Work Text:
Like always, it’s Frank who suggests it.
“Eddie,” he says, super casual and not casual at all, at the tail end of their weekly session, “I’ve seen a great change in you, this past year. You’re happier, more confident and open. I’m very proud of your progress.”
Eddie can hear a but coming — he thanks Frank anyway. “I’m proud of me, too.”
“Have you given any thought to sharing that progress — the New Eddie, as it were — with anyone else?”
“Everyone important already knows.”
Frank raises a single brilliant eyebrow.
Frustration builds and tangles in Eddie’s gut. “I’m out — to my family, to my friends. I’ve formally and informally asked for accommodations at work. Hell, I even joined that veteran’s support group and came out there. What more do you want from me?”
“I was just wondering if you’d spoken to your parents or sisters about your progress.”
His jaw clenches, involuntarily. Distantly, he’s mildly aware of his right hand wrapped around his left wrist, squeezing in pulses. “Why would I?” he bites out, voice going monotone in the way he still hates a little bit.
“We’ve established that a lot of your negative beliefs about yourself were instilled in you during childhood. I think it might be beneficial for you to share the man you are, the man you’ve become, with the people who raised you.” Frank pauses, lets him digest this. “Share your joy with them, your happy and healthy and authentic life as your authentic self.”
“Yeah,” Eddie scoffs, “my parents will definitely be happy to share in my queer joy.” He shakes his head. “They already think I’m a massive disappointment who can’t do anything right. This would be just another thing that they can use as proof that they’d be better for Chris than I am.”
“What about your sisters?”
“My sisters follow me on Instagram. If they haven’t figured out that I have a boyfriend by now, that’s on them.” He lets his wrist go, flexes his fingers. “I don’t think they’d react badly. They’d — they’d be happy for me, that I found someone to love me and love Chris. I don’t — I don’t think they’d be surprised.”
“That’s good. Maybe start there. And then maybe you can move onto your parents.” Before Eddie can open his mouth to reply, the timer goes off, signaling the end of his session. He sighs, heavy. Frank puts his pen down on his notebook, tosses him a smile. “All I ask is that you think on it. I know it’s scary and it hurts. But you’re strong, Eddie, and you deserve to celebrate yourself with everyone who loves you. Remember that you’re happy with the life you have. They no longer have power over you.”
“See you next week.”
Buck and Chris are waiting at the dining room table when he gets home, homework spread out between them. Between Buck click-clacking away at his laptop keyboard and Chris scribbling on his math worksheet, they’re too focused to answer anything more than a collective “hey” when he calls out from the door.
He presses a kiss to the crown of Chris’s curls, which his twelve-year-old whines about but accepts. His boyfriend, however, is much more receptive to a kiss, straining his neck up towards Eddie in silent request. With Buck leaning up from his chair and Eddie leaning down, their mouths touch soft and simple — hello, there you are, I missed you — and Buck’s arm snakes it’s way around his waist, tugging him in to press their sides together.
Humming into the kiss before pulling away, Buck rubs his big warm hand gently over Eddie’s hip. He’s completely detached from his work on their monthly budget, eyes scanning Eddie’s face. “You good?”
Therapy is hard on both of them.
“I’m good.” He casts a look in Chris’ direction and runs his fingers through Buck’s messy curls. “All talked out for now.”
Buck — as always — gets what he means by that: later, not with Chris here. He nods, casual, and changes the subject. Eddie loves him for it. “Easy dinner tonight, just some broccoli mac and cheese. It should only have a few minutes left in the oven.”
“I love you.”
“I love you more,” Buck grins.
“I love you most,” Chris interjects, routine.
Dinner is a messy, chaotic affair. Chris inherited Shannon’s unfortunate tendency to talk with her hands and a noddle or two goes flying as he regales Eddie with tales of his day in his sixth grade classroom. Buck eats the way he always eats: like he hasn’t eaten in days, like he’ll never have another meal again, like no one ever taught him not to talk with his mouth full. What else can Eddie do but listen to them, his family, heart full and fond? They stay at the table long after their plates are emptied.
Dishes don’t take too long, even though they do them by hand. Buck doesn’t even ask about fixing the dishwasher anymore. It’s their mess to clean up. Chris disappears into his bedroom to finish his homework and play video games until lights out. When their hips bump or fingers brush as they pass dishes back and forth, it’s like being a teenager again, that first-love thrill.
“So,” Eddie starts, quiet under the sound of the water running, “Frank thinks I should tell my parents about me — about us.”
Buck’s big blonde head shoots up from where he was focused on drying dishes. “And what do you think about that?”
“I think he might have a point.”
Tilting his head like a confused golden retriever, Buck makes an encouraging sound. It’s a sound Eddie hears a lot after therapy, one he’s been hearing for years. It’s an open, vulnerable sound, one that Eddie knows means Buck wants to hear every ugly thought inside his head.
“I love you,” Eddie continues, “and I love the life — the family — we’ve built together. But — maybe more than that, I love me. I love the person I am. I want people to know who I am.” He stares down into the cup in his hand, a commemorative one from the zoo’s reopening after the pandemic. It’s easier to talk when he doesn’t have to look into Buck’s eyes. “When I was a kid, I thought I would never be able to tell my parents what I was. I knew they wouldn’t accept it and I thought I would just hide forever. I was good at it, hiding.”
He stops, sniffles.
“Hey, hey,” Buck soothes, dropping his dishrag and glass to the counter and reaching for Eddie. His big arms — arms that pulled Eddie to safety, that carried him to refuge, that swam through hell for their son, literally and figuratively — wrap tight around Eddie’s shoulders and squeeze them together. “It’s okay.”
Eddie’s big hands — hands that have taken and saved lives, that cradled his son, that held Buck steady in his lowest moments — slide up Buck’s wide back and clutch at his shoulder blades. “I don’t want to hide anymore. From anyone. Especially not from them.”
“You don’t need to,” Buck speaks into his hair, presses a kiss there. Those few inches of height between them leave Eddie feeling small and protected, loved. “We’ll figure it out. We’ll set up a call or FaceTime or something and —”
“No.”
“No?”
“No,” Eddie insists, “this is something I have to do in person.”
Buck pulls away slightly, but doesn’t take his hands off Eddie. “You want to go back to El Paso?” Eddie has never been brilliant at reading facial expressions, but he can read Buck like an open picture book, the concern etched into every line of his face.
“I think I need to.”
With a nod, Buck tugs him back in tight. “Okay. I’ll book us some tickets, talk to Bobby about getting our shifts moved around, get Chris’s homework for a few days to take with us so he doesn’t miss too much. We can stay in a hotel, make it easier to get some space—”
“Baby,” Eddie interrupts, “you and Chris should stay here. I need to do this on my own.”
“You think I’m going to let you go to El Paso to come out to your parents on your own?”
“I’m not asking permission. I’m asking you to stay here with our son so I can handle this myself and have something good to come home to.” He cups Buck’s face in his hands, traces his thumb around his pink birthmark. “There are some things I need to do by myself, for myself.”
Buck whines, high pitched. “I want to be there to have your back.”
Eddie can’t held but smile. “You always have my back, even if you’re a plane ride away. Okay?”
“Okay.”
“Good boy,” Eddie praises just to see Buck flush.
He shoves Eddie away, but doesn’t go too far, keeps his fingers tangled in the hem of Eddie’s t-shirt. “Don’t do that to me when the kid’s still awake.” Eddie smirks. “You’re such a tease.”
“Gotta leave you wanting more.”
Buck shakes his head. “I have everything I want right here.”
It takes a few days to get everything sorted, but soon enough the glass doors of the airport loom high and clear in front of him.
The jeep is parked along the curb behind them, idling with music playing. (Eddie hates driving. Buck loves it. It works for them.) Buck waits with his arm wrapped around Christopher’s shoulders while Eddie gets his bags out of the back. He sets the suitcase on it’s wheels and turns to face them. Buck takes his hand, rubs his thumb back and forth over Eddie’s rough knuckles. Chris shuffles closer to Buck, closer to him. Eddie puts his free hand in Chris’s curls, a loose group hug, an electric circuit that only works when they’re all together.
“It’s only two days,” he reminds them, “at most. I’ll be home before you know it.”
“I’ll miss you every second,” Buck vows.
“Tell Abuelo and Grandma I love them,” Chris requests. He frowns. “Unless they’re assholes. Then tell them I take it back.”
“Chris!”
“Language, kid,” Buck chuckles.
“What? I’m twelve. I should be allowed to say, like, one bad word.”
They share a look over his head. Buck shrugs. (Buck would. His parental supervision growing up was his teenaged sister. What did he know about appropriate ages for swearing?) Eddie sighs. “We’ll let it slide this time.” Eddie casts a look at the doors. “And we’ll talk about it when I get home.”
He presses a long, lingering kiss to Buck’s mouth, foreheads pressed hard together. Buck’s proud nose drags against his, like Buck wants to nuzzle inside him. He gives a squeeze to the back of his boyfriend’s neck and then it’s Chris’s turn for a kiss, pressed to the crown of his head while Eddie holds him close and breathes him in for a too-short time.
“I love you,” Buck says.
“I love you more,” Chris says.
With a hand on both of their shoulders, he promises: “I love you most.”
They don’t come into the airport with him. (Their job ends at the glass doors, Eddie remembers Buck telling him that once. It’s not a rule they usually follow.) His suitcase rolls and scrapes along the concrete, dragging behind him, and he leaves his family behind. When the doors slide closed behind him, he turns to look back over his shoulder.
Buck and Chris are still at the curb, watching him. Cradling Chris in his strong fireman’s arms, up on his hip like he’s seven-years-old again, he can see Buck speaking to their son. Reassurance, probably. God, he loves them.
He waits at his gate with an overpriced tea from Starbucks. It’s cold and sweet and it gives him something to do with his hands. Het types out two messages.
To his sisters, in their quiet little group chat, fondly named Keeping Up With The Diazes by Sophia, he sends the first message in the chat in the last three months.
Eddie: 10:34 AM:
In case you didn’t know, I’m gay. I’m also coming to El Paso. Don’t tell Mom and Papi.
To Frank, in an effort to be courteous and professional, he reaches out about his appointment scheduled for tomorrow.
Eddie: 10:35 AM:
Hi, Frank. This is Eddie Diaz. Sorry for the late notice but I will need to reschedule my session for this week. I won’t be able to make tomorrow because I’ll be in Texas coming out to my parents. You can reach out to Buck at the number in my file to reschedule. He knows my schedule better than I do. Wish me luck!
He immediately puts his phone on airplane mode — you know, like a coward — and doesn’t look at it as he boards the plane.
He keeps ignoring the texts waiting for him.
Riding through El Paso — through familiar streets, past the park where he played baseball, just barely missing being stuck in traffic in front of his old high school — in the backseat of the Uber has a tidal wave of sense memories flooding over Eddie’s head. Here is what it felt like to be nine and pull your own hair out of your scalp, to be twelve and realize things about yourself you can never tell anyone, to be sixteen and asking someone to prom as friends so no one will know who you really want to go with, to be nineteen and lose your virginity in the back of your truck.
He keeps his phone glued his ear, sticky in the heat, and lets Buck chatter on and on about his latest Wikipedia binge and what he’s making for Chris for dinner. It’s soothing, calming, the sound of Buck’s voice — a life raft in a tsunami.
“I’m almost there,” he says, interrupting the love of his life. “I’ll call you when it’s done.”
“The very second,” Buck insists. “I’d say I’d wait for you to call, but we both know I’ll be texting you like crazy. I’m here if — when — you need me.”
“I know. I love you.”
“I love you more.”
Distantly, from the background of Buck’s end of the phone, is Christopher yelling: “I love you most!”
Getting out of the Uber takes more strength than Eddie thinks it should. The long, open porch of the ancestral Diaz home sits welcoming from where Eddie stands in the driveway, but dread weighs heavy in his stomach. He twists the watch on his wrist, the special one with the cooling, calming weighted band that the 118 chipped in to get him for his birthday.
He summons all his bravery and knocks on the door. (This isn’t his home anymore.)
In the doorway, illuminated by the late afternoon sun, his parents don’t look so scary. Ramon, a man larger than life with big, rough builder’s hands, is slightly hunched, an inch or two shorter than Eddie now. His wrists look thin and bony. Helena, a heavy-handed and smothering influence who always seemed put together, has more grays in her hair than not, wrinkles around her eyes and her thinning lips.
“Eddie!” Mom cheers, throwing her arms around him and squeezing him close. His hands are tentative where they rest on her back, pressing a quick kiss to her warm cheek before she pulls away and starts to look around, behind him, eyes cats downward — looking for Chris.
“Edmundo,” Papi shakes his hand, claps him on the back a few times. His chuckle is welcoming, pleased, his smile wide and crinkling his eyes in the corners. “Come in, come in.”
The house hasn’t changed much since the last time Eddie was here. The house hasn’t changed much since Eddie was a child. The same pictures hang on the walls, painted the same color they’ve been for decades. It’s like being sucked back in time.
Sitting at the kitchen table, in the same chair he sat in when he told his parents he’d knocked his girlfriend up, makes him feel like he’s about to be in trouble. He reaches out, rubs a finger over the grooves dug into the wood from where Adriana used to chop vegetables without a cutting board.
“Not that we’re not happy to see you, mijo,” Papi says, reclining at the head of the table while Eddie’s mother bustles around the kitchen to get them all drinks, “but what brings you all the way from sunny California?”
The mocking tone covering his description of California doesn’t fly over Eddie’s head.
A cold, sweating beer is passed his way. He holds it with both hands, something to steady himself with. The condensation drips over his thumb, chilled and grounding. He doesn’t take a sip. “I thought I’d surprise you guys.”
“Where’s Christopher?” Mom asks, the first thing out of her mouth since her joyful shout of surprise when she opened the front door for him. Of course.
“Home,” Eddie says. Clarifies: “L.A.”
“You didn’t leave him with my mother, did you?” Papi scolds. “She’s too old to be looking after your child for you so you can take a vacation.”
“Especially,” Mom doubles down, leaning towards him over the length of the table, “a child like Christopher, with special needs. I love your mother,” she says this to Papi, “but, Eddie, she’s just not capable of taking care of a child like Christopher anymore—”
Eddie interrupts. He can’t help it. “Mom. He’s not with Abuela. He’s safe and sound, at home with Buck. He has a big week at school. I didn’t want to make him miss it so we could both come visit, but he sends his love.” He sighs. “And, anyway, this trip is about me.”
Mom laughs, short and mocking. “Everything’s always about you, Eddie. You didn’t think that maybe we’d like to see our grandson? It’s only been three years!” She looks to Papi to share a commiserating look. “Remember the tantrums he used to throw if things weren’t just to his liking?”
“Especial,” Papi rolls his eyes.
“There’s a reason,” Eddie says, “for that.” He pauses, takes a long sip of his beer. It leaves a circle of wet on the table. “After I — after the shooting, I was struggling. My team, they recommended I see a therapist, a PTSD specialist. Practically had to carry me into the building.” Before either of his parents can make a disparaging comment, he hurries along. “It helped, a lot, to talk about it all.”
“A Diaz man in therapy,” Papi shakes his head. “That’s not for men like us.”
“I saw a mandated therapist when I came back from Afghanistan and I thought it was bullshit. I saw a mandated therapist after Shannon died and I thought it was bullshit. I thought I could handle it myself, because you always taught me I should be able to handle everything myself. Like a man.” He pauses, thinks over what to say. “Men like me see therapists all the time. Veterans. First responders. Single fathers. Accepting help can save our lives.”
That causes his parents to pause.
“What do you mean?” Mom asks.
Eddie chews it over, how much to share. “I was low. Really low. Nightmares and flashbacks. And I tried to reach out to some of my unit, who went down in that helicopter with me.” He shrugs. “They were all dead. Some O.D.s and suicides. Made me feel like life was pointless, if I could pull them out of the hellhole that was Afghanistan but not save them in the long run. What was the point of helping anyone? What was the point of being alive?”
His mom has tears building in her eyes. “Eddie—”
“I didn’t — I didn’t hurt myself.” He didn’t, not they way they’re thinking. “But I did almost hurt someone else, because my brain was so sad and scared it couldn’t tell up from down.”
“Christopher?”
“No, no never Chris. I—” he takes a long, deep breath and counts backwards in his head. He will not meltdown. He will not meltdown. He will not meltdown. He wraps an arm around himself, uncomfortable in the best way. He remembers his mantra: My name is Eddie Diaz. I am a good person. I am a good father. I deserve nice things. I deserve to be happy. “I hated the world and I hated myself, but that never included Chris. He is never in any danger from me. No one got hurt and I got the help I needed. I don’t feel like that anymore.”
“Thank God.”
“Gracias a Dios.”
“But we talked about a lot in therapy. I unpacked a lot of stuff I had been dealing with — for a long time. And I’m not perfect, but I’m doing a lot better now. I’ve made a lot of progress. My therapist thinks I should celebrate that and I wanted to celebrate here, with you two.” He gives them a weak smile. “I want you to know me — the real me.”
Mom shakes her head, a sad smile on her face like he’s being silly. “Of course you should celebrate, but we know you, Eddie. You’re our son.”
He still hasn’t set his beer down, holding onto it like a shield or a safety blanket. “Maybe I didn’t say it right. I want to share myself and my progress with you.”
“Okay, mijo,” Papi says, “we’re ready.”
The breath that comes out of Eddie’s mouth is shaky and stuttered. “Okay.” He steels himself, straightens his shoulders. “Remember all those tantrums I had as a kid? I spoke to a few different doctors and I was diagnosed with ASD — autism spectrum disorder.”
His parents blink at him in silence. “What?”
Eddie continues: “Obviously I don’t need a ton of support or accommodations — I can manage without them. But they do help. A lot. And this diagnosis — it explained so much about me and my life and why I am the way I am.” He lifts his head, a relieved and teary smile stretched painfully across his face. His cheeks hurt, his eyes sting. “It’s been such a relief.”
“Eddie,” Mom says, almost annoyed, “you’re not retarded.”
“Jesus fucking Christ, Mom.”
“Edmundo—” Papi scolds, leaning forward to rest his elbows on the table. Eddie can hear his voice echoing in his head: We don’t take the Lord’s name in vain in this house.
“No!” Eddie pushes his back hard against the backrest of the chair. He lets go of his beer, finally, sets it back on the table outside of the ring it’s already left in its wake. “In what world is that an okay thing to say? I tell you I’ve come to terms with something huge about myself and you use the R-word like a middle school bully?”
“That’s obviously not how I meant it. I just meant—”
“Would you say something like that to Christopher?”
“Eddie—”
“Never mind, don’t answer that. I don’t want to know.”
Mom looks like she could cry, so Papi speaks for her. “How could you accuse us of something like that? You really think we’d treat our only grandson that way?”
“Why not?” Eddie growls. “You treat your only son like that.”
“Is that why you left Christopher in L.A.?” Mom demands. “Because you don’t trust us around our grandson?”
“Maybe! Maybe I didn’t want him here for the fallout of this conversation. Maybe I wanted him to be happy at home, instead of listening to us arguing. Can you blame me? You’re not exactly taking it well and I’ve barely even started.”
“There’s more?”
Go big or go home. Eddie just wants to go home. He puts his hands palm-down on the tabletop. “Yeah, there is.” Breathe in, breathe out. “I met someone.”
“You’re dating again?” Mom is already shaking her head. “You really think it’s a good idea to bring someone new into Christopher’s life, with your . . . diagnosis? Can you even handle dating?”
“Saying I met someone isn’t right. I should’ve said I’m seeing someone. It’s not someone new.”
Papi raises an eyebrow. “Did you an Ana get back together?”
“No. No, not Ana.” He looks from one to the other. “We’ve been together for a few months, but we’ve been friends for years. Things are getting serious. I’m happier than I’ve ever been. I’ve never been loved like this before. I’ve never felt like this before. I’ve never known someone who loves Chris as much as I do. And — and I want you to be happy for me.”
Earlier fight entirely forgotten, like it didn’t even happen, his mother reaches for his hands and offers him a big, excited smile. “Of course we’re happy for you! That’s all we’ve ever wanted for you, Eddie. Tell us everything! What’s her name? Have we met her?”
Wariness crawls its way up his throat. He swallows it down. “You have. His name is Evan, but he likes to go by Buck.”
The silence is deafening. Mom keeps her hold on his hands, but her fingers go slack. She gapes at him, mouth hanging open like a caught fish. (He gets that comparison now, in a way he never has before.)
Papi stutters out: “What . . . what do you mean?”
“I mean — Buck is my boyfriend. And one day he’s going to be my husband. Because I’m gay.”
“You can’t just decide to be autistic and gay, Eddie.”
He pulls his hands away, wipes some of the condensation off the table with his palms as he drags his hands in close to himself. “I didn’t just decide. I was diagnosed with ASD. And I’ve known I was gay since I was twelve years old.”
“You had a wife! You have a son!”
“I thought I could try and be something I wasn’t. I thought I would never be able to tell you who I was — and if I could’ve loved any woman, it would’ve been Shannon. I did love her, I do love her, but I was never in love with her, it was never romantic the way it should have been. It was always — I was always gay. I’m just done hiding it now.”
“I just don’t understand.”
“You don’t have to understand. I just want you to know me and the man I love and be apart of the family we’ve built together.”
“Family? Christopher knows?”
Eddie licks his lips. “Chris loves his Buck. Hell, he’s pushing for him to move in and adopt him. You’re the only ones who aren’t cool with this.” He stares down at his lap, tangles his fingers together under the table. “Why can’t you just love me for who I am?”
“This is a lot,” Mom says. “I don’t know where this is coming from.”
“It’s that English teacher he had. The one with the artist for a roommate. I remember, don’t you — the way Eddie couldn’t stop talking about him and read every book he recommended, like he’d ever been a good student before.” He shakes his head at Eddie. “He put all those ideas in your head.”
“Oh, please,” Eddie scoffs, "Señor Mendoza didn’t make me gay by giving me books. What made me gay was looking at other boys and wanting to kiss them.”
“Was I not around enough? Did I not teach you to be a man?”
“It’s not about you — or what you did or didn’t do. It’s not something I learned from someone else. I’ve always been this way. I was born autistic and I was born gay. I’m the same person I’ve always been — you just have words for it now.”
“You have to understand, Eddie,” Mom says, “this is a big shock to us. I feel like my entire world just turned upside down.”
“You have to understand,” he says, “that this is who I am. This is my life. It’s not changing. If you want to be part of my life — part of Christopher’s life — you need to accept it.”
“You would keep Christopher from us?” Papi asks.
Mom lets out a little sob, hands over her face.
Eddie nods, decisive. “I’m not subjecting my son to hatred or indifference. He has two fathers and he’s proud of it. I won’t let anyone take that from him or make him feel ashamed for it. I need you to decide if you can deal with it, if you can still love me, because I’m not hiding anymore and I’m not forcing Chris or Buck to pretend, either. We’re proud of our family.”
There’s a long, drawn-out pause. Eddie steels himself for their rejection, their disappointment, their hatred, for them to threaten to take Chris from him. Papi takes a deep breath and fits the palm of his hand around the curve of Eddie’s shoulder, shakes him gently.
“Of course,” he says, “we still love you, mijo. I may not understand it, but we will learn. No matter what, you’ve always had our love and you always will. Our love is not conditional.”
Tears well, unexpected, in Eddie’s eyes. He sniffs. “Didn’t always feel that way.”
Papi nods. “I’m sorry for that.” He shakes his head. “We never meant to push you away. Or make you believe we didn’t love you. We just wanted what was best for you. I’m an old man, Edmundo, and I can’t change the past.”
“You can do better in the future,” Eddie suggests.
“You will forgive us, if we don’t always get it right?”
Eddie nods in agreement, wiping roughly at the tears tracking their way down his cheeks. He laughs, light and relieved. “Shit, I owe Buck twenty dollars. I bet him I wouldn’t cry for this.”
“We won’t tell,” Mom says, hands outstretched to rub his arm, “if you don’t.”
“Oh, he’ll know anyway. He’s got a sixth sense, I swear.”
“He — he’s good to you?”
“The best.”
They sit in comfortable silence for a long moment. Eddie’s phone buzzes in his pocket. Mom pats his hand and gets up, moves around the kitchen to make them all a snack. After placing a bowl of tortilla chips and some salsa on the table, she slides him a glass of water.
Papi chews casually, despite the quiet. Eddie sips at his water and ignores the salsa — his mother always makes it just a bit too hot for his tastes. It’s almost nice.
Mom asks, “Can I ask a question?”
“Is it going to be offensive?”
“I don’t know.” She muses on it. “I don’t think so.”
“Shoot.”
“If you’ve known you’re — that you’re gay — for so long, why tell us now? Why not tell us before? You’ve had thirty years to tell us, Eddie.”
He feels his mouth twist, involuntary. “I didn’t think I could tell you. It didn’t seem important enough to tell you and implode my life over, when I didn’t even have someone I could be with. Then I met Shannon and — I knew I didn’t love her the right way, couldn’t, but I thought it could be enough.” He smiles. “But now I’m in love, for real. I want to marry Buck and I want you to be there for it.”
“Marriage?” Papi coughs. “Already?”
“It feels like we’ve been together forever. Why wait?”
Papi concedes this point with only a nod. Mom jumps into a conversation about Sophia’s wedding — still in the works, more than five years after an early engagement — and says she wishes the Sam would just man up and commit already. Eddie’s phone buzzes again. “Lots of men are afraid of commitment,” Mom says, as he pulls his phone out of his pocket. Her voice is prideful. “They’re not like you. You’ve always been the kind of man who dedicates himself to want he wants, even the little things.”
“Yeah,” Eddie says absentmindedly, unlocking his phone, “that’s the autism.”
Mom draws in a quick, sharp breath. Eddie blinks up from his phone screen, realizing what had just tumbled out of his mouth. It was easy, casual, the way he and Buck tease each other at home, where it’s always the autism or the ADHD or the CP or the PTSD. A slip of the tongue, maybe too much for the way their conversation had started.
They all stare at each other. That stupid Spider-Man meme Ravi is always sending in the 118 group chat comes to mind and Eddie wishes he could erase it from his memory almost more than he wishes he could erase his words from the conversation. Despite their frankly unexpected declaration of love, he doesn’t know what they liked less — the gay thing or the autistic thing — and he braces himself for a dressing down.
Papi starts laughing, though, head tipped back against the backrest of his chair. Mom follows, little awkward high-pitched giggles. A laugh huffs it’s way out of Eddie’s lungs, too. While the three of them are sitting around the kitchen table, laughing like idiots, the front door creaks open.
“Mami? Papi?” That’s Adriana’s voice, her footsteps clomping through the house. She always wears heavy and strappy platform sandals, with her toes painted to match her fingernails, and it has always made it easy to hear her coming. “Have you guys heard from—” she rounds the corner into the kitchen, spots them “—Eddie?”
“Hey, Adri.”
“You don’t answer your phone? Asshole.”
He stands up, shoves his hands in his pockets. Smiles, not very sorry. “Sorry. They don’t like you to text on airplanes.”
“You just drop a bomb like that and—” She stops, looks at their parents like she’s noticing them for the first time.
“It’s okay,” he assures. He can’t stop smiling. God, he loves his sisters. “They know. I just wanted to get to them first.”
“You’re such a bitch,” his sister says, pushing up onto her tiptoes to wrap her arms around his shoulders and pull him in tight. Her cheek is warm and sticky with foundation against his.
“That’s homophobic,” he jokes, squeezing her body and swaying side to side. He wants to pick her up, the way he used to when he would get home from Afghanistan and hug her so hard he would lift her right off her feet. (He’d do it to Sophia, too, both at the same time. Sometimes he misses his sisters so much it hurts.)
“I’m so fucking proud of you.”
Eddie’s phone buzzes where he’d left it on the table.
Adriana pulls away. “Probably Sophia. She’s been blowing up my phone.”
“Nah,” Eddie says before he even picks it up, going for casual, “it’s just Buck checking up on me. I promised to call and update him and Chris. This conversation didn’t exactly go well for him, with his parents.” He waves the phone like an explanation. “I’m just going to—”
“Go talk to your — boyfriend,” Papi instructs. It’s clear he’s uncomfortable with the word, but he’s trying. He’s trying. That’s all Eddie can ask for. It means more than Eddie knows how to say.
“He’s probably beside himself,” Mom agrees.
Eddie ducks outside and sits at the edge of the porch. Listening to the ringing on the other end of the phone, he looks out over their front yard. This is where he sat when he made the decision to move to L.A., committed to bringing Chris with him. This seat, this yard, lead him to his home, to Buck. A wave of gratitude washes over him.
“Baby!” Buck’s voice is tinny through the phone. “Are you okay? How did it go? Do you need to come home early? I can change your flight, just say the words. Or I can come get you. Are you okay? Answer that one first.”
Tears — happy tears — spring to his eyes. “I’m good. They took it so much better than I ever imagined.” He wipes a hand over his face. “They don’t get it and we fought a little. It wasn't perfect and it doesn't fix anything but — but they still love me. They love me and they want to know you.”
“That’s fantastic, Eds.”
“I’m so relieved.”
“I’m so happy for you.” A pause. “Does this mean you’re not coming home early?”
Eddie chuckles. “I’ll be on the first plane back to L.A.” He watches the sun start to set in the distance, over the silhouette of El Paso, the city he grew up in. He wants to go home. “I have something important to ask you.”
“Okay. I love you.”
“I love you more.”
With no Chris, Buck finishes their routine, their family mantra, with a promise: “I love you most.”