Chapter Text
“You’re exhausting…we all have our own problems but you don’t see us whining about it. No, somehow we just manage to suck it up. Why can’t you?”
It was the only thing the Buck could think about as he watched the rest of the 118 deal with the mess unfolding in the parking lot, and slowly made his way back to the Jeep. He sat in the car for a moment watching Eddie and Lena work together as a team to get the Prius off of the spewing column of water erupting from the hydrant. They worked completely in sync as they carefully moved the car forward and worked to cap the flow of water coming from the hydrant.
Ever since he’s walked into the station and seen Bosko’s name taped over his, Buck had known that the rest of the 118 had been a lot less focused on his mission to return than Buck had been. But seeing their teamwork in action, Buck knew his place had been filled.
They didn’t need him.
Maybe they didn’t even want him.
After all, he was exhausting.
It wasn’t like Buck hadn’t considered the premise before. If anything, his whole life had been a cycle of people reminding him of the fact. His parents had certainly never missed an opportunity to berate him for every small mistake he’d ever had the misfortune to make. Hell, even some of the people in the 118 had called him out for his overexcitement and info-dumping during the late hours of a shift when everyone else was just looking for a moment to rest between calls.
But Buck had never expected it from Eddie.
The man he slowly but surely had been falling in love with for the past year. The man who had invited Buck into his home, into his son’s life and had taken up every empty space in Buck’s brain since the moment they met.
Eddie had always shown such patience with Buck. Even when Buck knew that he was being annoying with his exhaustive explanations of his latest internet deep-dive, or in moments where he had more energy than he knew what to do with. Eddie would simply give him a small amused smile or a breathless laugh that would give Buck a warm feeling in his chest and eliminate any of the self-consciousness hiding in the back of his brain.
But this time, Buck was only left with a cold numbing feeling in his heart and his stomach. Is this truly what Eddie had thought of him all this time? This whole year, had his best friend really seen him as an exhausting burden so focused on his own problems, that he couldn’t see the things bothering the rest of his team?
Buck had long prided himself on his ability to provide support to those he loved. When Bobby had asked him and Hen for their help with his sobriety, he’d tried his best to be there for the man. When Maddie had come to LA, he’d tried his best to keep her safe from Doug (even if in the end, he hadn’t fully succeeded). When Eddie had first joined the 118, he’d introduced him to Carla in an attempt to help the man find a balance between work and caring for Christopher. He’d always tried his best to be there for them all.
But maybe, with everything that had happened to Buck in the past few months, first with his leg and then with the blood clots and finally the tsunami, he hadn’t been the supportive friend he’d always claimed to be. He knew the ladder-truck situation hadn’t been easy mentally on any of the 118, and to have all of them watch him nearly die on Bobby and Athena’s back patio only a few months later, he should’ve done more to check in on them, support them and let them know that he was okay.
And the tsunami…
Buck remembered what Eddie had said to him, how he had reassured Buck of his trust in him. But what if he hadn’t meant it? Clearly he’d been holding a lot of the truth in when it came to Buck. So what if the tsunami was the same? Maybe Eddie didn’t trust him after all.
Maybe Eddie was right. Buck had allowed his own issues to ruin everything. He hadn’t been there for Eddie. He hadn’t been there for Christopher. And given how close he looked to making the grocery store fight physical, Eddie would probably never want to speak to Buck again.
So Buck made a choice.
He shifted the Jeep into gear, gave his team one final glance, and as he made his way out of the parking lot, he made a left towards the office of Chase Mackey. There was one last thing he could do to make it up to the members of the 118 that he’d let down. He would drop the lawsuit, and then none of them would ever have to deal with him again.
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After their argument at the grocery store, Eddie had honestly expected Buck to show up on his doorstep asking to talk. It was the kind of thing he would’ve done before the lawsuit, not wanting to leave things awkward between the two of them.
But that hadn’t happened. In fact, Eddie hadn’t heard anything from or about Buck until his next shift three days later when Bobby broke the news to the whole team that the lawsuit had been dropped and Buck had chosen not to return to the LAFD.
Eddie had felt his heart drop into his stomach.
He knew the things he had said to Buck at the store had been harsh. And for the most part, untrue. He hadn’t meant to throw his own baggage onto his friend, but Eddie had been angry… angry at Buck, but also angry at himself, at Shannon, and every other godforsaken thing that he’d been through over the previous months.
It hadn’t been fair to Buck to say any of those things. He wasn’t exhausting… he was… easy. Knowing Buck was like breathing fresh air every time he entered a room. From the moment he and Buck had gotten past the initial tension of that first shift, they’d practically been attached at the hip - earning more than a little teasing from the rest of the 118. Buck had been the one to help him find support to care for Christopher, the one to listen to him talk through his complicated feelings surrounding Shannon’s return, and even the one to comfort him in the moments where his grief became overwhelming after her death. He’d saved his son’s life during the tsunami and had held onto the burden of nearly losing the boy even despite Eddie’s continuous protests that it hadn’t been his fault.
Buck was everything to both Eddie and his son, and he had just screwed everything up.
Throughout that shift, Eddie sent nearly 20 texts to his best friend, demanding an answer - first to know why he had dropped the case, then to demand why he was leaving the department, and finally, after no response from Buck, to beg that Buck at least tell him that he was alright. Eddie was worried that the abrupt shift in Buck’s actions was a marker of something much worse.
That final text did receive a response from Buck. A very simple response.
I’m okay I promise. You don’t have to worry about me anymore. It’s time for me to move onto the next thing. Please don’t contact me anymore. I need to do this on my own.
I’m going to coordinate with Carla to still have occasional contact with Christopher if that's alright with you. Maybe try and set up a phone call or hangout every now and then when she’s watching him just to check in. He shouldn’t have to suffer just because of our differences. If you have any issues with that plan, let Carla know and she can communicate that to me.
That was all Eddie got. The minute he got off shift, Eddie tried to call him, but none of his calls got through. Either Buck had turned his phone off or he had blocked Eddie’s number. Eddie panicked. In his moment of panic, he called Maddie. Her response to his question was even shorter than Buck’s text.
In a cold voice (Buck or Chimney must have told her what he’d said in the grocery store), Maddie simply said, “He’s safe. He was just here and he’s okay. He just doesn’t wanna put in the effort to be somewhere where he’s so clearly not wanted. I’m sure you can respect that. He’s ready to move on, and now you have to be as well. You owe him that much.”
And as she hung up, Eddie felt his world collapsing.