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Eddie wakes from a restless half sleep. The room is dark, curtains drawn, lit only by the dim green numbers on his alarm clock. 2:00 am. He was half expecting it, as Chris had started to complain of a stomach ache in the evening. Eddie knew it was serious when he turned down not just dinner, but the cookies Eddie had brought home for him that Bobby had made on shift.
But the room is quiet, and empty. As is the bed next to him, in fact. Eddie notices Buck is absent, covers tossed back in an uncharacteristically hasty pile. Eddie listens, but can’t hear much coming from the rest of the house.
He steps out of the bedroom to investigate. The hallway is dark but for a column of blindingly white light from the bathroom, where the door is partially ajar. Eddie peeks into the strip of light, and is cracked open.
He sees Chris, heaving over the toilet, and Buck kneeling behind him. Chris sits up and turns back to Buck, face tear-streaked and miserable. Buck wipes his mouth gently with a tissue, and wipes his tears with his thumb. Chris collapses into his shoulder. Buck just holds him, hands soothing up and down his small back.
Eddie is frozen to the spot. His heart feels smashed open, all gooey-insides and sharp, delicate shards of eggshell dripping between his ribs. He feels raw, the sensation wiping away any illusions he may have once had about being hard-boiled. Eddie puts his hand to his chest as if there was a wound there, sure if he pulled his fingers away they’d be coated not with blood, but with pure, golden yolk.
Or maybe his heart is the burnt-sugar shell of a crème brûlée, whacked with the back of a spoon. Why is that the thing people do to crème brûlée? It’s such a violent action for a delicate dessert. Maybe that’s the point, Eddie thinks, to know what it feels like to make a perfect, fragile thing, that can’t be enjoyed without destroying it.
Eddie makes himself go to the kitchen. He fills a glass of water and returns. He slips into the bathroom, grabbing a wash cloth from the cabinet and running it under cool water in the sink, and wrings it out.
Buck looks up at him, and he looks…well, he looks like Eddie feels. Like his heart is overflowing his chest and spilling into his throat, like it aches with every bit of pain he can’t take away from Christopher, like he’s rooted to the ground to be a shelter that Chris can safely fall into, like he finds his own stability in that.
Anyone who’s met Uncle Buck for more than three seconds could tell he’d be good at the fun parts, the birthday parties and the zoo trips and the secret-ice-cream-before-dinner. But Eddie knows he’s part of a rare few that knows this Buck, the one with shadows under his eyes and his knees pressed to the cold tile, because he’s pushed the bath mat up for Chris to sit on. This is the Buck who’s good at the messy parts.
Eddie swallows past the eggshell shards in his throat, because moments like this make it so easy to picture a vast, ludicrous, unreasonably perfect future. He’s acutely aware that it’s far too early in their relationship for these kind of dreams, but that doesn’t seem to stop them.
“I don’t know if I should apologize for waking you, or for not waking you,” Buck murmurs.
“Neither,” he replies, obviously.
Eddie joins them on the floor, folding himself into the space between the toilet and the tub. He knows Buck would’ve already taken his temperature, but he puts a palm to Chris’s forehead anyway, if mostly so he can smooth back his curls, because he can.
Christopher picks his head up from Buck’s shoulder. “Dad?” he sniffles.
“Hey, mijo.” He straightens his pajama shirt, thumb rubbing his shoulder.
“’M sorry,” he mumbles.
“Hey, shh, it’s alright,” he soothes. “Try and drink some water.”
Eddie holds up the glass, tilting it slowly for him to get a few sips. When Chris withdraws he sets the glass down, reaching for the wash cloth. And though his temperature was fine, Eddie wipes the cool cloth across his forehead anyway, and holds it to the back of his neck.
Chris climbs over into Eddie’s lap, settling against his shoulder as Eddie leans back against the tub. Thankfully Chris’s stomach seems to be giving him a reprieve. Eventually his body settles, and his breathing slows against Eddie’s chest, as he sinks into sleep. Eddie tips his head back against the cool ceramic ledge of the bathtub, and lets his eyes drift closed.
He’s not sure how much later it is that he wakes to Buck gently nudging his shoulder.
“C’mon,” he whispers. “Bedtime again.” He picks up the water glass as he stands, stretching his limbs out. He stoops to press a feather-light kiss to the top of Chris’s head, and then one to Eddie’s, as he carefully steps around them.
Eddie catches his hand as he turns to leave, drawing Buck’s gaze back to him. He kisses his knuckles lightly.
“Thanks,” he says.
They haven’t said the other thing yet, which in this moment feels absurd. Buck has been so thoroughly folded into his life for so long, that those three words would already not feel like enough. But Eddie catches his eyes as he steps away, and is reassured that he knows. He knows.
Eddie scoops up Chris and stands slowly, struck with the sudden awareness that his feet dangle at least an inch longer than the last time he’s held him like this. He carries him to his bed, depositing him gently, pulling the covers up to his shoulders. Eddie pulls the wastebasket up beside the bed, just in case.
Eddie hears quiet footsteps approaching from the kitchen, and Buck reappears behind him with a fresh glass of water for the nightstand. Eddie retreats to the doorframe, but then lingers there, watching the slight rise and fall of the comforter in the soft blue glow of the night light.
Buck’s hand comes up to rest on his shoulder. “You should be sleeping too,” he murmurs. “Or at least making a semi-convincing attempt at it.”
Eddie blows out a breath and concedes, letting Buck lead him back to bed, back to the quiet, comforting stillness of the dark.