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The thinly veiled excuse for carpooling is saving gas and the environment by driving the opposite direction of the station to herd Eddie and Christopher into his Jeep. Buck reasons with himself, and Eddie from time to time, that if they’re working the same shift (which is always) there’s no reason for them to drive separately. It would be irresponsible, foolish, so unbelievably silly that it out-sillies the laughs hidden behind mug rims that Hen and Chim give Buck every single morning without fail.
So, Buck does his due diligence as best friend and love-struck idiot and rolls to a stop at the Diaz residence every morning shift. His thumbs tap at the leather steering wheel cover, left knee knocking into the car door, unbelievably giddy at the potential to see Eddie and Christopher first thing on this fine Monday at 7AM.
He watches the door, the radio a low hum in the background with some new pop song that Buck only kind of knows the lyrics to. His heart rate picks up, a smile stretching across his lips, as the door swings open and the tale-tale clicks of Christoper’s crutches come through the open window.
Buck hops out of the Jeep, rounding the back with a tap to the bumper and the spare wheel with his finger, opening the door to the backseat for Christopher, “Morning,” he calls to both of them, hoping his excitement is summed up to Buck’s usual way of being and not his deep, unspeakable, affection for the two Diazes making their way down the sidewalk.
“Morning Buck,” Christopher grumbles, not unkindly, in typical pre-teen on a Monday morning fashion, but still stops to offer Buck a half hug.
Buck forces himself to not ruffle Christopher’s carefully styled hair, “Not excited for school?”
He lets out a sigh like he’s an investment banker and his stocks just went down, “I would be more excited if school wasn’t so early.”
“When I went to school we had to leave the house at six just to get there on time,” Eddie says with his typical, very dad-ly, eyebrow raise, “you don’t even have to wake up until six thirty.” Eddie looks over at Buck above Christopher’s head, giving him a ‘kids these days’ shrug.
Buck huffs a laugh, taking Christopher’s crutches while he gets himself situated in the backseat, “That’s sounding real ‘back in my day’, Eds. You sure you’re not fifty?”
Eddie passes Christopher his lunch box, rolling his eyes, “Ha-ha, Buck, I have the joints of a twenty year old.”
“God bless fish oil.” Buck shuts Christopher’s door with a little salute, ducking away from the swat he could feel coming from a mile away.
“Cabrón,” Eddie mutters under his breath with a grin on his lips, opening his own car door.
Buck’s goofy little smile stays on his face until he settles into the front seat. He quickly buckles his seat belt, looking back at Christopher as he slouches in the back seat, then to Eddie who’s slipped sunglasses over his nose and has an elbow propped against the windowsill. They both look so comfortable, so at home, in Buck’s Jeep that it makes his heart flutter a little.
“Ready?”
“To go back to sleep,” Christopher mumbles, his cheek pressed into the window.
Eddie laughs, it’s short and fond, “Let’s go.”
“Mind if we make a quick detour?” Buck checks his blindspot before pulling out of the drop-off line and into the mess of parents, guardians, and possibly other love-sick friends written into the will who are also trying to leave the campus grounds.
Eddie shrugs, his shoulders audible against the fabric of the passenger seat, “We’ve got some time before shift starts. What’s the detour?”
Buck hits the gas as he makes a left turn onto a two way, four lane street, trying not to accidentally kill himself and Eddie in front of Christopher’s school. He flicks his eyes over to Eddie who doesn’t even look fazed at his driving skills, and lays off the gas, “I’m craving an iced coffee, didn’t have the chance to make some night.”
“We going to that little cafe you like?”
“Nah,” they roll to a stop at the red and Buck looks over to Eddie whose head is leaned back against the headrest, slightly turned to him, “I want shitty iced coffee. Something a little burned.”
Eddie’s lip twitches, and Buck knows his eyes are crinkling in the corners under his sunglasses, “Starbucks?”
“I didn’t say I wanted charred coffee,” Buck scoffs, “I have standards.”
“Sure you do, so where are you getting this burnt coffee? 7/11?”
“Don’t knock 7/11 coffee until you’ve tried it,” Buck won’t confess to how many 7/11 runs he’s been on while working B Shift, there’s nothing like gas station coffee to push him through burning eyes and sleep deprivation, “but no, not 7/11.”
“It’s green,” Eddie nods his head toward the windshield, “where to, then?”
Buck startles at the green light and focuses his eyes back on the road, “Dunkin” he grins, going five-over so they can make it to the drive-thru and to work with some time to spare, “you know, the place America runs on.”
Eddie whistles, “Wow, I don’t think I’ve had Dunkin since El Paso.” His voice is wistful, full of memories about El Paso that Buck has yet to hear, he wants to know all of them.
“How come?” He flicks his eyes over to Eddie, just for a moment, to see him jut out his lip.
“It gets expensive when you have a kid,” he says it like it’s a no-brainer, and sometimes Buck forgets how different their expenses are. That even though Buck is around as much as Eddie allows, helps as much as he’s allowed, Eddie’s a single father supporting himself and his kid on the same paycheck Buck spends on soft, organic cotton hoodies and LEGO sets, “plus, I like the coffee I make at home. Dunkin doesn’t have NesCafé or Bustelo.”
Buck taps his fingers against the steering wheel, nodding once, “Fair enough, but they do have very sweet syrups and the occasional whipped cream.”
“A little high fructose corn-coffee to start your morning.”
“Exactly,” Buck grins, flicking on his blinker to pull into the Dunkin parking lot. He rolls to stop in front of the first drive-thru menu board, leaning back in his seat so Eddie can see, “What do you want?”
Eddie looks at the menu for a moment, the tint of his sunglasses too dark for Buck to see his eyes, “A black coffee is fine, hot.”
Buck levels Eddie with a look, a look that says are you being serious right now?, “Dude. No. I refuse to order you a plain coffee from this fine establishment,” he nods to the board with his head, “live a little, I’m buying.” Buck lets Eddie have a moment to look at the menu and flicks through the many apps he has on his phone until he lands on the little white and orange Dunkin icon, pulling up his barcode to scan.
Eddie clears his throat, fingers drumming against his thighs, “How about the—” he pauses a moment, reading the menu, “—pecan vanilla latte?”
The request of a latte shouldn’t make Buck grin as hard as he does. It’s not in judgment of Eddie’s beverage choice, no, it’s in a burst of happiness that warms Buck’s heart because Eddie asked for what he wanted. Something so small, but so huge in the span of Eddie’s life progress, “Iced or hot?”
Another pause, and then Eddie offers him a sheepish smile, like ordering a sugary coffee is something to be embarrassed about, “Iced.”
“Perfect.” The grin is still on Buck’s lips, and he holds what are hopefully Eddie’s eyes behind his sunglasses before turning back to the lane in front of him to pull forward.
Within minutes they have their drinks. Buck opted for an iced coffee with a mocha swirl, but instead of taking off to the station he pulls forward in the lane, letting the person behind him get to the window so the Dunkin employees can keep their service time good. He raises his eyebrows at Eddie, “So?”
Eddie holds the plastic cup like it’s a bomb about to go off, “‘So’ what?”
Buck motions to the condensating cup, “How is it?”
While Buck can’t see Eddie roll his eyes, he knows from the move of his head that he was just on the receiving end of a Diaz eyeroll. Eddie brings the orange straw to his lips, taking a little sip before sighing and relaxing into the seat, “It’s actually really good.”
The grin is back on Buck’s face, it’s too much for this situation and he knows it, “I’m glad to hear it,” he takes two pulls from his own straw before securing the cup in its holder, “there’s no better way to start the morning than Dunkin coffee.”
Eddie laughs, resting the cup on his thigh, “Whatever you say, Buck.”
Buck notices things about people. He’s a noticer.
It’s not that he’s nosy, no, he just watches people and remembers things and notices. Especially when it’s people he cares about, even more so when it’s either Diaz boy that occupies the majority of his heart. So, after their first trip to Dunkin, Buck couldn’t help but notice how much Eddie enjoyed the coffee. How much he savored the drink until it was just pieces of ice with a rim of diluted coffee and pecan syrup at the bottom of the cup. The way he took a moment, one last pull from the straw, before he had to throw the ice into the sink and the plastic cup in the recycling.
And, look, Buck will do a lot to make Eddie happy. He will walk to the ends of the earth, fight people on Ticketmaster, sit in the long lines of the DMV if it would make that little soft and content smile appear on his face. Alas, he doesn’t need to do any of that. He apparently just needs to offer Eddie an iced pecan vanilla latte.
“I come bearing gifts,” Buck greets, watching Eddie lock the front door and Christopher quicken his pace down the sidewalk with piqued interest in the items in Buck’s hands.
“Donuts?” Christopher asks, he looks like he’s about to sniff the bag, visibly perked up despite the early morning.
Buck nods, raising the white paper bag in his hand, “Get yourself buckled in and there’s a strawberry jelly-filled with your name on it.”
“What’s this?” Eddie asks, stopping two feet in front of Buck, motioning at the cupholder with his chin.
See, Buck thought his plan to offer Eddie a gift of coffee was fail proof. He had the excuse teed up in his brain, but with Eddie in front of him, it’s poofed away. Because Eddie has one eyebrow raised, a little half smile on his lips, hand adjusting the strap of the work bag on his shoulder. And it makes Buck a little tongue-tied, “I had a craving and, you know, the app has a rewards system. This month they’ve got deals for lattes.” It’s not exactly a lie, because Buck isn’t a liar, but it’s not the most truthful either.
Eddie’s quiet a moment, looking at the two cups of coffee sitting next to each other in the carrier and Buck locks his knees so he doesn’t get fidgety under the assessing gaze, “How much do I owe you?”
Buck frowns, knees relaxing, “Eds, do you not know what a gift means?”
“Yeah, dad, don’t look a gift horse in the mouth.” Christopher calls from inside the Jeep, extending a hand for the bag housing the donut, “I thank you very much for your gift, Buck.”
“See,” Buck turns to give Chris the donut, “Chris knows what a gift is.”
Eddie rolls his eyes, “Chris, you just read the Odyssey, you know that looking a gift horse in the mouth is exactly what you should do.”
If Eddie looked the proverbial gift-horse in the mouth he would probably see all of Buck’s ooey-gooey feelings disguised as Dunkin branded coffee and donuts. Buck does not want Eddie to look the gift horse in the mouth.
“Eddie,” Buck extends the holder, Eddie’s pecan vanilla latte closest to him, “take the latte.”
“I’m going to CashApp you the five dollars.” Eddie says it like a threat, taking the cup and a paper-wrapped straw.
Buck grins in accomplishment, taking his own drink out of the cup holder, “And I’ll send it right back,” he looks in the Jeep, making sure Christopher is buckled in, before tossing the cardboard holder on to the seat next to Christopher and shutting the door, “I’ll block you on CashApp if I have to.”
“Then I’ll just Venmo you,” Eddie raises, opening the passenger door and setting his bag on the floor, “or I’ll just tape a five to our locker.”
“And then I’ll block you on Venmo and the five dollar bill will stay there until someone steals it or you take it back,” He leans a shoulder against Christopher’s door, arms crossed, “it’s a gift, accept it.”
Eddie unwraps the straw, stabbing it into the lid like the straw personally offends him, “I’ll pay you back somehow, you can count on that.”
He watches as Eddie takes a sip and has to suppress the grin turning into a sappy little smile because Eddie’s shoulders relax, he lets out an almost inaudible sigh, and Buck swears Eddie’s eyelashes flutter as he closes his eyes. Buck wonders if he kissed Eddie right now would he be able to taste the pecan and vanilla syrups from his lips.
“Guys, we’re all gonna be late if we don’t leave soon.” Christopher’s voice comes from inside the Jeep, making Buck jump and almost drop his own cup.
Eddie licks his lips, unaware of all the everything that just transpired on Buck’s half of the Jeep, “God forbid our kid is late to school,” he sighs, leaning in the Jeep to set the cup in the holder, “let’s get going.”
Buck’s all of everything just became an all of so much more because Eddie just said ‘our kid’ like it’s a normal, every day, phrase that they use all the time. Buck needs to go dry heave behind the spare tire.
“You okay, Buck?” Eddie asks, looking at him like he’s the one who just dropped a wonderful bomb on everything.
“Yeah,” Buck unsticks his tongue from the roof of his mouth, “totally okay, why wouldn’t I be okay?”
Eddie blinks at him, opening his mouth to say something, but Buck taps into his community college football skills and weaves away from the question and Eddie with his coffee clutched to his chest, taking a moment behind the Jeep’s tire to breathe even though he knows he’s tall enough to be seen over it, and then rounds the Jeep like a completely normal, not at spiked in blood pressure, person who just heard his best friend-slash-embarassing-crush call his kid their kid.
Buck opens the door too quickly, offering Eddie and Christpher a probably crazed smile, watching a set of brown and blue eyes look at him with the same concerned eyebrow raise. He clears his throat, hopping in and pressing the ignition button.
“You okay, Buck?” Christopher asks from the backseat, looking at him through the rearview mirror.
“Totally okay,” Buck nods, fiddling with the AC, feeling Eddie’s eyes on the side of his face, “everyone ready to go?” He watches Christopher nod from the mirror, and quickly looks at Eddie who’s sipping his drink with too much suspicion in his eyes. Buck chooses the adult path, always known for his emotional maturity, and ignores Eddie for the duration of the drive to Christopher’s school.
Buck thought getting to the station would be an escape from Eddie’s questioning eyes, and for a moment he let his guard down. In the locker room, he changed and chatted, in the loft he looked through the dozen new photos of Jee that Chim proudly scrolled through for everyone to see. It’s when he’s standing over the trash can, taking his last sip of mocha swirl coffee, that Eddie corners him.
“Hey,” Eddie says, his own empty cup held gently in his hand, “so you’re acting weird.”
Buck does not choke on coffee, his throat just tickles, “Uh—”
“And I know why.” Eddie cuts him off, not making eye contact, instead picking at the label on the side of his cup with Mobile Walk In. EVAN B. Lg Ice Latte Pecan Vanilla printed in black letters.
“You do?” His stomach drops, is his crush that obvious? Did the thing about our kid give it away? Buck never thought about where they’d have the ‘your crush is one sided’ conversation, because he thought it would never come up, but he didn’t think it would be in front of the downstairs trash can. Maybe in the future he’ll laugh at how Eddie threw away the coffee cup that held a little of Buck’s heart at the same time as Buck’s actual heart.
Eddie clears his throat, still not looking Buck in the eyes, probably about to let him down easy, “Yeah, because I said the whole ‘our kid’ thing.” He huffs a mirthless laugh, shaking his head like this whole thing is ridiculous, “I’ll make sure not to say it again.”
Buck blinks once, “What?”
Eddie finally looks up at Buck, lips in a fine line, “It made you uncomfortable and I’m sorry I crossed a boundary, I just thought—” he pauses, “I just consider him our kid, but I’ll reign that in, sorry again.” Eddie tosses his cup in the trash, not even giving Buck a moment to collect his thoughts and react before turning on his heel and leaving.
To Buck’s credit, at least his reaction to “our kid” gave Eddie the absolute opposite impression of Buck’s feelings. Which also means, to Eddie’s credit, now Eddie thinks Buck doesn’t consider Chris to be their son. And Buck does, always has, somewhere between the first Christmas they spent as a “family” and the tsunami Christopher became like a son to Buck. And then the will happened, and that solidified Buck’s presence in Christopher’s life, he just didn’t know he could voice that. He didn’t know that was an option, and now, with the way Eddie clammed up and apologized, it tentatively is one.
The rest of the shift there’s a weird tension between him and Eddie, enough so that Chim pulls him aside and asks if they’re alright. And they are, or will be, because while the tension Eddie’s pulling is withdrawn and cut off, Buck’s is thrumming with pent up energy, with possibility.
“Ready to go?” Buck leans a shoulder against the locker room’s door frame, watching Eddie finish tying the laces on his boots. He notices the way Eddie’s shoulders tense for a brief moment before they relax, like Eddie has to force himself to drop them. Buck hates it.
Eddie pushes himself up off the bench and grabs the handles of his work bag, giving a single nod to Buck, “Yeah, let’s go.”
They’re silent walking to the Jeep, silent as they buckle in, silent as Buck navigates them through the budding traffic of LA in the morning. He doesn’t turn the radio on to break the silence, doesn’t try to bring up some random piece of information to get Eddie to laugh, just drives in silence and lets Eddie lean his head against the window with his eyes closed.
Buck does wonder what's been running through Eddie’s mind since they spoke at the trash can, since Buck reacted to our son coming on 25 hours ago. He wonders if Eddie thinks he fucked this up, their friendship up, by a slip of the tongue that made Buck’s heart leap into his throat.
“Welcome to Dunkin,” comes the tinny voice from the menu board, “can I take your order?”
Buck’s elbow hangs out the window, fingers tapping on the grimey rubber trim, “An iced coffee with a mocha swirl, an iced pecan vanilla latte, and a jelly filled donut, please and thanks.”
There’s a pause while the person punches the order in, “That’ll be $10.75, pay at the second window.”
“I swear to God I’m going to send you a direct deposit,” Eddie mutters from the passenger seat.
“And I’ll just send it right back,” Buck grins, some of the tension between them seeping away, and pulls forward to the window, passing the worker his card and presenting her with his rewards QR code.
Buck takes the coffees, slotting his into the Jeep’s cup holder, passing Eddie his own cup, and setting the bagged donut on the center console. He hears the shift of ice where Eddie takes a sip and slots it into the cupholder, right next to Buck’s. Instead of leaving the parking lot, Buck pulls into an empty spot and parks the Jeep. He can feel Eddie’s eyes on him, giving him space, giving him a moment to think.
“I don’t want you to stop calling Chris our kid,” Buck looks up at Eddie, watching his eyebrows raise, his lips part in surprise, “I reacted that way because I didn’t think it was an option to think of him as our,” he motions between them, “son.”
“Buck,” Eddie’s voice is soft, he unbuckles himself so he can angle his body toward Buck, cramped in the small cab of the Jeep, “he’s been ours since you went with me to get him pictures with Santa, I just hadn’t realized it yet. I don’t think either of us did.” Eddie’s eyebrows crease as he frowns, Buck wants to soothe them with his thumb, “After the will, after we didn’t really talk about any of it, I didn’t know if I could think of him ours. Yesterday it just slipped out because even though I didn’t know, the thought never left my mind.”
The warmth in Buck’s chest is so warm, so comfortable, that Buck doesn’t know what to do with it. It wells in his throat, bubbles in the form of single-syllable words on his lips, pricks at his eyes, “You can always think it, Eds,” Buck says softly, reaching out to gently take Eddie’s hand in his, “you can always say it, because I want him to be ours. And,” Buck takes in a shuddering breath, looks into Eddie’s brown eyes, feels the warmth of Eddie’s hand on his fingers, “and if you want, I’d like to be both of yours, too.”
There’s hope in Eddie’s eyes that’s so bright, so brilliant and beautiful that Buck almost wants to look away, but he doesn’t. He can’t.
“We want you to be ours,” Eddie looks down at their twined hands before looking back up, “I love you, Buck, I’ve been in love with you, Buck.”
“Yeah?” Buck asks, a smile pulling at the corners of his lips.
Eddie rolls his eyes, a light blush dusting his cheeks, “Yeah, wasn’t it obvious?”
“No, it was not,” The warmth in Buck’s chest overflows, pouring into his heart, pouring out of his lips, “because if it was I’d have told you that I was in love with you a long time ago. And,” this time Buck looks away, over to the orange and pink posters in the window of Dunkin, “maybe would not have been unintentionally courting you via Dunkin lattes.”
Eddie snorts, and throws his head back laughing, bumping it into the window behind him, “Is that why I’m not allowed to pay you back?”
The warmth is now real and it’s the burning blush on Buck’s cheeks, “Yeah, but you also just need to learn what a gift is, Eddie.”
“I guess I accept your courting coffee,” Eddie’s smile is soft, his face is flushed from laughing, and he leans forward to place an elbow on the console, moving into Buck’s space, “so, what, are we boyfriends now?”
Buck lets himself be pulled into Eddie’s space, like he has the gravitational pull of a small planet, “Boyfriends sounds nice,” his smile is soft, blush still warm on his cheeks, “can I kiss my boyfriend?”
Eddie’s eyes flick down to Buck’s lips and then meet his eyes again, “You may.”
Their first kiss is soft. It’s just the press of lips, their noses bump, and Eddie’s hand comes up to cup his face. They pull apart for a moment, before Eddie leans back in and they both relax into exchanging soft kisses. It’s kind of ridiculous, they’re in the parking lot of Dunkin, in Buck’s Jeep with the seat belt digging into his shoulder, and Eddie does taste like pecans and vanilla syrup, but Buck wouldn’t change anything about this moment. Not the lead up, not the past four years that they’ve known each other, nothing.
Buck rests his forehead against Eddie’s, taking in the fact that he got to kiss his best friend, that he gets to be in love with his best friend, that his best friend is now his boyfriend, “Should we bring our kid his donut?” Buck asks, he feels giddy saying our kid, he doesn’t know if he’ll ever get over that.
Eddie’s breath smells like sugary coffee when he huffs a laugh, “Yeah, our kid is definitely going to be annoyed that he’s going to be late to school but the donut will soothe that over.” He leans away from Buck, settling into the passenger seat and buckling his belt, all the while keeping a hold on Buck’s hand, “Let’s go home.”
Their hands stay twined together for the rest of the drive.
Christopher is, in fact, annoyed when Carla helps him into the Jeep ten minutes later than they normally take off, but the combination of the jelly donut and their hands firmly together on the center console work miracles because instead of annoyed-preteen, they get inquisitive-preteen, and that really is their kid, isn’t it?