Work Text:
It started one day, after a particularly long and grueling shift. Eddie and his coworkers on B Shift were cleaning out their lockers, stuffing clothes and other belongings into their duffel bags, getting the space ready for the incoming shift that would relieve them. Eddie, like some of the other firefighters on his shift, would also bring in a photo or two, using magnets to stick them to the inside of their assigned lockers. It was a little silly, Eddie supposed, putting up and taking down a photograph of Christopher at the end of every 24 or 48 hour shift, but it never failed to brighten his mood when he was working.
Eddie had started working at the 118 about a month prior, but he still didn’t feel like he knew his coworkers especially well. Everyone was friendly enough, but most seemed content to stick to themselves or a single long-made friend. Eddie didn’t particularly mind; he had been brought on to the 118 by Captain Nash, who oversaw the A shift. He was temporarily working with B Shift, for reasons to do with trouble finagling Christopher’s care schedule, and would hopefully be switching to the A Shift in another month or so, when Chris started at a new school and Eddie’s schedule could change a bit. So, he didn’t really mind that he wasn’t making fast friends at the 118, content to concentrate on making his first few months as a probationary firefighter as smooth as possible.
At the end of this shift, though, Eddie was dead on his feet, and managed to forget to completely clean out his locker — leaving behind the single photo of Chris, held up by a tiny magnet pilfered from Abuela’s fridge. Unaware of the chain of events a tiny photo of a tiny boy was about to set off, Eddie sighed tiredly, shutting the door, a left for home and a well-deserved sleep.
Two days later, Eddie arrived at the 118 again, and opened his locker door to find a surprise. There, the photo of Chris just where he had left it, and underneath — a post-it note. In large, untidy scrawl was a short phrase: “Super adorable. I love kids!” Eddie stared at it briefly, a little in shock. He hadn’t even remembered that he had forgotten the photo; and here was a bright and unsigned missive like a wave from a friend. He smiled bemusedly down into his locker, unsure what to make of it.
“What’s got you in a good mood, Eddie?” Another firefighter — Walker — asked.
“Oh, nothing, just a good day off,” Eddie answered, shutting his locker. The rest of their shift — an easy one, thankfully — found Eddie feeling strangely light, smiling in down moments when his mind drifted back to the note. At the end of their 24 hours, Eddie debated briefly before deciding to leave the photo up in the locker. He was guarded about Chris, always; he had only mentioned having a son in passing to his coworkers — but something about the genuine tone of the post-it note made him feel okay just leaving it up. The stranger from A shift had already seen it, after all, and they always used the same assigned lockers. Just before he left for the day, he pulled out a pen. At the bottom of the note, he added a tiny smiley face and a small addition: “I love this one.”
And he thought that would be the end of it. But by the time he returned to work again, there was another post-it note, this time in a violent shade of pink. “Hey! You left the photo up. Made me smile this morning. Your kid is the cutest!” Something surprisingly warm curled in Eddie’s stomach when he read it, and by the end of the shift he had already decided what he was going to write back.
“He’s 7, and he knows he’s the cutest.”
From then on, the stranger from A shift and Eddie left each other notes at the end of their shift. They never signed their names, and neither of them ever stuck around long enough after work to catch each other in passing. Eddie supposed he might meet whoever it was when he did switch to A shift, but there was something nice — something sweet, Eddie admitted to himself — about the anonymity of the notes. They were always short, casual; thoughts on the weather, or about a weird emergency that had happened that day, and often random, interesting facts that the stranger seemed to collect. Eddie’s coworkers noticed, of course, because Eddie didn’t bother to take down any of the previous notes. Soon enough, his shared locker was covered in overlapping post-its in various colors. A couple people had tried to ask about it, but Eddie merely shrugged, and no-one seemed curious enough to press further.
A couple of weeks later, though, this lack of curiosity changed.
“What is that smell,” one of Eddie’s coworkers groaned in appreciation. The moment they had walked into the changing rooms, Eddie had smelled it, too: something that smelled deliciously of cooked tomatoes and onions and garlic. When he opened his locker, he was shocked to find that the source of the aroma was coming from his own. A brown paper bag had been left in the bottom of the shared locker, another post-it attached to the top. “Bobby made his killer lasagna today — I had to save you a piece. I hope you’re not lactose intolerant!”
“Okay, Diaz,” firefighter Nomura said, pressing into his side a bit to take a look, “spill. What is going on? Are you secretly dating someone from A shift?”
Eddie appreciated the blatant jealousy even as he flushed ridiculously. Everyone at the 118 knew about Captain Nash’s famous family meals, and everyone was sore that they usually missed out on this perk of the job.
“No!” Eddie said, too loudly, “I don’t even know their name.”
Nomura raised a skeptical eyebrow. “Well,” she said, “feel free to tell them that they’re welcome to leave leftovers in my locker, too.”
And if Eddie devoured the — admittedly delicious — lasagna at lunch while avoiding the knowing glances from his coworkers, that was his business.
“That was so good, thank you.” Eddie’s next note read, “but I ended up staining my jacket with tomato sauce :(“ The next time he opened his locker, he was shocked, and perhaps a bit delighted, to find a folded black denim jacket at the bottom of the locker. “Here,” the note read, “take mine,” with a winky face drawn on the bottom. And — Eddie was terrible at this, he had next-to-no experience — but he couldn’t deny that it felt a bit like flirting. He waited until he was back in his truck after shift, the jacket shoved unceremoniously into his bag, to pull it out and take a closer look. It definitely belonged to a man, based on its size, and Eddie could tell that it would fit a bit too big in the shoulders. He felt something molten erupt in his stomach, wondering what on earth all of this meant.
A couple of days later, Eddie hadn’t returned to work and so hadn’t returned the jacket. He had, however, in a moment of weakness alone in his bedroom, tried the thing on. It was a little big on him, but it felt nice, and it smelled nicer: some combination of a woodsy sage scent that stuck to the collar. He found himself wondering, now more than ever, who the kind and funny stranger was that had been making his days so bearable. Before he could decide what to do about it, he got the call from Captain Nash telling him that they were ready for him to start on A shift. All of his complicated feelings about the stranger were shelved as he made sure everything was in place for Chris’s schedule, and as he tried not to panic at the idea of meeting a whole new crew of firefighters.
The morning of his first new shift, he and Chris got ready together like they always did, doing their exercise regimens and eating Eddie’s terrible excuse for a homemade meal. On their way out the door, Eddie caught sight of the black jacket hanging on the rack by the door, where he had left it. In a decision that would strike Eddie later as one of the braver ones of his life, he slipped the jacket on over his t-shirt, and told himself it was a completely normal way to return it to its owner.
Once at the firehouse, he made his way to his colorful locker as he always did, and told himself that the buzzing that had made itself a home behind his ears was simply a reaction to his new shift.
“Oh, so you’re the one he’s been leaving notes for,” a man said next to Eddie’s elbow. “Hen,” he called to a woman who had just entered the locker room, “we finally found our mystery man.”
The woman raised an eyebrow at Eddie, but it was matched with a warm smile. “So you’re the guy who’s been making Buck giddy all month,” she said.
“Giddy?” Eddie said, much squeakier then intended.
“Oh, this is gonna be fun,” the first man said, punctuating his statement with a pop of his gum. He stuck out a hand, “I’m Chimney, this is Hen. You must be Diaz?”
“Call me Eddie,” he said, and he found himself already smiling at the pair. “I brought cookies,” he offered, holding up a Tupperware of cookies that he definitely hadn’t bribed his grandmother into making.
“You’re going to fit right in,” Hen said, warmly. At that moment, a large man practically barreled into the room, his momentum and possibly overly long legs causing him to stumble slightly on his way in. He looked like an adorable giraffe. His eyes immediately landed on Eddie, and as he took in the sight of Eddie wearing what was obviously his jacket, he blushed furiously. He stepped forward a bit more cautiously, ignoring his coworkers entirely, and offered an easy smile.
“Hey, locker-mate,” he said, and Eddie found himself unable to stop grinning back at him, “I’m Buck.”
“Eddie,” he said once again, and stared for a beat too long before starting to shrug out of the jacket. He gestured weakly towards their locker. “I guess we’ll have to get me a new locker, huh?”
Buck, now grinning a little mischievously, leaned forward just enough to knock a shoulder into Eddie’s, a warm press of contact that Eddie thought he could get used to. “Nah,” he said, “I don’t mind sharing.”
“Good,” Chimney said from behind them, and Eddie had to admit he had forgotten about everyone besides the man in front of him. “Because you’re gonna have to share all these baked goods with us.”
They broke apart, laughing, and started actually getting ready for their shift. They grabbed their things, placing bags in their locker, hands brushing as they moved in what already felt like a practiced rhythm. Eddie smiled when he caught Buck looking at him from his periphery, and felt certain, for the first time in a long time, that he was in the right place.
Later, after a long but easy shift, Eddie was even more certain of that feeling. And if he found a new note, tacked front and center that read, “I know the best taco place nearby, if you’re hungry?” Eddie could admit to himself that he had a pretty good idea why.