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The whole thing begins, as so many things seem to, in Eddie’s kitchen.
It’s a Sunday evening in May and Buck is fiddling around with a box of pasta, a pot of water already boiling on the stove. Eddie can’t help but notice how distracted he seems, as Buck’s thumbs follow the seam of the box but make no move to open it. He moves from where he’s carefully chopping an onion, the recipe Buck had shared pulled up on his phone at his elbow.
“The water’s going to boil over,” Eddie finally says, setting the knife down and turning to rest his hip against the counter.
Buck startles a little. “Hm?”
“The directions on the box haven’t changed in the last 2 minutes you’ve been staring at it, Buck.”
“Oh.” Buck lets out a little laugh, tearing open the top and tipping the penne into the water with a small splash. “Yeah.”
Eddie’s brows furrow. “You okay?”
Buck shrugs a shoulder.
“Buck.”
Buck sighs, and sets the box next to the stove top. He grabs a silicone slotted spoon from the canister nearby and stirs the pasta slowly. “Tommy told me we need a break.”
“Oh,” Eddie says. He rolls the thought around in his head. Selfishly, that means, he thinks, that Buck can spend more time where he belongs – here with him and Chris – but still: “I’m sorry.” He steps towards Buck, and reaches out, grasps his shoulder. Buck, still facing the stove, relaxes a bit under his touch. Eddie tightens his grip.
Buck waves his free hand in the air, still stirring the pasta, gaze aimed at the noodles floating around lazily. “I’m not upset? That’s the thing – I feel like I should be upset, angry or sad or something. But I’m not. I get why he did it.”
“Why’s that?” Eddie asks. He thinks he should remove his hand now, let it fall from Buck’s shoulder, but, well. He doesn’t. He just lets it linger there, tethering them together.
Buck pauses in his stirring. He lifts the spoon out of the pot, sets it on the spoon rest on the counter. “He said I wasn’t ‘in it.’”
“What does that mean?” Eddie asks, squeezing his shoulder lightly.
“I…” His shoulders tense, and Eddie drops his hand, frowning. He watches as the starchy water swirls slowly. He hears Buck let out a long breath. “It doesn’t matter.”
“Buck–”
“It’s really not a problem, Eddie,” Buck says, turning, finally, to face him. His eyes flicker over Eddie’s face, and Eddie can’t tell what he’s searching for, but he holds his gaze. “If I was upset, it would be one thing, y’know? But I’m not. He and I… we were never going to be anything serious.”
Eddie nods slowly. “And you knew that?”
“We both did,” Buck says, and he’s smiling, so it’s okay. It has to be okay. Eddie leaves it alone, and he gets back to work chopping the onion and Buck lets the pasta boil, joining him at the island to crush some garlic.
When dinner is ready, Eddie calls Christopher into the kitchen, and they sit around the table. Chris tells them about the field trip his class took last week, and asks if they can read over his final paper on Walk Two Moons for English class before he submits it.
“It’s not due until Wednesday, but you said I couldn’t play any more Minecraft until my homework was done,” he says, stabbing the last of his noodles with his fork. “It took forever.” He shoved the pasta into his mouth, chewing forlornly.
“Just think of how much time you’ll have to play Minecraft now that it’s done, though!” Buck replies, and Eddie nods at his sullen preteen.
“How about this,” Eddie starts. Chris looks up at him through his glasses, squinting suspiciously. “You can go play Minecraft for the next hour until your shower, we’ll look at your report, and you and I can make any edits tomorrow.”
“Yes! Thank you, Dad!”
Eddie laughs as Chris hugs him, sending a grin to Buck. “Leave the paper up on your Chromebook and I’ll come get it when we’re done cleaning up.”
As Christopher heads down the hall, Eddie begins stacking their plates. Buck stands up and grabs all of their water glasses. “He’s such a great kid, Eddie.”
Eddie shoots him a smile. “I’ve gotten really lucky with him.”
“You know it’s not luck,” Buck replies, tone serious.
Eddie shakes his head carrying the plates to the kitchen. He sets them in the sink, turning the water on to warm up and plugging the sink, rolling up his sleeves. He grabs a dishcloth and tosses it in Buck’s direction, so that he can dry the dishes after Eddie washes them. He hears Buck’s footsteps as he shuffles closer. He hears Buck set the glasses on the counter. He hears the water as the sink slowly fills. He hears Buck take a breath. He hears:
“Eddie.”
He hums in reply. He grabs the sponge from the frog caddy above the sink, and grabs a plate, and begins to scrub.
“Eddie.”
He turns and looks at Buck, who looks distressed, almost. His eyebrows have a ridge forming between them and Eddie has a flashing thought that he wants to poke it, smooth it out, kiss it, but then Buck is talking again and Eddie feels he has truly lost the plot.
“It’s you.”
“What?”
Buck’s hand is gripping the edge of the counter so tightly his knuckles are turning white. Eddie’s gaze flicks down to it, just briefly, and then back up to Buck’s face, and Buck’s cheeks look so pink. It’s an odd contrast, and maybe an odd thing to notice when his best friend is staring at him in a way he never has. “Tommy and I couldn’t be serious, I couldn’t be all in, because… because of you, Eddie. Because I like you.”
“Oh.” And Eddie would be lying if he says he’d never considered this before, especially since that night at Buck’s kitchen island, two months ago, Buck’s big blue eyes finding his own brown ones as he told him that he had been on a date with a man. As his best friend confessed that men were an option now. Eddie has thought about it, sure. In the brief moments when they bump shoulders on the way back to the engine at the end of a call. When Buck stays over after Chris goes to bed and they sit on opposite ends of the sofa, and Eddie wonders what it would be like if he could cross that line and slide over and rest his head on Buck’s chest. But… but Eddie has never considered a man an option. Not really. Even if that man is his best friend. Even if that man is Buck. So, through glass in his throat, he says, “Buck… I can’t – I’m not –”
“Yeah,” Buck breathes. The kitchen – the house – seems to go silent. Eddie thinks he could hear a pin drop in Chicago. A butterfly flap its wings in Australia. “Yeah.” Buck sets the dishcloth down, rubs his hands on his jeans. “I’m… I’m gonna say goodnight to Chris. I’ll, uh, see you at work on Tuesday.”
And all Eddie does is watch as Buck leaves.
*****
Eddie and Chris are at the grocery store on Thursday evening picking up a few basic necessities for school lunches when he makes his next mistake. Chris is talking a mile a minute about some kind of dragon in a video game, and Eddie is trying to listen while also steering the cart, which has a fucking wobbly and screechy wheel, around the corner of an aisle, and it bumps into someone else’s cart, rocking some bottles back and forth, and he’s about to apologize when the other person looks up and–
“Oh, Eddie! Hi,” Marisol says, brushing a loose strand of hair from her forehead. “Hi, Christopher.”
“Hi!” Chris chirps, polite, and Eddie remembers, vaguely, that Chris had liked her. That they had gone to bookstores together, and out for ice cream and to the beach, that she had always listened intently when Christopher told her about school and movies and books.
“Hey, Marisol,” Eddie says, finally, his thoughts racing.
“How have you been?” she asks.
“Good, good,” Eddie answers, patting Chris’s shoulder. “We’ve been good. How are you?”
Marisol smiles. She’s pretty, still. Warm brown eyes, wavy hair, a lovely lilting voice. Why did Eddie break it off with her again? He can’t remember. “Not bad. I just finished a job renovating a client’s office, so I’ve got some big plans for the weekend.” She gestures to two bottles of wine and a loaf of sourdough in her cart.
“I bet you did an amazing job.” Eddie racks his brain. He’s not doing anything on Sunday, and Chris will be at a friend’s house…. He can’t think of one reason not to say it, and it’s out of his mouth before he can rethink it. “Would you like to get coffee sometime? Sunday?” Chris casts a sidelong glance at him.
Marisol’s head tilts as she looks at him appraisingly. “Yeah… yeah, I’d like that.”
*****
It’s been a slow shift – not the q-word, never the q-word – and Eddie and Buck have been paired up to do inventory for the engine. Normally, it would’ve been a given for them to do inventory together but, well… things have been anything but normal between them since that dinner a few weeks ago. Eddie can’t help but feel as though it’s his fault. Buck’s been more or less his normal self; Eddie, on the other hand, feels like he’s treading in quicksand, too anxious to stay still, and no one is nearby to feed him a branch and pull him out.
So, in short, he’s been avoiding Buck. Which means it comes as a surprise when, between checking off equipment on his clipboard, Buck pauses and says, “Are you bringing Marisol to the reception?”
The reception. Because Maddie and Chimney had gotten married in a hospital, and it had been beautiful, but they still wanted to have a fun celebration, too. So in less than a week the 118 and all of Maddie and Chimney’s closest friends would gather at a botanical garden for a celebration of love.
Eddie almost drops the AED he’s holding. “Sorry?”
“Marisol. Are you inviting her?” Buck doesn’t look up from the clipboard, scrawling something in the margins of the checklist.
Eddie frowns, putting the AED in the engine. He hadn’t even mentioned Marisol to Buck, they’d only gone out a couple of times since meeting again at the grocery store… and yeah, maybe she’d spent the night once or twice, but…a wedding reception? “Uh, no, I wasn’t going to – how did you –”
“Chimney mentioned that you’ve been seeing her again.” Ah. Yeah. Eddie had let it slip to Chim one morning when he walked into the station with a smoothie Marisol had slipped into his hand before his shift.
Eddie peeks at Buck again, but he hasn’t looked up from their list. “Oh. Well, no.”
Buck nods. “I think I’m going to invite Tommy.”
Eddie blanches. “You’re seeing him again?” He turns quickly and fidgets with the jaws of life.
“Yeah.” Buck pauses, opens his mouth, then lets it close. He lets out a breath and Eddie waits, holding his own breath. “I’m… yeah.”
Eddie sticks his hands in his pockets. “Okay.”
*****
The weather is absolutely lovely on Saturday evening. It’s exactly what Maddie and Chimney deserve, after everything they’ve been through. It’s warm with a light breeze, sunny but not too bright. Maddie and Chim themselves could be on the cover of a wedding magazine, and the venue is decked out in hydrangeas and lavenders and dahlias. Jee is wearing her flower girl dress and blowing bubbles on her Uncle Albert’s lap next to the dance floor, and Eddie thinks everything is just about perfect. Just about.
The dance floor itself is packed; Maddie and Chimney sway in the middle, faces close as they smile and whisper to each other. Hen and Karen are nearby, enjoying some time when Denny and Mara can’t possibly be getting into trouble with so many adults around (and Denny and Nia are, in fact, sitting at the table next to Eddie’s, talking to Chris about some new movie). Bobby and Athena are in the corner, laughing as they dance, and Ravi has brought his partner as well, the first time the 118 has officially met them, and the pair spin each other near the DJ’s booth.
But Eddie’s eyes keep straying back to Buck and Tommy, standing out from the other couples sheerly due to their height. Even from a distance, Eddie can see that Buck’s eyes are a little unfocused, maybe from the alcohol he’s already consumed. Every now and then Tommy will lean in and whisper something, and Buck’s mouth will turn up at the corners, but it’s not real. It’s not the smile Eddie knows. And Buck’s hands are gripping Tommy’s shoulders and a thought shoots through Eddie, like a shock, like he’s been dragging socked feet over carpet and he’s just touched a doorknob, that he wants Buck’s hands gripping his shoulders. That he wants Buck smiling at him. But his real smile. That he wants to be the one Buck drives home at the end of the night. The one who kisses him on his doorstep, then smiles, says Stay, and drags him inside. Maybe… maybe it could not matter. Could not matter that he’s a man. Could not matter because… because he’s Buck.
(Or maybe, it’s because he is a man, and because he is Buck. Because. Both.)
He thinks, vaguely, that this should be more of a realization. A lightning bolt instead of static. But then, maybe it makes sense. They’ve already built a family. They’ve already built a home. They’ve already acted like jilted lovers, like grieving spouses.
Maybe it does make sense.
Eddie watches Tommy and Buck dance, and he figures it out.
*****
August rolls around, and Eddie breaks it off with Marisol again. Now that he knows what he knows, that he likes Buck the same way Buck liked him all those months ago, it feels dishonest to lead her on. She leaves with him with a withering glance and some rude words which is honestly deserved, he thinks. Chris just groans when he tells him.
And then Buck’s birthday is fast approaching, August 17th, and Eddie finds out from Hen that Maddie and Bobby are throwing him a party at Maddie and Chimney’s house. It’s not a surprise party, and Buck hasn’t invited Eddie, and again, Eddie figures that’s more or less what he deserves.
But Hen has told him about it, and made it clear that Buck does want him there, so on August 17th, he and Chris, in jeans and button downs, show up to Maddie and Chimney’s with presents and good spirits. Eddie tries not to let his surprise show when Buck approaches them as soon as he walks in the door, giving Chris a hug before he heads off to join Denny, Mara, and Harry.
“Hey,” Eddie starts. Normally, in normal circumstances, before… everything… he’d go in for a hug. He’s not sure if he can now.
“Hey,” Buck says, smiling small.
Eddie smiles back. “Happy birthday.”
“Thanks,” Buck says. He pauses. “I wasn’t sure you’d come.”
Eddie lets out a breath. “Yeah. I…. I’m sorry about that.”
“It’s okay.” Buck shrugs.
Eddie shakes his head. “Don’t do that.”
Buck furrows his brow, and Eddie feels that flash of want again. He tucks his hands deep into his pockets and sighs.
“Don’t forgive me,” he says. “You get to be mad, Buck. You get to be mad at me.”
Buck’s looking at him like he’s grown another head. “You didn’t do anything.”
He’s so wrong that Eddie almost laughs. Instead, he lets out a long breath, rocks up on his toes. “I did. I really did.”
“Okay,” Buck says easily. “Are you going to tell me about it?”
“...Yeah,” Eddie answers. He looks around the living room, the kitchen. Maddie, Athena, and Karen are sipping wine on the couch, Chimney and Bobby are pouring drinks and getting snacks for the kids, Ravi is playing with Jee and a stack of building blocks, and Hen is helping May pull a cake out of a box. Eddie squints. “Where’s Tommy?”
Buck answers slowly. “We broke up.”
“Oh. I’m sorry.” He’s not. He’s really not.
“Don’t be,” Buck shrugs, “I broke up with him, this time.”
“Oh.” Eddie’s cheeks feel warm suddenly, and he fiddles with his sleeve.
“Yeah.”
Eddie feels Buck’s gaze on his face. He looks up to see his blue eyes burning a hole into him. “Uhm. Can we…. can we go outside?”
Buck nods, and follows Eddie onto the front stoop. As soon as he closes the door behind him, Eddie says, “I broke up with Marisol.”
“Oh,” Buck says with a sudden intake of air. “That’s… how are you?”
“I’m gay.”
Buck’s breath hitches. “Eddie…”
“Buck, I’m sorry. I’m sorry and I’m stupid, I made a–”
“Eddie–”
Eddie’s hands spread out in front of him. “You told me and I freaked out and I wasn’t–”
“Hey–”
“–and I got back with Marisol and it was so stupid of me and it was just some weird, weird attempt to–”
“Eddie–” Buck intones, reaching out and grabbing his hands in his own, and Eddie’s flashing thoughts this time are oh and right and big. “Take a breath. It’s okay.”
Eddie huffs, gripping onto Buck’s hands like a lifeline. “Why aren’t you angry?”
Buck snorts. “I don’t know. I’m just not.” He pauses and bites his lip. “Do you want me to be?”
“I… no, but I feel like you should be?”
Buck rolls his eyes. “I mean, I didn’t love it. It didn’t feel good. Especially the whole Marisol thing. But, Eddie. I can’t expect anything to happen just because I want it to.”
Eddie starts at that, jerking his hands back a little and then immediately sliding them back into Buck’s palms. “You want it to?”
“I– what?” Buck asks.
“What do you want to? Happen, I mean?”
Buck takes a deep breath and Eddie feels him squeeze his hands. “You said you’re gay?”
“Yes.”
“You’re sure?”
“Buck,” Eddie says.
Buck laughs a little wildly.. “Sorry, sorry. I… why Tommy and I took a break in the first place. Because it’s always been you, Eddie. Even before I knew I liked guys. But it took me six years to get there. And, like, four near deaths between us. So how can I be mad that you didn’t get there in thirty seconds?”
“It’s always been me,” Eddie breathes. And yeah. It does make sense.
“Yeah,” Buck says, smiling shyly. Eddie wants to kiss that smile. Eddie wants to kiss him. He can feel his hands starting to sweat.
So he says: “You, too.”
Buck’s eyebrows shoot up. “Yeah?”
Confident: “Yeah.”
“Okay.”
Eddie laughs. “Okay?”
“Yeah. No. I mean. Good. Great, even.”
Eddie likes him. Maybe even…. “Can I… Can I kiss you?”
Buck doesn’t blink. “Yes.”
And when Eddie leans in, Buck leans in, and Eddie doesn’t know how it took either of them six years or thirty seconds or four near deaths to get here or countless movie nights. It shouldn’t have taken them any time. Because nothing has ever felt more right, or more safe, than the feeling of Buck’s lips on his. And when Buck’s tongue darts out to press into Eddie’s lips and Eddie gently pushes Buck back and says, “We’re on the front porch,” and Buck giggles, Eddie thinks that this is how everything should be.