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Buck can take a hint. Particularly when it comes to romance and attraction—he knows when someone wants him and he knows when to make a move. Honestly, at this point he’s had so much practice charming people into bed that he could teach a class on it. One Night Stands 101 or something.
Which is why Taylor Kelly confuses the hell out of him.
Since the treasure hunting incident, she’s backed away from him three times. She’ll lean in close, lower her voice, flutter her eyelashes, brush her hair behind her ear…
And then lean away! Buck is losing his mind.
So when she does it again, when they’re at his apartment after a dinner Buck cooked for them, leaning against each other on the floor in front of the couch, Buck sighs out,
“Taylor, what are we doing?”
She’d turned away from him already, faked a laugh over some conversation they’d been having (i.e., she’d been having while Buck was getting lost in her eyes), but at his words she freezes.
Slowly, like a kid caught with their hand in the cookie jar, she turns back toward him. The expression on her face is familiar. He’d seen it on Abby a lot, near the end. And Ali.
It’s regret.
“My bad,” Buck says hastily, holding up his hands, “Sorry. If I’ve been, you know, pushy about it.”
Taylor bites her lip.
“I’m sorry, Buck,” she says. “If we weren’t friends then… yeah, a tumble would be fun. But we are. And it gets… messy.”
“I would have thought you’d be kind of into a friends with benefits situation,” Buck says, non-judgemental. “Don’t have to waste time on romance or relationships, you know?”
“I don’t have an issue with it,” Taylor corrects. “But you would.”
“Me?” Buck says, surprised. “Most of my relationships have been no-strings-attached ones.”
“Yeah…” Taylor says gently. “But that’s not you anymore. You know I’m right. You want romance, Buck. You want marriage and kids and love. Real love. And you deserve it. Which is exactly why you shouldn’t waste your time on me.”
“That’s bullshit,” Buck protests, but his heart is sinking because, well, she’s right.
Taylor shakes her head. “I can’t give you those things, Buck. I’m not sure they’re what I even want. Love, yes. But the rest of it?”
“Who says we need to figure it out now? Who says we can’t give it a shot and see where it goes?”
“Because I don’t have all that many friends,” Taylor admits. “And I don’t want to lose one over something stupid like a lack of self-restraint.”
“Who says you’ll lose me?” Buck asks, grasping at straws now. “You keep talking like you can predict everything, like the future’s already set in stone. But from what I’ve seen, the future’s pretty fucking unpredictable.”
“Buck,” Taylor says, swaying close to lay a hand on his cheek, “even if I did love you as more than a friend, I wouldn’t be able to hold a candle to Eddie.”
Buck feels the world stop turning. For just a second. Stalled on its axis like a wind-up toy that reached the end of its mechanical loop.
“Oh, Buck,” Taylor says, pulling her hand away. “C’mon. You revolve around him like he’s the fucking sun.”
“No, I…” Buck shakes his head like a dog dispelling water from its fur. “We’re friends. Brothers. I love him, yeah, but not like…”
“Brothers don’t look at each other the way you two look at each other.”
Buck’s palms are sweating. “Look at each other… how?”
Taylor gives him a long look, somewhere between disbelief and pity.
She says, “like they want to devour each other whole.”
Buck doesn’t sleep that night.
Taylor left with a kiss to his cheek and an open invitation to call her therapist—not her, she made abundantly clear, because she’d done enough to help Buck through the ensuing emotional crisis over the next three hours and two bottles of wine. But Buck just stares up at the ceiling and relives every moment he can recall about Eddie.
And there’s… a lot to get through.
Eddie smiling as Chris reads out a poem he wrote for class.
Eddie concentrated and intense, fists raised as he efficiently and elegantly attacks the punching bag at the station.
Eddie lying pale and cold in the hospital bed after nearly drowning, Buck gripping his hand and thanking every God he can think of that he won’t have to tell Chris he lost another parent.
Eddie’s eyes, warm on his, smiling that conspiratorial smile he saves just for Buck, that makes Buck feel like he’s swallowed the sun.
And Buck realizes that, on some level, he’s always known. He’s never felt this way about anyone. Like the world glows a little brighter when Eddie’s around, like his heart is a skipping record every time Eddie touches him.
He can’t remember a time when it didn’t feel like this.
Buck throws off the covers and stomps down the stairs, grabbing his keys from the kitchen counter on his way out the door.
The drive to Eddie’s is full of white noise and Buck’s memories.
“Real funny, Buck.”
“I know you did.”
“You could have my back any day.”
“Buck, there’s nobody in this world I trust with my son more than you.”
Buck finds himself at Eddie’s door, the porch light flickering on as it senses him. He thinks about knocking, but he doesn’t want to wake Chris, so he pulls out his phone and texts Eddie.
Within a minute, Buck hears noise from inside the house. Eddie’s always been a light sleeper. He makes it to the door three minutes after Buck texts him, ‘I’m outside.’
It’s enough time for Buck to shiver a little at the cold night air, realize he’d put on two different shoes, and chicken out.
Eddie swings open the door and blinks at Buck, a tiny frown on his face.
“What’s wrong?” He asks, stepping aside so that Buck can come in.
Buck curses internally while he toes off his mismatched shoes. “Nothing. I… I just couldn’t sleep.”
“Not your leg, is it?” Eddie asks, making his way down the hallway to the living room. Buck’s heartbeat kicks up, because here’s Eddie sleep-rumpled at four in the morning, opening his door to Buck and worrying about an injury from two years ago.
Buck never had a chance, did he?
“No,” Buck replies, following Eddie onto the couch. “Not the leg.”
Eddie fixes his eyes on Buck and gives him a long, assessing look. Unlike Taylor, Eddie’s gaze is tinged with concern and sympathy.
“This about Taylor Kelly?” He asks, eyes narrowing.
“Jesus,” Buck mutters. “What is it with you two reading my mind lately?”
“You’re just an open book, Buck,” Eddie says, fighting a yawn. “Not much to it. What happened?”
“She just… turned me down,” Buck says with a shrug. He can’t bring himself to feel that bad about it.
“And you’re… upset?” Eddie asks, because of course he can tell that’s not what Buck is really here about.
“No,” Buck admits. “Not really.”
“What is it then?” Eddie asks. And the way he says it, so patiently, resting his cheek against his fist as he sits sideways on the couch to face Buck, breaks something down inside him.
“It’s just…” Buck picks at a loose thread on his jeans. “I just wonder when someone is going to look at me and like… want me. When someone is finally going to love me back.”
The room goes still, like it’s holding its breath the same way Buck and Eddie are. Buck can’t bring himself to look up at whatever expression is on Eddie’s face.
Eddie breathes out. In barely more than a whisper, he says, “I do.”
Buck’s vision goes white for a moment.
His voice cracks as he says, “what?”
“I love you,” Eddie says, firmer now. He’s committed to it. That’s how Eddie is. He doesn’t back down. Buck’s always admired that about him.
“You… but… Ana?” Buck splutters, staring sightlessly down at his own hands, which have fallen still in his lap.
Eddie lets out a hollow-sounding laugh. “Ana broke up with me,” he says.
“What?”
“A few weeks ago, actually. Says I wasn’t trusting enough. That I didn’t really want her in mine and Chris’s lives. She wasn’t wrong.”
“No?” Buck feels like he’s breathing underwater, like there’s no air in the entire goddamn universe.
“Because I already have you,” Eddie says. “Hard to fill a place that’s already taken.”
Buck is horrified to feel a tear slide down his cheek. Jesus, he’s a mess. Eddie’s in love with this?
“Hey,” Eddie says, reaching over to lay a hand on Buck’s shoulder. Buck feels his tell-tale heart skip a beat. “Buck, you alright?”
“I just found out my best friend is in love with me,” Buck chokes out, “after realizing that I’ve been in love with him for years. Give me a minute.”
Eddie doesn’t.
He reaches a hand over to Buck’s jaw, turning Buck to face him. Eddie’s smile is ecstatic, radiant, like someone just told him every Hildy product in the world had been destroyed.
“That so?” He says, his other hand slipping over Buck’s shoulder and down his back, bringing them close. Close enough that their noses are practically touching.
“Yeah,” Buck says.
He can take a hint. He knows when someone wants him. He knows when to make a move.
But when Eddie kisses him, it takes Buck completely and wholly by surprise. Because apparently Buck is hopeless when it comes to love.
Eddie pulls away and Buck chases him with lips and hands and muttered pleas. Eddie breathes a laugh against his lips and Buck wants to feel that every day for the rest of his life.
“I love you,” Eddie says, “so goddamn much.”
“I love you, too,” Buck echoes, feeling warm and soft inside and out. Like he’s incandescent.
“Good,” Eddie says, kissing Buck on the nose, which makes him feel like his bones have turned to jelly. “Can we go the fuck to sleep, then?”
Buck laughs. “I’ll try to save my earth-shattering realizations for daytime from now on,” he says.
“Please do. I’d hate to have to kill you before the wedding.”
“Wedding?” Buck asks, laughing again.
“M’serious,” Eddie protests, rubbing his nose against Buck’s cheek. “I’m going to marry you, Buck. I’d ask you now, but the ring’s in my nightstand.”
“Bullshit.”
Eddie presses his smile to Buck’s. “Why don’t you come to bed and find out?”
Turns out, Eddie does have a ring. It’s black and polished metal that he shyly admits he bought more than a year ago.
“Wasn’t that during the lawsuit?” Buck asks, admiring the ring on his finger. “Weren’t we not talking then?”
“Why’d you think I was so mad at you?” Eddie says, eyes closed, laying back against the pillows. He’s got one arm wrapped around Buck’s waist. “Mad at myself too, ‘cause I couldn’t stop thinking about you.”
“Why didn’t you say anything?”
“I wasn’t ready. I didn’t think you could ever… I didn’t think you felt the same.”
“Guess tonight was a surprise, huh?”
Eddie slides his hand up to twine his fingers with Buck’s, brushing his thumb over the ring on Buck’s hand.
“Yeah,” Eddie agrees. “Life likes to throw me curveballs, I guess.”
“Excuse you,” Buck says, settling down into the curve of Eddie’s arm. “I’m not a curveball.”
“Sure you are,” Eddie says. “But I love you anyway.”
Buck rests his cheek on Eddie’s chest, closing his eyes. “I’m gonna have to send Taylor a thank you card.”
Eddie snorts. “Go to sleep, Buck.”
Buck, smiling to himself, does. After all, they’ve got a pretty big day ahead of them. Starting with Christopher.