Archive of Our Own

“So, you excited for us to visit?” Sophia asks, from her rectangular screen on Eddie’s phone in their sibling group chat video call. Getting time to orchestrate a group chat across three time zones is an effort, but they’d managed it. She’d only started the group chat for them a while back, when they started making more of an effort to catch up with each other again. Eddie might not love the growing number of group chats he’s now currently a part of, but it makes him smile to see messages and stupid internet things from his sisters, even if he frequently has to get Buck or Ravi to explain the references.

Eddie gives an exaggerated sigh. “I mean, I guess. Might be working. You can find things to do in LA right?”

Sophia sticks her tongue out at him, reminding him that she might be twenty-seven, but she’s also still a bratty seven-year-old at heart.

He grins. “No, of course I got as much time off as I could. Can’t let Chris take up all your time.”

Adriana beams, pushing her reading glasses up her nose. It’s latest where she is, probably around nine in Boston. She looks like she’s been up late a few nights this week. “Ooh, I can’t wait to see him, he looks so big in your photos! How is he twelve??”

“You’re telling me,” Eddie groans. “He was a little boy like two seconds ago and now he sasses me all the time. And he’s getting too cool to hang out with me.”

Adriana smile turns mischievous. “I mean, it was only a matter of time before his cool outstripped yours. You’re working with a limited amount, Eddito.”

Sophia laughs. “Ooh, burn.”

“Oye,” Eddie starts, mock-offended. “I go to the trouble of organising a group call and making sure someone else can make dinner so we can do it at a time that works for you even though it’s early for me, and all I get is insulted? Dios mio.”

Adriana cackles. “Te amo mucho, Eddie,” she says, with an apologetic grin.

“Gracias for the organization, Eddie,” Sophia says, exaggeratedly, beaming. It makes him chuckle.

“Ok, ok,” he says.

“Where is Chris, I wanna say hi,” Sophia asks, excited.

“I told you, he’s too popular now, he’s at a friend’s place tonight,” Eddie says.

“Ooh, is it just you and your gorgeous man tonight?” Sophia says, waggling her eyebrows.

“Yeah, is he cooking you dinner?” Adriana says, pushing her glasses down so she can peer over them.

He groans. "Do we have to do this?"

"Absolutely we do, Edmundo," Adriana smirks.

"Yeah, I start dating a complete snack, it's like just another Tuesday," Sophia says with a laugh. "You do, AND it's your mysterious best friend co-parent that we've somehow never met in person, we're never getting over it."

They both giggle. He sighs, long-sufferingly.

"Yes, Buck is cooking me dinner."

"Ooh, romance," Adriana teases, and Sophia makes kissing sounds at her phone, and Eddie is once again reminded that you can have adult relationships with your siblings but also sometimes its just like you're teenagers or kids again, because this is vividly reminiscent of them teasing him when he got together with Shannon in 12th grade. When they were between 15/16 and 13/14.

Ridiculous. He rolls his eyes

"Anyway, niñas," he retorts, emphasising just to be a dick. "The reason you're haven't met him in person is because neither of you have come up here before in the FIVE YEARS I've been here."

"We've all been busy!" Adriana protests. "I've been in clinical psych residency hell for the last four years!"

"And I'm broke, you know this," Sophia adds, with a half-grin. "So, it's taken me forever to have the money to visit. Which is why we're SOOO EXCITED to see you soon!"

"So excited!" Adriana adds, grinning. "We're so keen to meet Buck finally!"

"Put him on, we wanna see those cheekbones!" Sophia requests, with a laugh in her voice.

"He's cooking!" Eddie says, laughing. "You'll see him soon enough."

"Alright, fine," Sophia says, pouting.

"So, the plan is that I'm flying to Austin, meeting up with Soph, and then we're going to fly to LA together," Adriana says, ever the planner. If it were up to Sophia she'd probably hitch-hike and get dropped off on the back of some motorbike, much to what would certainly be their mother's horror if she knew this.

"Ah you get to experience LAX for the first time, fun," Eddie says dryly.

"Oh, can't wait," Adriana returns, just as dry.

"You think we'll see anyone famous? Your Timmy Chalamets and whoever?" Sophia puts in.

"I have no idea who that is," Eddie says honestly. "But I think famous people must go through a less terrible part that isn't resolved for misery and the general public."

"Ooh, fun," Sophia says. “We’d do it for you.”

“Aw, you do care,” Eddie teases. “Tia Pepa’s also really excited to see you.”

“Yeah, tell her we can’t wait!” Sophia says, excited.

“I can’t wait for her tamales,” Adriana adds. “Mine aren’t as good.”

“Who can be?” Eddie admits. “Mine are still getting there. Buck’s getting pretty good at them, though.”

“He’s cooking from Tia Pepa’s recipe?” Adriana asks, raising an eyebrow.

“Since when does he make tamales? Or you, for that matter?” Sophia puts in, looking delighted.

“I’ve been cooking better for a while now, ok,” Eddie retorts to her. “Tia Pepa gave him a lesson and sent him the recipe. He goes over and helps with groceries and stuff when I can’t sometimes, and they gossip, honestly he turns into a vieja when he hangs out with her.”

“Stop, you look so fond, Eddito!” Sophia all but screeches.

“I forgot your face could do that, Mr Serious,” Adriana teases, laughing.

“He’s so in loooove,” Sophia sing-songs, then launches into song lyrics from a song that their Mom used to put on when their Dad would get home after a long time, and they’d dance together to it sometimes. “Te amo, desde el primer momento en que te vi…”

Adriana laughs along with Sophia at Eddie attempting to look annoyed and failing because he’s still smiling too much.

“Dile a tu novio we can’t wait to meet him so we can tell him aallll the embarrassing stories we have,” Adriana teases.

“Suddenly this doesn’t seem like a great idea,” Eddie mutters, to the cackles of his sisters.

“You miss us, admit it,” Sophia wheedles.

“I will admit nothing,” Eddie teases.

“Alright, I’m tired, and we should let Eddie get back to his romantic dinner with his lovely, sexy boyfriend,” Adriana says, smirking because she knows it’ll embarrass him. Siblings.

“Have a good night, querido,” Sophia says, winking obnoxiously.

“You’re both the worst, and I hate what you’re implying,” Eddie says with a sigh. “Can’t wait to see you either. Te amo.”

“Te amo mucho, Eddie,” they echo, grinning.

He hangs up and smiles to himself. As much as they annoy each other, deliberately, he’s glad they’re his sisters and no one else. A few weeks ago – a few days after they told everyone at the bar – he called his sisters to come out to them. He was nervous – not because he genuinely expected them to be cruel or not accept him, but as always, it’s scary being one thing in someone’s eyes for over thirty years and then admitting you’re something else – but they were really good about it. Kind, excited, good-naturedly-teasing when they found out the person he was dating was the friend who’d been in most of the few pics he posted on Instagram in the last few years.

It had been embarrassing when Sophia went into Buck’s Instagram to find his thirst traps – unfortunately already a phrase he knew thanks to Buck – and send them to the group chat with commentary from both her and Adriana; but they were just teasing him, and in a weird, kind of inexplicable way, he also felt buoyed by it. Like, them teasing him about girls was normal, so them teasing him about boys meant that nothing had changed for them and now he was being honest about himself, it didn’t have an undertone of inexplicable guilt and confusion about his feelings that he had to bury whenever they did it.

He's just happy they’re his sisters, and they love him.

Eddie goes into the kitchen, and watches Buck sizzle something in a butter-yellow apron he bought recently. The look on his face when he’s learning something new, when his recipe is going to plan, the quiet confidence he’s built up with cooking the last couple of years is so great to see. Eddie’s heart swells with affection.

Buck turns and sees him, a warm, gooey smile unfurling at it. “Hey! How’re the girls?”

“Good,” Eddie says, walking over from the door. “They’re very keen to see you. I apologise in advance, it’s gonna be a lot.”

Buck chuckles. “No way, I’m excited! They seemed very fun on the phone.”

“Oh yeah. Very fun. Almost too fun,” Eddie says, coming up to him. Buck puts the pan on low heat, so Eddie can wrap his arms around his waist loosely.

“Ok, Mr Grumpy,” Buck teases. “Fun is good, remember?”

Eddie sighs. “Oh, they’re gonna love you. I’m starting to worry.”

Buck grins and leans in for a kiss. “Nothing to worry about.” He pulls back and swears softly, looking at the stove. “Except me burning dinner.” He moves back to stir, waving Eddie away. “Get out of here, you’re too distracting with that face.”

Eddie laughs. “I can’t help my face!”

“That’s why you have to go,” Buck says, warding him off with the spatula. “You’re too gorgeous. Ándale!”

Eddie grins. “Duolingo’s paying off.”

Buck very affectionately flips him off. “Dinner will be ready in ten.”

“Gracias, mi amor,” Eddie says, exaggeratedly, as he leaves, to Buck’s amused chuckle.

“Yeah, we’re just outside the Southwest section – are you close?” Eddie asks, talking into his phone.

 Buck looks down at Chris, who is looking at something on his phone. “You excited to see your tias?”

Chris looks up, with a grin. “Yeah, it’s been ages since I saw them! I can’t believe they’re coming here.”

“Yeah, I know they’re very very excited to see you,” Buck says, ruffling his hair a little.

Chris makes a face. “Buck!”

He’s getting too old for that, maybe, which absolutely doesn’t make Buck emotional. “Sorry, bud. Habit.”

Chris smiles again. “That’s ok.”

He looks up at Eddie. “Are they here yet, Dad?”

“We should be able to see them soon,” Eddie says to him, scanning around. “They said they just –“

He’s cut off by a shriek and Buck’s emergency-trained senses immediately turn towards it, but there’s no section of the overpass roadway breaking apart, no ten-car pileup, just two women running towards them looking excited.

“Here we go,” Eddie says under his breath, though he’s smiling irrepressibly.

“Fun good remember,” Buck replies in the same way, grinning.

Both of the girls – women, obviously, but that’s how Eddie often refers to them, so it’s stuck in his head – are much like the photos he’s seen, and the one time he met them on one of their sibling video chats. Sophia, tall and slender, with long dark hair and striking eyebrows; Adriana, shorter and curvier with shoulder-length curls.

“Eddie!” Sophia says excitedly – Buck thinks she was the one who shrieked when she saw them – and throws her arms around him. He gets that – this is a much less baggage-filled reunion, but he would’ve yelled in his excitement at Maddie’s return if he hadn’t thought it might freak her out. Eddie seems just as excited to see her, wrapping her in a tight hug.

Sibling relationships are funny like that – you can spend ages away from each other, living separate lives, and think you’re ok and then the minute you see them again you realise just how much you’ve missed them.

Adriana looks thrilled to see Chris, in front of Buck. “Tia Adriana!” he says, just as thrilled. He’s getting a little old for the unselfconscious affection he used to give out, but he seems to forget this in the face of a family member he doesn’t see often, running to her outstretched arms.

Buck doesn’t mind – he’s good to wait as the family catch up with each other.

“Dios mio, look at you!” she says, letting him go. “You’re taller every time I see you! You’re gonna outstrip me soon!”

“To be fair, that wouldn’t be hard,” Eddie teases.

“Ooh burn, Ade,” Sophia laughs.

Adriana shakes her head at Chris. “Your dad and tia are very mean,” she says to him, mock-serious.

“Don’t listen to her, she’s just as mean to us,” Sophia says, making Chris giggle. “If not more.”

“Definitely more,” Eddie adds, catching Buck’s eye fondly for a moment. Buck looks back, feeling even more fond.

Sophia beams at Chris. “How are you, my little sobrino? You’re not even that little anymore! Gimme a cuddle!”

Chris hugs his other tia while Adriana hugs Eddie. “How are you?” she asks, smiling but there’s something in her eyes that reminds him of the way Maddie looks at him sometimes. Which is funny because she’s two years younger than him. But then again, he understands the impulse – he always wanted to protect Maddie the way she protected him, he was just too small. And by the time he got big enough, it was too late.

“I’m good,” Eddie says, genuinely.

Adriana puts her hand up to his face gently, just for a moment, and in that moment greatly reminds Buck of both Tia Pepa and Abuela. “You look it.” She smiles, more. “I’m glad we’re here. And this must be Buck?”

Buck has been so comfortable being in the background he’s surprised to hear her address him and look right at him, but hearing Eddie say, “That’s Buck,” so fondly, snaps him out of it.

He chuckles, a little nervous. “I’m Buck.”

Adriana genuinely looks pleased to meet him. Which is something he senses is not a given with her, she has a steelier glint to her eye than her sister, kind of reminiscent of their mother. But hers is  shrewder, less judgemental seeming. “It’s so great to finally meet you properly! Can I hug you?”

“You don’t have to – ” Eddie starts, but Buck waves him off.

“I love hugs, bring it in!”

Adriana beams, and embraces him, albeit less tightly than her brother. Which might be a bit odd since they’ve only technically met once over video.

“That was a great hug, I can see why they like you so much,” Adriana says, letting him go.

Buck beams. “Yeah, probably the main reason I’m so jacked is to be able to give good hugs with these arms,” he jokes.

Adriana chuckles. “Reasonable. Number one, hugs, number two, saving babies, etc?”

Buck chuckles in return. “We’ve had less calls with babies than you’d think. Although I did have this wild call involving a newborn rescue the first few months I was working – kind of sad, now I think about it, but it had a happy ending.”

“You have to tell me about that –“

“Ok, maybe we can do work stories when we’re all back in the car?” Eddie says, but his eyes are still fond even as he’s trying to shepherd everyone towards the car park entrance.

“You can tell he’s the oldest,” Sophia says to Buck, coming over to hug him too.

“Heard that,” Eddie retorts.

“Meant you to,” Sophia returns without missing a beat.

Sophia hugs him tighter than Adriana did, looks at him affectionately like they’ve known each other a lot longer and just haven’t seen each other in a while. “I’m so glad to finally meet you. Eddie and Chris talk about you so much it feels like I already know you, is that weird?” she says, though she doesn’t seem embarrassed by it all. She has a very confident energy that reminds him of Eddie when they first met – but unlike Eddie’s reserved, cool confidence hers is bubbly, outgoing.

Buck loves meeting new people. But he especially loves meeting new people who are just as excited to meet him. “No, definitely not! I’ve been so excited to meet you guys, he’s told me some great stories,” he returns, happily.

Sophia grins. “Oh, we’ve got stories about him, just you wait.”

“Ok, car now, Diazes and Buck,” Eddie says, long-sufferingly, but Buck beams at him and he can’t fight a smile back.

Adriana shares a snigger with Chris, and Sophia links her arm through Buck’s as he takes her bag and Eddie has Adriana’s.

“It’s not that heavy, really,” Sophia protests.

He shakes his head. “What’s the point of having two firefighters with you if you can’t get us to take the heavy things?”

“I’m sure we have some photos of him with the super gelled up hair somewhere,” Adriana says, laughing, taking a sip of her wine. She’s sitting on the floor on a cushion, on the other side coffee table, Sophia to the side of her on a whole host of stolen cushions. They’d insisted on taking the floor, because of the various injuries he and Buck seemed to acquire.

“If you’re really lucky he’ll also be wearing very baggy jeans,” Sophia adds, giggling into her own wine.

Eddie shakes his head. “They weren’t that baggy!” Now they’ve been able to break out the wine after Chris has gone to bed, his sisters have really kept their promise of telling Buck the embarrassing stories and looks of Eddie’s childhood. He takes a large sip of his tempranillo.

“You could’ve hidden a whole other child in your pant-leg!” Adriana crows.

Buck laughs. He has one hand on his wine glass, one around Eddie’s waist, holding him gently but steadily.

Sophia is on her phone trying to find if she has any photos of him from the age they’re talking about.

“Promise me you’ll still love and be into me if they manage to find these photos?” Eddie asks, joking but feeling slightly embarrassed.

Buck presses a light kiss to his temple. “You’ve seen my Peru look, and you’re still attracted to me, so fair’s fair,” he says with a laugh.

“You were still cute,” Eddie says, fondly. “You just made some hair choices.”

Adriana and Sophia look curious and delighted. “Peru look? Explain?” Sophia asks, eyes lighting up.

Buck laughs again, seemingly not self-conscious at all. Eddie’s always loved that – knowing him as much as he does, he knows just how self-conscious he can be, how much he worries people don’t like him and wants badly to make a good impression on them; but you’d never tell when he’s comfortable, when he’s in his confident element. Eddie has the kind of social anxiety people mistake for aloof confidence, kind of like that – Mr Darcy – which he wishes he didn’t know, but his Mom got his sisters obsessed with Pride and Prejudice growing up and he’s absorbed a lot of that through osmosis. Like random snatches from the girls’ favourite songs growing up that will just jump into his head sometimes.

“Ok, so I was twenty-three or four I think? And I had an experiment with bleached tips that did not work out, in hindsight,” Buck admits, grinning.

“Frosted tips? Do you have a photo?” Adriana asks, thrilled.

“Guys, come on,” Eddie protests, but Buck just squeezes his side lightly.

“Happy to do it. Though I will need one of my arms back,” Buck says easily.

“Well, I guess you’re putting the wine down,” Eddie says, matter-of-factly, and Buck chuckles, ghosting his lips against the side of Eddie’s head before putting his wine glass down on the coffee table.

“Honestly, probably not even top five of the most embarrassing things I’ve ever done, so.” He’s scrolling through his Instagram.

He hands it to them, and they laugh, but not meanly. “That’s wild,” Adriana says, gleefully. “Look at your little puka-shell necklace and your tan, bless.”

“Were you on holiday?” Sophia asks, grinning widely.

“No, I lived there for a few months, bartending,” Buck replies, leaning into him a little. He’s warm and slightly tipsy, like all of them, and Eddie is incredibly glad of his presence.

“Oh, cool,” Sophia adds, looking impressed. “I’d love to live anywhere overseas for a little while. I’ve visited but it’s not really the same.”

“Yeah, I mean it’s really only Peru that I’ve been able to get too, I kind of always meant to do more but then I moved here, and then became a firefighter and haven’t really had – time to think about it since,” Buck muses.

“Yeah, my overseas travels weren’t exactly holidays, so you’re up on me,” Eddie adds, taking another sip of wine. It’s kind of a dark joke, he guesses, but he knows Buck will get it at least.

There’s a fleeting moment of sadness he thinks he sees in Sophia’s eyes, and he feels guilty. She was only fourteen when he left the first time, and she was upset, and he remembers her not wanting him to leave the second – but Shannon was already mad at him, and he couldn’t deal with her also making him feel like he was making a huge mistake, so he just told her he had to do it. For his new family.

Whatever Adriana thinks, he can’t tell, but she takes a sip of her wine. She was older the first time, sixteen, and she was one of the first people he told about Shannon, because he knew she wouldn’t tell anyone before he was ready – so she got why he was leaving, but she was distant, more closed off. Like she’d already accepted whatever fate he’d given himself.

“Sorry,” he says, on the back of these unexpected memories. Buck holds him a little tighter. Sophia smiles a little at him, her accepting smile, that would mean she was no longer mad at him if they had a fight. He smiles back a little, an apology.

He looks at Ade, and she nods, accepting it. “It’s ok,” she says, and he thinks maybe she means it for both her and Sophia, or even all three of them. She watches him. “If you guys were to go overseas again, on holiday, where would you go?”

“With our child and also our boundless free time and bank accounts?” Eddie jokes, and then Adriana gives him a look.

“With or without Chris, assume that he’s just as happy to stay as to go,” Adriana continues. “Where?”

He looks back at Buck, who raises his eyebrows quizzically. “I don’t know,” Eddie says, honestly. “Italy, maybe?”

“I’d love to go to Italy,” Buck says, eyes lighting up. “Gelato, mopeds, ancient ruins, what’s not to love?”

“True. Or Greece,” Eddie muses.

Buck looks excited again. “Fried cheese things, donkeys, different ruins, that would be amazing.”

Eddie smiles at him. “Or like, Japan?” he asks, just to throw a curveball at him. Although Japan would probably also be cool.

Buck sighs dreamily. “Mmm, those fried gyoza dumplings, karaoke, those old hot spring spa places.”

Eddie chuckles. “You’d be excited about going anywhere huh?”

Buck looks at him fondly. His lips are a little purple from the wine. They look so kissable. “Anywhere with you.”

At this, Eddie almost does lean in and kiss him, except for Sophia breaking in with, “Who are you and what’ve you done with my brother, you cow-eyed romantic!”

“Yeah, say something only the real Eddie would know!” Adriana jumps in, teasing.

Eddie feels his face warm, and Buck kisses the side of his head again, grinning. “They’re right, you never used to be like this.”

“I know, apparently this can happen when you stop repressing yourself after thirty years,” Eddie teases, and Buck beams.

“Yeah, when I first met you, I thought you were so cool,” Buck says, and Sophia giggles. Eddie narrows his eyes at her and turns back to Buck.

“Oh, and now?”

Buck smiles more, dimples in full force, and as glad as Eddie is to have his sisters here in the same city as him for once, he’s also annoyed he can’t immediately press kisses to said dimples, his cheekbones, his birthmark (which always looks pinker and darker when he drinks, and it’s making him look overwhelmingly beautiful tonight) while they’re still in the room. “Now I know you’re a soft-hearted goofball and it’s so much better.”

See? Absolute cruelty he can’t kick his sisters out of the room like he could as a teenager so he can kiss Buck senseless.

Eddie has a brief vision of what it would’ve been like to do that as a teenager, with any boy, a brief moment of longing for the person he didn’t allow himself to be and couldn’t allow himself to be. Not in a Catholic family in Texas, in the early mid-2000s. But it’s a split-second moment, because he knows that despite it all, he’d never give up how he got to this point.

“Pot, kettle,” Eddie says, fondly. He moves his arm from the top of the couch down to Buck’s waist, pulling him closer.

He looks back at his sisters. Sophia is smirking into her wine, and Adriana has a mad, mischievous glint in her eyes.

He narrows his eyes at her. “Oh no. You’ve got that look in your eye. I do not like that look, Ade.”

Adriana laughs, trying to feign innocence. “Qué look, Eddito?”

He is not fooled. “Muy mala idea, Ade.”

Sophia laughs. “Oh my god, are we doing muy mala idea again? Wasn’t the last one when you snuck into Mr McCoy’s place and put a skirt on his lawn gnome?”

Buck laughs, in delighted surprise. “Sorry, you did what? When?”

“I was fifteen, and Ade dared me too,” Eddie says, shaking his head, trying not to smile. He fears he’s failing. “It was this stupid game we used to play. Daring each other to do our very bad ideas and awarding each other points.”

“The dares were harder based on age,” Sophia adds. “Mine were always tame because I was the youngest and they didn’t want me to get into any actual trouble they’d have to tell Mom about.”

“Oh my god,” Buck says, sounding thrilled. “What in the Disney Channel – who was Mr McCoy? Why’d you put a skirt on his gnome?”

Adriana grins, and Eddie catches her eye and can’t help grinning too. He rubs the back of his neck. “He was this old, asshole, conservative gun-nut guy in our street. Like, so far, so Texas, but he was always rude to us. And Dad, if he was around, and they saw each other. He’d always say it was like, the bins or something, but you know.”

Buck nods.

“He was slightly nicer to Mom, I’m sure you’re shocked to hear,” Adriana adds, wryly. “Like, I don’t think he liked any of us, but he’d be polite to her in a way that he never was with any of us.”

“Can’t imagine why,” Buck agrees.

“It’s a mystery,” Sophia adds.

“Anyway,” Eddie continues. “He was one of those like, support the troops, real men, kind of guys, and he had these beloved garden gnomes out the front of his house, you could see them through his front gate – and I think his favourite one was this one dressed in army fatigues?”

“Oh God,” Buck groans. “I can’t believe that’s a thing.”

“You didn’t grow up in Texas,” Eddie says, with a rueful grin.

Adriana cackles. “God, it was painted like a uniform right?”

“Ooh, I remember that now,” Sophia says, giggling as she puts her empty wine glass on the coffee table.

“So, Ade and I were in a dead heat for points – “ Eddie starts.

“Hey – “ Sophia protests, a little too tipsy-giggly to be mad. “I couldn’t catch up to you guys with my low point dares!”

“If we’d given you harder dares and something had happened – “ Adriana counters.

“As it did for me – “ Eddie continues.

“What happened?” Buck asks, eyes lit up and cheeks pink.

“Getting there,” Eddie says, squeezing his side, relishing how Buck’s eyes widen slightly at it. “So, I got the highest-scoring dares because I was the oldest, but Ade had done more because she was a little chaos demon who pretended to be the quiet middle child – “

Sophia laughs, lying back on the cushions she’d stolen from the couch. “So true –”

Adriana hits her arm, though not hard, and grins. “I just wasn’t afraid, Eddie, that’s why you couldn’t get ahead of me –“

“Of course I was afraid, you always gave me intense ones!” Eddie defends. “Anyway, we had to stop doing them because I almost got savaged by his Doberman. But I did get the skirt on the gnome, and he looked so mad the next week,” he says, laughing at the memory. Kind of laughing at the memory of laughing about it with thirteen-year-old Ade and eleven-year-old Soph.

“What did he keep saying?” Sophia asks, laughing. “He kept yelling about it in the street.”  

Eddie catches eyes with Adriana. “THE MAJOR HAS BEEN STRUCK BY MISCREANTS!” they both say, trying not to wake Chris while providing the full gravitas of the statement, and then collapsing into barely-stifled laughter.

“Oh my God, Eddie, you act like I’m the daredevil,” Buck says, laughing along with Adriana and Sophia. “That’s so funny.”

Adriana nods. “But as I recall we still only ended up at a tie,”

Eddie opens his mouth. “I was almost eaten alive –“

Adriana scoffs. “Ok, dramatic, but if you wanted a round with equal points, as a decider – Buck could play too – I have an idea.”

Eddie groans. “We are all adults, Ade, and two of us already have a very dangerous job – “

“Please can I play?” Buck interrupts, eyes wide. Like he doesn’t know Eddie wouldn’t say yes to almost anything if he asked like that, with his stupid big blue eyes and general puppy demeanour. “It sounds so fun, Eddie!”

“See, he’s in!” Sophia says, from the floor.

Adriana’s eyes sparkle. Oh no, can’t be good. “It wouldn’t be anything dangerous, you do that to yourselves enough.” She smirks. “We don’t have to go all the way to Japan to do…karaoke.”

Sophia sits up. “Yes, I am in! Buck?”                                                                                                                                        

Eddie could probably feel Buck’s giddiness at this idea even if he wasn’t holding his side. “Yeah! I’m not a great singer but count me in!”

Eddie groans, again, and runs a hand through his hair. “I hate karaoke.”

Buck bumps his side, affectionately. “You’ve done karaoke with me.”

“That’s because I like you,” Eddie says grumpily.

“Come on, it’ll be fun! We’ll get drunk! You can defend your title!” Buck says, nearly vibrating with excitement.

“Yes, drunk karaoke!” Sophia says. “Also I need to know more about this, have you duetted together? What song?”

Eddie sighs, leaning into Buck’s warmth, just drunk enough to agree to this stupid very bad idea. “Alright, fine. We’ll figure out a night we can organise care for Chris.”

The other three seem very excited – as much as they can when they don’t want to wake a child.

Eddie tells the girls goodnight – they’ve got a mattress and the couch in the living room, though Adriana probably could’ve afforded a hotel room but wanted to stay where Eddie, Sophia and everyone would be – brushes his teeth and goes into his darkened bedroom.

Where his boyfriend promptly presses him against the door and kisses him so intensely he takes a moment to remember where he is after it. ;

“Thought you were asleep,” Eddie whispers, grinning.

“How could I sleep when I’ve been dying to do that all night,” Buck whispers back.

“You have no idea,” Eddie says and drags him into another kiss that they clumsily manoeuvre toward the bed, falling onto it with stifled giggles.

After a few minutes of fumbling hands and kisses, Buck looks at him in the dark of the room. “As much as I desperately want your hands on me right now,” he whispers, breathlessly. “Your sisters are so close outside, and I don’t think we should do that to any of us. We all have to have breakfast tomorrow together.”

Eddie groans softly. “You’re right, I would die. Though, I also might die if I don’t have your hands on me soon.”

Buck grins ruefully, and he can just make it out. “You managed it for five years, what’s a few days?”

Eddie pokes him in the side. “That was before I knew what it was like to have them!”

Buck chuckles and kisses him gently on the lips. “Goodnight, baby.”

Eddie kisses him again, sighing into it. “Good night, amor.”

He knows he could echo baby back, darling, sweetheart – but baby was for Shannon when they were teens and he was a little more embarrassed to use the sort of Spanish endearments he’d only heard from his dad to his mom, his older relatives to their husbands and wives, and then when he got home again they weren’t calling each other much but their own names, he’s never called Buck that except involuntarily; darling is his mom’s thing, for her husband and kids alike; sweetheart he could probably do, but hasn’t yet attempted it, maybe Buck would like it; but he knows Buck likes the Spanish terms, makes his eyes go bright and happy and a slight blush creep up his ears, adorably. For the first time in a relationship, Eddie feels the need to say them, because he feels how true they are, and how the English words don’t quite capture the intensity of what he feels and needs to convey to Buck.

Up before anyone else, Adriana, quietly slips into the kitchen to make herself coffee. Thinking she’ll be the only one up, she tries to not make much noise.

“Puta madre, Eddie!” She swears, putting a hand to her heart, seeing him at the table. “Why are you sitting in the dark by yourself?”

Eddie looks up. “I’m not in the dark, it’s light outside.”

“Ok, sorry, it’s still gloomy in here, I didn’t see you,” Adriana says, heart starting to return to normal.

“Do you want some coffee?” Eddie says, and gestures to the machine on the counter. “It always makes two and I just made mine, so there if you want.”

She nods and goes to get it. “I’ve been meaning to ask, since when do you – noted technophobe – have a fancy computerised coffee machine?”

He shakes his head. “It’s a long story,” he sighs. “And I’m not scared, I’m cautious.”

Adriana grins to herself. She was always the one who had to set up new tech for him.

Settling down at a chair near Eddie, she looks at him. He looks tired. “Are you ok, Eddie? How long’ve you been awake?” she asks, suddenly nervous. She wasn’t here during his lowest mental health periods – they’ve all been so separate for so long they’re trying to work on being there for each other now, as much as they can in separate states – but she wouldn’t know whether this was something he did then, whether it’s a sign of something worse.

He smiles a little, reassuring her. “Just a little before you. I’m ok, I just can’t get back to sleep sometimes.”

She watches him. He seems to mean it, though his eyes still have an edge of anxiety. She can guess who it might be for.

“Does this happen a lot if you’re not on the same shift?” she asks, gently, taking a drink from her mug with both hands.

“Sometimes,” he admits. “We’re not usually…not on the same shift.”

Adriana nods a little. “You’re worried about him?”

Eddie looks down, takes a sip of his coffee. “I don’t know. Our team is good, most of the time it’s fine.” He pauses, glancing up at her. “I – I just. He’s got such a big heart, you know? And it makes him reckless sometimes.” His voice wobbles on the last word but he seems to keep it together. “I hope I’ve shown him enough times that he has a family to get back to, so he can’t be so…” He trails off, glancing down, then back up at her. “But I can’t help but be nervous when I’m not out there with him.” He pauses. “That probably sounds dumb.”

“It doesn’t,” Adriana tells him gently. “You love him. It’s a dangerous job at times. And you of all people have more reason not to want to lose him.” She wonders if she’s going too far, not meaning to get heavy. She just wants him not to dismiss that fear.

Tears are leaking out of Eddie’s eyes, and he scrubs at them with a hand. “God, now I’m crying in front of you. I cry way more than I used to, it sucks,” he says, sounding embarrassed. She takes his hand, pulling it down from his face and holding it on the table.

“Eddie,” she says softly, almost pleading. “You can cry in front of me. I’m glad you are, it means you’re doing the right work.”

He sniffs, but his tears seem to be stopping as soon as they began. “I know. I just – I’m your older brother.”

Adriana sighs, and squeezes his hand. “And you used to cry in front of me, and then at some point you became this person who couldn’t show me when you were upset like that. I was actually…worried about you, for a long while,” she says, her voice tightening too. “Honestly, I’m so happy to see it, as much as that sounds weird.”

Eddie smiles a little more. “I get it, you love to laugh at my pain,” he says ruefully, but not at all serious.

She chuckles, sniffling. “Of course I do, I’m the middle sibling,” she deadpans.

He chuckles wetly.

She lets his hand go with a squeeze so he can wipe any errant tears away, and takes another deep sip of her coffee. “This is pretty good, actually. What kind of fancy bougie coffee are you buying and where can I get it?”

Eddie beams. “It’s good, right?” He looks down at it, almost fondly. “Buck found it because he needs fancy coffee for this machine he bought – “

“He bought you this? Damn, Damien’s not buying me expensive appliances like this yet,” Adriana says, surprised. Not that she actually cares, because Damien’s a sweetheart and he barely makes anything teaching and she’s just happy being with him, but those HILDY machines aren’t cheap.

Eddie looks caught for a moment, and his smile becomes sheepish. “It was before we started dating, actually.”

Adriana widens her eyes at him. She hasn’t exactly had a front row seat to this friendship-burgeoning romance, but everything she’s heard feels so insane, she wonders how their actual friends feel about it. Especially with the idea of her brother that she had, the stoic single dad who seemed to exist only to work and look after his son. The Eddie that’s in love now is the Eddie she remembers growing up with, especially when they were younger – sillier, looser and cheekier. “He bought you this expensive machine while you were still friends?”

Eddie waves a hand. “It was a prank, your sweet little sobrino and him ganged up on me.”

Adriana chuckles into her coffee. “That’s so cute. Anyway, where’d he get the coffee?”

“From the farmer’s market. He always spends way too long chatting with the stallholders, and I swear they flirt with him and he says they’re just being nice –” Eddie is saying, and he should seem annoyed from his words but he seems just so fond, the way she’s seen him look at Buck for the last few days.

It moves her. She’s teased him a lot about how sappy and in love he is, but now she’s genuinely feeling sappy. “God, I’ve never seen you like this,” she says, softly. “I mean maybe when you started dating Shannon and you were so moony over her, but that was…different. Teenager stuff.” She breathes out. “This is – you’re in love in love.”

“That a professional term, Ade?” he teases, but he can’t stop smiling.

She laughs, quietly. “Yeah, it’s in the DSM-5.”

He shakes his head, still smiling. “You know I don’t get your psych jokes.”

She sighs, exaggeratedly.

He looks away for a moment, and then back. “It feels crazy, Ade,” he says, quietly, still smiling. “I still can’t believe I’m allowed it.” He blinks. “I’ll always love her, with some part of me, because she lives through our kid and how much he reminds me of her sometimes.”

She nods, feeling her eyes get prickly again. “Yeah, he really does.”

He smiles, almost like he’d forgotten she’d known Shannon too. They weren’t close, but Adriana had been still at home in 2011 when Chris had been born; often (perhaps due to the stress of maintaining a good GPA in a hectic senior year while living with her well-meaning but stress-inducing parents, evermore precocious little sister, and a harried still-teenaged sister-in-law single parenting a baby with special needs, while worrying about her brother in a warzone) she’d shut herself away to study, didn’t want to deal with the noise and the mess and the anxiety. But they had also had some nice moments before she went off to college, almost like briefly having an older sister. “I wish I’d tried to know her better,” she admits, thinking about it.

Eddie nods. “We all have our regrets,” he says, and he must be doing the work in therapy because his voice is steadier than she’s heard him talking about her since her death. “But I know she thought you were cool. And smart as hell.”

Adriana smiles, a little sad. “She was cool. And I think she’d be proud of you, you know. Being honest with yourself. I think she’d want you to be this stupidly in love.”

Eddie sniffs. “Now you’ve done it,” he croaks, before tears start dripping down his face again, and for once – he lets go. Adriana pushes her mug away so she can throw her arms around him. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have –“

“No, no,” he says, when she finally lets him go, and she’s surprised to see he’s kind of smiling. “Thank you. There aren’t a lot of people here who knew her much here – the team met her a few times, but they never really got to know her. So, thanks for talking about her.” He pauses, but it doesn’t seem like he’s about to break down again. He wipes his eyes, his face. “I’ll always love her but…what you said? In love in love is really how I feel about Buck. I’ve never felt anything like it. He makes me feel – secure. Like we’re…holding each other steady.”

Adriana smiles, feeling a bubble of happiness growing inside of her, looking at her brother’s soft, lovestruck face. “I’m so glad, Eddie. Te amo.”

He smiles at her. “Te amo, Ade. I’m so glad you’re here.”

They’ve made it to a night where they’ve organised that Chris will sleepover with Denny, and Hen very generously said they probably wouldn’t need to collect him until the afternoon if they wanted.

The bar is loud, and all four of them are a few rounds in, now it’s later in the night.

“Alright, alright, are we drunk enough to give our names to the guy running the karaoke?” Adriana asks, and Sophia slaps the table excitedly. “Yes, muy mala idea time!”

“Yes!” Buck crows.

Eddie groans. “Must we?”

Buck bumps his shoulder. “I dare you.”

Eddie bites back a grin, warm and drunk and pressed up against Buck in the booth. “You can’t goad me into drunk karaoke.”

“Who’s goading?” Buck says, bubbly and smiling like the golden retriever of a man he is. A golden retriever who’s had a few margaritas and a shot of tequila enough to forget Eddie’s siblings are sitting across from them.  He leans forward, and his margarita-breath should maybe be off-putting, but it’s Buck, and Eddie finds him hot even with a mouth of foaming toothpaste, so he’s clearly a lost cause who finds this hot too. “Maybe I’ll kiss you into it.”

Eddie looks at his incredibly blue eyes and almost kisses him there. He sighs. “Alright, I’ll do it,” he says, dramatically as possible. “But I want that kiss later.”

“You better believe it,” Buck says, and his eyes are so unbelievably full of want and affection that Eddie leans over and kisses him anyway, just lightly, on his very pink lips.

Sophia wolf-whistles, and a part of him feels embarrassed to be doing that in front of them – almost like he forgot they were there – but he’s drunk and he’s happy and it’s not like they were making out. He felt awkward having much PDA with Shannon too, around them,  although that may have also been for other reasons.

He turns back to them, both smirking at each other and then at him. “Sorry, had to take payment beforehand. How are we doing this?”  

“Fair enough,” Adriana rules, and continues. “Alright, muy mala idea.”

Buck and Sophia cheer. “Muy mala idea!”

Eddie grins, leaning into Buck.

Adriana leans forward, mischievous twinkle in her eye the same as when she was thirteen. “Ok, the challenge iiiiissss….”

Everyone drums on the table.

“Karaoke a song you loved when you were fourteen!”

Eddie fails not to groan as Sophia cheers, excitedly. Buck just seems happy to be there.

“It doesn’t have to have come out that year, but it has to be honestly something you loved, and you have to state, onstage, that you loved it then,” Adriana continues, triumphantly. She turns her gaze to Buck specifically. “Now, I have a pretty good memory of what they loved, and can keep them honest, but I’m relying on your honour to be honest with us.”

Buck nods solemnly. “I’ll have to think about it, but I promise.”

Adriana grins. “Perfecto.”

“Ok, who’s going first?” Adriana asks.

Sophia downs the rest of her drink and gets up. “Me!”

“Shocker. What song are you doing?” Eddie asks her, smirking.

“You’ll find out soon,” she says, turning back to blow them a kiss.

They watch her go up to the DJ – or at least the man in charge of setting up songs for karaoke – and smile confidently as she asks him something. He – a guy probably around her or Adriana’s age – looks kind of stunned to speak to her, but he smiles and nods. People – mostly, but not all, guys – have already begun to pay her attention as she makes her way onto the little karaoke stage.

Eddie shakes his head silently, sharing a look with Adriana, who raises her eyebrows.

Buck imagines it must be weird – to him, he’s only ever met Sophia as a beautiful adult woman and she’s not his sister, so people looking at her seems pretty likely – but she’s their little sister, someone they probably still half see as a kid, no matter how old she gets. He knows Maddie does that a bit with him, and they’ve got more of an age gap, but even their smaller gaps probably feel big to them.

Sophia takes the mike stand, drunk and giggly. He thinks she’d probably be confident without the drinks, but she’s got no evident nerves right now. “Hello, LA,” she says, bubbly and beaming. “I was very obsessed with this song when I was fourteen. This is dedicated to my brother over there, who pined like this for many years over that beautiful man next to him.”

There’s a few cheers. Surprisingly – or maybe not – no one has heckled her, and a few people seem to be paying attention.

Adriana snort-laughs, and Eddie flips her the bird.

“Unbelievable,” he says, frowning. Buck kisses his cheek, pulling him close, and Eddie can’t seem to help but smile and look down.

Adriana and Buck cheer, and Eddie does so begrudgingly. Or as begrudgingly as he can really feel when he’s warm and a bit drunk and sitting with some of his favourite people.

Then the banjos start.

“Oh no,” Eddie says, with some trepidation.

“Oh yes,” Adriana laughs, eyes lighting up gleefully.

“You’re on the phone with your girlfriend she’s upset,” Sophia starts, not seeming even a little embarrassed.

Buck meets Adriana’s eyes, and laughs, turning back to Eddie. “Aw, babe.”

“Not a word,” Eddie says, pointing a finger in the air at him.

“And she’ll never know your story like I do,” Sophia continues on stage, pulling the mic stand towards her. “But she wears short skirts I wear t-shirts,”

“It is you,” Buck teases, mouthing along to the rest with Adriana.

“I will kill you,” Eddie grumbles, but Buck is too busy mouthing, but what you’re looking for has been here the whole time, at him. He is incredibly cute when he’s grumpy. Especially if he folds his arms over his chest.

“If you could see that I’m the one who understands you, been here all along so why can’t you seeeee-eeee? You belong with meeeee-eeeeee, you belong with me,” Sophia sings, throwing herself into the chorus with gusto, even adding some theatrical hand movements. She doesn’t have a bad voice, honestly, and she clearly knows the song very well.

“Was this you on the phone to your sisters before we started dating?” Buck teases.

“I mean not far off,” Adriana joins in. “He would tell us about you, and your horrible ex-girlfriend who he did not like, and Soph and I wondered whether he was jealous.”

Eddie groans.

“Yeah, he really did not like her. Which was fair, ultimately.” Buck grins. “It’s so cute you complained to your sisters about your massive crush on me that you didn’t realise was a crush,” he says, letting out a cheer for Sophia. Adriana laughs, also cheering her.  

Eddie buries his head in his arms with a strangled yelp.                                    

Buck rains kisses to the top of his head. “If it makes you feel better, Maddie teased me about having a crush on you very early on when we’d first met because I wouldn’t stop talking about you and how cool you were.”

Eddie turns his head to the side and looks at him. “I know, she told me. She also told me you didn’t exactly say no.”

Buck grins back at him. “I think I said cute, or something sarcastically. But she was right, as always.”

“You both had crushes on each other subconsciously for years and convinced yourselves you were only deepening your relationship platonically, that’s professionally very interesting, but personally hilarious,” Adriana chimes in. “Now come on, let’s cheer!”

Sophia seems to be having great fun onstage as they watch, cheering intermittently. She finishes her final note and gets more applause and cheers than Buck might have even expected, but he joins in heartily as do her siblings.

Sophia does a really-too-elegant for being drunk kind of curtsey and leaves the stage. It seems to take her a while to get back because people keep talking to her.

Adriana sighs, watching her. “Ah, she’s gonna be busy for a bit.”

When Sophia gets back, she beams at them all as they cheer her coming over. “Sorry, got some people wanting to give me their numbers, and I had to tell them I’m going back to Austin soon.”

Eddie frowns. “Ah the hardship.”

“The struggle,” Adriana teases. “But I think we all agree, you knocked that one out. We’ll decide scores at the end. But well done!”

“Did you have to publicly link me to a teenage Taylor Swift?” Eddie grumps.

“Thank you, and yes,” Sophia replies. “You got him, didn’t you?”

Buck pulls him closer to him, and Eddie grins against his will. “I did.”

Adriana gets up, a few songs later, and launches into hers without preamble, except to say, as agreed upon, “I loved this song when I was fourteen,” which she does, also without a hint of embarrassment. Angry emo guitars break in and Buck is sure he knows this song but he can’t remember the name. “I’m in the business of misery, let’s take it from the top,” Adriana sings lowly, and her voice is different to Sophia’s but it’s also good.

Buck starts to wonder if their parents are good singers at all, if their mom ever sang with them as kids, because Buck’s only rarely heard Eddie sing – if he’s drunk or thinks no one is home when Buck has, in the past, dropped by unannounced, but he’s not bad either. Certainly, better than Buck, although he has no idea whether his parents can sing. He’s not sure they ever have. Maddie was the only one who ever sung to him. He loved that.

“I love seeing the Diaz competitiveness come out with you all, it explains so much with you,” he says, grinning at Eddie.

Sophia laughs. “Oh yeah. Never play Monopoly with us.”

“Oh, I know,” Buck says, with a laugh too.

“I’m not that bad,” Eddie says, trying not to grin.

“The only reason you didn’t financially ruin your son last time is because he’s scarier than you!”

Eddie laughs. “We’re raising him right.”

Buck leans into him. “Yeah, think so.”

Sophia smiles at them, happy-drunk, and then her eyes flick back to Adriana.

“Whoooo-ooooah, I never meant to brag, but I got him where I want him now,” Adriana choruses, and they cheer for her.

“Oh shit, I do know this song,” Buck says, remembering a girl he knew in high school, a long time ago. “Haven’t heard this in forever.”

“Lucky you,” Eddie says, darkly. “She used to play this in her room all the time, I’m gonna have it stuck in my head for the whole next shift we have.”

Sophia giggles. “Would you prefer Taylor Swift?”

“I would prefer neither,” Eddie retorts.

When Adriana finishes her song, they all cheer wildly, but she also gets a fair round of cheers from the general audience.

She comes back over to them, grinning as they cheer her.

“¡Bien hecho!” Eddie says, smiling at her. “Even though you’ve stuck that song in my head now.”

Adriana snickers. “Sorry, Eddie. I had to go with my girl Hayley Williams though.”

Sophia high fives her.

“Loved it,” Buck adds, beaming. “A worthy contender.”

Adriana beams. “Who wants another round? If I don’t make it back it’s because I’ve been mobbed by my many suitors.”

Sophia rolls her eyes, but she’s grinning. “Gracias, precioso.”

Adriana blows her a kiss and heads towards the bar.

Eddie drops a kiss to Buck’s head. “I gotta pee.”

“Have fun,” Buck says, and Eddie shakes his head, grinning as he gets up.

Sophia cocks her head at Buck, smiling dreamily. “You guys are cute.”

“We are,” Buck says, feeling a rush of drunken affection and beaming. “Our friends found it even more annoying when weren’t dating, because it made them feel insane.”

Sophia laughs. “God, I can barely imagine it.” She smiles, thoughtful. “I’ve never seen him like this. The last time he was giddy and affectionate like this with someone was…well, you know. A long time ago.”

Buck nods. “Yeah,” he says, thinking about a seventeen/eighteen-year-old Eddie, what he might’ve been like. Still serious, probably, after feeling like he had to look after his sisters and his mom for years, but less weight on his shoulders. Sillier, lighter, maybe. “I kinda wish I’d been able to know him then. Not to like – get in the way of that, especially because it led to the creation of one of my favourite living people. But to see what he was like then. What they were like.”

Sophia smiles, still, but it’s a little sadder. “Yeah, he was great then. I mean, not fundamentally different, but just…hadn’t gone through life’s shit yet. He was always taking a lot on himself, playing the man of the house, and it used to piss me off, but uh, he was also so fun, at times. Like when we were kids.” She pauses, playing with the straw in her drink. “I think she took some of the weight off of him. At least back then. We used to tease him about how nervous he was to ask her out, and how giddy he was about her when they were dating.” Her eyes flick up to him. “I’m sorry, I tend to talk too much when I’m drinking. You probably don’t wanna hear that.”

Buck shakes his head. “No, I want to.” He pauses, hesitates. “I didn’t really get to know her well. For reasons that seem kinda obvious now, but I really was trying to give them their space, and it was complicated, and then –“ he breaks off, thinking about it for a moment. It feels like a million years ago, in some ways. He and Eddie barely knew each other, even given how close they got just in the first few months, it doesn’t compare to where they are now, even before they got together.

He looks back to Sophia. “She meant a lot to two of the people I love most in the world. Which means I’m always curious to know more about her. What she was like, especially back then.”

Sophia’s eyes are soft on him. “I lived with her, you know, when she and Eddie were living with Mom and Dad. And Eddie wasn’t there. I was kind of there the longest. I don’t know if we were…close, because we had such different lives. She was raising an infant with special needs, and I was like, sixteen and obsessed with boys and trying to pass Bio, you know?”

Buck lets out a breath. He’s never thought about this, when Eddie had in the past told him few details about his life post-high school and pre-Shannon leaving him. “Yeah, I can imagine it must have been hard for you all to live together sometimes.”

Sophia pops her fairly magnificent eyebrows at this. “But we got along sometimes too. Especially after Ade went to college, it was like she was another older sister, so I wouldn’t miss mine too much.”

She looks down and Buck looks away, to give her a second.

“I’m sorry, I’m getting like – sad drunk, and I’m not trying to be –“ Sophia says, with a smile. “I just mean…they had that kind of teenage thing where it’s all so exciting and new. But I’ve never seen him like he is with you. He’s just so…comfortable. It’s not something I would’ve ever said about him before, even then. And I think it’s because even then with how much he really loved her and how exciting it was originally, he wasn’t…able to be honest about what he wanted. I don’t even know if he knew.”

“Don’t think he did,” Buck agrees. “He’s done a lot of work to get here. I’m so fucking proud of him.”

“Me too,” Sophia says, softly. “And I want to thank you. I know you’ve been a huge part of that.”

“Barely,” Buck protests. “He did the hard yards.”

Sophia shakes her head. She looks at him with wide, dark eyes. All three siblings don’t look totally alike, but her eyes are all Eddie.

 “Buck, you saved him, ok?” she says, smile a little wobbly. “I know he’s got stuff he’ll always be dealing with, but you have to take credit for that. You’re the reason he felt safe enough to come out. Fall in love.”

Buck blinks, emotional as anytime someone reminds him that he is, in fact, an important part of the people he loves’ lives. Like, he knows it, but it hits him every time. “Took us a while.”

“Yeah, jeez,” Sophia says, a teasing glint in her eye. “Ade and I totally used to stalk your insta because Eddie never posts anything but sometimes he’d post you and Chris, and we were like who is this?”

Buck laughs, rubbing the back of his neck. “Who is this weirdo who only posts gym selfies and pictures of him hanging out with his best friend and his kid?”

Sophia laughs. “More like who is this weirdo who loves them this much?”

“Fuck,” he says, half-laughing as he swipes at his eyes. “Don’t make me cry, I’m too drunk.”

Sophia chuckles. She reaches out a hand over the table to lightly touch his arm, comfortingly.

“What’s going on here?” Eddie says, finally returning. “I get held up coming back and you’ve gotten into the DNMs?”

Buck looks up at him, and maybe he is drunk, but Eddie looks so incredibly beautiful. Even in the bar lighting, he’s just so beautiful, and there aren’t actually little hearts around his head but there might as well be. “Eddieee,” he says, beaming up at him. “Your sister and I are friends now.”

Sophia nods at him. “Yep. Besties,” she says, with a mischievous quirk to her mouth. Buck imagines she’s mostly playing it up to tease him.

Eddie shakes his head, dropping into the booth next to him and snaking an arm around his waist. Buck once again is drunk enough to wonder if they could sneak off to make out somewhere, but he keeps it together, because this group isn’t as big as the work one can get, and the girls will definitely notice if half of it disappears. “You can be friends, but he’s my bestie,” he says, with a smile, dropping a kiss to the top of Buck’s head.

Sophia giggles. “He was always bad at sharing.”

Eddie scoffs. “Ok, youngest sibling.”

Both Buck and Sophia gasp in exaggerated offence.

Buck turns to look at Eddie. “You can’t discriminate against youngest siblings, Eddie,” he says, mock-hurt but almost immediately distracted by Eddie’s own dark eyes. He’s just so pretty, Buck wants to cry except that he’s already sort of cried once tonight.

“Let me make it up to you?” Eddie says with that teasing smile that makes Buck feel crazy, and leans forward and kisses him. Not intensely, not for a long time, just a light kiss because they’re still in front of his sister – but Buck still feels light-headed with it.

Buck takes the little stage and smiles over at them. God, that smile. He can see a few interested parties in the audience watching him. Something he’s enjoyed since being out is the thrill of thinking, mine. I’m the only person who gets to have that smile on him, in the morning, when it’s quiet and we’ve just woken up.

A line from an ABBA song his Mom loves and played a lot of when he was younger comes to mind. I wasn’t jealous before we met, now every woman I see is a potential threat.

He didn’t think he was that much of a possessive or jealous husband – and not much of that as a boyfriend in school, or with Ana. It’s not that he hadn’t cared, he had – particularly with Shannon, he’d just thought he was raised around enough women not to be so aggressively possessive if guys looked at her. Turns out, this relationship has kicked something into gear in his brain. Not that he wants to be aggressive about it, but he can’t help feeling twinges of it now when people flirt with Buck on calls. Maybe he always did, and he just refused to catalogue or understand that feeling before he shoved it in the overstuffed cupboard of repression in the back of his brain.

Neither Buck nor anyone he works can be allowed to know how much childhood ABBA is still lodged in his brain, though. Not on pain of death.

“This is for the man I spent the last five years pining over,” Buck says with a laugh, and Eddie whoops and his sisters cheer, catching Sophia’s eye. “I loved this song when I was fourteen.”

When the music comes in, Eddie doesn’t recognise it. Buck’s no singer, but he’s not bad to listen to. It’s not a particularly difficult song, maybe. Or maybe Eddie’s too in love with him to care.

Buck has his hands on the mic stand, and his eyes on Eddie as he gets to the bridge. “Gimme me a chance to hold on,” he sings. “Just give something to hold on to.”

Adriana and Sophia cheer, a little rowdy in their drunkenness, but not aggressively so. Eddie is drunk enough to not feel like he has to play Big Brother Father Figure right now anyway.

“It’s so clear now that you are all that I have,” Buck continues, getting to the chorus. “I have no fear because you are all that I have.”

He bobs his head dorkily, white-boy-dancing style but also like he’s aware of how silly it looks and finds it funny. Eddie wants to tell everyone in this bar that they’re regularly having sex.

“Oh, I miss Damien,” Adriana says, watching him with a fond smile, which he thinks is probably more to do with her boyfriend than his, but he thinks she likes him anyway. And she doesn’t always warm to people immediately, either.

Sophia puts her arm around her, and Adriana rests her head on her shoulder. Eddie watches them and feels a swell of affection and happiness that they’re here. That they’re closer than they’d been for a while.  

Adriana’s eyes flick to him and she smiles, quietly, understanding. She always got it. It was a little scary a times, especially when there became so much that he really didn’t want to talk about. But he supposes that’s why she went into the psych field.

He looks back to the stage.

Buck catches his eye. “Under your skin feels like home, electric shocks on aching bones,” he sings, and his eyes look bright and blue even from this distance, and Eddie wants to touch his skin and kiss it and kiss him until the world ends. Or they fall asleep.

Buck grins, finishing the song, and blows him a kiss. He even gets a reasonable cheer, although Eddie can’t be sure what percentage of that is just thirsty LA bar-goers. But, he supposes, it’s not so bad as long as they know who he’s going home with.

“Ok, I think it’s time,” Adriana says, across the table. “You’re up, Eddie.”

Eddie groans, but he really has had enough tequila that he doesn’t really care anymore.

“Eddie, Eddie, Eddie,” Sophia starts chanting, next to her, and Buck and Adriana join in quickly.

“Ok fine,” he says, long-sufferingly.

“Yes!” Buck says, taking Eddie’s head in his hands and kissing him exuberantly on the lips, less a show of romantic passion than excitement, but he’ll take it. “Go get ‘em, cowboy!”

Sophia cackles at this, and Eddie feels his cheeks warm. It’s a weird thing that it’s become an affectionate little joke between him and Buck, stemming from a post-coital discussion they had about when they felt they were being most obvious about their crushes – given that it directly preceded one of the worst moments of Eddie’s life. But maybe because it wasn’t the end – it wasn’t Shannon again – they were able to reclaim that moment of levity before all hell broke loose.

He sends a grin back to the them, and gets up on the stage. “This is dedicated to my boyfriend,” he says, and feels weird that he doesn’t feel weird saying it. Maybe he’s just drunk. His table cheers for him at this. Buck’s eyes look twinkly even from over on the stage. “My partner, my co-parent. I love you. And I loved this song when I was fourteen.”

The DJ nods at him and starts the backing track. Its immediate guitar riff sends him right back to early high school. Now he’s doing the head-bobbing that he made fun of Buck for, but it’s just that he’s feeling the music and he’s had a lot to drink. It’s nostalgic. He’s happy. And he’s in love.

“You sit there in your heart-ache, waiting on some beautiful boy to,” he sings, and he locks eyes with Buck, with all of the love he’s feeling right now. “Save you from yooour old ways,”

Buck looks struck, gazing moonily at him in drunken awe. It makes Eddie feel strangely confident, like there’s no one else even in the bar but him. “He doesn’t look a thing like Jesus but he talks like a gentleman, like you imagined when you were young,”

Sophia and Adriana look thrilled, cheering him on.

By the end of the song, it’s not just their table singing along – though not overpoweringly – and Eddie feels weirdly proud of himself when he ends his song to the most cheers he’s heard tonight.

Eddie makes it back to their table – a few people trying to talk to him hold him up, including the woman that held him up outside the bathroom earlier, which is truly wild if they’re trying to hit on him given how much he told everyone he’s very much in love with Buck – and can’t keep from smiling at everyone.

They cheer him like crazy. “I think you definitely won,” Adriana says, grinning at him. Buck and Sophia cheer, and then he gets up from the table to stand in front of Eddie.  

“Ladies, sorry for this, look away or something. I gotta kiss the winner so badly,” Buck says, looking over at them, and then back to Eddie. He then pulls him into a kiss so passionate it dips Eddie backward.

The girls just seem to laugh and cheer. Eddie is so stupid happy, leaning into the side of his boyfriend’s face, arms around his waist, Buck’s arms around his. He’s a little sweaty and Buck shouldn’t be so happy to be pressed up next to him, and yet he is.

It’s not that his – their – son isn’t the absolute centre of his universe, and someone he enjoys spending time with more than almost anyone else. But he’s spent his whole twenties being a husband and a soldier and then a single dad, he hasn’t had a lot of opportunities like this. To just let loose and be silly and in love with someone, properly, and be with his siblings. Not Dad, or not just Dad, just a guy having a fun, drunk night with other adults.

“Did you like that movie?” Adriana says, with an arm around Chris. They’d found it on streaming, and figured it was a nostalgic rewatch that wouldn’t freak him out or otherwise get them yelled at for what they’d exposed their nephew to.

He grins. “Yeah! I want to go to that superhero school, and the flying bus! Although…” he starts, thoughtfully, frowning a little. “I think they’d make me a sidekick.”

Sophia elbows him lightly. “Hey, they were the heroes of the whole movie! Without them everyone would still be babies. They showed everyone. You’d totally be a hero anyway.”

Chris laughs, cheered. “They were the heroes, yeah,” he says, happily. “That guy with the fire powers was so cool.”

“Mm,” Adriana agrees dreamily, glancing over at Sophia, who nods in agreement. They’d both thought he was crazy hot, and not just for literal reasons, when they’d watched it as kids.

“He was great,” Sophia adds, smiling.  

“He should’ve been the main guy,” Chris decides, matter-of-factly. “The plant girl should’ve stayed with him instead of the other guy.”

Adriana feels a pang of love for this kid, who she doesn’t get to see nearly often enough. “What did I used to always say, Soph?” she says, squeezing him to her and making him protest and giggle anyway. “A boy after my own heart.”

“He gets it,” Sophia says, fondly.

“I’d love that power, if I was a superhero,” Chris continues. “It would be so cool.”

Adriana laughs. “Somehow I don’t think your Dad and Buck would think so, mijo.”

Chris looks at her, momentarily confused, and then laughs. “Oh, yeah. That would make me like their supervillain.”

Sophia grins. “Yeah, you don’t wanna make their jobs harder.”

Chris nods his agreement. “No. And I don’t want to put them in danger.”

Adriana looks at him – he’s so big now, it’s crazy, she’s so used to him being little – and thinks he more than other kids has a reason to fear this, and it sucks. “Yeah, I get that,” she says, quietly. “How are you doing?”

Sophia raises her eyebrows at her. Adriana nods, slightly. I’m not therapizing, I’m checking in.

Chris doesn’t seem fazed. “I’m good. School is good. Dad and Buck said if I get a good report card I can get the new Zelda game, and I did well this semester so I think I’m gonna get it.”

“That’s awesome,” Sophia says, with a grin. “I’m still obsessed with Breath of The Wild, honestly, but maybe I should get this one when you do. We can help each other.”

Chris’ eyes light up. “That would be so fun, Tia Sophia!”

“Yeah?” she says, happily.

“Yeah,” he echoes.

Adriana isn’t around a lot of kids, generally, so she finds it interesting what they think is important. But it’s probably a good sign he’s not organising his sense of well-being around recovering from the various traumas he’s already been through so young. She turns so she can look at him better.

“And Dad and Buck, that’s good? I guess Buck’s over here more now,” she asks, sure she knows the answer. But she’s also kind of curious to hear what he says.

Chris shrugs. “Not really. He was over here a lot before. Well, less when he had a girlfriend. Which is why I’m glad Dad’s his boyfriend now, so we don’t have to share him.”

Adriana shouldn’t have assumed. Of course, they’ve been playing house longer than when they realised that they were in love. She’s glad they found each other, not least because they might be the two most oblivious men in America.

Sophia chuckles. “Damn right.”

Chris looks at them both and turns his head back to Adriana. “He’s our Buck, you know? And I always felt like he made Dad happier. Dad was always sadder when he wasn’t around as much. I just want them both to be happy.”

“Yeah,” Adriana says, trying not to betray her emotion over the thought of Eddie being sad, and struggling through it. Having Buck to help with it. “I want that too.”

Chris looks at them both. “I’m sad you’re going soon though. I missed you guys.”

“We missed you too, mijo,” Sophia says, and she pulls him into a hug that Adriana joins. Chris puts up a squirming effort, but it seems mainly for show.

Adriana kisses his head.

“Can I ask you something that I don’t want you to tell Dad about?” Chris says, sounding unsure. “Or Buck, but mostly Dad.”

“Of course,” Adriana replies gently, not sure what to expect, looking at him. Sophia looks unsure as well, but she keeps her arm around him.

“Is it…” he starts, looking thoughtful and concerned. “Do you think it’s ok that I was happy for Buck to be with Dad because I already kind of felt like he was another dad?” he gets out. And in a quieter voice, “Is that unfair to my Mom? Cause I still miss her, but it just hurts less when I have Buck and Dad around.”

 “Aw, pobrecito,” Adriana says, heart instantly going out to him. She picks up his hand and encloses it in hers.

Sophia presses a kiss to his head, lightly.

Adriana looks at him, warmly. “Honey, I know you’ve been through stuff I can’t even imagine. And I know no-one will ever replace her. But it’s good that you felt like that. Just as your mom will always be that in your life, Buck’s got his own role in your life, and that’s special too. But it isn’t a replacement parent. It’s just a different one.”

Chris nods, looking a little relieved. “I didn’t want to hurt them by asking.”

“Yeah, I get that,” Adriana says.

He looks at her, and then Sophia, like he’s curious about something but unsure how to ask.

“What is it?” she continues, softly.

“Were you friends with her?” he asks, like he’s not just taking her out at the knees with these questions. “I know we lived with Grandma and Abuelo for a while. I remember you guys coming over and playing with me when I was little.”

Sophia holds him to her gently, frowning sadly at Adriana.

Adriana starts, hesitant. “I actually lived with you, for a little while, when you were born. I was a senior. I went to college before you’d remember, but I was around you the first few months of your life.”

“Really?” Chris breathes, surprised.

“Really really,” Sophia adds. “I lived with you for two years, actually. But I think you were too young to remember it now.”

Chris turns to her, moving in her loose hold on him. “Did you like her?”

Sophia nods, eyes bright. “Of course, cariño,” she says, with a little smile. “When your tia left for college, and your dad was away overseas, I missed them very much. And she was there for me, like another sister.”

“She had the same kind of sense of humour as me,” Adriana recalls. “And the same as you.”

She squeezes his hand. Chris looks awed. It’s a complicated thing to talk about – maybe they can talk about all of it when he’s older, the good and the bad of it all – but for now, she and Sophia seem to be united in talking about the best things they remember about her.

“I helped her dress you sometimes,” Sophia says. “You were a very cute little bebito,” she says, pinching his cheek and making him squirm backwards. “I might have some photos from back then, actually. If I can find them would you want me to send them to you?”

He smiles. “That would be cool. I could show Dad and Buck, too.”

“Yeah, I think they’d like that.” Adriana says, smiling back at him.

“I wish you guys could stay in LA,” Chris continues. “It’s nice, you being here. Like it was nice having Abuela here.”

Adriana nods. “I know, mijo. It’s hard when we’re all so spread out. But think about it like this, if you’re ever down south or on the East Coast, you’ll have family somewhere nearby. And you can always come visit when you’re older. I think you’d like Boston.”

Chris considers this. “A lot of historical stuff there, right? Buck says he’s never been in his travels but he’d like to visit.”

She smiles, still unable to believe he’s grown so much now. Twelve is too old for him to be, when her mental age for him is so much younger. “Maybe you guys can convince Dad to come over and see me sometimes. You could see Damien again.”

“Oh, Damien’s cool,” Chris remembers, happily. “He knows so much about Magic the Gathering.”

Sophia smiles at her over his head, affectionately teasing. Adriana had introduced her boyfriend to Chris the last time they’d all been back in El Paso together.

“Yeah, he does,” she says, smiling back at Sophia. “Now, who wants ice-cream?”

Eddie gets home from a shift that was long-ish but not horrifically exhausting, to see his sisters curled up watching TV. It’s after Chris’s bedtime, but not that late.

“Aw,” he says, coming over to the couch. They pause it, to look up at him. “Chris go to bed ok?”

Adriana nods. “Yeah, he was good. Seems like he doesn’t need much more than someone making sure he’s done his teeth and is in bed nowadays.”

“I know,” Eddie says, trying not to sound too wistful. While he’s happy Chris is getting older, needing him less, it’s also a bit sad.

“Don’t worry, we still gave him lots of embarrassing tia kisses,” Sophia reassures him.

This brightens Eddie a bit. “As you should. Carrying on time-honoured tia traditions.”

“Exactly,” Adriana says, with a grin. “Where’s Buck?”

“Yeah, weren’t you on the same shift?” Sophia adds.

“Had to drop by his loft to grab some things, but then he’s coming back here,” Eddie explains. Trying again not to sound wistful. Because what the hell, he just spent a twenty-four with Buck and he sees him almost all the time anyway, he’s not going to be sad that his boyfriend couldn’t immediately come home with him.

“Aw, pobrecito,” Adriana says, pouting, though he knows she’s teasing him. Stupid therapy making his stupid emotions more stupidly visible.

“Why haven’t you asked him to move in yet, Eddito?” Sophia asks, cocking her head and oddly reminding him of Buck for a moment. “Es hora.”

He scoffs out a half-laugh. “Piensas que estoy loco, Soph? We’ve only been dating a few months – ”

“Yeah, but you were dancing around it for five years, and it sounds like he spent just as much time here before,” Adriana points out. “I think he’d love to.”

Eddie sighs. “Look, I just don’t want to overwhelm him. Or Chris. This is already a big change.”

“Is it though?” Sophia says, screwing her nose up.

Eddie rolls his eyes long-sufferingly. “You’re not gonna let this go, are you?”

His sisters shake their heads.

“Alright, well then I’m grabbing some wine from the kitchen,” he says.

“You’re not too tired?” Adriana asks, eyes softer.

He smiles. “Well, you’re going soon. Gotta take advantage of the time.”

Sophia beams at him.

“So, you’ll visit Boston sometime? Chris seemed keen to visit,” Adriana says, holding her wine glass and nudging his leg with her foot.

“If we can get the leave, sure,” Eddie says, warm and little sleepy from the wine. “I think Buck’s talked about wanting to go. Apparently, there’s some good history museums.”

“Damien would know the best ones,” Adriana says, with a smile. “He’s such a history nerd. But not in a like, founding-father fanboying kind of way, por suerte.”

“Mmm,” Eddie and Sophia chorus, knowingly.

“Buck doesn’t seem like a nerd to look at,” Eddie begins, fondly.

“Certainly,” Sophia adds, popping her eyebrows.

“But he actually is, he knows so much random information, and I could just listen to him rant about like, mushroom networks or atoms that affect each other from different parts of the universe for ages,” Eddie says, and doesn’t realise he’s gone on longer than he meant until he sees Adriana’s soft, warm grin over at him.

“You loooove him,” she accuses, gesturing carefully with her wine glass.

He grins. “Guilty as charged.”

He takes a sip from his wine. “But you love your nerd too.”

Adriana giggles. “I do. I miss his stupid face.”

Sophia sighs. “Ugh, both of you stop being so sappy about your dorky boyfriends, I’m getting FOMO.”

Eddie shrugs. “Can’t help it, lo siento.”

Adriana giggles again, quietly.

Sophia can’t help smiling, though. “Maybe I should date a nerd.”

“And break your streak of hot meatheads?” Adriana teases.

Sophia shrugs. “Por que no los dos? Eddie’s doing it.”

Eddie chuckles and Adriana laughs into her wine.

“Kinda funny you both have white boyfriends now,” Sophia muses, smirking. “Caram-ba.”

“Oh, and you haven’t had any?” Eddie says, raising an eyebrow at her, daring her to try and dispute it.

Sophia giggles. “None I brought home to Dad.”

Adriana snorts. “Dad of all people can’t talk. We’re carrying on the family tradition.”

“True,” Sophia smirks. She looks at Eddie. “Obviously, there’s no timer on it, so don’t worry…but are you gonna tell him anytime soon? Might be a bit awkward to tell him when you’re showing up together on Christmas Eve.”

Eddie takes a big sip of his wine before answering. “I mean, yeah. I want to. We’ve been…a lot better about communicating, and he’s made a real effort to understand me so I wanna repay that effort.” He pauses. “It’s just…scary. And I’ll probably have to do it with Mom on the call too, and I really don’t know how she’s gonna react.”

Adriana looks at him seriously. “Well, first you can do it separately if you want. And secondly, I hope she won’t be, but if Mom is a dick about it, we’ll let her know, trust me. We’ve got you.”

“Yeah,” Sophia says, soft-eyed. “No-one’s allowed to make you feel shitty about this.”

He blinks, and looks down at his wine, feeling his throat tighten. “Thanks, guys.”

Adriana reaches her hand out for his and takes it. Sophia leans over from the other end of the couch to put her free arm around Sophia. “Te amamos, Eddie.”

“Los amo a los dos,” he says, softly.

He huffs out a wispy laugh as the moment ends, throwing his head back. “God, it’s just like…now I’m going to be the gay sibling. When people talk to Mom about me back in El Paso that’s going to be the thing now.”

Sophia giggles, but not meanly. “Ok, firstly, I’m sure that won’t be the only thing. It’ll be less like, oh the one who had a kid young? And more, oh the gay one who had a kid young?”

Adriana snorts and Eddie throws a cushion at Sophia, who dodges and squeaks, but not too loudly. “Hey, wine glass! Would’ve gone all over your lovely couch here.”

“Would’ve been worth it,” Eddie says grumpily.

Sophia grins at him. “And, secondly, gruñón, it’s not like something I was ever going to tell Mom and Dad unless it was a serious thing, but I’m like…fluid, I guess, so I can always tell them. Take the heat off you.”

Adriana gasps, but seemingly less out of horror and more of good gossip, turning to look at her. “Wait, did you actually end up dating that girl from the festival? I thought you were just like, straight-girl-drunk-bonding with her?”

Sophia smirks. “Yeah it was less straight-girl-bonding when I went –“

“Pare! Soph!” Eddie interjects, screwing his nose up. “We get it.”

Sophia sticks her tongue out. “Anyway, we ‘dated’ as much as I date anyone. She was cool, and so hot, and we had some fun times together. There are just a lot of hot people in the world of various genders.”

Eddie sighs, trying to take this in. “Upsetting that I think I’ve heard my boyfriend talk about his bisexuality the same way.”

Sophia smirks.

He looks at her. “Are you bisexual?” He pauses. “No, I’m sorry, you don’t need to label it, I’m just processing the fact I’ve spent so much time and worked through a lot of Catholic-ass guilt thinking I was the only one in the family.”

Sophia smiles at him, understandingly. She shrugs. “I mean, bisexual’s probably closest, but like, I prefer to think of it as fluidity for now.” She hums. “I don’t mind queer, either. It’s kind of chill.”

“I get it,” Eddie says, trying not to be struck by the weirdness of comparing sexuality labels with his baby sister, and how nice it feels. “I’m like, very gay but my feelings about Shannon are…complicated. There was a lot bound up there, and I really loved her once. Don’t know how that fits in, but I never felt the same about another woman. So, it’s easier just to say gay.”

Sophia nods. “Yeah, it’s complicated, I guess. Spectrum and all that.” She smiles. “So yeah, I’m way more shocking, I’m happy to distract them with it.”

“Gracias, Soph.” Eddie grins. “God, imagine Mom’s face if we told her at the same time.”

This induces some giggles in all three of them. Adriana sighs, ruefully. “I can’t believe I’m the token straight here. I was the one they were convinced was going to be gay. With my weird music and emo clothes.”

Sophia giggles. “I think they thought all emos were gay, maybe?”

Eddie snorts. “Maybe they, being Texans in the early-mid 2000s, mistook the posters of emo singers with those long swoopy fringes for girls?”

Adriana giggles. “I mean, Gerard Way also wore a lot of makeup in my posters. So. They really got misdirected.”

Everyone cracks up into giggles again, trying to quiet themselves.

A key sounds in the lock, and Eddie grins.

Eddie lets out a breath and collapses bonelessly on Buck’s chest. Buck’s warm hands rub up and down his spine, circle around his back, lightly.

“God, you really saved it up for me, huh?” Eddie says, half-delirious with how relaxed he is after that orgasm.

Buck chuckles, and Eddie feels it in his chest. This is maybe one of his favourite places in the world to be, now. Hard to be worried about anything when you’re curled up on such a broad, warm, strong chest. “Yeah,” he breathes. Eddie listens. “Sorry for basically attacking you the moment you got home from dropping Chris off, I just couldn’t wait any longer.”

Eddie chuckles into Buck’s skin. “I was planning on doing the same thing. It’s been too long, I was starting to lose it.”

“Me too,” Buck admits. “I love your sisters, but I’m glad they went home yesterday. And then Reuben inviting Chris over for the night, and neither of us working? A miracle.”

“Yep,” Eddie says, and kisses Buck’s chest. “Milagro.”

He props himself up, one elbow resting next to Buck’s head. Buck smiles up at him, all dimples, and Eddie has to kiss him slow and delicious.

He has a sudden, vague thought and thinks it would be insane to say it. But he’s too warm and sex-dumb to remember why. “Do you wanna move in here?” he blurts out, and instantly remembers why not.

Buck freezes for a moment, and Eddie is worried he’s shocked, but then he smiles – a smile that hits new heights of wattage and dimpliness, like the sun itself is powering it. “You mean it?”

Eddie nods his head. “Yeah, yeah I do. I know it’s only been a few months, but we love each other and you’ve basically been here for years, and – “

Buck cuts him off by taking Eddie’s face in his hands to kiss him and rolling them over in his enthusiasm, so he’s lying on top of Eddie. “Yes. Yes of course.” He peppers Eddie with kisses, joyfully, making Eddie giggle. “You know I feel like my home is here,” he says, in-between. “I love you so much.”

“I love you so much,” Eddie says, breathing him in, unable to stop smiling.