Chapter Text
It’s always too cold in Frank’s office. Just this side of the chill, hair plucking up along Eddie’s arms as soon as he steps through the door every time. He’s learnt to wear long sleeve shirts whenever he has a session because Frank runs warm, and Eddie can take off layers if he gets too hot. He probably won’t, though.
“Do you think you do it on purpose?” Frank asks, and Eddie would think it out of nowhere, but they’ve been tiptoeing around this now for the last few sessions.
“Yes,” Eddie admits. There’s no point in lying. Frank’s too good at catching him out.
“Why?”
It’s a perfectly normal question to ask at a therapy session but loaded all the same. Eddie hesitates, doesn’t quite know how to respond because the reason is right there at the back of his throat. But it’s easier to visualise how he’s going to say it rather than actually saying it. Thoughts are confusing, and especially his.
“Because I,” he begins. Cuts himself off when he decides that’s not right. “Because I,” but it still doesn’t sound right. “It’s because I –”
“You’re doing it again, Eddie. I know it’s hard, but you’ve got to just let something sit, even if it doesn’t feel right.”
He sighs, ducks his head between his hands, lets it loll off his neck. Loose like Jell-O. He nods.
“It’s hard because I’m so used to the normality of it. Because I don’t know what will happen if I don’t have my crutches.”
“Compulsions are not crutches, they’re barriers. They’re not helping you, not really.”
Eddie nods again.
“Yeah, I know.”
This is where they’re at. Eddie and his need to push something down whenever he doesn’t like it. And there’s a lot of things he doesn’t like, and there’s a lot of ways he pushes it down. Words not coming out right? Repeat them until they do. Think your heart is beating just a little too fast, and you’re definitely having a heart attack? Two quick fingers to the tender skin of your neck, just to check. Always just to check. You don’t want the one time you don’t check to be the moment everything goes wrong.
Last time he didn’t check, his friends all died. Even when he thought he saved them. So always check.
But according to Frank, that’s not allowed. According to Frank, that’s obsessive and compulsive, and there’s a disorder in there somewhere that he’s diagnosed.
“So, I’m not allowed to act on any compulsions, but I’m not allowed to ignore the thoughts either?” Eddie says, and the collar around his neck feels too stiff, and there’s sweat collecting in the fabric when Frank nods. “So, what the hell am I supposed to do?”
“Sit with it.” Frank says it like it is the easiest thing in the world. “For other people it is easy,” he continues, and Eddie hates it when he reads his mind like that. Hates that he knows Frank can’t read his mind and that he’s got to stop worrying about it. “They can have a thought, live with it and know that it’s not going to come true, and it’s not always what they want, and they can move on.”
“I can’t.”
“You have a disorder, Eddie.”
“And you’re telling me I can’t fix it.”
“You can’t,” Frank says. Eddie sighs. “It’s not going to go away. But you can learn to manage it, and that’s what we’re trying to do. How many people do you think have intrusive thoughts?”
Eddie shrugs, pulls his lip in between his teeth and chews on it a little.
“A good amount.”
“80% of people. The other 20% are lying.”
Eddie is quiet for a moment. It’s not that he thinks Frank is lying, he knows the man and he knows he would never do that. But the thought that almost everybody else experiences this and can ignore it in a way that he can’t is baffling. The thought that people would lie about it? Not quite so baffling. He’s felt the shame, the denial, he’s seen what it’s done to himself. What it’s done to his walls, caved in, and bloodied with pieces of himself. He knows the spiral like the back of his broken knuckles.
“So, I shouldn’t try to ignore the thoughts,” Eddie says and it’s a decision he’s making. Frank always lets him take the reins at a certain point in their sessions. Subconsciously, Eddie knows that it’s always fifteen to twenty minutes before the end when he’s really started to rile himself up with his own brain.
“Nope. That’s what the exposure is about. Avoiding the behaviours and experiencing the thoughts. And when you feel the panic coming on…”
“Sit with it,” Eddie says, like it is the easiest thing in the world.
***
Back at home, Christopher is waiting for him. He’s sat at the table, tapping a pen against the surface as his eyes dart between the homework essay in front of him, and the phone that keeps lighting up every now and then. When Eddie kisses him on the head, he tries to sneak a peek at the screen, but it’s black and he’s brushed off with an angsty teenage groan.
“I’m trying to concentrate,” Chris says.
“Yeah, looks it.” Eddie opens the fridge, coming back with a beer. “Who’s Amy?”
“I know you didn’t see anything.”
Eddie shrugs, leans against the counter.
“Worth a shot.”
“Hey, your dad is allowed to be nosy.”
The voice drifts out from the corner, and when Buck turns it, he’s got a grin on his face and a kitchen towel in hand. The light is dim, but it shadows across his knuckles as the fabric runs against them. Then Buck chucks the towel into the space, hoping it will land in a laundry basket somewhere, and Eddie looks up at him properly for the first time since their basketball game.
They’ve not spoken about it yet, not really. Eddie knows they should, and he knows that Buck knows they should. But they haven’t, and a part of it is because suddenly there’s been a shift.
Just days ago, Buck was a green mess. Flitting anxiously between desperate attempts at calling out (each one something Eddie somehow completely missed. He never misses with Buck), and aggressive bouts of jealousy that landed Eddie with the craziest sprain he’s ever experienced.
Now? Now Buck is shining. It’s like there’s a new light on in his eyes, and Eddie doesn’t know where the switch is or how it suddenly turned on.
“Not when he’s distracting me from schoolwork,” Christopher suddenly says, even though he’s the one scrolling Instagram, pen not even in his hand anymore. In an instant, Buck is on the other side of the room, snatching up Chris’ phone and locking it. The kid sighs, honest to God, like he is the parent. “Buck, if you don’t give me that back.”
“Do your homework and you can have it. Until then it’s going on silent. Why the hell is your phone already on silent?”
“Because who doesn’t have their phone on silent?”
“I think your kid just called us old,” Buck says.
Christopher laughs and then he’s picking up the pen again, and he’s writing something down. Just like that.
It takes a while, as all things with a child involved do, but eventually Christopher gives up on paying attention for the night and retires to his room. He tells Eddie he’s tired, that he’s going to sleep because of course he does. But Eddie’s not stupid, and he can hear the dim sound of joysticks shifting from where Christopher keeps his bedroom door open, just a slip of light to remind him who is home.
Eddie’s still watching the door when Buck, gently, speaks up.
“How was therapy?”
Eddie nods, turning around and preoccupying his hands. They fiddle with the rim of his beer bottle, spin the lid around in his palm and flick it over the ridges of skin. It’s still odd, talking about the way his brain works, the fact that it is not normal. Frank hates the term, but Eddie sort of begrudgingly accepts it. His brain isn’t normal. If it was, the fact that he currently really wants to check the door is locked so that Christopher doesn’t die wouldn’t be a problem. But it is, and so here they are.
“The usual, really,” he begins. Looks up to Buck to talk. Let him know they are okay. “Frank talks, I get defensive, he talks some more, and I give in and admit he’s got a point.”
“A classic.”
“Exactly,” Eddie says.
Exactly. Completely normal, just like his and Buck’s friendship right now. Completely normal, just like his brain. Christopher has gone quiet, and if he could just go check on his breathing things would be fine.
He thinks up a way to change the subject.
“Can you watch him, on Saturday, by the way?”
If Eddie weren’t so hyperaware of Buck’s being, so knowledgeable, especially now, of everything his best friend does, he wouldn’t notice the sudden shifting of his weight. The way Buck stands up a little straighter, reminding Eddie how distinct their height difference is. If Eddie weren’t so aware of these things, he wouldn’t notice. But he does.
“I uh.” Buck falters. Which is new. Not new for Buck, but new for them. Too knowledgeable, too hyperaware. “I can’t. I’m busy. Uh why?”
Eddie wants to ask the same question. Buck’s usually free to watch Chris, loves hanging out with him, and even when he can’t he gives Eddie a why. Not this time.
“Date night with Marisol,” is all Eddie says, and suddenly that weird feeling is back. The one that starts in his throat, a firm ball lodged there that he has to swallow a couple of times before it shifts to his chest. His lungs are stuck. Eddie is stuck, and neither of them are speaking, and it gives Eddie all the time in the world to think about date night with Marisol. He needs to speak over the thing stuck inside him. “It’s fine, Hen and Karen can watch him overnight.”
“Overnight?”
“Yeah. Overnight.”
And the conversation ends there, without really ending at all.
***
When Eddie opens the restaurant doors, ears immediately filling with clicking glasses and muted conversations one over the top of the other, he does not expect to see Buck and Tommy on the other side of the room.
He doesn’t even think before he walks over, Marisol trailing behind him like she’s trying to catch up.
“Tommy,” is how he starts before his mouth is moving, and then he’s yelling out a loud “Buck!”
He jumps in his own skin, shocking himself with the volume. Can hear it echoing in his own eardrums. The restaurant seems to get a little bit quieter, and Eddie’s palms are slick. Marisol looks at him. “You two guys are here together?”
Stupid question to ask, of course they are. But why?
Tommy goes to speak. Buck gets there first.
“Just hanging out, you know.” He laughs awkwardly, and then Eddie laughs and it’s too loud again, and Marisol is looking at him but so is Tommy and he really needs to sit down.
Marisol’s arm is suddenly there, tucked under the crease in Eddie’s elbow and she’s pulling him away like she knows he needs to get out of there. She smiles at Buck, smiles at Tommy.
“Well, we’ll leave you guys to it,” she says. “Enjoy!”
She guides Eddie over to a table, tucked away in the corner. Sits him down in his seat like he can’t do it himself (he probably can’t right now), and then sits herself opposite him. Everything is dimmer over here, in their little corner of the world, and the feeling of eyes all over his skin recedes just a little bit. Makes him feel just a little bit better. Everything just a little bit at a time.
“It’s nice that they’re hanging out together, huh?” He asks.
Marisol doesn’t say anything. Instead, she picks up a menu, starts leafing through it and so Eddie follows suit.
“What you thinking?”
“I’m just glad Buck and Tommy are hanging out one on one, you know? Things were so tense for a minute when Buck sprained my ankle, and I was worried they’d never speak to each other. It’s nice.”
And it is. He’s not lying, even if his brain wants to tell him he is because this is just another fluke thought, and he doesn’t need to ignore it. He just needs to sit with it.
“I meant about food.”
Oh.
“Oh.”
“Are you okay?” Marisol asks, reaching out over the tabletop, fingers touching the skin at his wrist. Her pinkie rests there in comfort. Like it was meant to. He thinks maybe it was meant to. He thinks maybe this is it for him, that he can make this work. She’s a good fit for him, for Chris too, he thinks. He likes her well enough. He just has to sit with it.
Behind him, Buck laughs.
“Scoot over.”
Marisol doesn’t really have time to question him, mouth making this funny little squeak as Eddie shuffles himself into the booth beside her. He’s pressed against the corner like this, backed up into it. From his corner, he can see the way Buck ducks his head down into his drink when Tommy says something that makes him smile.
They order their food, Eddie barely paying attention. His arm swings over the back of the booth, resting gently on Marisol’s shoulder. She leans into it, presses herself up against his side so that her hair nestles itself under Eddie’s jaw. He breathes her in. The strands of her tickle and Eddie wants to sneeze. Wants to pull away and yet he pulls her closer, watching Buck. Watching Tommy.
They’re both two sizes too big for the table, for their seats, but it’s not out of place because they make it work anyway. Broad shoulders hunched over to talk to one another closer, Tommy’s arms flexing instinctively when he leans, Buck’s birthmark catching ruby in the light above them. They meld and Eddie is so fascinated, so wrapped up in trying to understand what he’s watching.
There’s a kiss tugging at his nape, touching the tender piece of skin just above the bone and he doesn’t mean to twitch away from it. But he can feel the beat of his heart in the blood there and if he tries to count it, he won’t stop. He pretends he doesn’t notice Marisol’s eyes when she finally moves her head.
Their food comes, and Eddie looks down at it. Wonders why he ordered it, when he ordered it because he’s not even sure he did. He hates Angel Hair pasta; it freaks him out.
He eats it anyway.
***
“Tommy and Buck were cute, weren’t they?” Marisol says as Eddie unlocks his front door. The key jangles a bit, stuck in place. He’s not sure, but it almost sounds like she’s testing something.
“What?”
“You know, the way they were with each other. All over each other like that, it was cute. They’re nice together.”
“All over each other?”
He thinks back to the restaurant. His mouth still tastes dry, can still taste the pasta. Finally, he unlocks the door.
“Oh, come on, you couldn’t keep your eyes off them the entire ni-”
The door closes behind them, and Eddie doesn’t get to hear Marisol finish that sentence. As soon as he hears the click of the lock, sound and in place, his hands are on Marisol’s waist. He holds her there, forces his hands to mould to her as he pushes her up against the door. He’s so gentle, doesn’t want to hurt her, but also wants to feel her underneath him. He does. Eddie smothers himself with the scent of her, gets the taste of angel hair out of his mouth with her tongue.
And it’s fine.
He’s Jell-O.
He doesn’t need to worry, doesn’t need to overthink this like everything else. It’s fine that his heart is beating like that, it’s normal, is this normal? The way his insides want to escape through his teeth when he kisses down Marisol’s skin, is that normal? The way he doesn’t really know what he’s doing, is that normal? Is it normal for him to sit like this? Where should he put his hands? Is he being normal? What’s normal? The way he checks all the exits in case of an emergency, God he really hopes there’s an emergency.
They get to the bedroom and Eddie’s phone rings. He hides the sigh of relief in a bruising kiss on Marisol’s lips, pulling away too quickly.
It’s Buck.
For their phone calls, it’s very quick. Eddie is on and off the phone within thirty seconds, max. When he turns back around, Marisol is underneath the covers, arms folded up over herself like she’s trying to cover something even though she’s fully clothed.
“You need to go?”
“Sorry,” Eddie says. “It’s an emergency.”
***
At Buck’s, Eddie doesn’t need to knock. There’s a key hidden amongst everything else on his chain. Eddie’s car keys, his house key, a keyring from Christopher, and another one from Denny that they made together and gave to him as a birthday present five months too early. There’s the key for his locker at work, and a key to Buck’s loft. He lets himself in.
Inside, Buck isn’t sat on his (ugly) couch. He’s pacing the kitchen island, running laps around it with a beer in his hand. There’s another, on the island, waiting for Eddie. He picks it up and nods.
“Trying to burn holes in the floor or something?”
“Depends how much it’s gonna cost me to fix it,” is Buck’s mumbled response and Eddie almost misses it.
“Huh?”
“Nothing.”
Right. Okay. This is fine, Eddie thinks, even though what he really wants is to grab Buck by the shoulders, sink his thumb into the bone, and shake him. Tell him that they’re okay, he doesn’t have to do this, there’s no need for them to tip toe anymore. There never was.
“Are you okay?” Is what Eddie says instead.
“No.” Buck takes it back almost immediately. “I mean, yes. I will be.” Then he pauses for a moment, shoulders rising as he breathes in deep. Let’s it out and says, “I have something to tell you.”
So, Eddie waits on his side of the kitchen island, Buck stranded on the other. Shipwrecked and waiting for the other to find them. When Buck doesn’t continue, just shifts his eyes around the room, barely touching Eddie with his gaze, he takes the reigns.
“Is this about Tommy?”
And when Buck’s muscles tense, when he somehow manages to make himself smaller, in that way he does when he thinks he’s taking up too much space, always thinking he takes up too much space, Eddie knows. Eddie knows that Marisol got something right.
“You knew.”
Eddie knows.
He asks anyway.
“Knew what?”
“Tommy and I…” Eddie can see the trepidation lining Buck, in the shake of his pupils when he finally, finally, tells Eddie where the light in them has come from. “It was a date. We were on a date.”
Strangely, Eddie doesn’t panic. It’s not expected, maybe, but it doesn’t shock him. Even more strange, is his own expectation that he would panic. It’s like he waited, fists clenched for it to hit him, and when it did it was nothing but a tap. Buck and Tommy are dating. Buck, his best friend, and his new friend, Tommy, are dating. Not even dating, they went on one date. He’s not shocked. Just confused.
“So, Tommy is… gay?”
“Well, it never came up specifically, but yeah, something like that.”
“Something like that,” Eddie echoes. “And you’re…”
“I don’t know.” Eddie can tell he’s thought about it a lot, is still thinking about it. “I mean, I think bisexual makes the most sense for me, but who knows?”
And that, Eddie doesn’t understand. Eddie needs answers, needs things explained concisely so that they make sense because his brain hates when things are left unanswered, when there’s nothing concrete. He needs concrete. He needs something that makes sense.
“Well surely you know?” He asks. He doesn’t mean for it to come out the way it does, really. He just wants the answers for Buck.
“I know that I like women. I know that I like guys. I also know that there’s a whole lot of other people out there, and a whole lot of other labels, and that sexuality is fluid. I didn’t even realise I like dudes until Tommy kissed me.”
It’s like a rom-com record scratch in Eddie’s brain. He can hear it clear as day. Screech. Pause. How the hell did we get here?
“Tommy kissed you?”
Buck laughs. Tucks his head all shy into the dip of his shoulder and blushes. Buck blushes. And now there’s something weird happening in Eddie’s stomach, something curling inside him. No, not curling. Unfurling. Something is unfurling and he wants it to stop.
“That day when I uh.” Buck gestures awkwardly at Eddie’s ankle. It twinges with memory. “Did that, Tommy came over to talk and-”
“Yeah, I know,” Eddie interrupts him. “I told him to.”
Buck smiles again, bright so that all his teeth show. His hands rest on the island, holding all of his weight where he leans.
“Right. So, he came over and tried to apologise. I told him not to, because I was the one being stupid. He said that he could never replace me in your life, or Christopher’s, I told him I was jealous, that I wanted his attention and then he just… kissed me.”
“He said that to you?”
Buck nods, as if he thinks it’s crazy too.
“I know, I told him: no bad blood, just bad behaviour.”
“He told you that we’d never replace you?”
They talk over each other, words spilling together into a puddle. Then there’s silence. Buck watches Eddie. Eddie watches Buck. He can feel the heat rising in his cheeks, blood pulling at the skin, and he is so glad Christopher is not here because he would be bullying the hell out of him right now.
“Yeah,” Buck begins. The hesitancy is back, but he starts to move. Makes his way around the island so that he leans against the counter beside Eddie now. “I was worried. About that. I do it a lot, apparently.”
“But he’s right. No one could ever replace you. Ever.”
“Not even Marisol?”
Something tells Eddie that maybe this wasn’t always about his friendship with Tommy.
“What?”
“You’ve been pulling away, Eddie. Maybe not on purpose, but I see it.” Because of course, Buck sees it. Even if Eddie doesn’t, Buck is so aware of everything, of the people he cares about. “When you’re not with Tommy, you’re with her, and when you’re with Tommy she’s watching Christopher.”
“You still watch Christopher,” Eddie argues.
“Yeah, when she can’t. When you’re with her.”
“Buck, she’s my girlfriend.”
“I know!” Eddie listens, waits for him to continue. Buck edges closer, stands up taller again as he moves. “I know that, and I know deep down that it’s stupid and…”
“Irrational?” Yeah, Eddie knows how that feels. He thinks about what to say next, and there’s only one thing that comes to mind. Only one thing that could possibly knock some sense into his best friend. “Who is in my will?”
Buck looks at him. Eyes so wide the dots of tears become stars in the diluted light of his loft. “What?”
“Who is in my will? Marisol? Tommy?”
“No.”
“Then who?”
Buck let’s out a breath, deflating with all the pressure. Eddie thinks he finally gets it.
“Me.”
“You.” It’s then that Eddie’s hands find their place. One grips his waist, holding firm and moulding to the soft curve of him underneath Buck’s jumper. The other rests where it always does, meeting the slope where Buck’s neck and shoulder meet. His thumb sinks deep into the bone. “No one is going to replace you. No one ever could.”
When they hug, Eddie can feel Buck smile into the press of their bodies. There’s nothing to it but Buck against him, the reassurance that they’re still them. Still Buck and Eddie. Nothing could change that. Eddie hates change.
There’s a noise by Eddie’s ear. Faint, but strong. Buck’s pulse beats, and Eddie grips him tighter.