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Eddie pulls into the driveway and cuts the engine. The house is dark, except for a couple lamps in the living room giving off a faint glow through the front window, and he lets himself sit there for an extra second and bask in it, the cozy feeling of coming home to someone. An adult, that is. And not just someone who’s waiting to be relieved of babysitting duty, someone who’s waiting specifically for him.
Christopher’s in there, hopefully asleep, and Buck is, too, probably lounging on the couch and watching TV. He’ll look up and smile when Eddie walks in, that particular smile that makes his eyes crinkle, and he’ll make room on the couch, and maybe he’ll even kiss him because that’s a thing they do now.
Not for long—it’s only been two dates, the second of which ended with a long, singular kiss up against the passenger door of Buck’s Jeep because by some unspoken agreement they’re taking it slow.
The anticipation is thick in Eddie’s throat when he finally gets out of the truck and tiptoes inside, shedding his shoes next to Buck’s and dropping his bag by the door and flipping the lock as quietly as he can. He turns the corner and freezes at the sight of Buck, who’s sitting on the couch with a beer in his hand and staring at the blank TV as if he’s seen a ghost.
“Uh, Buck?” he whispers, and Buck’s head whips around in surprise.
“Oh, hey, you’re home.” His voice sounds weird, high and kind of frantic. “How was the shift?”
“It was fine,” he says slowly, his hand outstretched like he’s about to soothe a skittish animal. “How was your—”
“Are you hungry?” Buck interrupts. “I made pasta, there are some leftovers in the fridge.”
“We actually had time to eat dinner for once. But thanks. What’s wrong?”
“I’m sorry,” he says immediately.
“Sorry about what?”
Eddie looks around the room, but he doesn’t see a broken window or a new puppy or anything else that would warrant the apologetic expression on Buck’s face. It morphs into a grimace.
“So, Christopher…”
“What about him?” Eddie lifts an eyebrow. “Obviously he’s fine, otherwise you wouldn’t just be sitting here on the couch.”
“No, no, he is fine, he’s asleep.” Buck leans over to put his beer bottle on the coffee table and stays curled forward, his elbows on his knees. “He asked me about sex, Eddie.”
Eddie blinks, then staggers forward one step and crash-lands next to Buck on the couch. “He asked you about sex,” he repeats, in a dull voice.
“I know,” Buck hisses. “I was like, wow, wouldn’t that be a good topic to discuss with your dad instead, and he said no, that would be too embarrassing and he wanted to talk to me.”
“Oh my god,” Eddie says faintly. He leans back and folds both arms across his face. “He’s…he’s not old enough, I thought. Is he? How does he even—”
“He said his friends at school were talking about it.”
“I am not prepared for this.”
“I wasn’t either!” Buck says hysterically.
Eddie rockets to his feet. “I need a drink.”
Buck gestures at his empty bottle. “Yeah, you need to catch up. Can I have another one, please?”
Eddie escapes into the kitchen and leans into the fridge, letting the cool air flow over his face. It doesn’t help, at all, so he grabs two beers and slams the door shut with a huff.
“I feel so old,” Buck whines, and Eddie levels him with an unimpressed look while he twists the caps off the beers and hands one over.
“Youfeel old? My child knows what sex is, Buck, Jesus Christ.” Eddie blows out a purposeful breath and sits back down. “Okay. What did you say?”
Buck pops up and starts pacing. “I…god, I don’t even remember. I kept it, like, appropriate, obviously. I said, um, sex was a physical way that people could express their love, I think. That when a girl and a guy, or two guys, or two girls—oh, then we had a little tangent about non-binary people—anyway, when two people love each other, it’s something they can choose to do together if they want.” Buck pauses to scrub a hand over his hair, his lower lip caught between his teeth. “I didn’t, uh, say anything about being married? I don’t know if…” he trails off, and Eddie waves his hand.
“I don’t think either of us could make that recommendation with a straight face.”
Buck bites his lip to muffle a hysterical giggle. “Oh, I talked about consent!” he exclaims. “That sex is only something that happens if both people have talked about it and are on board, and in general, someone should always have your consent before they touch you. And I definitely emphasized that it’s a grown-up activity.”
“Okay.” Eddie takes a long pull of his beer. “Okay, that’s good.”
“And then, and then he was like, Buck, you’re a grown-up, do you have sex?” Buck looks so fully traumatized that Eddie can’t help but laugh. “I somehow skirted right by that one, thank god, by the skin of my fucking teeth. At least he didn’t ask me if I was having sex with you, holy shit.”
Small mercies, indeed.
“Did he ask about, like,” Eddie winces, “the technicalities?”
“Not really. He did ask if kissing was part of it, and I said yes. I also definitely said something about babies, but he didn’t seem too interested in that part.” Buck stops in his tracks and whirls around to face Eddie, his face ashen. “Oh my god, I didn’t even mention condoms! Or STDs!”
“That’s all right.” Eddie stands and takes Buck by the arm, leading him back to the couch. “I think we can save birth control and safe sex for a future discussion, when he’s a little older.”
Buck sits and tugs Eddie back down with him, close enough that their shoulders are overlapping. “But,” he says, digging in his pocket for his phone, “but, I was googling after he went to sleep, like about how to talk to kids his age about sex, and I don’t actually think I fucked up?”
“Of course you didn’t fuck up,” Eddie says automatically. Buck looks up at that, and his face softens, and Eddie finally gets the smile he was thinking about in his truck.
“Hi.”
Buck drops his phone in favor of cupping Eddie’s face in his hands, pulling him forward for a kiss. Eddie sinks into it, bracing both hands on Buck’s thighs, and swallows the happy little noise he makes in response. The novelty of it still makes his head spin.
“Hi,” Eddie says, mostly against Buck’s cheek, after a minute or an hour, who knows. “Missed you today.”
He spent the day covering a shift for someone as a payback for her covering a shift of his a couple weeks ago, and it was fine, but he far prefers working with Buck by his side.
“Yeah?” Buck pulls back enough to look him in the eye. “Anything exciting?”
“Not really.”
“Good.”
Buck punctuates the word with another kiss. He looks satisfied, and Eddie laughs. “You happy I had a boring day?”
“Considering I wasn’t there, yes.”
Buck fumbles between them for his phone and finds it tucked in behind Eddie’s back. “Anyway, the articles are really helpful, actually. And it says that some kids prefer, like, books? To learn about it on their own. So I bookmarked some of the ones they recommend and thought we could check them out. Or you,” he hastens to add. “Just you.”
“Oh, no, you’re part of this now.” Eddie leans closer to look at his phone. He has a lot of tabs open, wow. “I can’t believe we haven’t even had a third date, and my son is asking you about sex.”
Buck elbows him. “Wow, way to make me sound like a stranger.”
“Farthest thing from a stranger.” Eddie grins, but Buck doesn’t return it.
“Are you mad?” he asks, and Eddie hates how small his voice is.
“Of course I’m not mad.” Eddie grabs his thigh again and gets distracted, spends a moment petting it. “I’m a little…it makes me kinda sad that he didn’t want to talk to me about it, we’ll have to figure that out. But it’s great he felt comfortable talking to you instead.”
Buck slumps back against the couch like his strings have been cut. “I was afraid you were going to murder me.”
“Never.” Eddie’s the one to reach over this time, fists his hand in Buck’s shirt and kisses him. “I’m glad he has you.”
“Really?”
Buck’s eyes are wide and blue, and Eddie doesn’t have to worry about hiding it anymore, he can let the affection show all over his face. What a fucking relief. “Of course. We’re the luckiest.”
“Me and you?”
“No, me and him.”
Buck’s face kind of crumples at that, in a really pleasant way, so what is Eddie supposed to do besides lean in those extra three or so inches. The kiss is fiercer than before, and briefer, and it takes Eddie an extra second or ten to remember what he wanted to say.
“Thank you,” he murmurs, “for being there for him.”
“Always.” Buck pulls back and scrubs his hands down his face. “But god, I can’t believe I survived that. You owe me, Diaz.”
“Yeah, what do you want?”
Buck smirks and slings one arm over the back of the couch, caging Eddie in. “Anything. I’m pretty easy.”
Eddie hums. “I’ll tell you something.”
Buck’s eyes brighten at that. Eddie doesn’t think he’ll ever get over how eager Buck is to know things about him, no matter how mundane. He listened with rapt attention the other day in the grocery store while Eddie explained his cereal choices, for god’s sake. Eddie is never letting him leave.
“What kind of something?”
“We’ll stay on topic. Something about sex.”
Buck leans in even more. Eddie should feel trapped, probably, but instead he just wants to burrow in, right into that little triangle of space between Buck’s bicep and the side of his ribcage and the back of the couch. “Really?”
“Yes, but you cannot laugh,” Eddie warns. “I’m serious. If you laugh, I’m throwing you out.”
“I’ll try real hard. Is it something embarrassing?”
“Not to me, really. You might feel differently,” he says, and Buck tilts his head, his eyes narrowing.
“I definitely won’t laugh, then,” he promises. “Tell me.”
Eddie drains the rest of his beer and sets it aside with a little sigh. “Shannon’s the only person I’ve ever had sex with.”
Buck doesn’t laugh.
Nothing about his face or his posture changes, actually, he’s just sitting there, open and willing like always, to take in whatever Eddie’s ready to share.
“It’s just—we were so young, right? And when she left, everything was so hectic and hard, plus it just felt wrong since we were still technically—”
“You don’t have to explain yourself to me,” Buck interrupts. “Unless you want to.”
“And then she came back and we, you know.” Eddie winces. “Well, you know what happened. Then it was getting over that and being a single dad and you.”
“And me? What about me?”
Eddie was honest before, that he doesn’t find his relative lack of sexual partners embarrassing, but this, this makes the heat flood to his face and his gaze skitter away from Buck’s. “You know.”
“Um, no, I literally do not know. What?” Buck’s hand comes up and grabs Eddie’s chin, bringing his face back toward him. “Tell me.”
“That I, uh, had a little, you know, crush on you.”
“What!” Buck looks more delighted than Eddie’s ever seen him, probably two seconds away from jumping on the couch. Eddie lays a hand on his arm to steady him.
“We are literally dating, why do you look so surprised?”
“Well, I know you like me now, I didn’t know you liked me before!”
“You knew,” Eddie says confidently because he was pretty sure his dumb crush was visible from space. “You had to’ve.”
“I most certainly did not know a thing, not until you asked me out to dinner with that fucking look on your face. When? For how long?”
Discretion is the better part of valor or whatever, Eddie figures as he hooks a leg over Buck’s lap and reels him in with a hand on the back of his neck. Buck opens for him easily, his arm coming around to toy with the hem of Eddie’s shirt.
“I know you’re trying to distract me,” Buck says, the words coming out in a jumble against Eddie’s mouth. “And I’ll allow it, but we’re coming back to this later.”
“Fine,” Eddie lies.
Buck’s hand sneaks under his shirt and clutches at his waist, his fingers digging in hard enough that Eddie feels lit up with it, desire coursing up his spine as he arches forward. Buck catches him, his hand moving around to his lower back and holding him there, holding him steady while he deepens the kiss, coaxing it into something plush and soft. Eddie gets a grip on his hair, eliciting a groan, and at that Buck pulls back, though it appears to take some effort. His hand kneads restlessly at the thigh Eddie has thrown over his lap. “What happened to taking things slow?”
Eddie tips forward again, his mouth starting at Buck’s ear and working its way down. “Did either of us actually say that we wanted to do that?”
“Um.” Buck tilts his head, letting Eddie at his neck. “I thought it was, uh, implied.”
“I don’t really want to take things slow. Do you?”
Buck doesn’t answer, just nudges at Eddie’s face with his nose until they’re kissing again. It feels like an answer in and of itself, the way he’s hanging on tight enough to bruise, his hips rocking up as he grips Eddie’s thigh, and Eddie’s about to combust, right here on his couch. He slides his hand down from Buck’s nape to his chest and pauses there.
“Your heart is racing.” He goes back up to Buck’s neck and probes his fingers around his pulse point, trying to estimate his heart rate, but Buck pushes his hand away with an irritated noise.
“Yeah, I’m nervous,” he hisses.
“What, why?”
“Because you’ve—you’ve had a lot of sex with one person. That probably means it was really good, right?” Eddie opens his mouth, but Buck shakes his head and cuts him off before he can say anything. “Actually, I don’t want to know. I hope so, for your sake. But I’ve had literally the opposite of that. What if I don’t know how to do it? The way you like it, I mean, what if it’s terrible?”
“Buck,” Eddie starts, then decides that action might be a better strategy at the moment. He gets Buck by the shoulders and twists him a little, pushing him down until his back hits the couch. Buck reaches for him, shamelessly greedy as his legs swing up to stretch out fully, and Eddie goes, sprawling over him and reminding himself that he can be greedy, too. Buck’s wearing shorts, the thin ones he works out in, and it’s so easy to slide his hand under the bottom of them and up the outside of his thigh, torturously slow, until his thumb rubs across the thin skin at the front of his hip. Buck groans, his head thrown back as his tongue peeks out to wet his lips. A stronger man could resist, probably, but Eddie is weak, collapsing forward to bring their mouths together again. Buck makes another noise, surprise and relief all rolled into one as if it hasn’t been maybe sixty seconds, at most, since Eddie’s tongue was last in his mouth.
When he speaks, Buck’s voice is rough enough that Eddie can feel it, slinking across his skin and down into his gut. “I’m serious, Eddie, I—”
“What did you tell Christopher that sex was?”
Buck exhales. He lifts his head and focuses on Eddie through hazy eyes. “A, uh, physical way for people to express their love.”
“That doesn’t sound hard, does it?” He kisses Buck before he can speak and murmurs against his mouth, “I regret that choice of words, do not make a boner joke.”
Buck kisses back, hard, and playfully nips at Eddie’s lower lip. “I wasn’t even going to,” he protests. “We’re having a moment.”
“We are?”
“Yeah, I was about to tell you that I love you.”
“Oh.” Everything in the room stills, and Eddie swallows. His lungs aren’t working, he doesn’t think. He reaches for words, and all that comes out is, “then I reiterate, please don’t make a boner joke.”
“You’re the one who keeps talking about boners.”
Eddie drops his head with a groan, burying his reddening face in the crook of Buck’s neck. He must’ve taken a shower sometime earlier in the day because he smells like Eddie’s body wash. He kisses the tender skin and bites down a bit, until Buck shifts underneath him restlessly.
Buck slides a hand into his hair and scratches for a few seconds, then grabs a handful and tugs Eddie’s head up until they’re eye-to-eye.
“Do you not want me to say it?” Buck asks, his eyes giant and soft, and Eddie knows that if he said so, Buck would drop it for now and not mention it again until Eddie was ready. Because Buck fits into his life seamlessly and is willing to suffer through an agonizing discussion with his preteen about sex and is always, always the one Eddie wants to come home to.
“I love you,” he says instead, and Buck grins.
“Wow.” Buck still has a grip on Eddie’s hair, and he uses it to gently jostle him back and forth. “Way to steal my thunder, man. Unbelievable. Bad love declaration etiquette.”
“Should’ve been faster.”
Buck’s fingers dig in around Eddie’s hip, tight enough that he gasps a little and focuses on Buck, laser-sharp.
“I love you,” Buck says, and Eddie knew it was coming, sure, but it wasn’t enough to prepare him. Nothing would have, and he knows it’s good, so good, but it’s also overwhelming enough that he needs to rest his head against Buck’s chest. “Still counts as me saying it first, by the way,” Buck says after a minute.
“It absolutely does not,” Eddie raises his head to say, and Buck lifts a knee to gently knock him in the side. The movement has the benefit of shifting their hips, and Eddie groans.
“As comfortable as this couch is—”
“It’s really not,” Buck interrupts, and Eddie smiles.
“You wanna move?”
“Yeah.” Buck tugs him close with a hand on the back of his head and doesn’t let their mouths part as he sits them up. He finally pulls away with a smack and takes Eddie’s hand to pull them both to their feet. “Oh, and by the way, if Chris ever catches us, you have to explain.”
“Deal.”