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“What’s that one?”
“Mmmm, that one is… Cassiopeia, the Queen.”
As much as Eddie loved Los Angeles, as much as he loved the city, as much as Eddie loved his life with Chris, and Buck, and the 118, sometimes he longed for El Paso.
Sometimes he longed for clean, dry air, for cool desert rains, but more than anything, he missed looking up and seeing stars when the sun set. He had grown up with the ability to see the Milky Way right outside his bedroom window (or at least, that was how it felt as a kid). Abuela used to tell him about every star, every constellation, every story behind them all, and Eddie had kept that information with him for years.
As great as LA was, it was shitty for stargazing—the city never slept, literally, and when Eddie looked up at the sky he could hardly see more than the Hollywood sign when he wanted to forget everything manmade.
It mocked him.
“What about that one?”
“Ooh, good eye. That’s not a star, that’s a whole planet. You’re looking straight at Jupiter, kid.”
“Wow.”
Yeah, wow.
As usual, Carla was the answer. She had no more than mentioned the word ‘stargazing’ while recounting the road trip her husband had taken for his birthday, and Eddie was all over her, begging politely asking her for more information. Turns out, less than two hours outside of the city, there was one of the best state parks in the country to look up into the sky at night.
Who would have thought?
The fact that it was just as easy to convince Buck to take a night off with him as it was for Eddie to pull Chris out of school the next day said a lot; and while Eddie wasn’t usually one to be super introspective about his relationship, he could tell that it meant just as much for Buck to be included with he and Christopher as it did for Eddie to be able to open himself up to someone outside of their little bubble.
He had to admit—as excited as he was to share what was such an important part of his childhood (and such a good memory), he was a little worried that Chris wouldn’t feel the same way Eddie did about it. Chris, of course, immediately put that fear to rest—he had immediately dug out one of the beaten old Astronomy books Eddie had given to him, and spent the entire two hour drive
God, sometimes Eddie forgot just how hungry his kid was to learn.
“Okay, okay, you see that one buddy? The one that’s moving really fast?”
“Is that a shooting star?”
“No, even cooler—that’s the international space station. There’s astronauts from all over the world up there.”
“Really?!”
Chris’ little hands were flying over the book that Eddie had given him so long ago, easily filling in some of the information the book left out (yes, stars really could explode, no, they didn’t actually twinkle). It might have been a little shallow, but Eddie still loved feeling like he was useful for Chris—the kid who was outlearning him at an alarming pace. He lived for the moments that he got to share; even if he all but promised Chris a telescope for his next birthday, it was more than worth it to see the awed look on his face as he looked up to his dad.
He had all but cocooned himself between Eddie and Buck, claiming the fluffiest pillow for himself, the overstuffed duvet Eddie had spread over them covered in an assortment of snacks. Eddie might have gone a little overboard in the blanket department, but he couldn’t find a reason to think of that as a bad thing—who said their miniature camping excursion had to be uncomfortable?
(Buck, to his credit, had made it exactly one half hour into stargazing before dozing off in the mountain of blankets Eddie had piled up in the bed of the truck—his head resting on Eddie’s shoulder, Chris resting between the two of them, all but using Buck as a glorified booster seat.
Eddie didn’t mind—the fact that Buck felt safe and comfortable enough to sleep around him made his heart warm in a way he wasn’t sure he was allowed to think about.)
“Do you think I can get my own constellation?”
“You already do, buddy… see, that one, right there. That’s Cepheus—the king of the world!”
Any protests that Chris tried to squeak out were immediately negated by the force of his giggles.
At some point in time during the evening, in between telling Chris all about Andromeda and Leo, about Orion and the Scorpion, Eddie had to admit, he stopped watching the sky and started to watch Chris. For so much of his life, he had felt guilty, like he had to make up for all the time that he had missed when Chris was a baby, but looking back now, he wouldn’t change a thing—even if it did hurt him to admit it. After the tsunami, Eddie had brought Chris and Buck back together the next day, his reasoning simple—it was Chris’ turn to save Buck, just like Buck had done for Chris, but now was one of those moments where he realized that Chris didn’t just save Buck—he had saved Eddie, too.
‘I miss you all the time.’
Hearing that had done a number on Eddie, but looking back, it was easy to identify that as the lynchpin, the catalyst of change that pushed them across the country, into the 118, that had brought Sharon back into their lives for the end of hers, that had thrown Buck at him before Eddie even knew what was going on. More importantly, it was the moment where Eddie realized that Chris wasn’t just his kid, he was his own person—he existed outside of anything that Eddie could control or maintain, and it was all he could do to hold on as Chris took charge in his own life.
He could barely remember what it felt like, to be so young, and open, and willing to take whatever information the world could give you. It wasn’t always easy to see himself in his kid, but he prayed that Chris never lost that sense of curiosity, of wonder, that he had when he was a kid himself (that all but abandoned him now, taunting him, hovering just out of his reach).
He couldn’t resist leaning over as Chris looked down at his book, kissing the crown of his son’s head, letting himself breathe for only a moment through the mess of curls as he closed his eyes.
“Where’s the Big Dipper?”
Eddie grinned and hunched down next to Chris’ eye level, mindful of the human body he was using as a seat, his index finger tracing over the familiar cluster of stars.
“See, here’s the head, and body, and legs, and tail… and right between the Big Dipper and Cepheus… that one is the Little Dipper. Big Bear and Little Bear.”
“Just like you and me, huh dad?”
Eddie had to swallow before responding.
“Yeah buddy, just like you and me.”
(”Buck can be Virgo.” Chris decided after a long moment of quiet, nodding sagely as Eddie had to choke down a laugh as to not wake the Virgin himself.)