Chapter Text
He feels like he’s still underwater.
Vaguely, he registers the feeling of falling; Hen and Bobby are on either side of him (they always are) but he can’t feel anything, can’t answer their questions, past the suffocating feeling rushing through his head. The wave might have receded physically, but it’s overwhelming him inside.
He blinks slowly as Hen shines a light into his eyes, turns his head, pulls the dirty bandages off his arms. When they realise he’s bleeding there’s a flurry of motion that’s too much for him to process, and he retreats into his head, tuning out completely.
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He has no idea how much time has passed but he’s suddenly aware of a hand on his shoulder, warm and comforting, and yet shaking him with enough urgency that he forces himself into the front of his brain to regain control of his eyes.
When he flicks them sideways, it’s Eddie at his side.
He’s horrified.
This is Eddie whose kid he just lost, whose kid he could have gotten killed just hours ago. Eddie who should hate him. Maybe he’s here to yell at Buck. To confirm his fears that the team doesn’t want him, doesn’t need him, that he’s doing more harm than good.
It’s these thoughts that send him spiralling upwards into full consciousness, and he feels like he may as well have been slapped across the face. Hot tears well up in his eyes and he’s powerless to do anything about it, pulling his lips taut and looking down at his lap. He’s sitting up on a bed. He’s not sure how he got here.
Eddie visibly startles when the tears start to fall.
“Buck,” he says insistently, “Hey. It’s okay.”
Buck tries and fails to bite back a sob. “No,” he chokes out. “Chris – “
“- is fine. Thanks to you, Buck. You’re both going to be okay.”
Buck starts really sobbing at this, wringing his hands together when he feels them shaking. Eddie’s arm is around him in an instant, pulling him close into his chest in a way that makes him feel a lot like a small child. The same way he should have been holding Christopher. He’s so deeply exhausted, down through his bones, that he simply can’t fight it – he lets himself be manhandled into the embrace, burrows his face into Eddie’s shoulder and tries to ignore the way his tears fall onto the other man’s shirt as he loses control of himself.
After a couple of minutes, Eddie pulls away, uses the pads of his thumbs to wipe Buck’s face dry. Absently Buck realises that he couldn’t even sit up on his own right now if he tried to; that Eddie’s hands on his face are the only things holding him upright.
“We’re gonna get you home, alright? I’m going to go and grab Chris, and Maddie’s on her way, she’s going to drive us back. Are you okay on your own for a minute?”
It’s too many words. Buck registers that it’s a question and moves his head in a way that he hopes resembles a nod. There’s a worried note in Eddie’s voice that he hates. Maybe agreeing will make it go away.
Instead, Eddie goes away. He doesn’t remember if that’s what he said he was doing. He lets himself sink back into the comfort of the fuzzy feeling in his head.
By the time Eddie returns with Chris in his arms, Maddie seconds behind them, he’s near catatonic. He lulls like a puppet between them as they make a joint, concerted effort to drag him out to the car. It’s not easy when his feet aren’t doing what he wants them to, aren’t supporting his weight. He wonders if he’s been in the water for so long that he’s forgotten how to walk.
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The next time he feels conscious, it’s less with the feeling that he’s trapped within his own head. For a second, he expects to be floating – flings his arms out for purchase on something, expecting the water to unmoor him at any moment – but the feeling never comes.
Maddie’s voice shushes him quickly. He snaps his gaze over in that direction, realising as he does that he’s not at his home, but rather he’s at Eddie’s, tucked under the blankets in the bedroom instead of the couch where he usually bunks when he stays.
Maddie’s sitting on the end of the bed. “You had us so worried,” she says, her voice thick in a way that implies she’s recently been crying.
“M’okay,” he says on impulse, because Eddie had already told him so, which meant it had to be true. His voice scratches, catching in his throat.
Maddie shakes her head, rubs her hands over her face. “I don’t think you are,” she says. “But you’re going to stay with Eddie and Christopher for a while, and I think – I hope – you will be.”
Buck nods and looks around again. “Where’s Eddie?” he asks. “Chris?”
“They’re in the kitchen. I think Eddie wanted to give us some space. He was worried you were overwhelmed in the hospital.”
Buck hums. Absently, he thinks it might have been nice if Eddie was here. “Wanna see Chris.”
Maddie bites her lip. “I can ask…”
Buck nods empathetically before she can finish her sentence. He needs this more than anything. He tunes out again when she gets up, tunes back in when the door opens, feeling off-kilter. He feels like a static radio.
Christopher lingers in the doorway for a second too long before Eddie’s hands touch his shoulders from behind and urge him into the room. Buck stares at Chris as he approaches – he looks exhausted but honestly, he’s struggling to believe that he’s alive at all.
“Chris?”
“Bucky!” says Chris, voice light in a way that Buck had already forgotten it could be. He all but throws himself at the bed, worming his arms around Buck. Buck startles, winds his arms back around the boy, pulling him close the way he should have all those hours ago. His small body is warm. Breathing. Alive. For what they’ve been through, he’s doing remarkably well.
He’s changed out of the damned yellow striped shirt he’d been wearing. Buck grasps at the clean blue one he’s wearing, inhales the familiar scent of Eddie’s laundry detergent. It makes him all too aware that he feels dirty, in the same clothes he’d had on all day, probably smearing dirt and grime into the room – sullying the Diaz home with his presence.
If he cries a little more into the top of Chris’ head, nobody needs to know about it.