure of the headache building behind his eyes. 

There’s so much swirling around in his brain, guilt, desire, desperation, all only amplified by the way Buck’s looking at him, raw and vulnerable. Eddie wants to reach out, put the pieces of Buck back together by hand if necessary, but he’s got no damn right to do it, not when he can’t even be honest with the man, can’t even fix this problem, not to mention the landslide of further ones awaiting them if he lets enough slip to kick it off. 

He’s got to salvage this. Make a relief cut to let some of the pressure out. 

Eddie takes a deep breath. Or, well, ‘deep’ is relative, his diaphragm is still way too tense to allow for an actual deep breath, but it’s deeper than the ones he took before. Half a deep breath is better than nothing, he reckons. And… it’s the same all around, isn’t it? Having half of something is better than having nothing. Hell, Eddie’s whole life’s made up of half-things; half a son, half a Buck, half a sane mind to cling to, and Eddie knows from experience that not getting as much as you want of these things is leagues better than getting nothing at all.  

Half a truth, he wagers, must also be better than nothing. 

Eddie chooses his words carefully, lines them up in his head until he’s sure the sentence he’s constructing is airtight as can be, no leaks or hangnails to get caught on in sight. Then he speaks. 

“I’m… working through something in therapy right now. And it’s honestly been taking a lot out of me. I promise that everything’s fine, I just… need a moment, you know?”

It isn’t much, but it’s something. Buck’s edges seem to knit together a little again. 

“You and therapy still aren’t on the best of terms, huh?” he jokes, but Eddie can tell from just the rasp of his voice that his heart’s not actually in it. 

Still, Eddie takes the out, huffs, draws up his eyebrows. “Yeah. I was starting to hope that maybe Frank was the problem, but with the way it looks…”

Buck bites his lip, features settling into a more serious expression again.

“You know, y-you can talk to me about it. If– If that’s easier, I mean. Maybe it would help to–”

“No.”

No way in fucking hell. 

A crease between Buck’s brows again, the twitch of a nostril. His voice, ever so cautious and concerned. 

“Eddie, are you sure?” 

It’s an offer, Eddie knows. A last hand stretched out. He declines it all the same. 

“Hundred percent.”

There’s something behind Buck’s eyes that just… sort of shuts down at that. He doesn’t let it show as obviously as he did earlier, but Eddie can tell. A shutter that just drew closed. Whether Eddie’s behind that shutter, or the person pulling the strings, or maybe the shutter itself, he doesn’t know. It kind of hurts to look at; Buck wasn’t made to be closed off, shut out. 

But… maybe it’s better if that shutter stays closed. At least for today. So Eddie can get back to a regular human state of existence before he has to watch his tongue as much as usual again. 

That’s why, when Eddie sees a flicker of light break through in the form of a mouth hesitantly pulling open, lungs filling with air, he shuts it down.

“I’m going to go sleep off the hangover now, okay?” he says, hoping it’s enough of a sign for Buck to understand that this discussion is over. That he can go home. 

“Okay,” says Buck, showing absolutely no intention to leave. 

They stare at each other, and for a split moment, they’ve got a real Mexican standoff at their hands; Buck seems to have sniffed out Eddie’s bluff, knows he’s not actually going to try to get anymore shuteye if he’s left alone. If Eddie lets himself get called out on it, they’re going to have to do this whole talk about talking to each other again, only this time without a convenient out. 

“You can go, you know,” Eddie says. “I’m not at risk of choking in my sleep anymore.”

“I know,” Buck replies. 

There’s tension building between them, reinforcing the dull pounding behind Eddie’s eyes with every second that it stays. Buck rarely gets like this. Curt, an undercurrent of annoyance and defiance growing with every word unspoken. They could have a full-blown fight at their hands, if Eddie just wanted it. 

He doesn’t, of course. He wants peace, Buck’s arms around himself. But he knows he can’t have that, so he needs to take the next best thing he can get. And if that’s Buck, sitting in his living room like a pissed-off guard dog, then that’s just what it’ll be. 

So, instead of making a scene, Eddie relents, trudges to his room and lies down in his bed, eyes open and facing the ceiling as he tries to quell the ever-present urge to go and ask Buck to join him. 

When he emerges after four sleepless hours, Buck is still there. So is the tension, lingering around them like the stench of smoke after a long call. It stays, even when Buck begrudgingly leaves an hour later, settles in Eddie’s muscles with a sense of foreboding, a bowstring drawn tight. 

*

Things come to a head two days later. Eddie has no excuse for it – he should have expected something like this to happen. 

Danger is just another part of the job. They all know that, have to be prepared for it. There is always a chance that their path into a burning building is a one way street. That they’ll never set foot outside of it ever again. 

It’s the kind of grim reality you have to accept in order to be able to sleep at night; if you can’t face the fact every call might be your last, then you aren’t cut out to be a firefighter. Eddie finds this part to be, well, not easy per se, but certainly manageable. 

Bearing the knowledge that this same reality extends to the rest of his team as well, that’s another pair of shoes. In the end, they’ve all made the calculation for themselves and came to the conclusion to stay in this line of work, and that should be enough – it isn’t, of course, but it has to be.  

It comes down to trust; of them, and of himself. Eddie trusts his teammates to know their limits and the risks they’re taking. He trusts himself to help minimize the danger they find themselves in and be ready to make difficult decisions under pressure. Theoretically, all of that applies to Buck, too. In practice, there’s a different kind of edge to knowing Buck’s life is on the line as well when they’re budding shoulders on their way headfirst into danger.

It’s not that Eddie can’t handle watching Buck get himself into threatening situations. Lord knows, the sight is anything but unfamiliar to him. Buck has tangoed with death on plenty occasions; Eddie is there to make sure they don’t get too friendly with each other. 

It’s the moments when he isn’t there that scare him. 

Like today, when Eddie just about makes his way out of a collapsing deathtrap of a burning building, kid in his arms, and realizes that Buck isn’t behind him. 

Immediately, a primeval kind of panic flares in the confines of his chest. Just a minute ago, they were on each other’s heels, sharing a concerned look when Bobby told them to evacuate at once. This is a five-alarm, not a measly kitchen fire – there is no way in hell Buck would loiter about. 

He deposits the child in a nearby paramedic’s care, barely taking the time to catch his breath before storming off again, because he hears Bobby’s voice on his radio, going ‘Firefighter Buckley, respond’ and every second of silence following the transmission painfully digs into Eddie’s skin like a knife. He’s counting again, like a prisoner carving notches into his bed frame, praying that this time the number will be inconsequential, that he’ll have forgotten it in a week’s time because it merely marked the span of his own distress, and not the unthinkable. 

He’s right on track to the front door, sprinting at an unrelenting pace, when Hen steps in his way. Eddie slams into her full force, the both of them tumbling to the soot-covered ground in a flail of limbs. A faint notion of regret and sympathy for the bruises she no doubt just took upon himself to stop him passes through Eddie’s mind, quickly drowned out by the knee-jerk spike of anger flooding his senses. 

There’s no time for this, not even time to yell at Hen for slowing him down, so Eddie bites his tongue as he tries to scramble off the ground, to no avail: Hen’s got him trapped in a fucking bear hug, grip vice-like around his midriff, even as Eddie kicks and swipes at her like a wild animal. 

“Let me go!” Eddie shouts, only half-aware of how deranged he probably sounds, winded and tripped up on adrenaline as he is. 

“So you can run in there and get yourself killed?” Hen’s voice is audibly strained with the tension of keeping her muscles tight as a coil around Eddie’s body. Still, she shows no signs of relenting. 

“I need to go get him!”

Eddie starts clawing at her hands, trying to pull them apart from where they’ve locked around his waist. He can feel the hysteria rising in his chest, the beat of his heart getting louder in his ears, as the seconds keep passing; they’re in triple digits now, which means they’ve entered the danger zone because Buck not responding after over a minute has passed is utterly unthinkable.

Stomach-turning fear claws up Eddie’s throat, tears a frustrated scream out of him as he strengthens his grip around Hen’s hands yet again, feeling less sorry about potentially hurting her to get to Buck with every tick of the invisible clock in his mind. 

“Eddie, I can’t let you in there,” Hen grits out, persevering despite the undoubtedly painful pressure he must be putting on her wrists by now. 

“Firefighter Buckley, respond,” Eddie’s radio goes again. In the distance, Eddie can hear another part of the building collapse as the roof caves under the heat and fervor of the flames. 

“Please, Hen,” he cries out, voice breaking painfully as his desperation takes over completely, “ please, I have to go in there!”

“I’m sorry, Eddie, you know–” 

Before Hen can finish her sentence, their radios crackle to life once again, and they both involuntarily hold their breath to listen to Chim’s call-out. 

“Cap, I’ve got him! Got himself some bumps and bruises and a banged up radio, but otherwise he seems fine.”

Hen’s hands loosen and Eddie’s up and running before either of them can say anything more. He doesn’t even know where exactly he’s sprinting off to – the last time he saw Chim was three hours ago when they were both taking a short break, so he hasn’t even got the slightest clue what direction he should take, but there’s a nauseating pull in his gut, and Eddie puts all his trust in it to lead him to Buck. 

Because, despite all his disbelief in anything and everything supernatural, Eddie can’t deny the feeling that there just might be something between him and Buck teetering on the edge to the incomprehensible, strings connecting them woven into the fabric of the universe, a line securing them that no knife can cut. 

It’s an utterly irrational thought, one that Eddie usually doesn’t give much heed to, but against his better judgment, it seems it might be proven right once again – somehow, his feet have led him straight down the path to his desired destination. He can make out Chimney, at least, and when he shouts Buck’s name, he sees a blond head of hair turn in his direction. 

Finally, Eddie lays eyes on Buck. He’s still in his turnouts, dirty and rumpled, and there’s something bundled up in his arms, a shivering mess of matted fur – a dog, Eddie realizes, once he’s made it to them. 

As Eddie takes in the sight of the animal, Buck smiles up at him, his breathing labored, face smeared with soot and grime. He looks so fragile, so mortal, and it breaks Eddie inside. 

He could've died, just now. He would've just been gone. Because of a damn dog.

It shouldn’t surprise him, and it doesn’t, not really, because this is just how Buck is, always ready to risk his own life to save another, but it still feels like a blow to the gut, because on some level, this is Eddie’s fault – six damn years, and apparently he’s still not made clear enough, how much he needs Buck to look out for himself, how important Buck’s own safety is, and God how he wants to do that, tell him right now, but the words are all tangled up in other, so very selfish confessions, he finds he can’t force them out. 

There’s so many vulnerable things trying to weep out of the cracks forming in his resolve, confessions and pleas of an unveilingly desperate nature, and he can’t let any of them show, not if he wants to keep up this facade for the best of them both, stop them from collapsing in on themselves like the ruined house behind them. All those wretched words, gathering like water in a leaky basin, level rising until it’s up to Eddie’s throat, filling up his lungs, drowning out his thoughts, all while he’s trying to keep all the fractures and fissures sealed, hands hopelessly pressing them closed, but it’s not enough, it’s not enough. 

He can feel water dripping down his fingers, running down his arms, tears of it racing down his body to pool at his feet, it’s all overflowing, rushing past, but he’s got to keep it in, has to press tighter, force it closed, up the pressure until–

something

breaks. 

It erupts out of him so unwillingly, so utterly and completely despite himself, Eddie does not even register it as coming out of his own mouth at first.  

“Seriously Buck? All that for a fucking dog?”

Immediately, the light in Buck’s eyes dims. 

Eddie drags a hand across his face. “I can't believe– you could have gotten killed!”

“I-I couldn't just leave him,” Buck stutters, grasping the animal a little tighter as his expression balances on the tipping point between remorseful and rebellious. 

“So you were ready to die alongside him? What kind of an idiot –” 

“Eddie,” Chim interrupts him, “how about we leave the shouting for after we get Buck here checked out for head injuries?” 

It returns him to his senses like a slap in the face – what the hell is he doing? 

Those words he just threw at Buck are foreign to his own ears; he doesn’t want to chew Buck out for this, that’s not what anyone needs right now or ever. Eddie isn’t angry at Buck, not about something like this, never about something like this, it’s just– he just needed to get something out, before he exploded, right? But in his attempt to relieve the pressure of the worry that had built up inside him like blood in the muscle tissue surrounding a broken bone, he made everything so, so much worse, turned a closed fracture into a mess of an open, gushing wound. 

Every apology he tries to come up with as Chim checks Buck over is either too little or far too much, Eddie jumping to extremes like a keyed up metronome. He’s a fractured mess, parts balancing precariously on one another, just a wisp away from total collapse. 

Eventually, they get Buck loaded into the ambulance despite his repeated insistence that he’s totally fine; Eddie has no idea if it’s the right call, hasn’t been mentally present for most of the examination. Hen joins them, their whole team having been relieved off duty for the rest of the night after working overtime for almost the entire duration of this call. 

The ride to the hospital is silent, tension thick between them all. Buck keeps sending Eddie looks, turning more from apologetic to angry with every mile they put behind them. Eddie keeps his mouth shut the entire way, doesn’t say a single thing as Buck’s admitted, silently settles in the waiting room as the others wander off to find a snack to eat or call a loved one, all because he has no idea what dangerous words might come pouring out of him if he gives them the chance. 

Sitting around, waiting for Buck to be released, Eddie tries to mend the cracks splitting him open. Calm the storm raging inside of him. 

He’s… it’s just…

Watching Buck just come back from things like these like nothing significant happened is just so… well of course it’s not exactly bad, Eddie doesn’t want Buck to suffer from them, but it’s also so glaringly frustrating, because he keeps getting himself into the same situations over and over again, even though Eddie’s tried to tell him in every way possible to him just how important he is, how essential, how invaluable and utterly indispensable, and he’s got nothing short of the nuclear option left to try. 

Not that he’s ever going to do that – hell, Eddie apparently can’t even bring himself to utter the words he used to say. Now that he knows his own true intention, the deep-rooted feelings in his chest serving as foundation for all the reassurances and declarations of need, their syllables feel infinitely more heavy on his tongue.

Eddie can’t tell Buck what seeing him regard himself like that does to him. If he puts it in plain words, it’s almost a confession in and of itself. He really has no idea how neither of them saw it before; Eddie supposes he was willfully blind, only ever looking at what he was saying out of the corner of his eye, not ready for the wealth of implications and fears a true understanding of what was going on would bring with itself. The consequences. 

But at least he was able to say it – now his tongue’s all twisted by this messed up, convoluted moral conundrum that he’s gotten tangled up in ever since he decided to make it his top priority not to tip this thing they’ve built between each other out of its fickle balance. A real ‘lesser of two evils’ dilemma, one that somehow ends with the lesser evil ironically causing drastically more imminent harm than the greater because Eddie’s managed to back his way into a Catch-22 situation where he can’t calmly tell Buck how much he is valued by the people around him anymore. How Eddie’s really just concerned about the way Buck regards himself when it comes to the tough spots he finds himself in. How he’s not sure acting like nothing happened at all is the best way for Buck to deal with his close calls. 

There is also, of course, the selfish reason why Eddie has an issue with Buck moving on from his near death experiences this swiftly. 

He can’t ever bring that one up, because it’s not fair, is entirely his own problem and not Buck’s responsibility to deal with. And it’s also– it’s stupid, really, mildly inconvenient at most, nothing to make an entire thing out of, and Eddie should just– he should forget it. 

But he kind of… can’t. It taunts him, every time he comes across it. By all means, it shouldn’t bother him at all – Eddie’s not superstitious, knows that none of it means anything, it’s just a random assortment of digits, but– but he also can’t leave videos paused on the number. It’s wrong. 

You see, some part of Eddie’s still standing at the bottom of that ladder, staring up at Buck suspended in the air, body unmoving except for the sway of the wind.

Sometimes, he swears he can still feel the rain whipping in his face, hear the ringing in his ears, feel his nerves burning with both the energy of the conductive lightning strike the doctors will later tell him he suffered and the adrenaline coursing through his veins. 

It’s a cruel sort of irony – Buck got the brunt of the strike, Eddie just the pared-down version, but somehow the Lichtenberg figures on Buck’s skin disappeared in the following two months, while the ones that had carved their way through Eddie’s insides have yet to lighten.

In some way, the memory carries the bitter aftertaste of a missed chance – Buck was dead, and for the moment so were the countless things Eddie had never gotten to say, the days they’d never gotten to spend together, and even though Buck was returned to him, it took a long while to convince himself that so were those moments. 

Sometimes, especially on days like these, he fears that maybe death’s come to collect Buck once and for all, leaving Eddie with a hefty overdue charge and a hole of grief in his chest that no earthly thing could ever fill again. Just thinking about it gets him twitchy, fingers of his right hand tapping on his chair, leg cramping up whenever he forces it to stop bouncing. 

It’s embarrassing how quickly he yields and opens the map on his phone. 

It's just– there's no one else to tell. He's already unloaded enough on Karen and Hen, and he’s got plenty of other shit to work through in therapy; he’s not going to give either Frank or Esther more ammunition. 

Marker placed at the spot the ladder truck stood, Eddie’s staring at an empty textfield, biting the inside of his cheek as he tries to come up with words that come even close to what he felt. 

In the end, he closes his eyes and sees Buck’s face, slack and lifeless, raindrops catching in his eyelashes as Eddie breaks rib after rib trying to force nature to follow his command. 

Eyes blinking open again, he begins to type. 

I watched you die and it was as though with your heartbeat, the world stopped. I counted every second until your pulse picked up again. If it hadn’t, I don’t think I ever would have stopped counting. Every second spent on this earth without you there was entirely empty. I’m not sure I would survive it if you were truly gone. Not wholly, at least. A part of my soul will always follow you, anywhere and everywhere you go, even if it is to your grave. 

Heart heavy, he sends it off and tries to just breathe for a moment. Painstakingly relaxes his body one exhale at a time, climbing from the toes upward until he reaches the crown of his head. 

Slowly, the pressure behind his eyes abates and the static in his ears quiets. 

As if she sensed his current state of relative emotional regulation, Hen enters the room right when Eddie’s run out of fancy therapy grounding tricks. 

She quietly settles on the uncomfortable plastic chair next to his, handing one of the two paper cups she’s holding over to Eddie. She doesn’t say a word while he sips away at his coffee, just keeps her probing gaze on Eddie as he continues staring straight ahead at the wall in front of him. 

“I’m sorry,” Hen says eventually, after Eddie’s folded the empty cup in half as many times as physically possible. “But for the record – I’d have done the same thing if I hadn’t known, okay?”

Eddie stays silent. He knows he’ll forgive her eventually, but he’s not there quite yet. That’s childish, maybe, but considering the tone of voice Hen chose for this conversation mirrors one that Eddie’s heard her take with Denny and Mara, he figures it’s only fair he plays his part. 

Hen sighs. “I don’t know what’s going on with you Eddie, but I know it’s a hell of a lot more than you try to let on. You know you don’t have to do this alone, right? You can share the load. We’re not just friends for bar crawls and team barbecues.”

Eddie’s thought about that. Sharing the load. But there’s no real point to it, is there? It just comes back, with double the force. Settles on his shoulders with a damning sort of finality. The question isn’t about whether or not he’ll be crushed by it; it’s about what’s going to give first: his back, or the ground beneath his feet. 

There’s one person who keeps trying to take that weight off his shoulders, of course. Holds Eddie up when his knees risk buckling. The one good thing still right there, weathering the storm with him. And Eddie keeps hurting him for it. 

He drops his head into his hands, knocks it against the balls of his thumbs. 

Hen reaches for him, fingers ghosting over his back, probably unsure of whether a real touch would mend or splinter him. 

“Eddie? Talk to me. What’s going on in that head of yours?”

“It's just… I don’t know who I am becoming,” he confesses.

“What?”

He turns his head to look up at her, hands shielding his face as if they could hide his shame. “When I saw him, I just… exploded. I– I’ve never yelled at him for something like this. I don’t want to be that person. I am not that person.” 

A sad sort of compassion twists Hen’s features. “You two have always had a habit of reacting… not all that rationally when the other is in danger.”

Eddie laughs, bitterly. “That’s no excuse. I can’t be another person that chews him out for this stuff, I just–” he breaks off, sighs, lets himself drop against the backrest of his chair. “I just can’t take it when he gets like this. What do I have to do to finally make him understand? ”

Hen sends him a sympathetic smile. “I have a feeling you won’t like my answer,” she says.

Eddie huffs, presses his lips together as he nods softly. 

“Yeah,” he replies, “I don’t think I would.”

They sit in silence for a little while longer, until he can hear Hen gather her breath to say something. She does it with a calm and steady sort of build up, the same way he’s seen her get ready to lift rubble off of a victim, lever a particularly crushed car open with a halligan. 

It’s something he has to appreciate, no matter how little he likes what she has to say – she treats it with the same sort of gravity she knows he ascribes to it. 

“Just… would it really be such a bad thing?” she asks, expression carefully neutral, only the hint of a slant to her brow.

Eddie looks over to her, forlorn and lost for words. 

Doubt rears its head in his chest, coiling around his ribcage like a snake, blunt teeth scraping against the bone of his ribs as if it's sharpening them in preparation for its final assault. 

“Yes,” he says, unsure if he fully believes it. 

*

Buck gets discharged with a clean bill of health. He’s a little banged up, but after a good night's rest he should be good as new. He won’t look at Eddie on their way out of the hospital though, his eyes dead-set on the glass doors of the exit. And when Eddie stops on the way to the parking lot so he can order an Uber for them, Buck just marches on. It takes Eddie calling out his name twice for him to finally stop. 

Tension grips Buck’s shoulders still, Eddie can tell from the way they’re bunched together and barely moving with every breath Buck takes. His hands are grasping at nothing at the sides of his body, and the muscles of his neck are carved from stone. 

There’s a choice to be made here, the two of them ten feet apart, Buck’s back turned to Eddie, holding out for just a moment, giving Eddie a chance. A pause on the path away from him, one that would undoubtedly lead Buck to a different home, a different bed, a different man. 

If Eddie wants this thing between them to die, he could kill it now. 

Say nothing, let Buck leave. Keep up the distance he's been building for the past week, let it stretch out further and further until whatever still connects them snaps. Stomp out the last remaining sparks threatening to set flame to the foundation of who they are and strangle whatever left-over doubt and want has curled up around his heart. 

But killing this would be to kill them, as well. 

And Eddie knows he could survive losing Buck to someone else – a part of him would make it, at least. He could function, still. But he’s not sure he’d survive cutting Buck out of his chest like this. Not when it would hurt the both of them. Not when to do it he has to cut Buck first. 

He just hasn’t got the guts to do it the hard way. Sure, this means he’ll have to get infinitely better at keeping his head down, shutting his mouth. But what’s a hundred years of silence? Hell, a thousand? Eddie would rather tear out his own tongue than lose Buck like this. 

There’s a choice to be made here, but when Eddie looks close enough, it isn’t much of a choice at all. 

He crosses the distance. 

Eddie puts a hand on Buck’s shoulder and feels it go slack underneath his fingers. 

“I’m sorry,” he says. “I shouldn’t have lashed out.”

Buck turns his head, just a bit, just enough so Eddie can see how his eyebrows are drawn together, how his mouth is opened the slightest sliver so he can draw his breath through his teeth. 

“I was being an idiot,” he continues, “and just really fucking worried for a moment there.”

Eyes opening a little wider, blinking up from the ground, the hint of a blue iris.

“Doesn’t excuse how I acted, but I needed you to know.”

Buck’s voice comes out a little raspier than normal; whether that’s due to how he’s feeling or just a result of all the smoke he’s inhaled today, Eddie can’t say. “It’s… it’s okay. I, uh, I guess it was kind of dumb to risk it all for a dog.”

Eddie’s hand squeezes tighter on Buck’s shoulder, almost unconsciously so. He pulls a little bit, nudges Buck to turn toward him so Eddie can look him in the eyes. An overwhelming wave of relief washes over him when Buck follows his lead. 

Their eyes lock, and Eddie presses his thumb into Buck’s clavicle until he can be sure that they both know they’re real. “Buck,” he says, for the first time in weeks not unsure of his words, because he knows they have to be spoken, whether he likes it or not. “I don’t want you to stop caring. The fact that you stayed in there for a damn dog? That’s what makes you you . Would I like you to keep a bit more of an eye out for yourself? Sure. But I wasn’t mad at you for what happened. I think I was… mad at myself. For letting it happen. I’m your partner –  it’s my job to look out for you, and I screwed up.”

Most of the tension eases out of Buck’s expression, but not all; there’s still that slight flare to his nose, a barely noticeable pinch between his brows. He needs a little more than this, and Eddie knows he has to give it to him. 

“I’ve … been screwing up for a while now, I think,” he admits. “I’ve been all up in my head these past few weeks, with Chris, and therapy and everything, and I’ve been acting a bit like a dick. I’m sorry.”

The beginnings of an earnest smile paint Buck’s face, softening edges and lightening shadows, like sun breaking through a blanket of clouds. He’s devastatingly beautiful. 

“Okay,” he answers. “I just– I need you to talk to me, Eddie. Whatever’s going on, I’m here for you. Do it in your own time, but do it, okay?”

Eddie melts in the warmth of his gaze. There’s love there, devotion, and Eddie wants it too much to look away. He’s not going to say yes, won’t lie to Buck like that, but maybe he doesn’t have to. “C’me here,” he says, beckoning Buck closer with a nod of his head so he can pull him into a hug. 

It seems enough, the two of them drawing each other close in the middle of the sidewalk as if someone walking by might wash them away. The smell of Buck’s conditioner eases the tension out of Eddie’s muscles until he’s soft and pliant in Buck’s arms, nose pressed into the crook of his neck as they hold onto one another. This can be enough. 

*

Eddie brings Buck home. Eddie's home, that is, but the distinction hardly matters if all it would take to have it breaking down is a single question, a word, hell, a glance from Buck. It’s too close, too dangerous for his liking, but he’ll just have to deal with that. 

They order takeout for dinner, watch some stupid TV show, and then make up the couch, fighting about who will take it because Buck apparently considers the wound to his pride caused by the suggestion that he might need some softer cushions for the night more grave than those to his body. 

Eddie manages to win eventually, though, sets up tent in the living room as Buck brushes his teeth. When they’ve said their goodnights, Eddie watches as Buck closes the door to his bedroom. Shuts him out. 

It’s masochistic, he knows. But he has to see it. 

Afterwards, he slumps down on the couch, giving himself a moment of pause before he delves into his next exercise in self-flagellation: finally opening the email Esther sent him after their last session. It’s been sitting in his inbox for days now, taunting him. 

Eddie would be lying if he said he hadn’t been tempted to just let it rot there. Never come back to therapy again, either. But that’s a stupid, selfish thought, as the entire last week shows. He went out of his last session with the goal in mind not to cause Buck unnecessary hardships, but somehow managed to spend his week fucking up in ways he never has before. All in all, not that great of a record. 

At the root of all that went wrong this week, he knows, is his sudden and vehement rejection of Buck’s care. He has no idea why he thought it was a good idea to just push Buck away like that, chalks it up to a therapy-induced temporal bout of insanity because he really ought to know better. In the attempt to finally do right by Buck, he was way too radical in the measures he decided to take, should have simply tempered himself to more rigorous self-control; it’s not about stopping Buck from caring at all, but limiting just how much of his capacity Eddie’s taking up. 

So yeah, he can admit he was on the wrong track there. That doesn’t make it any easier to resist the temptation to turn his phone off again when he reads the title of the first article Esther’s attached to her mail. 

‘How to stop feeling like a burden’ , it says. There’s a knee-jerk retort forming in a part of his brain that Eddie guesses was mostly influenced by his parents and catholic school, but he swats away the thought like one would spritz water at an unruly cat before it earnestly crosses his mind. He’s got to stop catastrophizing like that – he doesn’t want to end up in the same damn situation he’s trying to get out of. And if that means telling himself over and over that he’s not a burden until he maybe actually believes it some day, then Eddie will confront his mirror-image with the same persistence of a middle school girl trying to summon Bloody fucking Mary. 

Still, he can’t help pushing back against the article a little bit as he reads it. What’s therapy without a fight, right?

So. 

‘Challenging negative self-talk’. 

Well, Eddie’s actions this past summer have kind of warranted some negative self-talk, but sure, he’ll humor the thought. The article wants him to ‘restructure’ his negative thoughts into positive ones, accept that he can’t do everything on his own, but it’s kinda hard to say ‘It’s okay for me to have needs’ when said ‘needs’ are all so very demanding, require the kind of self-sacrifice that is not fair, not right to ask of a person. The kind of self-sacrifice you shouldn’t accept, even if given. 

Eddie shouldn’t need Buck to hold him up, to step in when the weight is too much for Eddie to carry on his own. Shouldn’t need Buck to give more than he would ever ask for himself. Shouldn’t need Buck to tell him again and again that everything will be okay, until Eddie’s deluded himself into believing him. 

It’s too heavy. Too much. A rotten thing to task someone with. 

And those are just the ‘needs’ that truly qualify as such; there’s a myriad of self-entitled ‘needs’ whirring around Eddie’s head, especially at hours like these, that are in truth just ‘wants’ in thin disguise. Eddie can say he needs to hold Buck close, needs to trace the shape of him with his hands, needs to feel the heat of his bare chest against his own, but that doesn’t make any of it actually necessary for his survival.

Eddie doesn’t need Buck to cradle his face with his hands, doesn’t need Buck to whisper softly into his ear, doesn’t need Buck to be the first thing he lays eyes on when he wakes up in the morning and the last thing he sees before he drifts off into sleep. He wants those things, full-bodied and with a depraved kind of desperation, but he doesn’t need them. 

He needs his son back, that he does; needs to settle into mental stability again. Needs to stop blowing up his life every chance he gets. Needs to rebuild it into a version of itself that can house a child again. And that’s… that can be okay. Maybe. 

Problem is, if the past months have been any indication, he can’t do any of it on his own, as much as he might want to. He needs someone to cook for him when he’s too tired and wrung-out from therapy to form a coherent thought. Needs someone who makes him believe that there is still good on this earth, a point to it all. Needs someone with the patience and forgiveness of a benevolent God, ready to pick up the pieces and try again, and again, and again. 

He needs his partner. 

And that’s just… so much. 

So heavy.  

Even if – if – Eddie’s not a burden, he is a weight. And not some kind of fancy dumbbell made for doing reps with; he’s a grand old boulder, nature’s monolith, set into the earth eons ago with a kind of finality that humans have no say over. The kind of rock that remains rough even after years of wear, all jagged edges that dig into the hands trying to lift it. The kind that leaves your fingers bloody and worn, scrapes you open from knee to elbow when you’re not looking. So even if someone did all the work, dug him out of the ground and got to moving him, it would still hurt the entire way. Would maybe never stop. Scraped knees and bloody hands until the end of days.

But the stupid thing is, as much as Eddie may be a boulder set into the earth that thanks you for your efforts with nothing but a drop of your own blood, Buck is the kind of guy to already have twenty different tabs pulled up on his phone that detail just how one would go about moving such a boulder. What kind of equipment he needs to overinvest in, how many people to call to dig it out of the earth. 

Eddie… Eddie shouldn’t want things to be this way. And he doesn’t. 

Or. 

Well. 

He… he doesn't want to want it. Doesn't want to feel the undercurrent of satisfaction, comfort, love that comes with every surge of shame when he collapses in Buck's arms again. It feels like sadism to derive pleasure, happiness from it. To take comfort in the fact that there is close to nothing Buck wouldn’t do for him. 

Because Eddie’s got nothing to give back; all he can ever do is take more. Bring Buck into his home. Make him second father of his child. Tie him to this place until the end of both their days. 

Keep him like he’s his to have. 

And needing something like that from a person – absolute surrender, life-long devotion, complete sacrifice of the self until they’re more one person than two – that can’t be okay, can it? That can’t be normal. 

But Eddie… well… he needs it. 

Whether that’s okay or not. 

(Probably not.)

The thought leaves a bad aftertaste in his mouth, has him scrolling through the rest of the article without really engaging all that much with it. Most of the following subheadlines don’t evoke much more than a ‘did that in therapy already’ ( ‘Practice self-love’ – tried that, middling results so far) or ‘doesn’t apply to me’ ( ‘Communicate how you feel’ – yeah, no shot of that happening) anyway. He can worry about all of that in his next in-person therapy session, give Esther a run for her money when she gets to dig around in his psyche again. 

The last point of the article though… that one sort of does him in.

Think of someone you care about a lot – would you treat them the same way you treat yourself?

It should be easy to answer. By all rights, he knows sacrificing your entire life for someone who’s not going to get better and will keep hurting you, unintended or not, is not the right course of action. 

But the thing is– just– if the roles were reversed. If it was Buck who’d just royally fucked up his whole life. He wouldn’t, of course, not like this, never like this, but. If he had. And if Eddie was doing fine. Which, unlikely, but, you know. If he were. And if they were in this situation, just the other way around. 

Eddie– he’d know that it’s not right or whatever. That he shouldn’t just– that if Buck were really, utterly, done for, which, once again, unlikely, but you know. If he were. That it wouldn’t be healthy or okay or whatever you wanna call it to– you know. He’d know that at some point you need to give up. That if everyone agreed that there was no saving Buck. No way out. That you’d have to… cut the line. Eventually. 

But– 

just– 

the thing is– 

It wouldn’t matter to Eddie. 

If Buck laid down on the ground and vowed to never get up again, Eddie would be content to settle beside him. Bring a picnic blanket, maybe, and then wait for the end of the world together. 

That’s a dangerous thought, he knows. It sends something itching in his chest, a feeling he can’t put a finger on. Doubt is circling his ribcage like a snake again, but there’s also something else there that’s… different. Airy and vague, almost more a lack of something, but not in a bad sense per se. It travels through his body in rhythm with his breath, lifts him up and gently sets him down with every wave of it. Along comes a dizziness that could be either an up or a down, clouding his mind and numbing his digits. 

It’s confusing, and tiring, and enough to have Eddie shutting off his phone. 

He needs to get some sleep so he can be at the top of his game tomorrow, not let anything slip. Because whatever Eddie is, burden, weight, or nothing at all, Buck is still happy where he is right now, and Eddie can’t bring that out of balance. He’ll stick to his initial plan, try and keep things the way they were before Frank got Eddie to open up Pandora’s box. Go back to normal, as far as it’s possible. 

In the morning, he wakes up to the smell of pancakes. He follows it to the kitchen, sleep-addled and still in his pajamas. At the sight of Buck at his stove, Eddie is hit by such a visceral, all-powerful wave of longing, of love, his knees threaten buckling. It just feels so right to have Buck here, in this house, this kitchen, right there, only ever an arm’s length away. 

For a moment, he feels the words rising like water in his throat, lapping at his teeth. Then Buck chirps a ‘Good morning’ over his shoulder, and he’s so happy, so content, and Eddie knows he could never do anything to jeopardize that. So he swallows them back down. They’re cooperative like never before, slide down his larynx with barely a hitch, settle back in the caverns of his heart and shut the door. 

Breakfast as a whole is surprisingly… easy. Eddie listens to Buck explain how he’s working on his pancake recipe to make sure they’re extra refined by the time Chris comes back, and barely feels the urge to say anything. He just basks in the moment, lets Buck’s words carry him along as he stares at pink lips and blue eyes and drowns in their beauty. 

Even when Buck gets a text from Tommy, asking where he is and what the hell happened at yesterday’s five alarm, there’s only a slight stir of jealousy in Eddie’s gut. In fact, he finds himself telling Buck that it’s okay if he leaves now to go meet up with his boyfriend, and almost has himself convinced it’s what he actually wants. The illusion breaks the moment Buck says that he’s at minimum staying to help clean up the kitchen and Eddie lets him stick around for another hour to help with the laundry as well, but still, it’s a step in the right direction. 

Eddie can be normal about this. Hell, he made it through weeks of acting like everything’s normal before his ill-advised freak-out. This is going to be okay; he’s just going to keep his mouth shut and enjoy what he gets. 

*

Needless to say, when it, or rather, Eddie, comes out two days later, it’s not exactly planned.  

They're facetiming with Chris, having a good time, and Eddie yearns so badly he’s drunk with it because God, he wishes this was exactly what it might look like to a stranger – a happy couple on a call with their son who’s just spending some time with his abuelos, the lack of distance between Eddie and Buck not just owed to the size of the screen they have to fit onto, but also their own lack of inhibitions toward another. 

It takes an unbelievable amount of restraint for Eddie to not reach out, wrap an arm around Buck and huddle even closer, snuggle right up and rub his head against Buck’s like some love-starved cat. He’s cut himself more slack since working his way through Esther’s email, and although it is sweet torture to have Buck this close again, they’re both measurably happier for it. 

Maybe Eddie can build up some immunity to Buck’s charms over time, lose some of the butterflies in his stomach that flutter in beat with Buck’s eyelids, so that it’s less painful for him to be always just out of reach of what he wants; but for now, things are fine the way they are. 

They’re discussing scheduling for their second video call of the week, when it happens. 

“Abuelo and I will go see a movie on Thursday,” says Chris, causing Buck’s eyebrows to knit as he mentally catalogs this condition. 

“O-okay what about tomorrow, then?”

Eddie shakes his head. “Can’t do tomorrow, I’ve got a session lined up.”

And because he knows Buck is going to be concerned about this – Eddie usually doesn’t have therapy on Wednesdays and isn’t due for a session with Frank until next month – he adds, “Esther just asked to move this week’s session because of some family emergency.” 

Eddie doesn't even think anything of it in the moment – the conversation moves on, they settle on a different date for their next call, everything’s normal. It doesn't occur to him that he might have just made a mistake, a critical faux pas, in fact he probably wouldn't even have noticed that anything happened at all, were it not for the looks Buck keeps shooting him for the rest of the call. 

Once they’ve said their goodbyes and Chris has hung up (neither Buck nor Eddie can ever bring themselves to end the call, they’re weak like that), an unusually tense silence settles between them. Normally, they’d either order takeout now, or Buck would snap the laptop shut and get to making dinner. But they just sit there, Buck staring at the screen before him as if it’s faulted him.

“Spit it out,” says Eddie.

There’s a tick in Buck’s jaw. His eyes stay fixed on the laptop. “You haven’t changed spots, right?”

“What?” 

Buck’s head turns to him, the lines on his face showing a complicated mix of worry, disappointment and fear. “You said you were seeing an Esther, but the only relationship counsel at the place you go to is a guy called Clint Warren.” 

Oh.

Shit. 

The thing is, this is entirely Eddie’s own fault. He should have known that this would happen. His phone shares his location with Buck, for fuck’s sake. 

He should have realized that Buck would, of course, look up what therapists work in the building he could watch Eddie visit every week and would, of fucking course, come to his own conclusions. It’s the kind of thoughtfulness that’s just part of his nature. The sort of thing that Eddie’s been obsessing about for the past month or two. Literally one of his best qualities. 

Well. Fuck. 

“Eddie?” 

Buck’s voice is… yeah, concerned doesn’t quite cut it. 

Eddie can’t look at him. He can feel that his face has gone slack, and he’s doing his absolute best to keep it that way before something revealing sneaks its way into his expression. He’s got no idea what to do. This is– he didn’t prepare for this. 

This was supposed to be an easy evening, the kind they’ve shared for years. Domestic and unquestioned, their familiarity with one another having them act like a well-oiled machine as they move through this house as if they’re both permanent residents. This kind of evening isn’t meant to end with Eddie unable to meet Buck’s eyes. And yet, here they are. 

“Did you lie to me?” Buck asks then, and that finally gets Eddie to look up. 

“What?”

Buck looks serious, a kind of unease showing in his eyes that shakes Eddie to his core. “You said you were working through something in therapy. Did you lie to me?”

No, Eddie wants to say, because he is working through something in therapy. He very intently made sure not to lie – but at the end of the day half a truth still isn’t exactly a truth, and he definitely did lie about the whole relationship therapy stuff. Besides, all of this, be it lie or not, weighs on him like one. 

Buck seems to take his silence as affirmation. “Eddie, are you even seeing a therapist?”

Eddie drags a hand over his face. "Jesus Christ– Buck, I am seeing a therapist, okay?" 

“And his name isn’t Frank?” Buck asks, gaze probing as if Eddie might actually try and wiggle his way out of this one on the basis of a technicality. 

“Buck, I just said that her name’s Esther. That’s literally why we’re having this discussion.”

“But there is no relationship counselor called Esther where you go to therapy,” Buck presses. 

“Might have something to do with the fact that she isn’t a relationship counselor,” Eddie says, not thinking about just how much deeper he's digging the hole he's already in. 

Buck frowns, deep lines forming on his forehead. He’s getting that pout to his lip again, the one that only appears when he’s really concerned. Somehow, Eddie keeps managing to send them barrelling further into dangerous territory. 

“Listen, everything's fine, okay? You don't have to worry about me,” Eddie says, trying to be placating, even when he knows that it’s for nothing. 

Buck laughs, devoid of humor. “I always worry, Eddie.”

“I’m serious, Buck, it’s all– I’ve got everything under control, okay? It’s fine.”

Buck shakes his head, violently. “It isn’t though. You’ve been getting distant, shutting me out, and apparently, you lied to me about your therapist – Eddie, why didn’t you just tell me?”

“I just needed some time to deal with it, okay?” Eddie snaps, biting his tongue the moment the words come out a little too sharp. He’s fucking up. Jagged edges and scraped knees. He can’t do this again, can’t explode at Buck to compensate for all the things he doesn’t get to say. He doesn’t want to do this again.

But he’s also got no damn explanation, no quick side-step around the truth, the gigantic and dangerous secret laid down between them like a tiger, waiting to pounce. His back’s against the fucking wall. 

“Deal with what?” Buck asks.

“Everything,” says Eddie, a pitiful answer to the ears of anyone that doesn’t know who he means by it. Buck seems to be one of those unknowing people, judging from the disappointed look on his face. 

There’s a choice here, again. Choices all around, it seems; just never for Buck, and not really for Eddie either, if he just looks close enough. 

Because the cat’s out of the bag anyway – either Eddie does damage control here and now, or he lets Buck go back to the loft to google who Esther is himself. There’s no real point in delaying the inevitable any further, no matter how little Eddie wants to have this conversation. 

How scared he is of the outcome. 

And if Eddie’s being truly honest with himself – he’s pretty fucking tired of keeping up this charade. 

So when Buck asks, again, “Eddie, what’s going on?”, instead of deflecting, Eddie accepts defeat. 

He takes a deep breath, envisions himself as the most jiggly and unburdened piece of Jell-O this world has ever seen, and then turns to Buck.

“Frank didn’t refer me to a relationship specialist,” he says, because it's the easiest thing to start with.

Buck’s eyebrows lift slightly. “Yeah, I, uh, I got that much.”

“Smartass,” Eddie huffs, and it returns a smidgen of levity to their conversation, just enough to buy a little extra space in his chest for his lungs. Deep breath, as deep as it gets. He’ll need it. 

“He sent me to Esther because… because…” 

The words wither in his throat. There’s a kickback to them that’s made of a kind of shame that he thought he was way past already. He closes his eyes, breathes it out through his nose. He isn’t ashamed. Afraid, yes, but not ashamed. 

His eyes blink open, focus on Buck again. If this is their end, he needs to see it. 

“I'm seeing Esther,” he starts anew, “because according to Frank she's the best specialist for LGBTQIA plus issues in the area.”

The expression on Buck’s face turns… careful. Shielded, maybe, or just unbelieving. 

“I'm seeing Esther,” Eddie says, “Because I'm gay.”

Silence. 

Buck is just… staring at him. For the first time in the last five or so years, Eddie does not know what he's thinking. He looks shell shocked, honestly. Not a single muscle in his face moves. 

For a second, Eddie wonders whether he's frozen in time. If maybe something fundamental just broke and sent the universe spinning out of control. Then Buck kicks into motion again, a complicated sort of expression washes over his face, disappears as soon as it came, and it’s as if the moment before had never existed at all. 

“Oh my God,” he says. “I am so, so sorry, oh my God, I'm such a bad friend, fuck. ”

Dread settles like concrete in Eddie’s bones. Shit. Did he– did he figure it out? Is this it? The weight in Eddie’s stomach is certainly ready to pull him under. But beneath it all, there is a kind of… anticipatory fluttering as well. It feels wrong to feel it, considering this could be the end of everything. Right here, right now, an apocalypse in Eddie’s living room. But like with a rollercoaster, there’s always a little tingling before the drop, right?

“Buck,” says Eddie, “it’s fine.”

It is fine, right? It can be fine. They can be fine, whatever comes off this. 

“No,” says Buck, sounding hysterical, “no it's not fine, I, fuck, Eddie I-I've just forced you out! That is so not okay!” 

Eddie can’t help laughing just a little bit. This is what he’s getting worked up about? The literally least important thing about all of this?

“I’m telling you, Buck. It’s okay. I’ve been meaning to find a way to tell you anyway.”

Okay, that kind of was a lie, but also not really. Eddie was looking for a way to tell Buck, until the whole therapy-debacle. 

“But it’s not– I shouldn’t have–”

“I don’t care. I– I want you to know this about me. So it’s good that you do now.”

And it is good. Whatever comes off this, it had to happen anyway. If he’s being honest with himself, Eddie is quite happy that he doesn’t have to live the rest of his life with the truth hanging over his head like the Sword of Damocles. He’d rather get it all over with now. 

“Eddie–”

“Buck.” 

It takes a single fond look, the tilt of a head, to ground Buck again. His eyes are wide as saucers still, and the pout hasn’t quite left his lips, but he seems less immediately distressed. A relative sort of calm, at least in comparison to the storm that is about to overtake both their lives.

“Why didn’t you say anything before?” Buck asks then, curiosity mixing with a dash of hurt. 

“I… didn’t know how to bring it up,” Eddie says. “Kind of didn’t have it all figured out for myself yet.”

There’s still that tinge of rejection to Buck’s expression, and Eddie can’t help needing to lighten the mood. “Besides,” he adds on, “it would’ve been pretty rude to steal your thunder, huh?”

Buck chuckles, ducks his head, bites his lip. He’s always so pretty, so reactive, his cheeks flushing this beautiful shade of pink at the slightest provocation. After a moment, he glances up, deep blue eyes meeting Eddie’s own. 

They stay locked in on one another as Buck’s head slowly tips up again. Time is slowing around them, until it’s thick as molasses. Breath aligning, features melting, not a single blink between the two of them. They’re here, and nowhere else. 

They’re here. 

Buck’s lips, pink, and full, and exquisitely enticing, draw open. 

Eddie’s heart is hammering in his chest, blood pulsing through his veins at a speed that’s turning him slightly delirious. This is it, isn’t it? They’re about to go careening over the edge, and no one can tell whether they’re going to pull off an action-movie stunt to reach the other side, or crash into the canyon below. All bets are off. 

The hitch of a breath, shoulders rising in step with the air whistling past those beautiful lips. 

If this is the end, the apocalypse, their collapse, then it’s the prettiest it ever could have been. There’s poetry somewhere in that, Eddie reckons; such utter beauty in the face of destruction. A worthy send-off. 

Or maybe – just maybe – it doesn’t have to be. Destruction, that is. Not forever, anyway. How could something breathtaking as this ever be damnation? If there really was a God, could He truly be cruel enough to take something like this from Eddie, when He was kind enough to give it away in the first place?

A lick of the lips. The tug of a grin. Finally, a blink. 

“Well, I, uh, I hope you know,” says Buck, a teasing sort of glint to his eye as the corner of his lip pulls up, “that this doesn’t change a thing between us.”

Oh. 

So he isn’t–

He doesn’t– 

Oh. 

Buck doesn’t– he isn’t– oh. 

He doesn’t need– doesn’t want–

He’s–

He isn’t.

He isn’t.

That’s– that’s good though, right? 

It’s what he wanted. The right thing. 

Should be a weight off Eddie’s chest. 

(It isn’t, of course, because nothing ever is.)

(It’s a block of ice in his stomach.)

(The dull ache of a needle pushed into muscle, all over his body.)

(The ground, stolen from underneath his feet, endless suspension in nothingness.)

(It’s the end, that’s what it is.)

Eddie laughs, emptily. 

“Yeah. Doesn’t change a thing.”

Buck goes in for a hug, pads of his fingers digging into Eddie’s shoulder as he pulls him in, but once they’re chest to chest, Eddie doesn’t feel it. 

Doesn’t feel anything. 

“I'm so happy for you,” Buck says.

“Yeah,” lies Eddie, “me too.”

They pull apart, and the foot of distance between them feels like a mile. Something is different. 

It seems a before entirely unknown kind of awkwardness entered the room when they didn’t look, waited for the right moment to slip in between them, and filled the space they left for it. It swallows any and all words they might have wanted to say, leaves them sitting in uncomfortable silence as they stare, no longer at each other, but at anything but. They alternate taking in deep breaths, on the cusp of saying something, anything, only to let the air rush out of their lungs again, no release to be found. 

This isn’t normal. They aren’t normal. 

They should be in the kitchen by now, making dinner, or setting out plates because Eddie’s not going to eat his takeout straight out of the container if he can help it. They should be laughing, chatting about Buck’s most recent Wikipedia spiral, as they get the beers out of the fridge. They should be settling on the couch, not still be sitting on it. Why are they still sitting here?

A tinny version of the theme of Airwolf breaks the spell of silence, has Buck scrambling for his phone to answer the incoming call. 

Eddie watches almost in a daze as Buck tells Tommy that no, he hasn’t forgotten about their date tonight, the call with Chris just stretched a little longer than expected. Yes, he'll be back at the loft soon. This is– did Eddie know that Buck had a date lined up? Did Buck tell him, and he just forgot? Overheard, because he didn’t want to think about it? Or does Buck just not tell him things like this anymore? 

Did he ever tell Eddie things like this?

Or is this just who they are? Who they’ve always been?

Is Eddie starting to lose it? Imagining things? 

Did he just delude himself into feeling Buck’s unconditional love as a noose around both of their necks? 

Were they ever even close enough for a single noose to fit them?

When Buck hangs up, there’s no words left to say. Nothing left to ask. They do talk, of course, Buck apologizing for having to run, Eddie telling him it’s alright, a final hug and then goodbyes at the door, but it all passes through his ears without ever actually sticking around, leaving a mark. 

It’s nothing. Too painfully shallow to be worth remembering. 

Underwhelming, as well. As if he’d been watching a storm on the horizon for weeks, months, bracing for it, eventually weathering the whipping winds and apocalyptical downpours, only for it to finally pass and leave him standing in the same room, the same house, the same city, as if nothing happened. As if none of it was ever real. 

And, sure, no one wants their house torn down. No one wants a nasty scar and a lifetime of pain. No one wants nightmares and sleepless nights. 

Still, there’s an undeniable comfort in being able to see, feel what something did to you. Trace the bumpy lines on your skin as if they’ll tell you the story of how they came to be there. Cut your hands on the splinters of the wooden beams of your ruined house. Feel something. 

But Eddie’s house still stands. His skin is scarred in the same way it was before. There’s no destruction, no desolation. 

Nothing has changed. 

Eddie watches Buck step out of the house and walk to his jeep. Like he always does. 

He watches him wave goodbye and get in the car. Like he always does. 

Eddie watches Buck leave. Like he always does. 

And yet, like never before, Eddie feels strangely and utterly… empty.

Chapter Text

“You were wrong.”

It’s the first thing Eddie tells Esther once he’s slumped down on the armchair in her office. He deserves to start this session with a little bit of a win, if just to balance out the flush of shame he feels at crawling back here after last week’s mental strip-down. Eddie: 1 – Esther: 0. Because that’s what this is. A win. It’s– it’s better this way. 

Esther herself looks entirely unimpressed by his declaration. She takes her time straightening the scarf loosely tied around her neck, a garish rose-patterned thing that’s the only pop of color in her otherwise unassuming attire.  

Eddie hates it on principle. 

“What do you mean by that?” she asks once she’s got her pen back in hand.

“I came out to Buck, and he didn’t choose me. Still dating Tommy.”

Esther quirks an eyebrow at him, then starts jotting something down in the book in her lap. 

“I never claimed he’d drop everything to be in a relationship with you once you told him you were gay.”

So he’s not even getting that win. Great. Eddie’s not getting fucking anything. Least of all a boyfriend.

Not that he wants one.

“But I must say, I am happy to hear that you've made progress on the ‘coming-out’ front,” Esther remarks, glancing up in between notes.

“Yeah it wasn’t exactly my choice,” says Eddie, adding on, “but I don’t regret it,” when he sees the shape of Esther’s piercing gaze dip into the concerned for a moment. “Or at least I don’t think I do.”

“Okay,” says Esther, clicking her pen, “why don’t we start at the beginning?”

Cliché, that’s what that sounds like to Eddie’s ears, even as he sighs and lets himself sink into the padding of the arm-chair, head dropping back so he can rest his eyes on the ceiling for a bit. 

The beginning. What beginning, exactly? As far as Eddie’s concerned, last week’s breakdown was more ending than beginning. As were most, if not all turning points his life has been marked by. It’s only really been graced by, at most, two notable beginnings: the birth of Christopher, and, perhaps, his own. Although that, too, might have been an ending of its own right. 

But all this dwelling in the past, this lingering in a swamp of self-pity, is about as helpful to Eddie as a pair of cement-slab shoes are to a swimmer, so he firmly sets his gaze on the horizon and takes the sluggish trudge to safer waters upon himself. 

The worst thing about it all – as for all of therapy – is the way Esther manages to spin all of Eddie’s fuck-ups into something positive. Scratch that, the worst thing is that some splinter of Eddie is beginning to believe her, despite how childish and embarrassing all of last week’s escapades sound when he lays them out. 

Choosing to set flame to all the progress he’s ever made gets turned into an irrational response following emotional distress, with Esther apologizing for not keeping a closer look on the time, and even when Eddie presses that he knew better, but did it anyway, she stays serene and clinical, pen steady in her hand. So a relapse? she asks, and Eddie has to swallow the uneasy feeling climbing his throat at that, face a hazy version of Buck at the back of his mind whispering relapses are par for the course, ever forgiving and understanding. Yeah, Eddie answers, I guess. 

Even when he maps out just how he kept pushing Buck away, knowingly hurting him, how it took a literal death scare for Eddie to get his shit together and stop fucking up all over the place, she listens calmly, makes the occasional note, levels him with a singular look. But you stopped of your own accord? she asks. You recognized your own behavior and corrected it accordingly? And Eddie has to grit his teeth and bear her words as though they are a lashing because can’t deny that that’s at least some version of progress. 

In some funny twist, the part he’d thought she’d like is the one she criticizes the most – he finally relents and tells her about utilizing one of the outlets she’d suggested, and while she does seem pleased at that, her encouraging smile is undercut by the gentle warning she issues with it. Outlets like that are good, she says, just make sure they do not become crutches. 

Eddie gets caught on that sentence for a moment, has no time to decipher it because before he knows it, they’re at the important part of the story. 

“And then you came out to him?” Esther asks, face professionally neutral as always. 

Shoulders shrugging, Eddie sighs. Eyes back on the popcorn ceiling of the office, his refuge for the past half hour whenever he started feeling like a little too much of an idiot. He imagines running his hand across the tiny blisters until it buzzes in that strangely numbing way, like he used to do on the wood-chip wallpaper of Andy’s room whenever he stayed over. “I just kind of… stumbled into telling him. Got tripped up in my own lies, more like. Hard to explain.”

“How did he react?”

“He was happy for me. Then he left to go on a date with his boyfriend. So, yeah, all fine.”

When Eddie lets his eyes drift from the off-white of the ceiling and back to Esther’s expression, he can see that it’s exactly as unimpressed as he’d expected it to be. 

“All fine?” she asks. “Or is there perhaps a reason why you wanted to talk about this?”

His gaze promptly drops to the carpet below his feet, lingers there for a considerable while. It looks worn, but well cared for, stomped down fibers revitalized again and again, probably by some vigorous cleaning personnel scrubbing and vacuuming and clipping until it was right back in shape. Still, a patch of it is lighter than the rest – probably the result of someone using too much bleach to clean up a stain. 

“I’m not happy about it,” he admits. 

“And you expected you would be?”

The stain is kind of crooked, shaped like a bean, or a misshapen potato, or a washed out birthmark, perhaps. Eddie bites the inside of his cheek. 

“Usually I’m happy whenever Buck is happy. Like, I knew it would hurt, but as long as it’s for his best, I thought I’d be better at making peace with it. But I just– I spent the rest of the day sitting at home feeling… numb. Which is really fucking stupid, considering this is how I wanted things to go, right?”

“Did you actually want things to be this way? Or did you think you should want it?”

Eddie presses his eyes closed. Somehow, the stain lingers in his mind all the same. 

“I… don’t know,” he confesses. “Both? I just… I want him to be happy. And I was pretty sure for a while there that he couldn’t be happy with me.”

“Was there any actual evidence of that being the case?”

Split knuckles. Smashed up bedrooms. A heartbeat eight hundred miles east that Eddie drove away. And yet, a steady presence at his side, sunlit smiles and broad shoulders that were both willing and able to bear the load that gentle hands took off from Eddie’s back any chance they got.

“I don’t know. He just always gives so much of himself and…”

“...you feel like by accepting what he gives you, you’re taking advantage of that?”

Eyes opening, his hand rubbing at them as he looks off to the side. 

“Yeah. That. I guess.”

“And those worries got worse after our last session, didn’t they?”

Eddie nods. 

“Even though you still wanted him?”

Another nod. 

Esther clicks her pen.

“Do you think the reason you don’t allow yourself to want things once you think you can have them is more rooted in your fear of ruining it or your desire to punish yourself for wanting anything in the first place?”

When Eddie still was a regular member of the fight club that shall not be called Fight Club for fear of making it sound like something more grandiose than it was – that is, a group of idiots gathering to watch even bigger idiots beat the shit out of each other in some seedy junkyard – he found that one of his primary advantages in a fight was the fact that he had an almost unnatural ability to predict the other guy’s strikes before they came in. 

It seems Eddie has either lost that ability in the years that have passed (unlikely, he kicks Tommy’s ass in four out of five rounds of Muay Thai) or it simply does not transfer to blows received in a ring fenced in by dull beige walls and the occasional unassuming landscape art print. 

Hunched over like she got him in the gut, hands gripping the armrest so hard his joints ache, Eddie fights the feverish urge to run. 

“ Jesus, Esther,” he grunts, “warn a guy before getting out the big guns,”and he swears he hears her snort at that, but when he looks over, her face is as boringly empathetic as always. 

“So?” she asks, just the slightest edge to the innocence in her voice, and for a moment it’s startlingly clear why Frank referred Eddie to her specifically. 

That bastard. 

“Why do you think I’m punishing myself?” Eddie asks in return, because if they’re going to spend the rest of the session poking at bruises again, he’d at least like it to be some new ones. 

“Denying your own desires until you're convinced they’ll go unfulfilled turns the act of wanting into a seemingly hopeless endeavour. Is that not a form of punishment?”

It’s a testament to Eddie’s personal growth that he stops himself from uttering the What is this, philosophy 101? lingering on his tongue, that he forgoes this deep-set urge to deflect, evade, parry, until his back is in the corner. At least that’s what he tells himself, because otherwise he could not bear the feeling of humiliating vulnerability when he not just ceases fighting back, but practically opens his arms and asks for collapse. 

“Maybe, I guess, but… I mean– why would I do that?” 

The thing is, Eddie knows he’s not going to get a straight answer. He’s had enough practice with Frank and his ‘I want you to think about it yourself’ s to know that most therapists moonlight as riddling sphinxes and will do anything to avoid just outright saying what’s wrong with you. But just because Esther’s “Why do you think?” is entirely expected, doesn’t mean he likes it. 

Because… because now that she’s said it, he can’t avoid noticing the undercurrent of satisfaction that comes with every painful reason floating in his mind. Lining them all up is like pressing your tongue up against an aching tooth, again and again, because there’s something sweet lacing the hurt. Something that tastes an awful lot like penance. 

“Whenever I want something, it fucks things up,” he finally says, but it comes out brittle. “I just–” Eddie swallows, blinks, eyes back on the carpet. 

Under his strained stare, the swirls and swells of the fibers blur until lights and darks form hazy faces, memories, and when he squints it’s almost like he can catch a glimpse of a slender mouth curved into a smile, bangs hanging low on her forehead. That desperate ache to reach out, touch, let this soap bubble of delusion pop with the featherlight caress of a hand wells up in his middle again, a sickening pull urging him to collapse inward, let the grief feed on him until there’s nothing more to give. Like the rising tide it swamps him until there’s no air left to breathe. No option but to press his eyes closed.

“I can’t control it,” he confesses. “If I let it in once, I can’t shut it out again. And I have– there’s people depending on me. I need to have my shit together. Whenever I get selfish, people get hurt. I can’t let that happen. I– I have to look out for them.”

“When was the last time you didn’t have someone to look out for?” Esther asks, and as fast as it came, the water recedes and the visions in the carpet are nothing but fiber against fiber again. 

Eddie blinks. “Well,” he says, “I guess– I mean, when I was…” He scratches the back of his neck, huffs. “I mean, when I– when I was–” He breaks off. 

He just– he isn’t sure. He should– why isn’t he sure? 

There should be some sort of clear cut-off here, right?

Christopher’s birth was the first thing that sprung to mind, but that’s stupid, Eddie was looking out for him before he was born. And before that he had Shannon, and she certainly wasn’t the first either, because someone needed to drive his sisters to team practice, and make sure they took their cold medicine when they were sick, and lighten their moods when they had a bad day, not to mention the help his mom needed around the house. That’s just what things were like.

Eddie sends his mind out eight hundred miles east to peer into the past, lets the clock run backwards and waits waits waits for a reason to pause it, to go yup, this is it, but all he’s doing is watching his life run past him in reverse.

He tries, God knows, he really really fucking tries to find that version of himself, young and entirely unburdened, but he–

looking back, there’s just– 

he can’t–

He looks up at Esther. 

“Sophia was born when I was four,” he says, helplessly. 

“She was– she was so tiny, and mom needed someone and dad wasn’t there and I– I couldn’t just– I was too small to help, but I– I knew. I knew. ”

“That you wanted to help her?”

“That I had to. ” 

There’s a lump at the back of his throat and pressure behind his eyes. Eddie huffs. “I mean, of course I wanted to help, too. But that wasn’t– they needed me. It wasn’t about what I wanted or not.”

“So you denied yourself,” Esther surmises. 

“It’s– it’s less denying, I just–” 

Eddie drops his head into his hands. 

“You cut yourself into shape,” Esther continues, “neglecting your wants until the line between want and need blurred and you found yourself malleable enough to shape yourself into whatever you believed your loved ones needed you to be.” She clicks her pen. “And now you’ve gotten so used to denying yourself for the good of others, you think that’s the only way to properly take care of them, so wanting things just for yourself feels like failure.”

The press of the balls of Eddie's thumbs into his eye sockets, while sufficiently painful on its own, is not quite enough to stop himself from splitting along the hairline fractures mapped across his body; it takes him biting his tongue, as well, to keep himself from letting it all escape him in some garbled scream, or a spate of words with barely a thought behind them. 

It’s good that he manages – Eddie’s pretty sure it’s unprofessional to tell your therapist to go fuck themselves mid-session. 

“Uh-huh,” he grits out.

“Do you want to take a break?” Esther asks, voice unconcerned but not unkind. 

“We’re way past that, I think,” Eddie groans, eyes still closed. “Just get this over with, please.”

“Hm,” says Esther, “what do you mean by that?”

Floaters dance around her figure when Eddie lifts his hands to look at her, hoping to communicate irritation, but probably broadcasting trepidation, instead. 

“Just– get to the moral of the story. Tell me what I need to know.”

Esther raises an eyebrow. Still unconcerned, but decidedly more unkind. Eddie likes the ever so slight hint of bitchiness it brings out in her. 

“So you can fix it?” she asks. “Or so you can bask in the pain of listening to me tell you about how attempting to force yourself to need and want less ended up causing more harm to the people around you than being yourself ever could?”

And Eddie knows that it’s not a lie, that the sting of her words feels like balm and lashing in tandem, that with it comes the urge to buff and polish until that raw ache has turned smooth and level again and another deficiency is evened out, but beneath all that there’s also something more, something important. 

“So that I know,” he answers. “So that I have to see it.”

Esther smiles softly. As if she’s taking pity on him. Eddie likes that decidedly less than the bitchy eyebrow. But when does he ever get what he wants, right?

“Okay,” says Esther. “It's really rather simple. I think you’ve forgotten how to want things just for yourself.”

It gets a chuckle out of him, unwilling and half-hearted. Speak of the devil. “Forgotten how to want things? That’s kinda hard, isn’t it?” he asks. 

Esther shrugs. 

"Wanting is a complex thing. There’s an unconscious current underlying it, sure, but there’s a conscious act to it as well, and that part many struggle with. Choosing to want something means acknowledging and, to some degree, accepting whatever desire drives that thought. Some people unlearn how to do that after spending years pushing what they want away in favor of duty. Some people deny themselves to please a God or to follow laws they've made for themselves. For others, it starts with the expectations of their parents."

Freudian bullshit, another set of words Eddie hinders from crossing his lips. Partly to protect the integrity of the session or whatever, partly because he has no actual clue what Freud was actually on about ( He was on significant amounts of cocaine, a little Buck-voice at the back of Eddie’s head supplies, which might explain all the fucked up theories he had). Eddie crosses his arms. "You think I don't know how to want things because of my parents?"

“I think we both know that you had a tough childhood that forced you to prioritise the needs of others above your own. Just how far that affects you to this day I cannot tell you."

Cop-out. 

“What do I pay you for then?"

Cat-like glint to Esther’s eye, even as her voice is placating. “I'm just here to ask the right questions. You have to find the answers yourself. I can't tell you what you want, but I can ask you why you're scared of letting yourself have it. And I can tell you that regrowing trust in ourselves is an arduous and lengthy process, but worth it all the same."

Therapy is a marathon, not a race, the Buck-voice parrots, like the real version had when Eddie had joked over a beer held in embarrassingly shaky hands that if the sight of a woman with a face cut too much like that of the ghost lingering in the corners of his home was enough to send him spinning out of control, he’d probably made no progress at all in the past six years. Or one of those Takeshi’s Castle parkours, Buck had added after a moment of pondering. Only with, like, spike pits and fire traps and real life snakes, and that had finally gotten a chuckle out of Eddie. 

Back in the real world, Esther checks her watch. 

“You said you don’t know what you want,” she says, once she tears eyes off the clock face.  

Eddie lets the incredulous undertone in her voice slide. “Yes,” he replies. 

“But you want to figure it out?”

Eddie nods. 

“Okay,” says Esther, “your homework for this week is to give yourself permission to want. Openly, and without shame.  You can only uncover what you want if you let yourself feel it. And when it comes to the question of whether you should have the things you want, I want you to try and stop visualizing whoever you think you are as a person as a counterargument to your own well-being. A simple desire is never selfish.” 

Unwillingly, a frown crosses his face. “What happened to the whole you’re-punishing-yourself-routine? Pretty much everything I want is stuff I can’t have.”

There’s a curious tilt to Esther’s head after he says it, her expression drifting between masked exasperation and amused fascination, which would feel a little disrespectful if Eddie didn’t infinitely prefer it over the miserably cloying aftertaste of pity other remarks of her’s have had. 

“I think,” she says again, those terribly annoying words always leaving her lips like the crackle of a radio-line opened, entirely unimportant to what follows, “you should take a second to ponder in which direction the chain of causation runs here.”

Eddie stares at Esther. She stares right back, her serene eyes meeting his, before her gaze drifts upwards by an inch, no doubt to catalog the crease forming in between Eddie’s eyebrows as he tries to understand what the hell she wants from him now.

“You know what,” says Esther then, “don’t worry about it too much. You’ll figure it out as you go, I’m sure. Just focus on your homework. Give yourself permission to want things. Start there, and see where it leads.”

They stare at each other for another beat, and Eddie finds that he’s very much content to leave whatever riddle she just posed him for next week. Lord knows he’s got enough other shit to worry about.

Then, the session timer goes off, and Eddie calmly collects his things and walks out. 

*

Therapy days are easily denoted on the Diaz family calendar by a simple ‘T’ and the fact that said T – barring the respective epithet of either ‘Ed.’ or ‘Ch.’ –  is the only letter gracing that specific day’s itinerary, schedule scrubbed clean of any and all other chores or duties. There’s a simple reason to it – far too often does Eddie feel like he’s balancing on a needlepoint when he comes home after spending his afternoon in an armchair letting himself be cut open and turned inside out like one of those frogs they dissected in eighth grade bio. 

Today, though, he’s feeling pretty stable all things considered when he hops out of the truck and makes his way inside the house. Maybe it’s because this session didn’t end on a self-revelation cliffhanger, maybe it’s because he’s been feeling generally numb since yesterday’s accidental coming-out anyway, maybe it’s because he’s got some relatively clear instructions for how to go on. He doesn’t quite see yet how exactly allowing himself to want is going to help him move on from wanting in the first place, but perhaps it’s a the-only-way-out-is-through kind of thing; purging the pathogen by letting the fever run its course, building immunity through consistent exposure. 

Anyway, it’s good that instead of fearing an imminent breakdown, he’s preoccupied with vague speculations on metaphors and healing journeys, because as soon as he throws himself onto the couch to let whatever show Netflix recommends to him first drown out the thoughts swirling in his head, the tablet on the coffee table lights up. 

Eddie almost falls off the couch with how quickly he jumps up. It’s entirely embarrassing, especially how hard he knocks his hand against the table corner when he reaches for the Ipad, but what else can he do, when flashing on its screen is the notification Chris is calling ?

With hasty fingers, he accepts the call, sitting up a little straighter on the couch as his mind shakes blank off his previous contemplations like an etch-a-sketch. Their next call’s supposed to be on Friday; Chris calling earlier could mean that he’s maybe, finally, ready to come home. Or at least that’s what Eddie’s wishful thinking is telling him. 

For weeks now, it’s felt like they hit an invisible roadblock on the 800 miles of highway between El Paso and LA, with no indication of how to get past it. Like one of those puzzle video games Chris and Buck used to play together sometimes, the kind where they had to combine the right objects and talk to characters in the right order and always ended up stuck at one point or another because they just couldn’t make out what the next step of the riddle was. Just this time, there’s no internet walkthrough to question, no hints to pepper into casual conversation, not a single damn nudge.

That doesn’t mean things are bad – they’re great, really, these days Chris even talks to him almost like he used to before Eddie blew up both their fucking lives, stone-faced apathy replaced by reluctant smiles and the occasional eyeroll; sometimes he even graces Eddie with a snort or, in the rarest cases, a full-on laugh. 

But there’s still an ache that comes with all of this, one beside the tormenting hollowness that’s been haunting Eddie’s body ever since he watched that kid walk out his front door. Because no matter how much they fix things or how close to ‘normal’ they get, he’ll never get back the kid he lost that day, nor the ones he lost with every day he didn’t get to be there to watch his son grow and change. That time has passed Eddie by, and he can’t do anything to get it back. 

It’s an itch beneath his skin, pressure behind his eyes, an ever-present cramp in his chest. It’s why he’s grown to both love and loathe these video calls.

Yes, getting to see his kid is the best fucking thing in the world, sun on his skin after a year’s worth of night, but the second Chris’s face appears on Eddie’s ipad, every beat of his heart chants come home, come home, come home, turns more and more painful with every minute that passes without Chris giving any indication for when exactly wants to be back, until they say their goodbyes, the screen turns black again, and Eddie’s left with a gaping chasm in the middle of his chest. 

He knows Chris doesn’t owe him anything, should take all the time he needs, but at this point Eddie is aching for something , anything, some kind of sign that he’s finally ready, but it just isn’t coming. 

And yet, with every bubbly jingle of another call connecting, hope flickers in Eddie’s chest anew. Today, it’s no different. Once the picture loads, Eddie can’t help the smile taking over his face at the sight of his kid. 

Chris is sitting on the deck to the back yard, facing the house because the connection cuts out whenever he dares moving his laptop further away from the router. In the background, Eddie can see his parents in the garden, his dad dazing away in a chair he’s pulled into the shade while Eddie’s mother seems to be pruning her roses. 

Picturesque and idyllic; it makes Eddie’s heart clench in his chest. 

They stumble through hellos, and before Eddie’s got a chance to ask why Chris is calling two days early, Chris is telling him all about how he’s been beating Eddie’s dad in chess almost every second match and just how much better his win rate on chess.com is looking these days, how he’s been learning all about different openings and the patterns you need to run along to reach a checkmate with just a rook and king. 

Chess – another one of those topics that has Eddie feeling all conflicted. He’s filled with pride at his son’s skills, can’t escape the warmth he feels for Ramon for teaching him, but there’s also all this deep-seated anger and disappointment boiling right beneath his skin because his dad never had that kind of time for him, wouldn’t even have gotten the board out if Eddie had asked. 

Before he can get lost in a swamp of grief for the childhood he didn’t get to have, or a thorny thicket of self-flagellation at being envious of his own son, something goes click in Eddie’s mind. Chris doesn’t usually talk this much about his progress in chess, and he most certainly doesn’t call specifically just to discuss it. 

“Not that I don’t love to hear about it, but is there any particular reason you’re telling me about all this right now?” Eddie asks when Chris finishes explaining the intricacies of the fork he apparently stumped Ramon with yesterday, desperate anticipation thrumming underneath his skin.

A spark in Chris’s eyes, the kind Eddie hasn’t been able to kindle for months now. 

“There’s this tournament…” Chris says, a challenge hidden in his words, one that Eddie can’t quite parse. Unstable ground, he’s not sure how to answer, what to ask, needs more information, stat, so he can tread as carefully as he knows he needs to. Before he’s got a chance to ask for any, they’re interrupted. 

“Ah, you’re telling Eddie about the tournament?” Eddie’s mother calls from the background, stepping onto the deck as she pulls off her gardening gloves. 

She walks up to the screen, ruffles a hand through Chris’s hair that he tries to duck away from. “He’s been going to a chess club in the neighborhood and they handed out flyers for it a while ago,” Helena says, eyes focussed on Chris as if she’s talking to him, not Eddie. “The instructors there say he’s got good chances to make it into the top ten. We tried to sign him up for it, but they said they need the signature of his legal guardian as well.” 

Eddie cringes with how sterile and disconnected the words sound on her tongue, spoken like they lifted straight off the page of a textbook, uncaring 11pt Times New Roman letters hanging in the air between them. Is this really what he’s been reduced to? His fatherhood nothing but a formality? 

Just the thought sends bile creeping up his throat, expression tensing slightly at the sick taste of it. He’s not sure whether he’s imagining the triumphant twist to his mother’s mouth at it. 

“Anyway,” she continues, “it’d be great if you could send it over. The tournament is just a month out, after all.”

“Oh,” says Eddie. 

His mother tilts her head, puts on a smile whose stilted kindness is undercut by a knowing glint in her eye.

“What, oh?” she asks as she rests her hand on Chris’s shoulder. 

“It’s just– school starts in three weeks.”

Chris’s eyes flick back to the screen at that, an infinitesimal twitch to his brow. He doesn’t say anything.

“We wouldn’t mind keeping him for a little while longer,” his mother smiles, “Isabel is coming back from her stay at your cousin Miguel’s in a fortnight, we thought we’d make a bit of a party out of it. You know, he’s taken her on that trip along the east coast?”

Eddie does know; his abuela's made sure to to call once a week and regularly has Miguel play IT support for her so she can send Eddie pictures and videos of the sights they've seen. He's probably had more contact with her in the past two weeks than he has with his mom during the entire duration of Chris's stay in El Paso, if not the entire year so far. 

“I’m sure Chris would love to see all of his nieces and nephews, right?” she asks. 

Chris shrugs noncommittally. His gaze flicks to Eddie.

“It’s, uh, it’s up to you, buddy,” Eddie says, and Chris looks away again, jaw tight and eyes stoic. 

Helena seems satisfied with the non-answer, gives Chris’s shoulder a squeeze before she walks out of screen without a goodbye. 

Chris himself keeps staring off to the side. The muscles of his face tense lightly, almost as if he’s trying to unstick a piece of gum that got caught in between his teeth. There’s something he isn’t saying, and they both know it. 

It’s painfully obvious – Chris has made up his mind already. 

Taking in Chris’s excitement, his reluctance to ask for permission outright, as if not to hurt him, Eddie finds the most likely option is also the one that tears the aching canyon in his chest open just a little wider. But this is his son; there isn’t a world in which Eddie would deny his kid something like this. Now Eddie just has to figure out how to make Chris trust him with the knowledge.

“Listen, Chris, if you want to play in the tournament, that’s totally cool. I mean, I’d– I just want you to do what makes you happy, okay kid?” he tries. 

With the same kind of efficiency and almost comical humiliation of a game-show’s FALSE buzzer noise, a singular roll of Chris’s eyes tells Eddie that somehow, he managed to say exactly all the wrong words, in the wrong order, with probably the wrong inflection as well.

Suddenly they’re back to where they started all those weeks ago, the ensuing silence between them laden with chilly tension that he has no idea how to break. Before Eddie can make even more of a fool of himself, Chris rolls his eyes again (Eddie knows his son is a teenager now, but that seems a little excessive), mutters something Eddie can’t make out, and then he’s shuffling out of his chair. 

“Chris?” 

Eddie’s not even graced with another look at the camera. Just Chris’s torso as he rises out of frame. 

“I gotta go. Abuelo and I wanted to play another match.”

And then the video cuts off and Eddie’s left staring at his own reflection in the uncaring black of the screen. 

He drags a heavy hand across his face to smother everything welling up in him at the sight of it. This is just– frustrating. Deeply so. He’s acknowledging that feeling. Lets it disintegrate whatever was left of his hopeful mood while he does. 

He has no fucking clue what he did wrong, can’t figure out how he keeps trying and trying and failing and failing, finds himself biting the inside of his cheek until copper coats his tongue so that he doesn’t get lost in the vortex of emotion his mind is trying to drag him into. 

Eddie doesn’t want to push any of this down, trust him, he’s learned his lesson, but he’s also just so damn tired of crying, and catastrophizing, of breaking apart at every fucking step of the way. 

Outlet, he thinks, a healthy outlet, and five minutes later he’s on his treadmill, trading tears for sweat and staring holes into the wall instead of putting them there himself. He runs until his clothes are soaked and his muscles protest with every move, until the ache in his heart is as dull as the soreness in the rest of his body and he’s too tired to feel much of anything anymore. 

Still, when Eddie’s lying in bed two hours later, freshly showered yet feeling as dreary as before, Chris’s absence has turned even more oppressive, the house’s emptiness as suffocating as it was on the first night he spent all on his own. 

The wrongness of it all twists in his stomach and coils around his organs. Eddie’s just not used to an empty home; he traded living with his parents for living with Shannon, for a cot in a cramped tent in the desert, for another in some faceless hospital in Germany, for living with Chris first in Texas, then LA. A house needs a second heartbeat to be a home, at minimum. Someone else’s voice to echo off the walls. 

It feels genuinely incomprehensible sometimes that he’s just… alone. Like a dream. A nightmare. Just– not real. 

Of course, Eddie… Eddie knows it is. He knows. But he’s been lying awake for hours now and has long since entered that vague and floaty state of fatigue that has him loop back through the same thoughts again and again and again until they’ve worn nauseatingly trite tracks in his mind. 

He can’t say exactly why he eventually rolls out of bed and slips into the hall. Sleep-deprived delirium, maybe. Or perhaps just plain old masochism. 

Steps slow and heavy, he drags his feet across the linoleum. He slumps against the doorframe once he gets there, puts a hand against the wood of the door, lets it trail towards the doorknob. 

Its metal is cool in his hand, yet the touch of it brands his skin. His fingers clasp around it, tighten until it hurts, then slacken again when he finds he lacks the courage to twist it. Ironic, really, that the scariest thing hiding behind a closed door could be nothingness. 

Eddie allows himself to pretend, for just a moment; a steady heartbeat in that room, another pair of shoes next to the door, a still-wet toothbrush in the cup on the bathroom counter. A second bowl of cereal every morning, cartoons running on the TV on a lazy Sunday afternoon, begrudgingly accepted goodnight-kisses on a curly head of hair. 

Then he twists his wrist and lets the grief wash over him until it’s drained him of all he has. 

After an eternity of staring at the empty bed until his eyes have grown accustomed to it like the darkness, Eddie steps in. 

Careful, controlled movements, eyes stubbornly fixed on the untouched pillow; letting them drift could bring him to capsize. His emotions have sedimented into a neutral, if slightly weary expression, and he’s afraid moving a singular muscle might stir them all up again. 

A hand, hovering above the cold cotton of the pillowcase. Then he allows his knees to give in, collapses against the side of the bed, head in his hands until his breathing has evened out again. Eyes closed when his hands drop again, he can’t bear to look around. The room is too untouched, too lifeless, lacks clutter on the side table, homework on the desk, laundry haphazardly strewn across the floor. 

He runs a hand across the carpet; it’s freshly vacuumed, fits right in. All flat surfaces wiped down, sheets changed every second week, for fuck’s sake, Eddie’s cleaned the windows twice since Chris went to Texas, even got a can of compressed air to deep-clean the muck out of Chris’s keyboard. 

Everything perfect to a T for when his baby decides to come home again. 

All of a sudden, embarrassment, shame, overwhelming loss, all blend together into a singular miserable weight curling around his chest like a boa-constrictor, squeezing, squeezing, squeezing until the first sob escapes his throat. 

His hands reach for something to ground him, draw open the dresser and grab hold of a shirt that Eddie knows he’ll have to throw out because it won’t fit Chris anymore. 

He buries his face in it, tries to stifle the sounds that come with every contraction of his chest, lets it soak up the tears running down his face. 

He just wants his kid. Wants to put his arms around him, smell his hair, tuck his head under his chin. His heart is beating painfully, bleeding all over his pajamas, the floor, the shirt crumpled in his hands. He just wants his kid. 

Is that really too much to ask?

*

Eddie wakes up with a crick in his neck and an eerie kind of calm wafting through his senses. 

It’s… unnerving, to say the least. Like coming to after a night of binge drinking to find that you miraculously have been spared the hangover. Clarity, where there should be a haze of confusion. 

Not that Eddie really has anything figured out – he wants his kid back, great, he knew that already – but it’s more focussed in his mind, another lens clicked into place, allowing for a sharper picture.

There’s a time window that’s closing, an hourglass running out of sand; he can hear it trickle past as he carefully folds the shirt he was still holding when he woke, smoothing out the wrinkles as he goes. He puts it back in the drawer, shuts it quietly, twists his neck from side to side to loosen the muscles.

What the seconds ticking by are leading up to, Eddie doesn’t know. Or, well, he knows one ending. No point in pretending. If Chris never wants to come back to LA again, it’s clear where Eddie’s road is taking him. It’s eight hundred miles to El Paso, but Eddie would make the journey on his hands and knees if needed. 

But whatever other ending there might be? Still pretty nebulous to Eddie, to be honest. He’d been hoping for the go from Chris, a word, a text, a nod, anything – but things aren’t looking too great on that front right now. 

So what now?

Permission to want, Esther said. Permission to want. 

Well, yeah, Eddie wants his kid home. But he also does not want to push or hurt him again. He wants to move forward. They’ve been teetering on this edge for weeks now; things with Chris got better and better until they reached an invisible threshold, a barrier on the road Eddie still hasn’t figured out who put up. If it’s a boundary Chris is setting, Eddie would rather chop off his own legs than cross it. If Eddie’s parents helped construct it, things are much more complicated. 

Permission to want. 

Permission to be pissed at his mom for the fact that she tried to go behind his back with the tournament, more like. Or at least Eddie would like it if it just came down to that. Being angry at his parents is one of those rare things in life that he’s scarcely if ever failed at. Sure, he may have put all of his built-up resentment toward them on the backburner as shame and self-hatred took the reins for a while there, but it’s been peeking through every now and then. 

So few calls from his mother, so half-hearted questions about his well-being from his father, so little time spent filling him in on how things were going. No plans to bring his kid home again. It’s all been accumulating to form quite a sizable reservoir of disdain. 

To be perfectly honest, Eddie doesn’t actually want to look at it all that much. It might hurt him more than he’d be willing to admit. But just because you want something, doesn’t mean you get to have it, and sometimes you have to do things even though they hurt. Kind of the whole deal his mind’s been on a spin about. 

Right hurt, wrong hurt, selfish, self-love, tough decisions, and self-sabotage. A mess as tangled as Buck’s headphone cables. 

And time, as previously stated, appears to be on the way out. Bit of a shit situation, to be honest. But Eddie’s always been good at working under pressure, and he reckons he’s got at least this week before the hourglass is empty. Looking at things head-on, that might prove a bit of a problem for him, sure, but what choice does he have? 

Permission to want, Esther said. Start from there and see where it leads. 

Well, shit. What does he want? 

Before Eddie can get into the thick of it, start soul-searching on the floor of his kid’s bedroom, his stomach lets out a disgruntled grumble that draws his attention. Hm. Permission to want. Indulging just for the hell of it. Well, a breakfast burrito can’t be the worst place to start, right?

*

When Eddie arrives at the station, it's with a full belly and newfound conviction to make things right. Not in the desperate fix-it-by-any-means-necessary-and-if-it-kills-me kinda sense that’s cost him way too much already, but in the go-at-this-calm-and-collected-and-figure-things-out-before-you-do-anything type of way. 

He’s done with panicking. 

No rash decisions, no catastrophizing; he’ll take his time to think about what to do about the tournament situation. He’s got at minimum a week, so he really doesn’t have to drag all of this to work with him. The opposite, actually; Eddie’s decided that he’s going to use this 24 to take a breather and get his head on straight. 

Unfortunately, it seems someone upstairs takes affront at that particular choice of words and immediately upon entering the building bestows upon him the vision of Buck half-dressed as he’s shuffling into his uniform, a sight that captivates Eddie’s attention so wholly, he walks face-first into the glass doors to the locker room. 

It’s… a humbling start to the shift, if anything. Chim’s laughing about it all the way up the stairs, has some extra spring in his step and everything, and of course he tells Hen before she even asks, and by the time Eddie’s made it up to the loft, he’s pretty sure the entire station knows. Nothing like a knock to the head to get him to focus on problem número dos, though; that is, the muddy waters of whatever the fuck Eddie’s going to do about the hot and pulsing love that’s taken up residence somewhere next to his heart. 

The – very annoying – thing is, Esther, once again, wasn’t exactly wrong with what she said. Eddie does feel a pang in his chest with every wave of desire or affection he’s hit by, a self-inflicted slap on the hand. The knowledge of what exactly the feelings swelling in him are, and the fact that, in some other set of circumstances, Buck could, hypothetically, return them, has evidently affected how much he allows himself. 

That’s a place to start. 

If Eddie ever wants to be remotely normal about any of this and return to some kind of level-headedness, he’s gotta get in check with his feelings. Come to terms with the tendrils of longing curling around his heart and eagerly reaching for Buck at any chance they’re given. Maybe even indulge them now and then. He can’t move on from this if he keeps pushing it down until it slingshots him in the face again. 

So, holding an ice-pack to the goose-egg that’s currently forming on his forehead, Eddie makes a pact with himself: He’s going to let every bit of love and affection that he feels run through him undisturbed until the enormity of it all no longer scares him. Or at least he’s going to try. He can’t exactly use this shift as a breather if he spends most of it holding his breath, afraid of what might stumble out of him along with it. 

Eddie starts off simple, nothing out of the ordinary, just easy smiles and their regular chirping and quipping, then transitions to some long looks like warm-up stretches, not shying away when their eyes meet, letting his gaze linger before softly drifting on. 

However, what was intended as a straightforward, maybe even slightly joyful way to soften himself up to wanting in more embarrassingly aching and desperate ways, immediately gets far more fickle and anxiety-inducing when after about two minutes of looking, Eddie comes to the conclusion that there is most definitely something going on with Buck today. 

He’s uncharacteristically quiet all morning, mouth held closed as if there’s a sentence sitting on his tongue like a grasshopper waiting to escape the second he opens it. Broken-off looks, sheepish ducks of his head, and that signature kicked-puppy-like flair to the permanent slant of his brow – yep, there’s definitely something wrong. And, perhaps most concerning of all, Buck keeps eyeing Eddie with an expression that makes clear he thinks Eddie should know what this is about. 

In an instant, Eddie’s resolution to stop fucking panicking is put to the test. 

There is only one thing that this could be about, one thing that has changed between them, or rather, one thing that might change something, might make Buck recontextualize all of Eddie’s actions and words. In step with just the thought of what this could mean comes a prey-like spike of fear in his chest, a herd of jack-rabbiting pulses of adrenaline chasing through his veins, because apparently the fact that Buck could maybe, potentially, have figured something out, is enough to send Eddie’s body into fight or flight. 

It’s grueling work, letting the fear run its course instead of trying to suffocate it under a pillow of ignorance, watching the worry ebb away instead of forcing it down, acknowledging the fact that there is nothing he can do to right this issue here and now. Choosing to believe that he might be misinterpreting something. 

But it’s good that he does it, because it keeps him from spiralling when, after a breakfast spent trying to act as if nothing’s going while waging silent war against his own anxious mind, he sees Buck head towards him when he’s finished restocking the ambulance, his eyes a mix of worry and disdain when they flicker to the other members of A-shift lingering around. 

For a second, Eddie entertains the thought that maybe what’s going on with Buck doesn’t actually have anything to do with him, but rather with Hernandez and Olson, who are mostly busy scrubbing the firetruck and don’t exactly warrant the suspicious looks Buck is sending them. 

But then Buck’s right in front of him, a strong hand wrapping around Eddie’s wrist and a questioning nod towards the vague privacy of the storage closet a few feet behind them, and Eddie has to give up on his wishful thinking. 

Up close, it’s obvious that the look in Buck’s eyes is apologetic more than anything, and Eddie isn’t sure whether he finds that reassuring or even more frightening. Regardless, he abides by Buck’s silent request, feet moving before he can form much of a second thought about what exactly is going on right now. 

As they pass, Eddie can feel the barely concealed stares of Olson and Hernandes digging into their backs, and oh. 

Oh this does look rather incriminating, doesn’t it? 

For a brief moment, Eddie allows himself to bask in the idea that this is exactly what it looks like – a quick expedition into the storage closet with just the two of them, Buck’s hand about to wrap around way more than just Eddie’s arm, a dream world where Eddie gets everything he wants and some extra reckless workplace affections on top. 

Surging in tandem with that sinfully delightful thought is a mean a flare of disgust at himself for fantasizing about his best friend like this, as if his lewd imagination might stain Buck’s hands where they’re touching the skin of his arm, but Eddie reminds himself that he just wants, he’s not going to get anything anyways, and before more of his self-hating tendencies can rear their ugly heads, the door behind them snaps closed, and Eddie’s got other things to worry about. 

Prime among those the utterly brittle gaze Buck has fixed on him now, the one that pierces right past the shroud of fear in Eddie’s mind and feeds into a much deeper-lying need to reassure Buck however he can, words and smiles, hands on shoulders, other, much more tender caresses, if they were allowed to him. It grows until it almost eclipses all else on his mind, is only held at bay by the steady thrum of anxiety his heart’s pumping through his body. 

“Sorry,” is the first thing that leaves Buck's lips, when he finally wrenches his mouth open. “Sorry, I, uh, I wanted to text you, but then I thought, you know, this would be kinda awkward to do over text, but then I was so busy yesterday and I just had absolutely no time to come over again, so I wanted to do it at the beginning of the shift, but there were just so many people around and I didn’t know how much I could say and–”

“Buck. Take a breath,” says Eddie. Half of that is directed at himself as well; whatever happens now, whatever Buck’s going on about that he apparently couldn’t adequately communicate via text, he needs to meet it as calmly and collected as possible, even if it is the uncomfortably open and clear rejection whose foreboding is currently freezing Eddie’s veins with fear. 

They breathe in tandem, and for a moment there’s just this, just them and their lungs filling, then draining, and Eddie thinks he could exist here forever. Some of the tension in Buck’s shoulders dissipates, muscles of his face relaxing as well, hint of a self-deprecating smile pulling at the edge of his mouth. His eyes stay worried, though. 

“Listen,” he starts again, “I, uh, I just wanted to say that I’m really really sorry for just walking out on you after you came o–” – a clang from outside the closet has Buck jump to alert like a scared dog, tension right back where it just left – “I mean, after, uh, what we talked about.” 

Most of the fear leaves Eddie right then and there. Ice dewing, blood pumping again. Of course Buck hasn’t let this go yet. He’s just a plain old worrier, and Eddie got worried right with him. He dismisses the vague undercurrent of… something that he feels at the hit he was bracing for not coming. 

“It’s fine, Buck, really. It’s not a big deal.”

“It is a big deal!” Buck protests, then cringes. “Or, uh, i-it’s not a big deal, but, it’s like, a deal, and I kind of ruined it–”

Eddie rolls his eyes, fondly. “You didn’t ruin my coming out Buck. It’s all good.”

“No, but like–” 

The ring of the alarm saves them from getting caught in an endless feedback-loop, and Eddie sends Buck one last reassuring smile, says, “Buck,” before he pushes open the door and they race to the truck like normal again. 

He’s pretty sure Hernandez is giving them a massive side-eye as they rush past, but Eddie finds he doesn’t actually care much about that. 

Instead, there’s some extra levity granted to his step as they run, the averted crisis like salve on his wrought-up nerves that allows him to return right to where he was before he got all worried, that is, the tentative beginnings of his exercise in wanting things just for the hell of it. 

And, well, sitting in the back of the truck, Eddie wants to press his right leg into Buck’s left in further silent reassurance that yes, it really is fine, and who’s to judge him if he does it, right? Buck certainly doesn’t mind, from how his eyes crinkle and he knocks his shoulder into Eddie’s.

Okay, thinks Eddie as he concentrates on listening to Chim and Hen talk about their days off in hopes of avoiding the embarrassing flush to his cheeks that he’d certainly get if he spent another second focussed on Buck’s warmth at his side. Okay. Maybe therapy homework can be fun, actually. 

First time for everything, right?

In the beginning, it’s simple enough; Eddie watches Buck as he clambers his way up the ladder to literally get a kitten out of a tree, and only feels faintly bad for how his gaze drifts away from the cat and down to Buck’s ass. He can’t help looking anyway, right? He needs to make sure his partner doesn’t stumble or fall. He’s just doing his job. 

Then, back at the station, when Buck passes him the coffee, Eddie lets his fingers linger on top of Buck’s for a little longer than he usually allows himself. A tingle passes through his nervous system at the contact, this tiny indulgence almost as sweet as the sugar he dumps in his cup afterwards. 

Nothing to feel bad about here either, this isn’t taking anything, he’s not being selfish or perverse for taking pleasure in the brush of a hand. This is normal. Other people do this all the time. 

Other people also sometimes get caught on how beautiful their best friends are and find themselves staring at their face to memorize the slope of their nose and the delicate web of acne-scars mapping across their skin like galaxies in the night sky. Or at least that’s what Eddie tells himself. 

He’s not entirely sure whether other people relegate the same amount of time to observing just how their best friend’s tummy stretches and squishes and pillows over their belt. He has to admit that even if they did, they probably don’t think about how they want to pat or knead or bite said tummy. 

Well, they should. It’s a good tummy. 

Either way, all this wanting, it turns out rather quickly, is not quite as straightforward as Eddie would like it to be. 

First of all, the second he gives himself permission to just for a moment indulge in the thought of how it might feel to gently sink his teeth into the supple flesh of Buck’s underbelly, he is overcome with a vertigo-inducing nausea that he only manages to shake by telling himself again and again that just because he was raised catholic, he doesn’t have to act like a fucking prude, and that wanting something still doesn’t equal actually getting to have it, so why make a fuss about it anyway, right? 

Second of all, as soon as his initial reservations are mostly overcome, it gets harder in the exact opposite way; that is, an uncomfortably literal one. 

Just after lunch, Eddie watches Buck roll up the hoses, the muscles in his arms bulging against his straining T-Shirt, and Eddie has to snap his gaze away because he’s starting to think about those muscles, then snaps his gaze back because he’s decided to let himself want goddamnit, then snaps his gaze away again when his imagination takes the sentiment of I want to be crushed by that man and starts playing a film-festival’s worth of R-rated mental imagery of just how that might go down. 

Therapy be damned, Eddie’s not going to pop a fucking boner at work if he can help it. 

While explaining to some idiot on a call that no, he shouldn’t use the microwave to dry his phone after it fell in the pool, Buck crosses his arms in such a way that his enormous biceps are squishing his equally sizeable pecs, and suddenly all Eddie can think is God I want to bury my face in those tits, an entirely unproductive thought when you’re supposed to be giving a kid the fire-safety talk and not lustfully gazing at your coworker’s chest. 

Then, back at the station, Eddie has to fake wanting to take a nap when Buck asks for a spot in the gym because now that the floodgates have been opened, he is not sure he could look at the expanse of Buck’s skin dappled in tiny beads of sweat without immediately thinking about licking them off. 

Buck looks kind of disappointed at that, but Ravi quickly offers to spot him in Eddie’s place, and before more vague feelings of guilt can leak into Eddie’s already rather saturated mind, he ducks out of the gym. 

Instead of directly heading to the bunkroom to lie awake in shame for an hour or two, Eddie first makes a strategic detour to the bathroom. There is no real privacy to be found in a firehouse, especially not before nightfall, but since Hen and Chim are currently restocking the ambulance (rendering Eddie’s good friend the storage closet a void option) this is as close as he can get. 

Perched in a stall, Eddie has to admit he feels like a relapsing addict when he fishes his phone out of his pocket and opens the browser. But there’s no other place to put all of this, and he’s already bit his tongue so many times today to keep it from forming his questionably obscene thoughts into real-life words or just darting across his lips in silent appetite. 

He can be allowed one entry. 

It takes a good while to figure out where to place the marker; Eddie doesn’t exactly want to tack whatever he’s about to write to the firestation. Stuff like this isn’t called not safe for work for nothing. 

When he’s finally figured out some sort of compromise – a street-corner where he watched Buck lift a truck tire off a guy like it’s nothing and had to do some heavy breathing exercises to stop himself from asking his coworkers do you think he’d toss me around like that if I asked him nicely? – Eddie finds himself staring at the white of an empty textfield, taunting and daunting in equal measure. 

He blinks at it. Tries to scrounge up some of the thoughts that have been plaguing him all day. Comes up dry. 

The screen dims a little and he taps to refresh it. The cursor flashes at him to make a move. 

Eddie swallows and– this is awkward. 

Like. Really awkward. 

How do people just– how do they just write this kind of stuff? On his journeys across the map he has seen entries about people sucking dick the first time, making love to a partner, lusting after a friend, so he knows not everyone runs into a fucking wall in the privacy of their own mind when they try to put these feelings into words. 

Maybe Eddie should just let it be. What is his problem anyway? That when he steps out of the stall, there’s a chance that Buck’s going to be there? Dripping with sweat and on the way to the shower? Muscles glistening and eyes twinkling? His workout shorts entirely too formfitting and–

Yeah okay, there might be a problem actually. 

One that’s not just making itself known in his head, but in his pants as well. 

So much for mission: Do Not Pop a Boner at Work. 

Well shit. 

The textfield is still infuriatingly bare, but it feels like the growing heat in his gut is slowly melting the levee his mind has erected, thoughts trickling in and pooling at his fingertips. Sadly, none of them are coherent; just visions of skin, of bodies in motion, the taste of sweat… 

Eddie doesn't realise his other hand has wandered downwards until the heel of it presses against his half-hard dick, searching for a little bit of relief even as two layers of fabric dull the sensation.

He bites his lip. Stops his hand right where it is. This is– this is wrong. 

Is this wrong?

It’s not like his mind’s never strayed off course while jerking off before, unwillingly indulging in the hazy fantasies that linger at the edge of his periphery. 

But– to do it intentionally? 

Then again–

He's still got the text field open.

This could just be… stress relief. An outlet. 

Eddie swallows. 

Allows his mind to drift again. 

The vague shapes and sensations swirling in his brain rearrange themselves, condense into well-known proportions, tangible and tantalizing. Eddie can’t help imagining running his hands along those flanks, burying his nose in those armpits, licking a stripe up the column of that throat– a shudder escapes him as his hips buck, and fuck, yeah, this is fine actually, he's just trying to take the edge off, ease the tension, dispel the tightness in his body. 

This is fine. Just a fancy way of beating writer’s block.

Shakily, Eddie starts typing one-handed.

I’m not sure I knew desire like this before you. 

Heel pressing down harder. 

The sight of you makes me crazy. 

Fingers slowly sneaking up, playing with the waistband. 

I don’t know how I ignored it this long. 

Dipping down, under, gripping himself. Fuck. 

I would drop to my knees if you would only let me. 

His eyelids fall closed. The vision of the fantasy overtakes his mind, every nook and cranny filled with velvety thoughts, of his knees pressing into the hard ground, a hand in his hair, his own on strong thighs, and he can't help tightening his grip in his pants, moving a little up and down, silently gasping. 

This part must be wrong, he knows, a line crossed, an unforgivable offense, but as much as Eddie waits for the all-familiar shame to turn the heat in his gut inside out, it doesn’t come. There’s just pleasure, running up his spine, tingling in the soles of his feet. 

His eyes blink open, squinting at the screen. That last bit of plausible deniability; as long as he’s writing, there’s still some kind of purpose to this. If he lets go of this tether, it’s just him and his obscene delusions. 

Eddie swallows. 

Clicks send. 

Drops his phone into his pocket and closes his eyes and lets himself fall into sensation. 

It doesn’t take long. Actually, it’s probably embarrassing how not-long it takes. Just a minute or two, eyelids fluttering, breath ragged, biting one fist as he fucks the other, pretending it’s someone else’s fingers in his mouth. A couple more strokes, then he’s standing up, turning around and putting up the seat, hand braced on the wall, trying desperately to stay quiet as heat washes through him and his vision whites out and he spills in the toilet. 

The comedown is… something, for sure. One minute he’s in the throes of passion, the next he’s just some guy standing in a stall at his workplace with his dick in his hand. Not the most dignified thing to be. 

Warmth is making place for cold and the onset of panic is starting to fray his edges, and before he can become somehow even more pathetic (read: have a proper breakdown about the fact that he’s some guy standing in a stall at his workplace with his dick in his hand while said dick is still in said hand), he shuffles out of the stall and into the shower, lukewarm water steadily pattering on his back and dulling his mind. 

He takes a deep breath. Puts a hand on the cold tile wall to ground himself. 

It’s just wanting. 

It’s not having, it’s not taking, it’s just wanting. 

The problem is, in some fucked up way, that almost feels worse.  

As if these feelings, these desires lodged in his chest will tip over like an inkwell when he spends more than a brief, dismissive thought on them, will stain his skin and make him leave pitch-black handprints on all he touches. 

But when Eddie blinks at his hands in the spray, they’re clean. 

All things considered, Eddie’s rather calm when he steps out of the shower five minutes later. That is to say, he’s still shaking ever so slightly, but now that he has (in the most literal sense) beaten back his horniness, he has to admit he feels a lot more adjusted. 

Unfortunately, right as he lifts the rose-tinted glasses of lust, the depressing realization that the vision of Buck and the occasional platonic touch is all he’s ever going to get opens up like a yawning pit in his midsection that devours him from the inside out.

It’s terribly greedy of him that this isn’t enough, he knows. But he wants to have so much more than he’ll ever get, and it's painfully evident in every twinge and beat of his heart. 

All this wanting, a futile endeavour. Yeah, maybe Esther was right about the punishment business. 

In the evening, Eddie lets Buck talk his ear off about the hike he’s planning to go on with Tommy and tries, hard as he can, to be happy for them. He isn’t. But he’s trying. 

I want that to be you and me, he thinks. The extravagant dates. The lazy mornings. The mundanity of shared taxes. 

He watches Buck’s deft hands cut up bell peppers for Bobby’s stew and imagines softly kissing their callused knuckles. Running his hands along Buck’s wrists. Feeling his pulse under his fingers, warm, steady, alive, alive, alive. 

After dinner they’re dozing on the couch, and Buck lays his mile-long legs over Eddie’s, and, tired and exhausted as he is, Eddie feels the strange urge to weep at the weight of them in his lap, how near they are and yet how far all of this is from his reach. How he wishes they’d remain there until they melt into his own and their bodies become a singular mass, arteries merging and blood mingling until it’s impossible to tell apart, their atoms slotting into the empty spaces of the other. 

All that to say, Eddie's already in a quite melancholy mood when Buck, who has by now – much to Eddie’s disappointment – retracted his legs to rest on his half of the couch again, looks up from his phone, eyebrows scrunched, and asks, “Hey, uh, why did Chris just text me not to bother coming over for our video call tomorrow?”

Eddie’s exhale turns into a low sigh. 

“Bad phone call yesterday,” he mumbles. “I’m figuring it out.”

Even without looking, Eddie knows the pull to Buck’s mouth at this, the way his eyes are no doubt widening, his brow slanting in pity that might be easier to bear than anyone else’s, but still feels sticky and messy as syrup in his mind. 

It’s quiet for a while, as Eddie stares off to the side and focuses on his breathing. The loft is pretty empty by now; it’s ten pm and there’s been a steady trickle of people retiring to the bunk room in hopes of getting a bit of shut-eye before the next call. 

Buck breathes in, a little bit jittery, a tell-tale sign that he’s gearing up to say something he’s not sure he’s allowed to say. 

“Eddie… listen, I don’t want to be presumptuous, okay? And I-I know it’s not my place. Just– don’t you think you should maybe have a talk with him about all of this?”

“I think he’s going to feel ready to come back when he does, and I don’t want to push him on it.” 

Sounds of shuffling, Buck’s weight shifting on the couch. Eddie still doesn’t look. 

“And you’re not just doing this because you still think he’s better off without you?” Buck asks. 

“No,” answers Eddie, and surprises himself with how little it feels like a lie in his mouth. “But I fucked up, and I’m not going to force him to forgive me.”

“Eddie, you’re– you’re still his dad. The fact that you let him go at all is– I mean, you’re giving him as much space as you possibly could. Obviously I’m not saying you should force him to forgive you or anything, but… I don’t think there’d be anything wrong with just… asking him to come back.”

Eddie nods silently, once, twice, meets Buck’s eyes for a moment. 

“Shannon once said,” he starts, and notes how Buck hunches in on himself slightly at the words, “that I keep making choices that no one asked me to make.”

He runs a hand through his hair, breaks off the eye contact. 

“I don’t want him to come back to me because he thinks he has to. He should get to make that choice for himself.”

Buck doesn’t have anything else to say after that. Or, well, he probably does; he just doesn’t speak it. 

It’s kind of strange, when Eddie thinks about it. Back when she was alive, Buck had had no problem talking about her, or questioning Eddie’s decisions when it came to what to do about her, but now that Shannon’s gone, and Eddie and Buck so much closer than back then, it’s as if she’s got the final word, more right to a claim than Buck could ever have. 

Maybe she should. 

Eddie won’t pretend he doesn’t feel guilt thrumming underneath his skin and rushing in his ears when the thought crosses his mind. 

But… but she’s gone. 

And Buck, currently staring into his phone unblinkingly and looking like he’s suddenly only half the size he usually is, very much isn’t. 

Don’t you know? Eddie wants to ask. You’ve already been granted more time with him than she ever was. There's no one else I trust like this.

Eddie’s got his phone out before he knows it. He contemplates for a moment whether his lawyer’s office or the hospital room in which he made his choice known to Buck is a more adequate place, settles on the latter because the fact that he said it is maybe most important of all. 

I gave you my heart here, he writes. You should have known, then. I guess it’s my luck you didn’t. It’s certainly both our luck that I didn’t – I’m not sure I would have been able to say it if I’d known it for the confession that it is. 

He allows himself a couple minutes of scrolling through LA after he sends it off, reads about highschool crushes and coming-outs, lost lovers and personal heavens found in another’s arms. Achingly sweet to nauseatingly sad, a wide array of emotions to cleanse his palate, project his own misery onto someone else instead of wallowing in it. 

When, ten minutes later, the bell rings, Eddie follows Buck to the truck without a word, moves in silent synchronicity with him when they pry open the doors of a stuck elevator to free its trapped passengers, spends the ride back listening to him and Hen chatter about claustrophobia and the efficacy of exposure therapy. 

Afterwards, a quick shower, just to rinse his sweaty body, not letting his gaze wander to where Buck is drying himself off, acknowledging that he wants and wants and wants, then sitting in that want as he forgoes temptation and only glances over when he’s certain Buck’s clothed again. 

Shoulder’s bumping on the way to the bunkroom, collapsing into neighbouring cots, pretending he’s trying to sleep until he hears Buck’s soft snores.

Eddie looks over. 

He allows himself to watch for a while; Buck’s legs that almost stretch beyond the bed frame, his head tucked into his shoulder, the rise and fall of his chest.

Ebb, flow, ebb, flow, ebb, flow. 

I want you , Eddie mouths into the darkness, careful not to let any breath escape his lips.  

I want you. I love you. I wish I’d get to have you.  

He has no idea how long he lies there in the dark, captivated by the image of Buck, soft, and at peace, and right there, but always out of Eddie’s reach. This is what he gets to have, and he cherishes it with all he has. 

Eventually, though, sleep comes for him too, settles gently on his senses like a blanket of fog, and permits him a few dreamless hours of unburdened quiet. 

The bell wakes them early in the morning. Yawning they drag themselves to a house party gone wrong, patch up scratches left by acrylic nails and lacerations caused by bottles smashed over heads, and Eddie lets the incessant screaming of the party goers that apparently still haven't finished fighting drown out his thoughts. 

“So, any plans for what you’re going to do with your day?” Buck asks as when they’re finally off shift and walking to their cars, having braved through another three calls, the last of which pushing them a good two hours into overtime.

Eddie shrugs. “Not really. I’ve got some errands to run, I guess.”

“Now?” Buck asks, and Eddie eyes him suspiciously, but chooses not to question his motives. 

“Yes,” he answers. 

Buck nods. “Good, good,” he says, and climbs into the jeep. 

*

A trip to the store and forty-five minutes of LA traffic later, Eddie comes home to find his door unlocked and Buck’s jeep parked in his driveway. It’s the kind of thing that was completely normal a few months ago, but now Eddie feels it like a weight in his lungs, moving with every breath he takes. 

Not in a bad way – it doesn’t drag him down or make it harder to draw in air than it was before. It gives weight to his breath. Makes it more meaningful somehow. He carries this with himself every day and that’s… a good thing. Or, well, at least Eddie likes the feeling of it. 

When he opens the door and shuffles out of his shoes, he barely resists the urge to call out honey, I'm home. Before Eddie knew just how much he wants those words to have a deeper meaning, he might’ve been able to make that kind of joke, but now, he’s not sure he could play it off convincingly. 

Instead he calls out a simple ‘Hey’ as he passes the kitchen on the way to his bedroom for a change of clothes, gets an echo with double the enthusiasm back from Buck who’s currently taking something out the oven by the sounds of it. 

Only once Eddie’s pulling a pair of sweatpants out of a drawer does he realize that maybe his silent acceptance of Buck as just another resident of this house that comes and goes as he wishes is more damning than any joke he could have made. And that maybe the real reason he doesn’t want to joke about any of this is that he does not want to make light of what they have. 

He doesn’t want the bro-ey distance they got over after only a couple months of knowing each other. He wants their normalcy, their ability to just exist in each other’s space, breathe each other’s air as they go about their lives. He wants Buck to use this kitchen like it’s his own because it is.  

Because, in some way, everything Eddie owns, everything he has, is Buck’s, too. 

And that’s such a big thing, Eddie kind of gets scared about it as he’s wiggling into his sweatpants. It just feels like so much to ask because all of Eddie’s is not just Buck’s to have, but also to safeguard, to treasure, to maybe even love. That’s a lot of responsibility to put on someone who has never explicitly asked for it.

But when Eddie pushes open the door to the kitchen and finds Buck beaming at him from the other side of the counter as he’s whisking some eggs, those fears of asking too much, of being too much… well, they don’t get silenced – life isn’t that kind to Eddie – but they do grow muffled. Like someone shoved cotton into his ears to shield him from the unrelenting noise.

It’s just kind of hard to worry about being a mess when his kitchen is most definitely messier right now – every counter cluttered with bowls and measuring cups, flour all over the table and parts of the floor, Buck’s hair now featuring a streak of frosting. 

He looks sickeningly cute. 

“What’s all this about?” Eddie asks, unable to hide the fondness in his voice. Why would he want to anyway, when Buck always gets that delightfully pretty pink tint to his cheeks whenever Eddie gets just a little bit more open, a little bit more risky with the words and inflections he chooses. 

“Well,” says Buck, face split open by that stupidly beautiful grin of his, “I was thinking…”

“Rare occurrence,” Eddie interjects, gets a chocolate chip flicked at him for it. 

“I was thinking,” Buck repeats, stressing the words as if he’s actually annoyed by the interruption, “that you’ve got a free afternoon and I need someone to taste-test the cake I’m going to bake for Jee-Yun’s birthday.”

“Her birthday’s in half a year,” Eddie says, raising an eyebrow. 

“So? Can’t start early enough.”

Eddie lets his gaze drift across the kitchen. 

“There’s batter for like… three more cakes here, Buck. And you just took one out of the oven.”

Buck blinks at him innocently. “Haven’t decided yet which one I want to make. That’s why I need you as my taste-tester.”

“Your taste-tester?” Eddie asks, biting back the I’d taste you any day creeping up his throat. 

“Well, I needed someone with the palate of a four-year-old,” Buck smiles. 

“And Chimney wasn’t available?”

Buck laughs, and before Eddie knows it, he’s mixing food coloring into buttercream and listening to Buck explain which cakes made it into his closer selection. 

It’s all so good, so easy, and as they’re putting the next one into the oven, Buck says, “You know, it’s so cool that you’re gay, we can go through my coming-out to-do list together now,” and Eddie laughs, asks, “Is it color-coded?” and Buck shows him the rainbow-colored notes in a folder on his phone and Eddie thinks I love you, I love you, I love you. 

They watch But I’m a Cheerleader to pass the time while the first cake cools, Eddie expertly masking just how Graham asking “Do you want me to do what I really want?” and then kissing Megan sends a pang of longing right to his heart. Once the movie’s over and they’re back in the kitchen, Buck goes through the other items on his to-do list as Eddie fills the piping bags (“Decorating cakes is hard, Eddie, we better get some practice in now!”), movies, music, museums, and he just… loves this. He wants this every damn day. 

In the middle of trying to follow some complicated piping tutorial on his phone, tongue sticking out with effort, Buck suddenly looks up, eyes wide, mouth split in a grin. 

“Oh my God, I almost forgot – we need to plan your first trip to a gay bar!”

Eddie grimaces, the piping bag in his hand making an undignified splurt as he grips it too tight. 

“Uh… Hen and Karen may have gotten ahead of you on that one.” 

Buck’s eyebrows furrow. “Oh? When?”

“The night I, uh, switched my location off,” Eddie admits, sheepishly scratching his neck and smearing some frosting there in the process. 

Briefly, a complicated expression flickers across Buck’s face, is gone too soon for Eddie to get a read on what exactly it is, but he knows Buck well enough to make an educated guess. 

Rejection. 

And, God, does it make Eddie feel bad, because he never meant to exclude Buck from any of this, but even as new guilt begins eating away at him, there’s suddenly a spark of annoyance eating away at the guilt because come on, right?

First he feels bad for taking up too much of Buck’s time, then for not taking enough – will his mind ever give him a damn break and just let him enjoy something?

Because that’s what he wants right now. Just enjoy this moment. Without consequences, without serious things to worry about, without any fucking guilt bearing down on him like leaden necklace. 

Decorate a fucking cake with Buck and eat it over movies. Banish the thoughts of his own neediness and just take what Buck’s offering him. He can have this. Have as much of Buck as he’s given. 

And of course it’s never going to be enough, not with how greedy Eddie is deep down, but it’s so good regardless, so divine, he’d be not just a fool, but a blasphemer to reject it. 

So he picks up the bag and gets back to making crooked little roses while he fights the urge to lick the frosting off Buck’s cheek.

And if Eddie sneaks a little entry onto the map in between movies, a tiny If you wanted to have me forever, you'd just need to say it. I'd never be able to resist having more of you in my life, then that’s nobody’s business but his own.

He's doing this in the name of therapy, after all.

*

By the end of their next shift, Eddie has to admit that things aren’t exactly going to plan. For one, he still hasn’t really found time to meditate on what to do about the tournament-situation. For another, he may or may not have increased the quantity of little black markers populating the city of LA on that map by an, uh, not insignificant amount. 

But, well, Eddie’s supposed to want, right? And the simple caveat that comes with wanting is the overwhelming need to put his thoughts into words. Eddie is almost thankful for his previous repression – it’s probably spared him years worth of embarrassing childhood diaries. 

Because as it turns out, Eddie wants, like, a lot over the course of a single day. There’s a steady stream of thoughts trailing through his mind, and while some are as simple as I want to play a game of pool with Buck or I want to win this game of pool against Buck, most of them end up a little trickier, as in, I want to never stop watching Buck bend over this pool table, or I want to bend Buck over this pool table myself. 

Old and new desires alike come to gnaw at him, wear him down until he’s back to typing them into his phone before they can turn him unsteady enough to let the words tumble past his lips. Of course he doesn’t give into every whim – otherwise whoever moderates the map would no doubt have put out a hit on him already and Eddie’s rather sick of getting shot – but now that he’s growing more aware of all these wants with every passing second, there’s just way more material that wants to worm its way out of his head. 

He isn’t even trying to purposefully reflect or anything, somehow he just keeps running into things that remind him. 

They get called to a bachelorette party that got out of hands, and Eddie spends the drive back to the station on an epic quest to locate the bar where they celebrated Chimney’s bachelor party so he can tack an You were draped all over me and I still wanted you to be closer onto the map.

A call to a graveyard turns into Eddie sneaking away to write You told me she saw you like no one else did and it hurt more than I was willing to admit as Hen and Chim patch up a kid that tried to jump over a headstone and broke his nose in the process. 

In the afternoon, they extricate a guy from a poker table who apparently was thrown through it head first when his fellow players realized he was cheating, and Eddie laughs and knocks his shoulder into Buck, says “Glad they didn’t do that to you,” but there’s something painful underneath how sweet the responding rumble in Buck’s chest sounds to his ears. The thought whirrs around his head all day, doesn’t leave him alone until he finally relents and types it out when he’s curled up on the couch later that evening. I took you out, he writes, a bitter taste on his tongue. Even told you to dress up fancy. It wasn’t a date – even though looking back, I think I wanted it to be. The entire night, I couldn’t stop looking at you. 

All of these are barely confessions, but they do make it easier to be around Buck. It just helps to know that he gets to put it somewhere. That maybe someone will read it one day. That none of this just exists in the confines of Eddie’s mind, that it’s something real, as much as one-sided affection can ever be real, anyway.  

Obviously, none of this makes the feelings go away. 

At every twist and turn, the ever-hungry beast inside Eddie’s chest claws at the cage it's found in his ribs, stirred by the flagrant want now freely coursing through his veins, moving with his breath, haunting the corners of his visions. But in some desperate way its presence warms Eddie, lights him up from the inside out. Has him burning up like a meteorite in Buck’s orbit. 

Painful, sure. But inevitable, in some sense. 

And… Eddie thinks there can be peace in that. In knowing, and watching, and waiting for it to pass. 

Maybe he can do this. Maybe there really is a balance to be found in between repressing every single feeling he has ever felt and being incapable of talking to Buck without stuttering out a love confession. 

And Eddie does feel some genuine relief at that – he’s happy as they’re walking in step to the locker room to change and clock out for the day, trailing everyone else because they were dead set on finishing their Streetfighter duel. 

As he changes back into his civies, he’s already constructing a vague entry in his head again, something about couches and video games and even losing being fun when he does it with Buck, but he’s not sure whether that one meets his primary criteria for actually being written yet (that criteria being I cannot say this to Buck without making it completely obvious that I am in love with him ). It’s been getting more and more tricky to draw a line between thoughts that can’t be spoken out loud and thoughts that should be spoken out loud because Buck deserves to know he’s amazing; Eddie hopes he’ll manage to strike a sustainable balance one of these days. 

“I hope you were better at that when you were doing it in real life,” Buck jokes when he closes his locker, “can’t imagine it’d be fun to just get beat into a pulp like that.”

Eddie scoffs, because it’s pretty bold of him to make a joke like that when he’s the one who loses nine times out of ten, so he snaps his locker shut as well and turns so he can quip something back, but all words whither in his mouth when he sees that suddenly there’s no more than five inches between his and Buck’s face. 

His mind empties out completely; for a moment, there’s nothing in the world but those wide open eyes staring into his, blinking in surprise. 

A sharp inhale, the both of them not daring to move a muscle, and Eddie’s lungs lock up as his mouth drops open just a sliver. Blue eyes flicking down, setting on– no, no, he isn’t looking at– is he? – then blinking up again, like nothing just happened, back to the beginning, back to gazes interlocked and sinews tense as steel wire. 

They’re just standing there, looking at each other. Kind of silly when you think about it. 

Then, Buck breathes out. 

Warm, loaded air brushes against Eddie’s face, lingers on his lips and travels up his nose, drips from his chin like liquid gold, and before Eddie even fully registers what’s happening, there’s a violent surge at the base of his gut, a primal desire to taste more, let that breath mingle with his own until there’s no difference to be found. 

It’s a magnetic force, pulls him under like the tide, that single puff of air enough to have him losing control and move forward as his muscles surrender to the imperative in his mind to get closer, taste more. 

He watches Buck’s eyelids flutter, and for the tiniest moment, Eddie is sure he is leaning in as well, his lips pursing ever so slightly, and just when both Eddie’s self-control and self-preservation have most definitely left the building and his hands are slowly rising, no doubt to frame Buck’s beautiful face–

The bell goes. 

Eddie doesn’t know who jerks back first. For a moment they’re just blinking at each other, no mind for the B-shift firefighters rushing past them. Then, Buck stumbles backwards, almost falling over the bench in the process. 

“I– uh– I gotta– I’m gonna–” he stutters, then grabs his duffel and runs out. 

Eddie stares after him. 

Shit. 

This is. 

Oh man. 

This is–

Shit.  

Eddie’s– 

yeah, he’s going to just pack up his stuff. Everything in the bag. Just cram it in there, it’ll be fine. Steps nice and light, everything is fine. 

Walk straight out and– that’s Buck’s jeep leaving the lot, is he– okay, yeah not thinking about it, not thinking about it, nu-uh, not now. 

He can’t do this at the station. No way. He needs to be somewhere further away for this. 

Just– get to the truck. Driver’s side, jump right in, key in the ignition. Don’t think about it. 

Handbrake released, twist the key, start the car. Don’t think about it. 

Out onto the road, just, somewhere further away, drive drive drive until there’s some half-empty parking lot in sight. Don’t think about it. 

Then, Eddie’s saving grace: a dilapidated McDonalds, the parking space in the outermost corner practically waiting for him to take refuge.

Put the car into park, ignition off, release the deathgrip on the steering wheel. 

Think about it. 

Fuck.

Fuck. 

This is– this is bad this is so so bad, this is– oh boy this is proper bad, like bad- bad, like–

Fuck, this is bad. 

Everything was so good, so easy, too good, too easy, control slipping right from Eddie’s fingers the second he relaxed his aching muscles.

The urge to clamp down, bite down floods his mind, screams screams screams until everything’s blank and there’s just muscle, just tension, hands grasping for controlcontrolcontrol and–

Stop. 

This isn’t happening again. 

No more fucking catastrophizing. 

No teeth grinding until his jaw hurts. Relent. Relent. 

Muscles escaping his control, his body contracting without order then relaxing with force, again, again, like he’s one big fascicle. 

No tension lacing his shoulders tight, release, relent, stretch fingers, toes, start breathing again. 

Then, as stiffness lessens, the shaking comes, pulses from his middle out towards his limbs, no control, a silent earthquake shivering through him, mind kick-starting right along.

I can’t– what if– I need–

Another breath, no panicking, no panicking, deep breath, in, and right back out. 

I should’ve– I didn’t– 

No calm, just thoughts, swirling and swirling, beginnings mixing and mingling until they’re nothing but anxious sludge, dragging downwards, pulling him under, yearning for the sweet relief of absolute despair, and he needs them out, gone, needs to drain this leaky boat with his leaky bucket before the depths below claim him.

Phone in his hand without thinking, and he’s typing, backspacing,  I tried to– I wanted to– I want to– but it’s as futile as all else, nothing works, nothing helps, the screen shakes in his unsteady hands, blurs until it’s just a smudge of pink in his vision, eyes narrowing, brow creasing, hands grasping tighter, tighter, but the words won’t come out, are stuck in his mind, just peeking out from the rubble. 

Please, I wouldn’t– I can’t just– If I had–

Another shake, another ripple, body quaking and muscles convulsing, the phone falls from his hand. His last chance at release, down in the footwell, screen still in sight, now clearer than before but so far away, his uncooperative arms would not, could not reach. 

I wanted– his mind laments like a record that’s caught, I wanted– I wanted– I wanted–

Another breath, no panicking, nothing is ruined, nothing is over, he’s not going under, tomorrow will come and he’ll live and he’ll live. 

This is fine.

Singular thought, like a lonely brick on unstable foundation, waiting for the rest of the house to be built. 

This is fine. 

Teeth grinding, toes curled into fists until it hurts, fingers digging into the seat, this is fine, this is fine. 

Thoughts, slowly untangling in his mind, sedimenting, separating, layer upon layer settling until everything’s clear. 

I wanted to kiss him. I wanted him to want it too. 

This is fine. 

Nails scratching across the fiber of his jeans, thighs underneath tensing until they’re steelen. 

This. Is. Fine. 

Shaky inhale, shakier exhale, a bit of panic lapping at his edges again, what happens now, does he hate me, does he pity me, does he know, does he know? Bile, rising in his throating, stomach bucking like a wild horse – does he know? – and his breathing’s picking up, his hands are tingling, his teeth bite down, skin of his cheek caught in the mix, copper on his tongue, and he’s spinning out, he knows it, his minds drifting and falling and–

A ding. 

He blinks. 

There’s an email notification flashing across his phone, all-caps screaming at him. 

FREE! $100 WALMART GIFT CARD THAT CAN BE YOURS!

He blinks again. Feels something building in his stomach, bubbling up his chest and– 

Eddie can’t help it. 

He snorts. 

This is just– he’s having a breakdown here, okay? A little respect for the guy with mental issues grinding his teeth to dust in a McDonalds parking lot, please?

TAKE OUR SURVEY AND YOU COULD BE THE LUCKY WINNER, his phone replies.

A chuckle skips past Eddie’s lips, is joined by another and another until he’s fully laughing. 

God, he’s sitting in his car in some random parking lot, feeling like he’s about to combust because of a kiss that didn’t even happen. That’s literally it. 

He drops his head into his hands and lets the laughter gently shake the tension out of his muscles. It doesn’t take long until a couple sobs mingle with the hiccuping chuckles tumbling out of him, and soon the pressure behind his face is slowly drained by the tears flowing down his cheeks. Soothing like rain on dry earth, they mend his cracked interior and soak him in tentative self-forgiveness until he’s all soft and mushy. 

Wiping at his eyes, Eddie takes a couple of shaky breaths, in, out, in, out, until he’s halfway back to normal, just grinning like a fool and shaking his head because what the fuck has his life become, he’s crying in the parking lot over almost kissing someone like he’s some teenager with his first crush. 

Jittery hands, rifling through the glove compartment for a tissue. 

It’s going to be fine, he tells himself, and it doesn’t even sound like a lie. 

Eddie blows his nose and drops his head back against the headrest. 

It would have been fine if he’d actually kissed me, too, he tells himself, and looks at it head-on even though it sends a torturous shiver through his limbs and a bout of nausea to his stomach. 

It would have been fine, he thinks, back straight and head tall as he weathers the flood of stomach-twisting emotion crashing into him, and, when all the self-hatred and doubt has ebbed away, and he finds himself standing knee deep in bitter disappointment, he braves that, too. 

Breathes in. Breathes out. 

A little bit shaky still, he bends down to fish his phone out of the footwell. 

When he unlocks it, the map’s empty textfield stares at him. Eddie scrunches his mouth to the left, then to the right. Before he can think better of it, he starts typing. 

I want you to kiss me, and maybe that’s okay, I don’t know. I just don’t want to lose you over this. 

He posts it, and it doesn’t feel like much. A bit of relief, sure, but honestly, it’s kind of underwhelming. Hm. Well, there’s only so many times you can do something before the novelty of it wears off…

Eddie shakes his head, breathes a little more, then bites his lip and starts the car. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees a group of girls walking out of the McDonalds, to-go bags in hand, laughing as they drink their sodas, looking like they don’t have a care in the world. 

Fuck it, thinks Eddie, and takes a detour through the drive-thru because while a cheeseburger and a pack of fries might not solve all his problems, they certainly wouldn’t hurt either. 

If the teenager at the check-out window notices how red-rimmed his eyes and puffy his face are, she doesn’t say anything. She probably doesn’t get paid enough to give a shit anyway. 

*

While coming-out to Buck had made Eddie feel excessively numb for the span of ten to twenty hours, whatever the hell happened at the end of last shift appears to have the opposite effect on him; despite how calm he carries himself when he gets home, Eddie feels raw, as if someone’s dragged a cheese-grater across his arms and left his nerves exposed. 

It doesn’t help that when the afternoon rolls around, he has yet to hear anything from Buck, which is at minimum unusual for the both of them. Thankfully, Eddie can keep his mind off the fact that he’s getting absolute radio silence from Buck by focussing on the fact that he’s still getting absolute radio silence from Chris, as well. 

Really the only person that’s texting him is – much to his dismay – his mom. 

There’s only ten more days to sign him up, Eddie. Don’t let your pride get in the way of this, writes Helena. 

Fuck you, mom, thinks Eddie. 

He does look over the PDF file his father sent him, though. Two boxes for him to put his first and last name, three more for address, e-mail, and phone number, a thin line waiting for his signature. 

Is he being selfish by not just filling it out already? There wouldn’t be any harm in having it ready if Chris really did decide that he wants to go. Seven full minutes of biting his lip and staring at the form, then Eddie exits out of the file reader, navigates back to his chat with Chris. He sent a message a couple days ago, right after the call ended, an attempt at an olive branch.  

Hey bud, if you want to talk about this another day, just send a text or call, okay? 

It got left on read. 

Eddie wants to write something more, get Chris to open up to him instead of shutting him out, but all messages he ever comes up with seem crooked and awkward. Lots of don’t worry about me s, or do what you want s and I love you either way s , and of course the forever-haunting if this is your way of telling me you want to stay in Texas, just say the word and I’ll pack up this house and join you. 

But Eddie knows how desperate he sounds, and he knows how much teenagers get annoyed by desperation, and he knows that whatever he writes would probably end up left on read as well. So he’s resigned himself to waiting. 

Admittedly, his hope for a good outcome dwindles with every day that passes. Hope in general appears to be rather short in supply right now. By the time Eddie trudges off to bed, there’s still no new message from anyone. Or, well, there’s the Don’t ignore me from his mom, but that hardly counts. 

Another day without progress. Eddie should be used to that by now. 

It’s different, though, from how it used to be; Eddie doesn’t feel like absolute shit when he lies down in bed, and even though he’s sure he made a big fat mistake that put everything he’s built with Buck for the past six years at immediate risk, he’s not completely spinning out about it. 

So maybe there is some sort of progress here, even if it’s not world-changing or whatever. Maybe sometimes progress is choosing to lock your muscles and stand still instead of walking back the way you came. 

There is no running away from whatever happens with him and Buck now anyway; they’ve got work in the morning, and then they will have to talk. If need be, Eddie will plead his case. Assure Buck that this doesn’t have to change anything. That they can get through this. That none of this has to be weird. 

Yeah, thinks Eddie as he pulls the covers over himself. This doesn’t have to be weird. 

By the time he dozes off, he half believes it. 

*

Unfortunately, all hope Eddie had for none of this to affect his and Buck’s relationship immediately goes out the window when he enters the locker room the next day and Buck all but storms out of the room, shirt not even half on. 

Great. He made it weird. 

It takes Eddie five minutes of staring into his locker to recalibrate and not immediately completely freak out at the thought of having ruined the most important friendship in his life, but when he’s finally finished his stupid fucking breathing exercises, most of the prey-like fear in his veins has dulled into the good old sense of impending doom Eddie carries with himself most days anyway. On top of it, resignation has laid down like a blanket of snow; heavy, numbing, and ice-cold. 

This is fine. 

This has to be fine. 

Eddie’s going to fix this somehow. He’ll– he’ll talk to Buck. Ensure he knows that this is just a temporary thing. That Eddie will get himself under control soon enough, that when he’s let all the wanting run through him, he’ll be right back to normal. 

That nothing has to change. 

Dear God, thinks Eddie, atheist that he is, please let this be fine. 

He puts on his best approximation of a neutral expression and walks up the stairs to the loft, where the look on Hen’s face when he greets her tells him that whatever grimace he’s pulled his face into looks anything but neutral. 

Thankfully, she just raises an eyebrow and doesn’t mention it any further. Not that she would really need to, when the atmosphere up here is already as supremely fucked as it is; Buck, overeager and overwrought, currently appears to be driving Bobby insane in an attempt to find some way to help in the kitchen, while Chim and Ravi watch from a safe distance, equal parts amused and concerned.

“You wanna explain what’s going on with him?” Chim asks when Eddie walks past them, some genuine concern hidden under the snarky tone of his voice. 

“How would I know, man,” Eddie mutters, and ignores the unimpressed looks they send him. 

He’s got his sights set on Buck. Eddie is gonna fix this, and he’s gonna fix this now. Just get it over with as soon as possible. 

Buck, however, seems to have other plans; the second he spots Eddie, he hightails it out of the kitchen, not even sparing him a look. 

Okay. 

Eddie won’t deny that this… hurts. Just a tiny bit. Like someone tying his heart up with a fishing line and then trying to pull it up through his throat. Or a series of knives cutting stripes along his legs that tear open a little further everytime he moves. Or– okay, point made, it hurts.

His second, admittedly half-hearted attempt at striking up conversation with Buck is similarly shut down, with the other man slinking out of the room before Eddie can even get close. It’s like they’re in one of those animal documentaries narrated by David Attenborough that Buck and Chris used to binge on weekends, Eddie starring as the helpless lion cub and Buck as the swift gazelle effortlessly escaping his clumsy attempts at capturing him. Or at least that’s what Buck would probably compare it to, if he was, you know, fucking talking to Eddie. 

The pattern continues for the rest of the morning, and with every gaze of Buck’s hastily ripped away the second it meets Eddie’s, there’s a hot wave of shame that, like ocean-water, drives further salt into the wound. Even worse, everyone knows something is up. They all keep eyeing them, and Eddie would like to tell them that he’s trying to fix this goddamnit, but Buck just won’t let him. 

After an awfully tense breakfast, Eddie tries his luck at cornering Buck again. He’s lounging on a couch when Eddie stalks over, entranced by his phone and thus granting Eddie an opening. Careful to avoid his periphery, Eddie winds his way through the slalom of upholstery, footfall silent, until he’s finally right behind Buck, ready to make his whispered appeal. 

“Listen, Buck, uh–”

Buck jumps up like a shot just rang out. His phone falls from his hands, him trying and failing to catch it in a grotesque approximation of a juggling routine gone wrong, before it drops to the floor, and he lunges after it. He scrambles to pick it up, presses the screen to his chest once he’s got it back in hand, fingers clenched tightly around it. 

Still cowering on the ground, Buck looks up.

“H-hey Eddie,” he replies, voice pitched and way too loud. “What’s up?”

“I– Buck, is everything okay?”

Buck’s face pulls into the most unconvincing confused expression Eddie has ever seen. “What? Yeah! Of course! Everything’s tip-top!” 

Eddie blinks. Shakes his head. 

“Listen, I just thought, maybe we could, you know… talk?”

A flash of fear in Buck’s eyes; it sends a bout of roiling nausea to Eddie’s stomach. 

“I, uh,” Buck stammers, knuckles going white around his phone, “are you sure that uhm…” He chews on his lower lip, eyebrows knit in a desperate sort of way that makes Eddie want to throw up because, God, he’s the reason for this, he’s making Buck uncomfortable, and that knowledge is a knife burrowing itself into his intestines. Before, however, guilt can trump stubbornness in Eddie’s mind, Buck’s face suddenly returns to a neutral, if slightly manic expression. 

“I– I mean,” he starts, and Eddie knows that that twitch to Buck’s nose means something dangerous, a tell-tale sign he’s about to do something reckless, but just because Eddie knows Buck’s tells doesn’t mean he knows how to stop him – after all, he usually ends up on the other side of the line and not blocking Buck’s way – and so all he can do is listen and pray his intuition is wrong, which, judging by the superficial calm in Buck’s voice, it is not. 

“I mean,” he repeats. “Y-yeah, perfect occasion for a chat, right?” 

Eddie frowns. Buck seems to take it as encouragement. 

“Just, uh, usually when we’re at work we’re so busy, we don’t find the time to just talk, but, uh, it’s” – he wets his lips, as if to gather resolve – “it’s just so quiet today, isn’t it?”

All heads in the loft snap to Buck. 

“Buck,” Chim hisses from three armchairs over, “tell me you didn’t just–”

The blare of the alarm elicits a cacophony of groans among the present, and quite a handful of angry stares at the both of them, which, hey, Eddie didn’t even say anything, he isn’t at fault here, okay?

Three heart-attacks, one allergic reaction, an assortment of broken bones and two kids with their heads stuck through railings later, Eddie still hasn’t managed to get a single word in with Buck about the issue. 

By the time they pull up to their twelfth call of the day, a fainting case at some indoor dive center, Eddie's given up on having a productive conversation with Buck today. No use in forcing it; he promised himself to be done with panicking and making snap decisions, and he’ll stick to that promise. He’ll just have to wait the weirdness out.  Give Buck space, and hope he comes to him when he’s ready. 

As soon as they set food in the building, the bite of chlorine fills Eddie’s nostrils, his nose scrunching without command. He stands back as Hen and Chim tend to the patient, who’s thankfully been rescued from the pool already. Perks of almost drowning in a divers’ training center, Eddie supposes. 

Buck is still keeping a healthy distance from him, the both of them trying to keep the onlookers moving on opposite sides of the emergency, but the initial pain of said distance has by now dulled into disgruntled annoyance, scraping at Eddie like an itchy shirt tag. It’s not that he wants to talk about any of this – a part of Eddie is still hoping all of this will resolve itself on its own without ever talking about it, that they can just forget it and move forward – but he misses talking to Buck, period. 

It’s a stressful day, an exhausting day, and usually the silver-lining of shifts like these is getting to complain about them together, as a team, but even that is denied to him. No one can blame him if he’s being a little curt with the people he’s telling to please keep moving and mind their own business. Especially when all the people here are so goddamn nosy. 

He’s waving along another group of shivering teenagers wrapped in blankets trying to get a glimpse at the victim when it happens. 

“Hey,” comes a strangely familiar voice from behind him, “she’s going to be fine, right?”

Something about that tone and cadence, the velvety way the vowels flow from his mouth – Eddie’s heart drops into his pants before he’s even fully turned. 

Because standing right next to him in a skin-tight black wetsuit, is Nate. 

Frantic makeout in the back alley of a club that got interrupted when Buck texted him Nate. 

Who, after letting him know that he’d made it home safe, Eddie still hasn’t called or texted. To be fair, he kind of had more important stuff to worry about than his little club acquaintance and whether or not he was quite desperate enough to give him a call yet. But still. 

Just Eddie’s fucking luck. 

“Oh my god– Eddie?” asks Nate the same moment Eddie blurts out, “She’ll be okay.”

Nate blinks. “I– what?”

“She’ll be okay,” Eddie repeats, brain working on autopilot. “Nothing too serious, and she’s in good hands.”

“That’s good– great!” 

“Yeah,” Eddie echoes, “great.”

They stare at each other for a beat, then simultaneously launch into carbon copies of the same half-hearted apology.

“Listen, I should’ve–”

“–could’ve sent you a text–”

“–stupid of me–”

“–really busy–”

They don’t even get to the “I’m sorry” part before Nate starts laughing and Eddie has to duck his head to hide the blush blooming on his cheeks. 

“How about we agree on ‘life is life, no hard feelings because we’re both working adults with horrible schedules’?” Nate offers, holding out his hand like he’s offering a peace treaty, and, smiling, Eddie shakes with him on it. 

“Forgot how big those hands were,” Nate mumbles under his breath and Eddie can feel his face heating up a little more, but before he can counter by making a remark about the sharp cut of the other man’s jaw, the broad V of his chest, or the gorgeous water-slick strands of hair falling into his face, Nate’s eyebrows shoot up as he spots something, or rather, some one further off to the side.

“Wait – that guy over there, the one my students are hitting on right now – is that–?”

Eddie doesn’t even have to look.

“Yeah,” he sighs, “that’s Buck.” 

Nate whistles low. “Picture didn’t do him justice… that is one handsome man.”

“I know.” Eddie doesn’t quite manage to hide the wistful tone to his voice. 

“So,” Nate asks, his hands coming to rest on his hips, “how’s it going?”

“How’s what going?” Eddie asks dumbly. 

“ That, ” says Nate and nods his head to where Buck’s standing, two girls in their twenties trying and failing to get him to drop his moody stare. 

“Ah.” Eddie scratches his neck. “Yeah, uh, bad. Very bad.”

“I take it Mr Hunk over there still hasn't come to his senses and broken up with his boyfriend?”

Laughing, Eddie shakes his head. “No, uh, no luck yet.”

Nate lets his gaze wander across Eddie, head to toe and right back up again, a teasing smile on his lips.

“So I’ve still got time?” he asks.

Eddie quirks a brow. “With the way things are looking? Time galore. Probably until I’m old and gray. Hit me up when I’m in the nursing home, I’ll be sure to take my dentures out for you.”

“What if I like a guy who bites?” Nate grins. 

“Then I’m happy to inform you that the LAFD’s got an excellent dental plan.”

If Eddie preens a little when that comment gets a laugh out of Nate, no one can blame him; with the day he’s had, any and all successes, no matter how minor, feel monumental. 

“Okay,” Nate says then, clapping his hands together,“we should probably go save your boy from Brit and Kacey before they try to drag him into the water with them like a pair of hungry sirens.”

However, before they can do much more than turn in his direction, Buck has freed himself from the girls’ clutches and strides over to them, tension in his arms and a set to his jaw. 

“Hey,” he calls when he’s in speaking distance, a strange tightness to his voice, “are you the guy who was supposed to check that girl’s equipment?”

“No, actually,” replies Nate, still smiling, “that would’ve been Yasha’s job. I think he’s getting chewed out by your captain right now. I’m the one who fished her out of the water.”

Eddie’s brows shoot up. “Wait, that was you? Without gear?”

“Well, I’ve been called an otter on occasion,” Nate winks, and Eddie is pretty sure he’s missing the actual joke in there, but he laughs all the same. Next to him, Buck grins too, but it’s a little forced around the edges. Kind of looks like he’s about to pop a vein, honestly. 

His teeth are gritted when he speaks. “That was very dangerous, you know? You could’ve gotten hurt.”

“It’s kind of my job,” Nate replies, lips curling into a lopsided smile. 

“Still,” Buck insists, “you should’ve had a coworker with gear on pull her up, or–”

“Waited for the professionals? Buck, he’s a diver,” Eddie cuts in, because frankly, this is getting a little bit embarrassing for the both of them. 

Buck sends him a glare that’s not quite anger, not quite betrayal, something softer underneath that Eddie can’t figure out. If he wasn’t currently rather pissed off due to working his way through a shift from hell and being exhausted to the bones, that look would probably skewer Eddie straight through the heart; as things are right now, it pierces only skin and muscle, the tip scraping at his breastbone. Still hurts plenty, if you ask him. 

There’s a fire to it that makes Eddie wonder whether Buck’s about to launch into a tirade, but before he can actually open his mouth, Bobby calls for him. 

“Buck,” he shouts, “come here for a second,” and, begrudgingly, Buck trudges off, though not without one last disgruntled look at Nate, who snorts the moment Buck’s out of earshot. 

“He’s a real charmer.”

“I don’t know what’s going on with him today,” Eddie groans. “Really, sorry, he’s not usually a douche like this.”

“Oh, I’m sure,” Nate chuckles. To his credit, he really does seem entirely unbothered. Amused, more than anything. He’s about to say something else, when Eddie’s radio pipes up, Bobby calling them all back to the truck.

Eddie slaps his thigh. “Gotta go. We’ve probably got another call to get to.”

“Busy day?”

“You wouldn’t believe it.”

“Well, if after all those work-calls you’re interested in a more private kind of call... you’ve got my number.”

Even with the stress and exhaustion weighing down his mind, Eddie can't help feeling a little flutter in his chest. It’s not that he’s actually planning on taking Nate up on the offer, it's just that… he could. He could be this person, if he wanted to be. 

And that… yeah, that feels good. 

Eddie gives Nate a little wave and turns on his heel, but right as he starts to jog after the others, Nate tuts at him, loud enough to give him pause. “Does Mr Firefighter need me to blow my whistle at him? Pool safety rule number six: No running!”

“Can think of plenty other things you can blow,” Eddie mutters as he slows his pace, Nate snickering behind him. 

“Hate to watch you leave…” he calls after him, and Eddie pointedly shakes his head in disappointment, but puts an ever so slight extra swing in his hips all the same. 

Unsurprisingly, he’s the last to climb into the truck, apologizing as he clips his seatbelt on. 

When he looks up, he finds that Buck’s eyes are fixed on him, and everyone else’s eyes are fixed on Buck. 

“Man, that guy wanted to throw himself after you, huh?” he asks, mouth twisted into a smile that seems a poor approximation of light-hearted, his hands wringing in his lap.

“What?” 

Across from them, Chim and Hen share a Look. Buck doesn’t seem to notice. 

“Just– he was acting a little too friendly, right?”

Hen’s eyebrows raise. “Buck,” she says, voice steady but glazed in amusement. “Does Eddie need to be on the lookout for another sprained ankle?” 

“Huh?” 

“Actually,” Chim smiles, gum smacking, “maybe we should call Tommy, warn him he’s got competition now.”

Buck freezes. 

“Wha-what do you…” he stutters, the rest of the sentence unspoken as the muscles in his face lock up.

“I’m just saying,” Chim chirps, “the last time Eddie stood that close to another guy–”

“Guys, we got a car accident coming up, two people with light injuries, someone trapped in their vehicle,” Bobby calls from the front, voice casual as if he isn’t always listening in on what they say. 

It’s enough to distract Hen and Chim; Buck, though, seems lost in thought. Something ice-cold runs down Eddie’s back. 

Is Buck– actually considering this? Dropping Tommy for someone he talked to once? 

Instead of– 

When he could–

No, that can’t be, this– this has to be the jealousy talking. 

Because if Buck starts dating Nate, Eddie is going to sell everything he owns and move to Texas. Or fucking Alaska. The Philippines, maybe. Never too late for a change of scenery. 

Finally, the truck stops, they pull the door open, and Hen and Chim jump out and jog over to the victims sitting on the sidewalk, but before Eddie can follow them, there’s a hand on his shoulder.

“L-listen, Eddie,” Buck starts, and for a moment, Eddie really does believe that they’re maybe, finally going to talk about the elephant in the room, but those hopes are dashed right the next second. 

“That guy,” Buck says, and something twists in Eddie’s stomach, bubbles in his blood, a sickly green feeling snaking all around his insides. He interrupts Buck before he can get another word out. 

“His name is Nate.”

Buck blinks.

“Ho-how do you know that?”

“Well, it’s what he called his contact when he typed his number into my phone,” Eddie says, and jumps out of the truck. 

It feels good, just for a moment, to leave like that, Buck too stunned to respond or move, but it takes no more than half a minute for Eddie to remember that they’re still coworkers and still have a fucking job to do. 

As partners.

Well, shit.

As if things weren’t awkward enough before.

There’s a tiny part of Eddie that rejoices all the same. Maybe he’ll at least talk to me now, it whispers, which, honestly, kind of desperate, but maybe Eddie’s just a little desperate when it comes to Buck. Maybe that’s just who he is. 

For now, he focuses on the patient in the car, makes sure she’s as fine as she claims to be so that they don’t cause or worsen any possible spinal injuries when they crack the car open and pull her out. 

Buck joins him just a moment later, tools in hand. Wordlessly, they get to work. Of course, the silence only lasts for about a minute. 

“So, uh, you, uh, have his number?” Buck asks, voice strained because he’s currently trying to lever open the crushed car door. 

“Well, yes,” Eddie replies. “Why? Do you want it?” It comes out a bit more snappy than intended. 

“No!” Buck calls, almost dropping the halligan in his hands. “No, no, o-of course not, I was just, ah, wondering, like, are you gonna call him?”

“Buck,” Eddie sighs. “Can we focus?”

“‘Course.”

With a little bit of team-work, they break the door open and help the woman behind the wheel climb out; Eddie sends her to Hen to get checked over.

Hands on his hips, he gives an assessing look-over to the rest of the scene, trying to figure out if they’re needed elsewhere, if just to find an excuse to not have to talk with Buck about any of this. Call him petty, but if Buck is so desperate to avoid Eddie that he jinxes the station, then Eddie’s not above avoiding him right back. Let Buck see how it feels to get the cold shoulder from your best friend. 

Eddie’s gaze gets caught on a street mailbox lying in the middle of the road, blue metal dented and feet askew; one of the cars must’ve run into it. He leisurely wanders over, Buck on his heel. 

“Just– you know it’s bad luck to date someone you met on a call,” he remarks as Eddie gives the box a probing nudge with his foot that reveals it definitely hasn’t been emptied yet today. 

“Technically speaking, we didn’t. Meet on a call, I mean. Help me lift this?” 

“Wha-what do you mean?”

“I’m gonna throw out my back carrying this thing on my own,” Eddie explains, crouching down. 

“No, I mean–”

“Buck.”

“Yeah, sure, sure,” Buck babbles, squatting opposite of Eddie to help move the mailbox. Eddie pointedly does not look at Buck’s bulging biceps as they waddle over to the sidewalk. He’s not in the mood to flatten his feet when he inevitably drops it after getting distracted ogling Buck’s muscles. 

They set the mailbox down with a grunt and Eddie stretches his arms because Jesus, that thing was heavy. How many letters do people still send these days?

“So, uh,” Buck pants, “ Nate… ”

Their radios crackle to life. 

“We’ve got another call coming in,” Bobby informs them, “finish things up and get back to the truck.”

Before Buck can say anything more, Eddie shrugs and turns to jog back to the truck. 

They fight their way through three more back to back calls, each more annoying and exhausting than the last, and instead of running from him like he’s been doing all shift, suddenly, Buck is stuck to him like glue. Bringing him tools, lending a helping hand, constantly trying to ask questions that Eddie only barely manages to avoid. 

Questions Eddie’s avoiding because, well – he is pissed. Which is dumb, he can admit that. After all, Buck’s trying to talk to him; this should be great, right? It should mean that whatever happened last shift actually wasn’t that bad – because if Nate is a more important topic, it evidently meant fucking nothing to Buck. 

Which, yeah. Great. Just great.

When they finally make it back to the station, they all rush to the coffee maker like a pack of wild animals. Once everyone has gotten themselves a mug of the hot ambrosia, they scatter again, all of them looking for a brief reprieve, a moment of silent solitude before the inevitable return of today's madness.  

Coffee in hand, Eddie is standing at the edge of the hangar, looking out at the fizzle of rain that’s slowly but surely growing into a proper downpour – wonderful, that’ll be at least four more fucking car accidents – when Buck joins him, fingers tapping anxiously against his cup. 

Eddie deliberates making a run for it, but really, what point is there to it. Besides, no matter how annoyed he is that Buck is apparently taking more interest in the personal life of some diving instructor than working through why he was avoiding Eddie like the plague this morning, he can’t deny that he yearns for Buck’s presence all the same. Even now, just existing next to him is soothing. 

They stare outside for another minute or two before Buck finally says something. 

“You didn’t answer my question.” 

“Hm?”

A twist to Buck’s brow. “You– you said you met him before. Nate. ”

“Oh.” Eddie scratches at his jaw. “Yeah, uh. We met at the club.”

“Oh,” says Buck, “ oh,” and he turns beet red. He bites and releases his lip twice, taps his mug again. 

“D-did you two, ah…” 

Eddie quirks a brow. Buck’s face grows impossibly redder. 

“No,” answers Eddie, because he reckons if he doesn't, Buck might pass out. 

For a moment, Buck seems to relax again. Eddie wets his lips. Stares back out into the rain. 

“Not yet anyway. Been thinking about texting him, though.”

“Don't,” blurts out Buck. “I mean, uh, do what you want, of course. Just…”

If I was doing what I wanted, Eddie thinks, I’d be doing someone else. He doesn’t say it of course, but he allows the thought to linger for just a moment, and finds there’s no shame, no worry, no guilt attached to it. That’s progress, he supposes, even though it feels completely useless in the grand scheme of things. 

“Just what?” Eddie asks, eyes back on Buck because he can never resist the magnetic pull he seems to have on him. 

Buck makes a complicated gesture with his hands that does absolutely nothing to clarify the situation. Before he can properly elucidate just what the fuck he’s talking about, the bell rings again. 

“You’re just not a one-night-stand kind of guy,” Buck explains, as Eddie tries and fails for the third time to reach the spooked cat on the passenger seat; the window’s too small, and no amount of here kitty kitty chants under his breath manage to coax the shivering creature towards him. Eddie can’t really blame it for not feeling up for cuddles – first a trip to the vet, and then almost getting crushed in the parking lot? The poor thing must be having a day. 

“Who’s saying I’d call him for a one-night-stand?”

Buck’s foot gets caught on a crack in the parking lot; he just narrowly avoids face-planting on the concrete. “So you– you’d take him out on a-a date?”

Sighing, Eddie decides to try his luck with the car door again.

“I don’t know man. Maybe… get a coffee–”

Eddie wedges the halligan into the slit between the door and the rest of the vehicle. 

“–have dinner–”

He pulls, first just with his arms, then puts his whole body weight into it. It doesn’t budge. Breathing hard, Eddie steps back. 

“–maybe go see a movie. Jaws?”

“Are you sure that’s not a bit gorey for a first date?” Buck asks. 

Hands held out, Eddie quirks a brow. 

“Buck,” he repeats, “jaws?”

Buck’s eyebrows scrunch and he gets a cute little look in his eyes before things apparently click into place for him and the hint of a flush spreads upwards from his neck. 

“Oh! Uh, yeah, sure, jaws, coming right up,” he stammers, handing them over. 

“Thank you.” 

The jaws of life make easy work of the window, granting Eddie just enough space to get his hands on the cat, who swipes at him as if its body has been overtaken by the spirit of one of its sabre-toothed ancestors. 

Its owner practically bursts into tears when Eddie surrenders the little demon to her arms, and magically, the cat forgets all about being angry or scared and starts purring like an engine. Whatever empathy Eddie had for it is quickly replaced by envy. He wouldn’t mind getting to go home right now, softly cradled in the arms of someone he loves. 

Unfortunately for him, it takes seven more grueling calls for their shift to finally be over, and the whole arms of someone he loves thing remains just as tricky as before. 

Beat wouldn’t even begin to cover what Eddie feels like when he stumbles out into the parking lot hours later – he’s pretty sure he’ll spend the rest of the day rotting in bed – which is why he can’t even find it within himself to be worried or scared when Buck pops up next to him again, questioning look on his face. 

“So?” he asks, tense as if he’s still expecting to be sent on another call any second. “Are you?”

“What?”

Buck stares at him like it’s a life or death kinda deal. “Gonna call him?” 

Eddie groans. “I don’t know, man.”

The concrete below his feet glistens in the sun; the rain let up about an hour ago, but the air’s still thick with it, carrying the grey smell of wet pavement. They pause in front of their cars, parked next to each other because of course they are, and Eddie looks at Buck, trying to read his expression, and finds that he can’t. 

“Just– you’d tell me if you did it, right?” Buck asks, kneading the duffle bag in his hands, and the uncertainty in his face hits Eddie like a blow to the gut. 

All this secret-keeping, this hiding away, no matter what Eddie does, he just keeps pushing Buck away from himself, when all he wants is to have him as close as can be. 

“Of course,” he answers, a knee-jerk reaction, really, but right as the words leave his lips, an almost dooming sense of deja-vu overcomes him, because they’ve been here before, been here all week, all month, really, and they can’t seem to get away, just come back to this, empty promises in emptier parking lots. And it’s Eddie’s own fault, he knows, because he can’t help starting the cycle anew, can’t help trying to stay down low.

There’s no getting away, and Eddie is so fucking tired, and his kid’s in Texas waiting for him to make up his mind, and the love of his life is standing in front of him, and Eddie wants to say everything, anything, but the only truth he knows is the one thing that can never cross his lips. 

“Of course I’d tell you,” Eddie repeats, quietly.  

Buck looks at him for a moment longer, then he nods. 

Eddie can tell that he doesn’t believe him. 

*

Why Buck didn’t call him out on how laughably boldfaced of a lie it is, Eddie doesn’t know. He reckons it’s probably got to do with the exhaustion. Or maybe– maybe Buck just didn’t want to. 

Eddie hopes it isn’t that.  

It’s not that Eddie likes being pushed. He hates it, actually. 

It’s a painful, mortifying ordeal, to have someone ask again and again are you okay, you aren’t okay, just tell me what’s wrong, and again and again deny them until you finally break, spill your guts all over the kitchen floor. 

But the alternative?

Drowning in silence?

Choking on the words?

Really, how could Eddie ever blame Buck for how much it hurts to have the stitches across his mouth torn open, when it was Eddie himself who sewed it shut in the first place?

This is the only way for him to speak. To breathe. 

There’s so many things Eddie would have never revealed if Buck hadn’t pushed. Even more still hiding right behind his teeth, held back, yet hoping for release. Confessions, mostly. Thoughts he cannot voice for fear of just how much those select few words might reveal to someone who knows to listen for the silences between them, as well.

Simple things, like the fact that he only pretends to love Pizza Hawaii so that Buck doesn’t have to eat it when Chris picks it as his order and wants to trade slices halfway through. 

Complicated things, like the way Eddie’s heart beats in tune with Buck's, as if it wants to trade places. 

And things that are so complicated, they almost wind up being simple again. 

Like the fact that Eddie remembers getting shot. 

He does. 

Most vividly when he wakes up in the middle of the night, soaked in sweat. 

Like tonight, for example. 

It’s spotty, but always the same when he dreams about it; one moment he’s standing in the street, then, bam , the horizon’s slipping away, he’s on the ground, feeling like he just got run over. White hot pain blinds him for a moment. 

The world slows down.

Eddie blinks.

He sees the sky. 

He sees Buck.

He feels blood staining his skin where his head rests on the asphalt. 

He thinks, “This is it.”

He sees the sky.

He sees Buck.

Want to have him closer. 

Thinks everything would be okay, if he just got to touch Buck one last time. Hold his hand, maybe.

Eddie blinks. 

The world goes black. 

Back when he was still in active recovery a nightmare like that, no matter how short, would keep him up for the rest of the night. Things have gotten better these days – the dreams are a whole lot less frequent and it usually only takes him an hour or two to wind down and drift off into sleep again. 

Usually. 

Tonight, though, Eddie's sitting in a lawn chair in his backyard, beer in hand, staring at the starless sky above.

He's thinking about the end. 

He rarely allows himself to do this; he's got a son to raise, after all. 

That doesn’t mean the idea entirely is absent from his mind – quite the contrary, really. The fact of the matter is, for years Eddie’s been carrying all his guilt and traumas like a loaded gun. He knows it for what it is. Has known it for a while. He’s always been good at disassembling and then reassembling his weapon. At basic, he was the best of his lot. 

As such, Eddie’s trauma is well-kept; it’s clean, maintained with the efficiency of someone for whom over years of practice the movements have turned subconscious, second nature, almost. He’s got all the parts of it memorized, information filed away for later use, can tell which one’s jamming even if he might not know why. 

He just doesn’t look at any of it. After his honorable discharge he swore off firearms for good. 

The problem with a gun, however, especially a loaded one, is that it needs to be fired eventually. That’s its purpose, after all. Eddie has never consciously planned on pulling the trigger himself; he’s probably too much of a coward. That doesn’t mean he hasn’t thought about it going off. 

He reckons he’s been waiting for the right person to take it out of his hands, stand a few feet away from him and take aim. 

Maybe he’s been hoping for it. 

Maybe the whole Kim stint was Eddie’s last, desperate attempt at trying to pass the gun to someone. 

Maybe he just wanted the limbo to be over. Have someone tell him he’s a bad person. 

Who knows. 

Eddie doesn’t actually want to die; he can’t, really. He needs to look out for Chris, for Buck as well, and he actually likes his life most of the time these days, would hate to just leave it behind. Just because he sometimes thinks it’d be better for him to be gone, that doesn’t mean he doesn’t also want to live. 

There was really only one moment in Eddie's life where, for just a few seconds, he felt truly at peace with death.

Eddie, crucially, never dreams about that part. Because there is no fear there. There is worry, sure, and heartache, and sorrow, but no fear. It’s selfish, maybe, but once he knew the most important people were safe, he was ready to let go. 

No, that’s the wrong way to put it – he’d never let go. He promised to fight. 

But he was ready for the line he was holding onto to get cut. For Buck’s hands to tire until he had to let go, let Eddie plunge into nothingness, only metaphorical ropeburn and very real blood on his face left to tell the tale of who Eddie once was. 

Really, if Eddie thinks about it, maybe that back then was not just a physical, but also the metaphorical gun going off – after all, the bullet ripped through him in so many more ways than the corporal, it’s almost unbelievable that the only visible scar he carries is the one on his shoulder. The maze of dominoes tipped off when the asphalt street knocked the air out of Eddie’s lungs is so convoluted, tracks leading through destroyed bedrooms, sleepless nights, and torturous therapy sessions, Eddie’s fascinated to this day that it led him to where he’s now and not the morgue. 

But the gun went off, and Eddie’s still here, and that’s that. 

Still, it's strange navigating a world without the reassuring weight of a weapon in his hands. He’s been bracing for the shot so long, his muscles are locked as if cast in stone; easing the tension out of them has been taking, and will continue to take years.  

It’s been getting better, of course. Even though it may not feel like it. At the beginning of this summer, he’d thought he was standing in a heap of rubble, all that he’d built reduced to dust and debris. Utter desolation. Lasting stability nothing but a childish fantasy.  

Now, he keeps thinking of being a kid, sitting on the couch next to his abuela as her knitting needles clicked in steady rhythm. He remembers holding her yarn, making sure it didn’t tangle as she frogged row upon row of a sweater she was knitting. The gauge was wrong, she’d explained to him when he’d asked why she was undoing all her hard work. If I finished it like this, it would end up too small. So I have to start again. 

He remembers frowning as he clumsily wrapped the yarn around his hands. But it already took you so long, he’d said. It’ll take you forever to finish it now. 

His abuela just smiled at him, that knowing glint in her eye that always set her apart from his parents, that Eddie now knows can only come from age, and patience. 

There’s always time to start again, Eddito. 

Eddie hopes she’s right about that. 

Because if he does what his therapists always want him to do and reframes his thoughts to account for the possibility that maybe, just maybe, it’s not too late, that this time, he’s building a foundation for something that can last, then all of this, while still bad, is not as bad and hopeless as it initially seemed. 

Yes, his son’s in Texas, but he’s working on that. He still hasn’t come out to everyone, but that’s just a matter of time at this point. And, sure, he’s head-over-heels in love with his best friend in the whole fucking world, but– yeah, okay, he hasn’t really got a retort for that yet. 

But still, he’s got so much more about himself figured out than he did just six months ago, and he clings to that thought like the lifeline that it is. 

He’s got goals, a semi-healthy relationship with therapy, and is steadily chipping away at the habits that have had him fucking up so many times before. 

He’s coming to terms with all of it; with what he wants, and what he gets, and that just because it isn’t bad for these things to align, it still doesn’t mean that it’s going to happen. 

Case in point: One Evan Buckley. 

Eddie put himself out there, laid out the facts and presented himself as an option, and Buck simply didn't choose him.

It's fine – he's fine. A week ago, this was his best case scenario. 

Eddie isn't delusional enough to claim there wasn’t a part of him that hoped for more, but that doesn't mean he can't be content with what he has. 

Of course, there’s no escaping the fear that maybe, he's screwed that up as well now. With how strange Buck was acting during their last shift, it isn't hard to imagine that he did. 

It’s a pit at the bottom of his stomach, one he’s not sure can just be knit closed again. 

If this keeps affecting work, Bobby’s eventually gonna catch a whiff of what’s actually going on, and that’s a conversation Eddie does not need to have in this life, and if things stay this stilted in private too, Chris is going to realize that something is up and will immediately go back to hating Eddie because he managed to screw up the one good thing he had left. Great. 

And the worst thing, at the core of it all?

He still can’t fucking stop. Eddie knows it’s hopeless, but the love is still there, and with every beat of his heart, it threatens gushing out of him. With the way things are looking, it’ll probably never go away. Eddie’s going to cover the entirety of LA with his desperate little markers, handfuls of seeds thrown onto a barren field, little capsules of potential doomed to never grow into anything more. 

That’s fine. 

Eddie’s fine with it. 

He’ll hold his tongue. 

His fingers will probably keep typing until he dies, though. 

Pandora’s box has been opened, and Eddie can’t find the strength within himself to truly will it closed again – now that this previously unnamed thing at the edge of his periphery has found its way into the focus of his eye, it’s so blindingly obvious, explains so much about who he’s been these past few years, he cannot in good conscience push any of it away again. To not know his love for Buck is to not know himself.

So he pulls up the map on his phone, scrolls through LA until he lands on Hope street, and stops right where he knows there used to be a dark stain on the pavement. 

It comes to him easier than anything he wrote before. As if the words have been at the tips of his fingers ever since they dragged across the asphalt that fateful day, laying dormant for years, patiently awaiting their turn.

I should have known, then. I was dying and all I could think about was how it would be fitting if the last thing I ever saw was your face. And how I wanted to hold you one last time. Dying would have been okay, I think, if I had done it in your arms. 

Sending the entry off doesn’t feel like relief. 

It feels like nothing, really; there’s a strange emptiness in Eddie’s chest, like his ribcage’s been hollowed out. Another overdue confession, another piece taken. What does it amount to at the end of the day? An illusive vignette of a relationship that never was, surrendered to the void of anonymity. A negative. Less than nothing. 

He’s staring at the text until its after-image is burnt into his retina, is written behind his eyelids when he closes them and drops his head back until it meets the backrest of his chair. 

It’s everything, it’s nothing, it’s whatever he deludes himself it is, but never what he wants it to be. Who cares, right? Eddie’s got bigger things to worry about. Like the PTA. Or taxes. What does it matter that he’s found the one person who can make everything okay. Someone who’s somehow managed to be both Eddie’s deliverance and damnation, just by caring for him in a way no one has before. A way no one else can ever come close to. Who. Fucking. Cares. 

Eddie certainly doesn’t; not with how stoically he’s keeping his eyes dry as he opens them to take in the sight of LA’s sorely underwhelming night sky, nuh-uh. 

It’s just… it’s just so fucking stupid. 

Eddie always figures his shit out too late. Here he is, finally allowing himself to want like his stupid fucking therapist wants him to, and it’s not even going to go anywhere. Leave it to Eddie to turn his self-discovery into another thing to make him miserable. 

But sometimes there are things you just can't have. With Buck it’s like with Chris; when it comes down to it, it’s not up to Eddie. He has to wait for them to give him a sign – Buck’s given him a pretty clear no; with Chris, the jury’s still out. Eddie has to hold out until his son decides for himself. 

Probably better that way. Eddie has a habit of making shit choices. 

There isn’t a cross in the world that you’re not willing to die on, Shannon had screamed at him during one of their more memorable fights. An important lesson to learn, one that Eddie’s still struggling to beat into his head to this day: Suffering does not cancel out. As much as he might want it to. 

The thought sends something stirring in his mind. 

Suffering. Misery. Choices. 

Things you think you can’t have. 

Chain of causation. 

Punishment. 

Eddie blinks up at the sky. 

Is this a choice? 

Not doing anything?

Is he still just waiting for a shot to ring out?

In his hands, his phone vibrates. 

Long-short-long-short. That’s–

A new message from Chris. 

btw grandma said to tell you that there's only like a week left for the sign-up so I guess you should make up your mind soon or whatever

Eddie doesn't believe in signs anymore, he doesn't, but– 

But it's the middle of the night, and he's tired and weak, and he's got the number dialed before he even fully knows what he's doing.

Barely a ring, then–

“Dad?” comes out of his phone's tinny speaker.

Eddie breathes in, sharply. Just Chris’s voice is enough to cut him down to his barest, have him question everything he is, does, says– God, he has no idea what to say, does he?

“Dad, it’s 4 am, why are you awake?” 

There’s a plethora of reasons he could give, but none of them feel like they’re of relevance at all. Like they matter. Staring off into the distant abyss above, that distinct lack of matter peppered with lifeless rocks and lonely stars that will drift on and on, all on their own, until the heat death of the universe gets them all, Eddie finds that there’s only one thing that’s important right now, one thing he needs, wants to make clear. 

“You know that I want you to come home, right?”

The line is silent. Eddie swallows. He reckons he’s got one shot at this. Better make it count. 

“I was just… scared. I am still scared. That you could end up hurt because of me again. And I thought that maybe it’s better for you to be away from me. No matter how much I hate it. And even when I felt that it’d be safe– it’d be good for you to be back with me, I was waiting for you to tell me to come get you. I just thought it’d be better to let you call the shots on this, give you space, and all that, but that’s not a fair thing to ask of you. I’m still your dad. I gotta make the big decisions. And I– God, I don't want to miss out on another day. 

“Chris, I’d– I’d sell this house and move to El Paso if that’s what I needed to do, you know? You’re the most important person in my life. Just thinking about living there again feels like hell, but I’d do it for you, in a heartbeat. I’d start at a new station, fight with your grandparents every day of the week, buy a house in the suburbs I grew up in, and enroll you in the same school your mom and I went to. I’d drive you to any and every chess tournament in Texas and sit in the front row every time no matter how embarrassing you think I am. I promise, I would. 

“But the thing is, Chris, I– I don’t want to do that. And I also don’t want to watch you grow up through a screen. I want you to come home. I want you back in LA, with me, and Buck, and Carla, and all of your friends from school. There’s plenty of chess tournaments here too. And I– I miss you kid. So bad. This house doesn’t feel right without you in it. So please, Chris. If you really like it better there, then that’s– that’s okay, too, we’ll figure something out, but, just– Come home. Please. ”

A pause. 

It stretches. 

Agonizingly so. 

Long enough to send him spiraling. 

Because really, what was he thinking? Chris probably hadn’t even meant anything by the message, had for sure not expected that Eddie would read it right away, and now Eddie’s pushing him again, not giving him room to breathe, not letting him make his own choices in due time. 

Still no answer. 

Fuck. Fuck.  

God, if Eddie has to hear him say it, it’ll kill him, he’s sure, it’ll–

A sniffle, across the line. It’s muted, like someone is pressing the phone’s microphone into a hoodie so that the sound doesn’t get captured, but the trick is futile on Eddie. He knows his son. 

“Chris?” he asks. 

Chris’s voice is almost free of wavers. “I hate you sometimes.” 

Eddie sucks in a breath. Tries not to catastrophize. 

“I hate you sometimes,” Chris repeats, “because you’re not even a shit dad. Like, Laura, from science club, her dad is a stuck-up asshole. And she can tell us about how much of a dick he is and not feel bad about it. But when I wanted to tell my friends why I left, it just sounded sad in my head the longer I thought about it.”

Something tears in Eddie, splits him right down the middle, two aching halves gushing blood. 

“I’m sorry, Chris,” he rasps. 

“It’s not your fault,” Chris says, and it sounds almost like an accusation. “Or, like, it is, it’s just… ugh. It’s unfair. You tell me that I have to ‘talk about my emotions’ and go to therapy, but then you do that. And I– I hate you for that. I do. That was so fucked up dad. And now I have to talk about all of this with you because you just don’t do anything. Do you know how many hang-outs I missed because I was stuck in Texas? Just because you’re suddenly all about letting me make my own decisions, as if that’s gonna make me feel any better about you treating me like I’m five and too young to understand what’s going on with you? You’re my dad. I always know when something’s wrong.” 

A sob breaks from Eddie’s chest before he even knows it was building at all. If Chris hears it, he doesn’t let it show. 

“You always just sit it out until you can’t anymore and then everything goes to shit,” he continues. “That’s, like, the dumbest thing you could do. And you know that. You have to stop doing that when I’m back. Like, I’d go right back to Texas, even though it sucks here. Do you get that?”

Eddie nods, even though he knows Chris can't see him, “I do. I promise, I do.”

“Good.”

Then, there’s silence again. 

The moment feels timeless. Just the stars above, the chill of the night, a hint of Christopher’s breathing across the line. As if they’re caught in a liminal space, an endless on-hold line, and it’s then that Eddie finally, finally can see plain as day that doing nothing, saying nothing, in hopes of giving the Chris room to choose is just as much of a choice as before, that asking for him to come back outright is no leap into the unknown, is neither selfish nor presumptuous because Eddie knows his son, he is that kid’s father goddamnit, and he knows what’s best for him. 

“Do you want me to come get you now?” Eddie asks, and for the first time in months, isn’t afraid of what Chris might answer.