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He’d only been on the job for a couple of months when he asked Hen for a favor. “You want me to do what now?”
Okay, maybe he could have worded the request better.
“I was hoping you’d take a picture of me?” He was standing next to the ladder truck, holding out his phone with a hopeful look. Hen was giving him a very impressive look, one part annoyed, one part impressed, two parts wondering exactly what he was up to.
“Do I even need to ask why you want me to take your picture? And if you say Tinder, I will hit you.”
Buck sighed. “No, it’s not for Tinder, or any dating app. I just need a nice picture for a postcard. That’s all, I swear. You always take the nicest pictures of your son, after all.”
The paramedic paused in her commentary. While Buck wasn’t always the most serious (‘reckless daredevil’ would be putting it politely), she could see that he wasn’t really joking with her. There was a seriousness about him, that this was something very important to him.
“Give me your phone and put on a smile, Buckley,” she said, pulling his slightly cracked phone out of his hand. She took one look at it and signed. “Actually, never mind. Mine would be better. It’s from the latest generation.”
“Yeah, I haven’t had a chance to upgrade yet. Figured I should save for a bit, since it still works and all,” Buck said, stepping back towards the truck while tugging on a Santa hat. It wasn’t that he didn’t want a new phone: he did, that wasn’t the question. He just wanted to save that money, just in case.
Hen nodded while pulling out hers. “Good idea, but I say get yourself a case and a decent screen protector. Otherwise, I’ll end up picking glass shards out of your hands one of these days.”
Buck grinned. “Sure, after shift. Have to get this printed anyway!”
She raised her phone and Buck put on a big smile, one that really lit up his eyes. She was impressed. He looked like he really appreciated the fact that she was taking the time to do this for him, but also he was taking pride in it. A good combination, instead of the disaster boy he usually was.
Once she had taken a fair few, she gestured for him to come over. “Pick your top three. Better to have options, but not too many options.”
He scrolled through the dozen or so pictures and quickly selected two. One that she’d taken right before he’d started smiling, and one where he looked like he could light up the world. When he noticed her giving him a look about the first photo, he sighed and figured it would be easier to give her at least a partial answer.
“The serious one is for my parents. Just a ‘I’m still alive’ message,” he explained, hedging around the real reason.
He hoped the serious photo would appease them. When he’d returned to the States from Peru, he’d given them a quick courtesy call. Just telling them he was going to the LAFD Academy, and that he was hoping to stay here for awhile, if they needed him for something. The response was less than kind. Instead of even just a “congratulations for attempting to get your life in order for the millionth time,” he got a long lecture about how firefighting wasn’t a respectable career for him. He needed to return home, go back to school, and take a corporate job, something that he could use to settle down in a few years.
Basically, be a desk monkey under his father’s thumb for as long as the man walked the Earth. Exactly what he didn’t want.
In reality, this postcard was going to be more of a “fuck you.” He’d made it through the Academy and was a part of one of the best stations in the LAFD. He was proud of where his life was starting to go. Sure, he’d never be a multimillionaire like them, but that’s not what he wanted in his life. He just wanted to be happy, and right now that was firefighting.
Hen sighed, clearly seeing that there was more to the story that he wasn’t telling her. But she pushed on. “And the other one?” she asked, not really expecting a full answer.
“Someone I haven’t heard from in about two years. But I want her to know where I am. If she needs me.”
That answer satisfied her curiosity more than the other. She gave him a small smile. “Hey, go get those printed on your way home today, so they make it by Christmas. Late cards always suck.”
He laughed. “Yeah, I will, I promise. Thanks for the help Hen.”
The next day found them back on shift. It had been pretty calm (never the q word, Buck had learned the hard way about that one, faulty fire suppression system be damned). He’d managed to complete his chores pretty fast for once, even taking the time to help out Hen with one of her own, as a thanks for the previous day.
After dinner that evening, most of their shift had scattered around the loft, doing their own personal tasks. Hen was reading a dime store novel that she clearly wasn’t enjoying very much. Chimney was failing at some sort of game on the television. Bobby had finished packing away the leftovers (the pans left to soak for a bit before Buck would be tasked to wash them) and had joined his probie at the table with a pile of paperwork he needed to get through.
Buck was sitting there, carefully penning a message on the back of a postcard. Bobby had never seen him take such care with his handwriting before. Then he noticed the haphazard stack of discarded cards next to him. It caused Bobby to pause before saying anything. No need to add another to the discard pile.
Once Buck had finished writing his last line, he set down his pen, leaned back, and let out a gigantic sigh.
“Not one for writing postcards, Buck?” the captain asked, good-naturally.
“Nah, cap,” Buck said, shaking his head, an easy smile setting in across his face. “Just had to get it right. I didn’t want to send something with strikethroughs every line. Better to have one good clean message, right?”
“It’s a good habit to have. And now that I know you have good handwriting in those hands...” Bobby trailed off as Buck began to laugh. He knew what Bobby was getting at. Buck’s reports
sometimes came with at least ten mistakes, usually spelling, always changing the meaning of whatever he was trying to write. He was becoming well known at the 118 for being detailed, but also having the worst handwriting.
“It’s only to this one person,” Buck said, nodding down to the card still sitting on the table. “The other… she’d expect me to cross out a lot. But I am getting better at it.”
Bobby smiled, before turning back to his paperwork.
A silence settled over their part of the loft. Buck started in on the other postcard, double checking the address before starting the message. He’d barely gotten two words written when a voice broke the silence that had settled.
“So, what’s their name?” Chimney was suddenly behind Buck, startling him bad enough to jerk, drawing a sharp and shaky line across the entire postcard.
“Jesus Chimney, what the hell?” Buck snapped, staring at the now ruined postcard. The address had been sliced through, making it completely unusable.
“Why are you so jumpy?” The other man said, settling down directly across from Buck and reaching for the stack of discarded postcards.”
“I don’t like people sneaking up on me,” Buck grumbled, pushing the discard pile out of Chim’s reach. “And no, you don’t have permission to read these, thanks.”
“Overly sensitive much?” Chim teased. He was teetering on the line between teasing and taking a joke too far, which seemed to be something Buck was having to deal with more and more.
“No, it’s just private. If I wanted to let you read them, I would. So, please, don’t.” Buck set the ruined postcard on the top of the stack, face down, before pulling out a second one, completely untouched.
It was a good thing he’d planned ahead and bought multiples of the second postcard too.
Chim wandered away, seeing that his words weren’t setting off Buck like they normally did. Which was a shame in his eyes, because he had several good jokes lined up just to use on the probie.
Buck wearily watched the man walk away, before sighing and beginning to write again.
It wasn’t that he didn’t want to tell the team about his family. He just couldn’t take the thought of them asking whether or not they were close. And they had been, at one point.
Buckley siblings against the world and all.
But now, it had been over two years since he’d heard her voice, after Doug had come home from work early and she’d had to hang up in the middle of a sentence. He tried calling back the next day, but the number had been changed.
He didn’t even know if she was still getting his postcards, but he had to try. He just had to hope that she was, so that she knew that he wasn’t leaving her behind.
With a sign, he started writing.
Dear Maddie...