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Buck makes it almost to the end of his first shift under Gerrard before getting written up. It’s an honest-to-god miracle that he makes it that long.
“Try not to take anything he says personally,” Hen tells the A-shift in a huddle after Gerrard’s arrival, after they’ve scrambled and freaked out and finally reached a state of resignation that he’s there to stay — for now. After Gerrard slammed himself in Bobby’s office like a smug conquering king.
“He’s going to mean it personally,” Chimney says.
“But you can’t react like it,” Hen insists. “Stay calm. Don’t react. But document everything.” It was what Tilak, their union rep, had said to do.
Buck looks at her helplessly. The small taste he got of Gerrard at the medal ceremony, the stories he’s heard over the years, do not make him hopeful for his ability to keep his mouth shut. If Gerrard says anything racist, misogynistic or homophobic to any of Buck’s family, he doesn’t think he can be held accountable for his actions.
Except that, the last thing Bobby said before he left to call the fire chief — after he said quietly, “I’m so sorry, everyone. I’m going to see if I can fix this — but this is my fault” — the last thing he said was, “I know it’s going to be hard not to be reactive to this — this — situation.” He gestured around the firehouse. “But do not get fired. I need there to be a 118 to come back to. Okay? And even in the middle of this — mess — you’re the best team of first responders I’ve ever worked with. Don’t let anyone take that away from you.”
Now Hen continues, “Tilak says Gerrard took every sensitivity training class that the city offers.” She rolls her eyes. “He’s reformed.”
“Believe it when I see it,” Chim mutters. “And even then, I probably wouldn’t believe it.”
And Buck is just — floundering.
Three things you’re grateful for, Dr. Copeland’s voice says in his brain. When things seem overwhelming or out of control, pause and think of three things you’re grateful for.
Buck looks around. His eyes land on the locker room. Bobby’s locker. Okay. Thing one. Bobby is okay. His return to the 118 is on hold for now, but he’s okay.
Thing two. Tomorrow, Buck remembers. He has a date with Tommy tomorrow. A redo of their ill-fated movie date. Buck is hoping for Twisters or Inside Out 2. Tommy says he’s happy seeing whatever Buck wants to see, but Buck can’t decide.
(Buck, Chris and Eddie watched the first Inside Out together a couple years ago, so it honestly might feel like a betrayal to see the second one without Chris. Even if he’s hundreds of miles away and probably too busy thinking about Eddie’s big-scale betrayal to care about what movies they watch without him.)
(They all cried, though — a real bonding experience, even for three people who were already bonded for life.)
(Is Twisters kind of a busman’s holiday for two first responders? Not really romantic date material?)
Okay, no, this is not calming him down.
Thing three. Thing three.
Gerrard sticks his head over the loft railing and yells down at them. “Hey! I know Nash used to let you socialize, but you’re not here to gossip with your friends. Less talking, more working.”
Next to him, Eddie sighs. And, yep. That sums it up. There is no thing three. This is a disaster. First Chris, now Gerrard — things have taken a nosedive in the past forty-eight hours. This is bullshit. Buck is going to snap.
“Okay,” he says. His heart is thrumming in his throat the way it always does when he wants to yell at someone. “Be right back.”
“Where are you going?” Chimney calls after him.
“Supply closet. Gotta get something.”
He returns a few minutes later with five clipboards, each holding a photocopy of an incident report form. Date. Time. Location. Description of incident. Employees involved. At the top, where it said “LAFD Incident Report,” Buck crossed out “Incident” and replaced it with “Gerrard.”
Buck hands a clipboard each to Hen, Chimney, Ravi and Eddie, and keeps one for himself. The rage is flowing through his veins and coming out his pores in the form of paperwork and Bic pens.
“Oh, fuck,” Ravi says. “Clipboard Buck.”
Hen and Chim smirk at each other.
“Fuck yeah,” Hen says. “Use your powers for good for once, Buckaroo.”
“For once!” Buck cries, offended. He turns to make eye contact with Eddie, who can always be counted on to smile at Buck’s micromanaging alter-ego, but Eddie isn’t even looking at him. He’s holding the clipboard and pen loosely, staring off into the distance.
Buck’s stomach swoops uncomfortably. Any time he lets his mind wander back to the day Chris left, his brain bounces off the memory. It’s untouchable, that’s how bad it hurts to remember. But Buck knows that Eddie lives there now. All the time.
(The worst memory, that Buck only revisits in glancing blows — the front door closing behind Chris. Buck’s hand squeezing Eddie’s shoulder because there were no words to make this moment, this situation, even one inch better. The sound of the cab pulling away. The quiet. Eddie shrugging his hand off, walking stiffly to his bedroom, closing the door. The sound — muffled — the kind of crying that hurts your throat, your neck, your chest, your stomach. Buck standing frozen in Eddie’s living room, unable to sit down or relax, or leave this disaster scene of a house.)
“Hey,” Buck says now, tapping his clipboard against Eddie’s. “This sucks.” He gestures up to the loft and Bobby’s (Gerrard’s? Ugh.) office. “But it’s going to be okay. Just gotta report everything.”
“Everything!” Chimney exclaims as he walks past.
“Every microaggression,” Hen reinforces as she follows Chimney over to the ambulance to check their supplies.
“By the book,” Buck says. He hesitates. “By the Buck.”
Eddie finally flicks his eyes to Buck. The corner of his mouth curls up the tiniest bit, like smirking is a reflex.
The bell goes.
*
Buck is the only one who actually brings his incident-report clipboard on the call, and — duh — it turns out that there is no time or space to fill out an incident report form when they’re out in the field. He ends up stuffing the thing under his seat, though he does make a voice note on his phone about the way Gerrard ignored Hen’s assertion that they needed to move the older man first, now, God damn it!
“Wilson,” Gerrard actually said at the actual scene in front of actual trauma victims. “You flunk out of medical school and suddenly you think you know better?”
Hen is a superhero who somehow let that roll off her back. She ignored Gerrard’s orders, backed up by Chim, of course. They saved the guy’s life and both ended up with verbal warnings. Hen rolled her eyes.
Once they’re back at the firehouse, Ravi dings everyone’s phones with a text to the all-staff (minus Gerrard) group. Buck opens it and immediately sees his face moving in jerky slow motion. It’s a fucking GIF set. Of Clipboard Buck.
Buck scrolls and sees:
Buck during the blackout, tapping his portable-charger inventory checklist. (He can’t believe that taking a video of this is what Ravi used his precious once-per-twenty-four-hours charge for.)
Buck moving his pen from the store cupboard shelf to his inventory sheet and back again, back and forth, in an admittedly comical sort of dance.
Buck balancing a clipboard on his head. (What the fuck, he definitely wouldn’t have done that if he’d realized Ravi was filming him.)
“Probie,” Buck calls across the firehouse, even though Ravi hasn’t been a probie for at least two years at this point.
“Me?” asks Grifferson, actual current probie.
“No, no,” Buck says impatiently, waving her aside. “Ravi!”
Ravi pops up from one of the couches in the loft. He is in the middle of typing into his phone. “Oh. Hi, Buck.”
Buck’s phone pings. It’s a series of messages from Ravi to accompany the GIFs.
Just a reminder to record anything objectionable that the interim cap does or syas
*says
get an incident report form from buck
Buck stops in front of where Ravi has sat back down on the couch. Ravi looks wary. Buck actually watches him lock his phone and stuff it under his leg — like Buck is going to confiscate it or something.
“Did you just make a GIF set of me? Like, since we got back from that call?” Buck refrains from putting his hands on his hips, barely.
“Um. No.” Ravi laughs. He sounds more mocking, less terrified than he used to. Ahh, nostalgia. “I made it last year. For the B-shift WhatsApp group.”
Buck takes a minute to digest the fact that Ravi apparently routinely mocks him when texting his B-shift buddies. He considers yelling at Ravi, but — wow, who has the energy?
“You adorable Gen Z probie with your suspicious amounts of free time,” Buck settles for saying.
Ravi has the nerve to look offended. “What? No, I just don’t have kids and spouses like you guys all do!”
“You know I don’t have a kid, right?” Buck asks. “Or a spouse.”
“Yeah, okay,” Ravi says.
The door to Gerrard’s office opens and Buck makes an immediate retreat, practically running down the stairs. He hears Gerrard yell out in his special way (old bigot shouting at first responders), “Okay, who’s buying lunch?”
Buck sprints into the changeroom, then sits on the bench to text Chris.
Chris still isn’t responding to Eddie’s texts. He’ll sometimes thumbs-up or heart Buck’s texts, though. Which is something.
Buck downloads the goddamn GIF set and sends it to Chris.
Ravi turned me into a meme
A few seconds later, Buck gets back, did you and dad plan this?
Buck is so surprised to get actual words from Chris that he almost drops his phone.
What
?
No response.
He goes in search of Eddie, who is vacuuming the fire engine seats. One of those jobs that you only do if you’re avoiding everyone, which — fair enough.
“Hey!” Buck calls.
It takes a few tries to get Eddie to look up. Finally, he kills the vacuum and raises his eyebrow at Buck.
“Look,” Buck says, holding his phone out to Eddie. Eddie takes it and reads the end of Buck’s text thread with Chris.
“Oh,” Eddie says. “Yeah, I sent him the Clipboard Buck thing, too. Thought it would make him laugh.” He hands the phone back to Buck.
Buck feels actual warmth bloom in his chest, then wonders if it’s weird that he finds this so touching. It’s the situation. Any willing communication from Chris is bound to make him emotional.
He shoots back a quick message: no, just great minds thinking alike
Chris sends back an eyeroll emoji, then follows it up with a GIF of a beaver gnawing on a wooden clipboard.
It’s something.
*
It’s twenty minutes till the end of their twenty-four. Buck is dead tired and seething. It was one of those shifts where it felt like the universe had chosen a theme for them. Today, that theme was hard-to-reach injured people. Buck has abseiled down two different cliffs, climbed the side of a house in Brentwood that was basically 90% glass, jumped a fence, climbed a tree and scaled a drainpipe. (“Okay, Spider-Man,” Eddie yelled up at him bitchily for that last one. 10/10, Buck thinks. Would do again.)
Hen is holding a stack of six Gerrard Incident Report forms from various team members. She’s going to drop them off with Tilak on her way home.
Buck is so ready to go home and faceplant into his bed for a few hours before his movie date with Tommy. He’s nursing a green tea to try to get him through the drive back to his apartment.
Gerrard comes out of the bunk room, yawning obnoxiously. He takes in the scene in the loft. Hen has already concealed the incident reports under her crossword at the table. Chim is eating an apple. Ravi is in the gym. Eddie is slumped next to Buck on the couch, having just returned from his own post-workout shower.
Actually — Buck feels the familiar weight and looks down — yep, Eddie has fallen asleep on his shoulder. His face is relaxed for once. There you are, Buck thinks.
Then Gerrard says, “Eyes up top, Buckley.” What the fuck? “Unless you’re stepping out on your boy Kinard?”
Buck has witnessed Gerrard microaggressioning pretty much everyone in this room over the past twenty-four hours, and this shouldn’t be the thing that gets him. Except. What does he even mean? He is simultaneously being a dick to Buck, Tommy and Eddie. Just — why?
Buck’s blood starts to boil again, and he thinks desperately of the photocopies of the incident form, of the clipboard in his locker, of check marks and Tilak’s advice, and Hen’s plan. Keep your mouth shut, he thinks to himself desperately. Twenty minutes and you can go home. Don’t ruin the plan already.
Then he opens his mouth and says, “Oh my god, shut up, Gerrard.”
Eddie has woken up by this point and is sitting up, stiff, next to Buck.
“Hey!” Gerrard says. “Watch your mouth. That’s Captain Gerrard.” He smirks, and maybe, just maybe he would have left it there, except then Eddie laughs.
A terrible mocking laugh. Music to Buck’s ears. He laughs and says, “Not from where I’m sitting.”
*
They both end up with write-ups, black clouds of injustice following them to the locker room after they clock out.
Buck is back in his street clothes, filling out one last incident report against his locker door, when Eddie speaks up from the bench.
“Sorry for making that whole thing worse back there,” he says. He sounds so tired.
Buck looks him over. His end-of-shift stubble, his unstyled hair. The pinch of his eyebrows. His light brown eyes.
“Nah,” Buck says, as he signs his name at the bottom of the form. “Thanks for having my back.”
A small smile breaks out over Eddie’s face.
There you are, Buck thinks again.
“Hey,” he says, grabbing his bag and heading toward the door. “Trying to pick a movie to see with Tommy later. Twisters or Inside Out 2?”
“Depends,” Eddie replies. “How comfortable are you crying in front of Tommy?”
“Right,” Buck says. The warm feeling is back. He feels known. “Twisters it is.”