Work Text:
So maybe while I'm not together, I can feel like I'm not alone.
"Joy" - Against Me!
It’s not until after they’ve silently finished their first beers that Eddie gets up from the couch, turning down the music a little before disappearing down the hall toward his bedroom. Buck watches him go with a detached sort of focus, then heaves a sigh and rubs a hand over his face. A moment later, Eddie reappears in a pair of grey sweatpants and a worn out LAFD long sleeve shirt, and it’s only seeing his current clothes that Buck truly grasps what Eddie had been wearing before. He thinks about saying something, but… he doesn’t really want to talk. Well, he does , but he… he blinks a slow blink and looks around Eddie’s living room, as familiar as his own. Talking wouldn’t be so bad, he guesses. It’s the thinking that’s really doing him in. The thing that pushed him out of his empty loft, quiet except for the deafening ringing of Tommy’s words.
[I know how this ends.]
You don’t know me, Buck thinks, a touch bitterly, and shies away from the thought immediately; he doesn’t like the shape of things he can sense lurching around just behind it.
He looks instead toward the threshold of Eddie’s living room, where Eddie is standing looking like he’s just asked him a question. Buck frowns at him a little, ready to ask him to repeat it, but Eddie just flaps both hands at him in a ‘don’t worry about it’ sort of gesture, and disappears from sight again into the kitchen. He's gone long enough that Buck heaves another sigh, one that feels like it comes from his thighs, and kicks his shoes off. He takes his jacket off too, tosses it onto a nearby chair, and turns his attention to the beer in his hand. He wishes he could take his head off, just for a bit. It's too heavy. Or maybe it's his body that's too heavy, too cumbersome to drag around. He wants to be something light--a breeze or a spark or a song. Something that weighs nothing. Something you could bottle and save for later, when everything feels a little less sharp.
He breathes in deep again, catches himself, lets out a little laugh completely lacking in joy instead. He's already getting annoyed with his own sighs. The song changes and he can't help but smile, just for a second. He recognizes the playlist--one full of classic rock songs he'd made for a barbecue Eddie had thrown last summer. And while the Doobie Brothers encourage him to listen to the music, he feels himself relax, just a little. It's warm here, not just the temperature but the light, the sounds, the pictures on the mantle. He can feel the warmth creeping into the numbness that'd settled into him when Tommy walked out of his door, the way it inches back into your fingers and toes after you've spent hours in the snow. He was right to come here. Not that he'd questioned it for one second but, it was nice to be reassured anyway.
When Eddie comes back, he's carrying a couple of plates, which he sets down on the coffee table. It's nothing fancy, just some cubes of cheese, cashews, strawberries, those little salamis you see at parties. Buck blinks at them, then throws a half smile at Eddie. He isn't hungry, but Eddie knows that. This isn't meant to feed him as much as it's meant to give him something to do with his hands, an excuse not to talk if he doesn't want to, a companion to the beer to keep him from getting too drunk too quickly. He thought of everything, and that thought squeezes Buck’s heart just a little, and the warmth tingles a little ways up his arms. Eddie settles back down on the couch, opens up two more beers, and hands one to Buck. “There are more in the fridge, and harder stuff in the cabinet if we need it,” he says. The first thing he's said since Buck showed up. At least--the first thing Buck's heard him say.
Buck nods, takes the beer, picks up a cube of cheese and just kind of hangs out with it for a minute. He tries to pick one feeling and pin it down, but they're slippery, fighting for position at the top, and he doesn't really want to hold them anyway, but maybe if he can look at one directly the others will settle down a little.
Because… it's not just that Tommy broke up with him. That sucks, obviously. Especially considering he can’t help but feel it was his fault. He'd thought things were going really well. Well… no. He told himself things were going really well. He was willing himself to believe that things were going really well, and Tommy seemed happy, and he was happy that Tommy was happy. But it turns out... He wasn't? Or… he was, but, he also knew things weren't going to last? But focusing on this one thought seems to set off a chain reaction, lights flickering on down the dark warehouse of his brain, illuminating thoughts he'd hoped to leave packed up in boxes. Maybe forever.
Like--why couldn't Tommy have just talked to him. And, why did he get to decide the way things went? Buck is older now, changed, experienced. More mature. He’s learned things about communication, about boundaries. This wasn't some high school relationship, this was… It was way more real… right?
Was it? comes a thought, suddenly in sharp relief as the fluorescent bulb above it hums to life. He wanted it to be, but there was a nagging, gnawing doubt. Cuz this feels pretty familiar. And as much as he hates the thought, he has to admit it’s true. It was different in a lot of ways but… in so many ways, it felt like Taylor all over again. And not just the initials, which Buck is just now realizing are the same. Well fuck, throw that on the pile, why not. And it was his fault. He’d asked too soon, just like he had with Taylor, because he was panicking about something else. And just like Taylor, he hadn’t really realized that at the time. But the Abby thing had freaked him out. And it didn’t feel the same because he hadn’t done anything wrong with Abby, not like he had with Lucy, but it still made him panic just a bit. Put a ding in the glow that seemed to surround Tommy Kinnard whenever Buck looked at him, so bright he had to squint sometimes, and that made him want to double down. Because if Tommy wasn’t it, well, then… who could it be? And if Tommy could hurt Abby like that… maybe he wasn’t… maybe he wasn’t flawless? But then Josh had really set him straight, and it all made sense. Of course Tommy hadn’t meant to hurt Abby, not really. He was just trying to survive, do the best he could in a world that didn’t feel as kind and welcoming as the one Buck got to live in. And hell, if it weren’t for Tommy, he wouldn’t have ever met Abby in the first place, and that had been a good lesson for him, eventually. And brought Carla into their lives, and gave Maddie a place to land… it had been good, in the end. Even if it did hurt like hell for a while.
He just wishes… Mostly it’s just that… “I wish he’d just said it was too soon,” Buck grumbles to the cube of cheese growing warm between his fingers.
Eddie raises an eyebrow and looks over at him. It’s clear from his face that he had been prepared, even content, to sit in silence the rest of the night, if that was what Buck needed. Buck loves him for that. He knows Eddie is going through his own things, with Christopher being gone and how weird it had been to have Gerard around and whatever was going on with the mustache. Which… he realizes is gone, now. And even through all that Eddie is willing to open his house to Buck, throw some snacks together, sit in amicable silence while Buck looks like the most pathetic lump. Buck will find a way to thank him, later, when he isn’t busy wallowing. He takes another deep breath, allowing himself another self-indulgent heavy sigh, relishing in the feeling of his lungs stretching to their full capacity. He takes a drink of his beer, and shrugs. “Tommy broke up with me.”
Eddie nods. “I figured that was the case. If anyone but you was hurt, you’d have been a lot more panicked and talkative.”
Buck raises his eyebrows and nods once. He would be annoyed at being read so easily except that it actually feels nice, to be known, to be understood. Because he was starting to feel like… Well, now that he’s started talking, he might as well keep putting his thoughts out there.
“Sometimes I feel like he didn’t really know me. A-and I know it takes a while to get to know people, I’m not expecting him to know everything about me after only six months but…” He can't help it. The lights are on, the boxes are open, and the shuffling things are creeping slowly into view. “He just… I never felt like he took me seriously. I do think he liked me, but… I think the me that he liked was a… a different version of me.”
Eddie nods, rubbing his upper lip. He looks back over at Buck, his face open and encouraging. Buck is going to talk for a while, he can feel it, now that he’s opened the door, and Eddie is ready to listen. Buck loves him for that, too.
“I asked him to move in with me,” Buck explains. His thoughts are even more slippery than before, now that they’re getting attention, but he feels that he could at least try to explain the situation to Eddie. “And he said… he said that he couldn’t do that because he knew how it was going to end, and that he was going to get his heart broken. And then he left.” Buck shifts in his seat, resting his right arm across the back of the couch, bringing his hands up to help demonstrate his feelings, the room temperature cheese cube all but forgotten between his fingers. “And like, maybe it was too soon. I think the whole Abby thing freaked me out way more than I let myself admit, and I did also kind of drop it on him. The thing about Abby I mean. But… I was prepared for him to say no. I mean, obviously I hoped he would say yes, but I knew that him saying no was a possibility. I just wasn’t prepared for him to just… decide it was over. He just said… that he was my first, but he wasn’t going to be my last.”
Eddie frowns, his beer halfway to his face. “Why can’t they be the same?” he asks.
Buck raises his hands an inch or two, leaning toward Eddie in his enthusiasm. “That’s what I said! I know this is my first relationship with a man but that doesn’t mean it’s my first relationship ever. I just don’t know why it couldn’t have been a conversation. He just… decided.” He sits back, takes a drink, finally remembers the cheese cube and eats it, washing it down with another drink while he thinks. “But… I’m starting to realize that’s kind of how he handled everything. Like… like he knew what was best and I didn’t know anything. I mean, the way he talked about everything he kind of… made me feel like a stupid little kid, sometimes. I mean, sometimes it was nice, you know, I liked that he was sarcastic and confident but… I don’t know, sometimes I felt so… dismissed.” He takes a deep breath. “I don’t know if he ever really listened to me. I mean… do you know what he got me for our six month anniversary? Lakers tickets,” he says, leaning forward so far it scrunches up his shoulders.
Eddie glances over at him quickly once, twice, both eyebrows raised, then composes himself a bit, turning to match Buck’s posture more, back squished into the corner of the couch, one arm on the back of the couch, one foot still on the floor. “But you hate basketball.”
“Now more than ever,” Buck grumbles, then reaches out and takes a strawberry, still slightly wet from being freshly washed, the green top cut off. It’s so sweet it almost makes his eyes water, and he’s grateful for the distraction from his own dumb comment. He hopes it didn’t hurt Eddie’s feelings--Eddie had readily accepted his apology regarding The Game, as it was cataloged in Buck’s mind, but he still felt embarrassed by it. A thought slithers to the forefront and writhes on top of all the others, one he hadn’t considered before. Embarrassed. Competing with the anger and the sadness and the confusion is just a profound sense of embarrassment. That he’d fumbled this so badly, but also that he is so upset about it, when it was starting to feel like he and Tommy were in two different relationships. Embarrassment at his own eagerness, his willingness to overlook the things he didn’t like about Tommy to appease that repeating chorus in his brain, it’s fine it’s fine it’ll be fine. “Just feels like something he’d gotten because he wanted to go. Like I was his excuse for buying them for himself.”
Eddie nods, in a side to side sort of way Buck reads not as total agreement so much as a concession that that could be the reason. That he isn't totally off base. It’s reassuring, at least, that Eddie isn’t arguing. Isn’t telling him he’s delusional. He finishes his second beer, reaching for the last two in the six pack he’d brought. He doesn’t want to talk anymore, not for a little while anyway. He’s tired of crying about it tonight, and he’s not as worried he’s going to spiral and do something really silly, like, call Tommy. He can’t imagine that begging would really improve Tommy’s perception of him as a mature adult.
He hands the beer to Eddie, who takes it and holds it while he finishes his second, then cracks open the third. “Well. I don’t know what to say except that really sucks, and I agree with you that it at least could have been a conversation. But, if he’s not willing to talk about it, then… it’s probably better to find that out sooner rather than later. Even if it hurts. But for what it's worth I think he's an idiot.”
Buck nods. It’s all he can do. After a few moments of silence, he rubs a hand through his hair and says, “Anyway, you want some Lakers tickets?”
Eddie laughs. “No, no that’s--” He stops, scrunching up his nose and naked top lip before raising his eyebrows as if to say, ‘well…’ Buck watches the thoughts play across his face for a moment, glad he isn’t the only one apparently battling with his own brain. Eddie finally takes a deep breath, turning his eyes to the ceiling for a second, looking a little… chastised, almost? Buck chews on the other half of his strawberry absentmindedly, waiting for Eddie to come to the conclusion of whatever conversation he’s having. “Maybe,” he says, finally. “I would… maybe I could buy them from you?”
Buck laughs, and is surprised to find it’s not totally forced. “No way, I didn’t even pay for them. And you like basketball, you should go and enjoy it. Do something fun for yourself.”
Eddie nods again. “Yeah, that’s what people keep telling me.” He glances over at Buck’s raised eyebrow and sighs. “I went to confession the other day and the priest told me I should… do more things that bring me joy. Wanted me to do something ‘frivolous,’” he says, bringing his beer to his mouth, and Buck hears the slight edge of disdain in his voice, but he also sees the smile tugging at the corner of his best friend’s lips. “Hence the Risky Business situation you walked into,” Eddie says, gesturing to his legs even though he’s currently wearing pants.
Buck smiles, and it manages to feel real. “Ah, so that’s what that was.”
“Yeah,” Eddie says, but the hint of disdain is gone, and he is smiling too. “So, maybe a Lakers game would be good. I have no idea who I’d go with though. I mean… the only person who I could think would want to go is…” He doesn’t have to finish his thought.
“Yeah,” Buck says, and drains half his beer.
“Why don’t we go together?” Eddie says, and weathers Buck’s ‘are you joking’ face with another side to side shake of his head. “I know, I know. You hate basketball. But, I mean. You like hanging out with me, right? So we could probably--”
“Yeah, let’s do it.”
Eddie turns his head fully toward Buck, surprised. “Really? Because I have like four more arguments ready to go.”
“No… I’ll go. We haven’t really gotten to do anything together in a while, just the two of us. It sounds nice.” He doesn’t mention Tommy's little quip about taking Eddie instead of him at their anniversary date. Hasn’t really thought about it since then, and certainly isn’t up to examining the initial thought that had flashed through his brain--
[ That might make it actually bearable ]
--those things could wait. But he has the tickets, and Eddie would have a good time, and he sure as shit isn’t going to give them back to Tommy, childish as it may be. They’re his anniversary present, and even if he had ruined everything by being impulsive, they are sitting on his kitchen counter, and Eddie looks genuinely excited about them, even if he had tried to hide it. So they’d go, and it would be fun, or it would be miserable, but either way he wouldn’t die, and he could just eat his weight in hot dogs, or whatever they served at basketball games.
“Cool,” Eddie says, and it looks like he might want to say more, but he doesn’t. He just reaches out and puts a hand on Buck’s shoulder, giving it a little squeeze.
“Hey…Thank you,” Buck says, raising his beer bottle to Eddie. He doesn’t say for what, because it would take all night to list everything, but… Eddie knows. He touches the neck of his beer bottle to Buck’s, a gentle clink, before they both settle back into the couch, both noticeably more comfortable than they were when Buck first arrived.
“Literally any time,” Eddie says, and Buck knows he means it. And he loves him for that, too.
----------------
The game is miserable, at least at first. Buck has forgotten how much worse the sound of sneakers on the court is in person, and it was already his least favorite part. Plus, he can’t stop thinking about the fact that he was supposed to be here with Tommy. And even though thinking about him hurts less than it did, it definitely still hurts. He feels… conflicted, is a good word. Upset because he’s not there with his boyfriend, but also upset because he’s there at all. He doesn’t sulk, not exactly, but something close to it.
But it doesn’t last. Eddie pays for hot dogs and beer, which Buck thinks is ridiculous because he didn’t have to spend any money on the tickets, but he doesn’t argue much. He goes and gets them so Eddie doesn’t have to miss anything, and by the end of the first quarter, he’s feeling a lot better. For one thing, it’s hard to be around so many people having a good time and stay in a bad mood. For another, the game itself is exciting. Buck may not like basketball, but he’s always been able to appreciate watching people being really good at what they do, whatever that is. But the biggest thing pulling him out of his funk is, of course, Eddie.
He’s having the best time. Buck hasn’t seen him this happy, this joyful, in a long time. And he’s glad he could play some part in that, however small. Buck leans forward in his seat a little, asks Eddie a question about a foul, and Eddie turns to him to stare for a second, then grins, answers, leaning closer to Buck to be heard over the crowd, the buzzer, the damn sneakers. And it’s… it’s the way he answers, more than the topic itself, that fills Buck’s heart with a warm syrupy glow. Tommy would have answered, sure, but his answers always had a snappy, sarcastic brevity to them. Like he couldn’t take anything seriously. Like he always had to be the smartest guy in the room. Eddie answers with no judgment, no tone at all except excitement to share something he likes. He elaborates without being prompted, anticipates follow-up questions, and doesn’t make Buck feel stupid about it at all.
Buck leans back in his seat, watching Eddie watch the game. He’s ready to turn away in a second if Eddie looks his way, but… he can’t help it. Eddie’s smile is all warmth, his eyes are sparkling, and even when the game doesn’t go the way he wants, he’s still laughing. And Buck finally lets himself think about the way he felt when Tommy told him he could take Eddie to the game instead of him. He’d been a little confused, but mostly ashamed about the fact that his first thought had been that taking Eddie would have made the game more tolerable, but… he was right. He doesn’t have to worry about saying the wrong thing and getting a sarcastic “Evan,” and an eye roll dusted in a kind of dismissive fondness. He can just… be. Buck stretches an arm across the back of Eddie’s seat, settling in just behind his friend who’s hunched forward, watching the game, and thinks about what Maddie told him the other day. About the universe bringing him a special person, and the thought kicks him square in the chest. Jesus, wait, is he stupid? Because… that’s it, isn’t it. It’s not right for your boyfriend to give you tickets to something and your first thought is ‘hey maybe I can take my best friend.’ It’s not normal to lay on your best friend’s couch, drunk and sad after just getting broken up with, and think about how more than anything you wish he hadn’t gone to bed just yet. And the more he thinks about it, the more pieces seem to fall into place.
Like, sitting at his kitchen counter and telling Eddie that it was a date, he and Tommy were on a date, and he hoped that was okay. And Eddie telling him it didn’t change a thing between them and the brief but white-hot sadness that Buck had felt, that there-and-gone thought that maybe he had wanted it to. Maybe he’d wanted it to change everything. And when he’d told Maddie that he was feeling bad about lying to Eddie about the date and she’d said…that if there was something he needed to tell Eddie, he would. And, okay maybe he really is stupid because there was also Tommy, inching ever closer to him and seconds away from kissing him for the first time and still questioning whether it was his attention Buck had been trying to get.
Buck pushes this thought a little further and it just…slides in there, clicks right into place with an ease that can only come when you stop trying to force something and finally figure out you’ve been trying to put it in upside down this whole time. Not a chest full of butterflies and not at all like being struck by lightning but more like… a sense of coming home. A weight, being taken off of you and set down gently so you can finally relax your shoulders. The comfort and the familiarity and the overwhelming relief of, oh… there you are. He watches the side of Eddie’s face as he watches the game, smiling from ear to ear, and thinks, Here, right here, this whole time.
----------------
It takes about five minutes for the panic to set in. He can’t be in love with his best friend?! Well, he can, he is , but he certainly can’t say anything about it. Eddie likes women, for one thing. And, they work together. And half the time it feels like they live together. If he told him, and things went wrong? He’d have to… well, change fire houses at the very least. And he thinks--knows--he’d rather die than leave the 118. Not to mention that losing Eddie would mean losing Christopher too, and, no, Christopher isn’t his kid, but sometimes he feels like he might as well be. Besides, having Eddie as a friend, and knowing things are good, is worth more than the risk of the potential of something else. The bird in his hand, the one that’s the most solid friendship he’s ever had, and the best work partner he could ever ask for, means so much to him. He’s not willing to risk it for the two flitting around in the proverbial bush, however pretty their plumage might be. He doesn’t even know if they are birds, really. It could be anything, and he’s not willing to loosen his grip on the thing he’s holding even to look.
He slumps down a little in his seat, then excuses himself to the bathroom and another beer run. He needs a minute to himself, away from Eddie’s sparkling eyes and dazzling grin. He must have gone a shade pale because Eddie raises an eyebrow at him, a look that Buck reads as ‘you good?’ without Eddie even having to say anything. He nods and smiles at him, takes the stairs two at a time, heads for the nearest bathroom. He’s not going to panic. He’s not, because… because this metaphorical bird really is beautiful. He is lucky, truly, to have the life and the friends and the family that he does. And… he can love other people. He has before, and he probably will again. But he knows, for the sake of that family and for the sake of this friendship, he’s going to have to do the hardest thing of all, and keep his mouth shut.
----------------
The rest of the game is fine. He tells Eddie he promised he’d watch Jee the next day, which is true, so he stops drinking, but brings Eddie a couple more beers before the night is over. And since the game goes into overtime he’s feeling perfectly okay to drive by the time they shuffle out to his jeep. Eddie’s holding his own, too, though Buck hovers a careful hand just above the small of his back in case he stumbles. They make it to the jeep rather quickly, but the cars leaving the parking lot are crawling, so rather than starting it up, they climb into the front seats and leave the doors open, listening to the sounds of the night and the occasional pointless honk.
“I’m really glad you came out tonight,” Eddie says, turning his face toward Buck, cheeks pink. He doesn’t sound too drunk, except that he’s scrunching up his nose more than usual, which is a pretty tell tale sign, not to mention way chattier. “It would have sucked to come here alone or with a stranger or whatever. I hope it wasn’t too miserable.”
Buck laughs. “No, no it was good. I really… I learned a lot.” Okay even in a crisis he can still be pretty funny, even if he’s the only one who’s aware a joke has occurred. “I’m glad I came out too,” he says, a little more serious, though the double meaning is not lost on him. “It got me away from the oven, for one thing.”
“Is your fridge still full of loaves,” Eddie asks, the sympathy in his tone completely nullified by the grin on his face.
“I’ve moved on to pastries, actually. The loaves weren’t challenging enough anymore. I actually had to stop myself the other day from buying a 25 pound block of butter.” He laughs when Eddie looks over at him, eyebrows to his hairline. “I didn’t get it! But croissants take a lot of butter to get those nice flaky layers.”
“Hey, you keep bringing things into the firehouse to share, I’ll buy you the butter myself,” Eddie says, throwing his hands up. “I’ll just have to do a couple more minutes on the treadmill.”
Buck rolls his eyes, smiling, turning his focus away from Eddie and toward his hands on the steering wheel. “Well, hopefully this is enough of a thank you for letting me come over and wallow on your couch. I get so in my head when I’m alone too long, I mean… I think we both know that.”
“Buck,” Eddie says, dipping his head toward him in a way that says, ‘are you kidding?’ “You don’t have to thank me. You know you’re welcome whenever you need somebody. And honestly, it’s sucked being in that house alone. I know Christopher needs space, but… it’s been so quiet. It was nice to have you there, too. And, great to get out of the house and do something. Especially something I wouldn’t have normally done for myself, so, thank you.”
“You think the priest will count this as you following his advice?”
Eddie thinks this over. “Maybe… I haven’t decided if I’m going to tell him. He was kind of bossy,” Eddie says, scrunching up his nose again.
“Sure, but… I think that’s his job. I mean you did go there looking for advice, right?”
Eddie shifts in his seat, pointing his body toward Buck, getting a little closer as he does. “That’s the thing, I didn’t! Well, okay I did, at the church, I went there to confess and to tell him about Chris and stuff, but then I panicked and just got out of there. Not--” he says, holding up his hands in response to Buck’s worried face, “not the way I was when I was with Ana, not a panic attack. Just regular panic. And… okay maybe it was a little bit of… I don’t know, anyway. A couple days later, when I was at the gym, he was there! Father Brian, I mean. And, I mean I don’t think he followed me but that’s when he told me that he thinks I deny myself joy. And that’s when he told me to do something frivolous. So like, yeah I did ask his advice but he also kind of ambushed me. I didn’t even know who he was at first--I thought he was hitting on me.”
Buck looks over at Eddie, smirking a little despite the fact that part of him wants to jump out of the jeep and run into traffic. “Would that have been so bad?”
Eddie laughs. “Nah, I mean… I told him I wasn’t interested, but. I won’t lie, he is a good looking dude. Like… objectively.” He chuckles, more to himself than to Buck, and Buck’s not sure Eddie is really talking to him anymore. “Can you imagine though, me dating a priest. I mean, priests can’t date. But. I’m just saying, I had a hard enough time with Marisol and she just used to be a nun.” His eyes widen and he shakes his head, and Buck squeezes his hands hard on the steering wheel for a second. He doesn’t want to imagine Eddie dating an ‘objectively good-looking’ priest, actually, thank you.
“But wait--was he hitting on you or wasn’t he? I-I mean you told him you weren’t interested, he must have said something…?”
“Oh he asked me if I ‘went there often,’” Eddie say, quoting the priest’s words with his fingers. “And it was like, I’m gross and sweaty after working out and this hot dude in a button-up asks to sit at my table even though there are a bunch of open ones and then asks if I come here often. What else was I supposed to think?”
Buck leans back in his seat, turning toward Eddie, and can’t help but tease him just a little. “Oh, was he hot?”
Eddie looks up, his curl bouncing across his forehead as he does. “Is that what I said?” Buck nods, and Eddie shrugs. “I mean, yeah I guess he really is. Maybe could use a little muscle but.. you know. Good looking. Obj--”
“Objectively, yeah,” Buck finishes with him. He scratches the side of his face, more for something to do with his hand than anything else, and takes a deep breath. Eddie’s his friend. He can at least tell him… some of the truth. “I’m not gonna lie Eddie, I feel like I’ve heard this before.”
Eddie looks over at him, confusion clear on his
[oh so handsome]
face. “Yeah? From me?”
Buck shakes his head, smiling as he looks down, gathering his words into some semblance of a sentence that doesn’t sound like he’s blaming anyone, or like he’s suddenly the expert on queer awakenings. “No, I mean, from me. Writing off attraction to men as, just something everyone does. And I’m not saying you’re attracted to … Father Brian, I’m just saying… I was doing the same thing myself, it turns out, thinking that all the comparing myself to other men and being able to admit that they were attractive was just me… I don’t know, being confident in my sexuality, I guess. But… turns out there’s a bit of a difference between, ‘yeah he looks good,’ and ‘oh he looks good. ’” He laughs again. “To be fair I didn’t know there was a difference until a man kissed me, so.” Hmm. He’s not sure he meant to bring it up quite like that. And, also, ouch. He didn’t want to think about Tommy right now at all. Though… he did have Tommy to thank for putting him in this situation. Whether that was good or bad… he really didn’t know yet.
Eddie, fortunately, is at least taking it well. “Yeah, I… I never really thought about it much, I guess. It wasn’t, you know, an option for me. Growing up. My father would get mad if I cried, I don’t want to think about what would happen if…” He trails off, then, stares at the dashboard of the jeep for a while, and Buck wonders where he’s gone. He didn’t mean to bring up trauma, that’s for sure. He just mostly was curious about Eddie’s true feelings about this… Brian guy. He couldn’t help but notice that Eddie’s problem with dating him was that he was a priest, not that he was a man. He’s about to ask Eddie if he’s alright, when Eddie looks at him, and his eyes are sparkling again. Or.. shining? They’re bright, and beautiful, beneath the cold white LEDs of the parking lot, but Buck can’t tell if he’s happy or not.
“Do you remember, on one of our first calls together, at that cowboy bar, where that girl got her head stuck in the tailpipe?”
Buck laughs, in spite of himself. “Oh, I remember. Thought someone was going to slip on a puddle, those girls were drooling so much.”
Eddie chuckles, nods, smiles at the memory. Okay, so, he’s not crying. “You asked me if Christopher was really the reason I don’t date.”
Buck is nodding, too, unsure of where Eddie’s going with this. He squeezes the steering wheel again with his left hand and forces himself to relax, to put his hands in his lap. “Yeah, you said it was because they weren’t your type.”
Eddie nods. “Yeah exactly. And, it was true. Still is. The problem is… I know for a fact what my type isn’t. It’s finding out what my type is that’s… proving a lot harder. Like. I loved Shannon. And not just because we had a kid together, she was a really great person and… under better circumstances maybe we could have had a better outcome. And I liked hanging out with Ana, and even Marisol, to an extent. But. I felt like I was trying to force something into a spot where it wasn’t supposed to be, you know? I know the sort of things I’m looking for, but… I think that priest was right. I don’t let myself have the things I want because I can’t forgive myself for the things I’ve done wrong. I’m just trying to hide behind all these other things, my job, my kid, my family problems, to give myself something to do, so I don’t really have to think too hard about the things I want.”
Buck blinks, slow, staring at Eddie for a second too long before ducking his head and clearing his throat. “Uh, w-what sort of things are you looking for?” he asks. He’s not sure he wants to know, but it's the question a best friend would ask. And he has to play the role of best friend to the best of his ability.
Eddie sighs, exasperated, but… maybe there’s a sense of relief, too? Like he’s finally being made to face these things, and Buck hopes it’ll be good for him. Whether or not it tears Buck apart is a different story. “I want… I want someone that I can be comfortable around. Be myself around. Someone who understands my job and isn’t, you know, dazzled by it. I’m not saying I’m this big hero but, sometimes it feels like the job attracts people who are, I don’t know, expecting big things out of me? Like being a firefighter means I can’t screw up in other places, or that because I’m brave about disasters I’m going to be brave about everything. I want someone who knows that--that I can be scared. I meant what I said then, too, that it is different when you have a kid. You have to find someone your kid likes, and Christopher’s had so many people taken from him… he gets attached to these people, you know? So, someone who’s dependable. And someone, obviously, who understands his limitations but doesn’t treat him like he’s breakable, or stupid, or whatever. What I want is someone who’s good for my family.” He takes another deep breath, then throws his hands up in a ‘what are you gonna do’ sort of gesture, before returning them to his thighs.
Buck is watching him, intently, watching the way his eyes are scanning the dashboard when he talks, the way his face is growing warmer, the way he wipes his palms down the legs of his jeans like they’re suddenly clammy. He knows his are. His chest is a butterfly sanctuary, his stomach is pure ice, and he’s having to remind himself to breathe every now and then. He can’t say why it’s all making him so nervous, except that it seems like Eddie is building to something. And Buck won’t allow himself to hope. So he just has to sit, and wait, and see where Eddie takes this.
“But it’s not just Chris. I’m… I can’t lie anymore. To myself, to other people. It has to be easy, it has to be… so in step and comfortable with what is already going on in my life. Someone I can trust. Someone who’ll have my back.”
Buck's eyes have drifted to the dark dashboard, if for no reason than the fact that he’s been staring at Eddie for several straight minutes, but this last remark makes him glance sharply at Eddie again. That could not have been a coincidence… right?
“The crazy thing is,” Eddie is saying, and a smile is tugging at the corner of his lips. “I’ve had it this whole time. I’m just… terrified. Because…” He takes a deep breath, and glances up at the ceiling of the jeep, and maybe he is crying because his eyes are shining so brightly. “Because I screw everything up. And if I let myself truly admit what I want, and I tell you, and you don’t feel the same way, then it’s… there’s no going back from that. And what we have, now, is so important to me, and to my son, and if I screw that up?” He finally looks over at Buck, and raises his hands again in a helpless shrug.
Buck knows that he is staring. He knows that he needs to say something, to move, to reassure Eddie. But all he can do is stare. This has to be a joke, or a dream, or… He swallows, hard, feels the sandpaper grit of his own throat and realizes words… words are not coming. So instead he reaches, stretches his left arm across the jeep and slides it behind Eddie’s ear, pulling Eddie toward him. Eddie moves, willingly, eagerly, toward him, and Buck tangles his fingers in Eddie’s hair as they crash their lips together. Buck can feel Eddie’s hand on his shirt, grabbing and pulling him even closer, the other hand sliding up his chest to his shoulder, that place where Eddie loves to rest his thumb, and past, to his neck, and he wants to cry it’s so right, and that feeling of coming home sets his chest on fire.
They pull away, but not far, and Buck rests his forehead on Eddie’s, and his own eyes are bright and shining and maybe he is going to cry but it’s okay because he’s smiling, and Eddie is smiling, and he never wants to leave this parking lot or this moment or the way they are shaped right now. He breathes again, and finds that he can speak, however rough it might come out. “I can’t believe I’ve been so stupid. It’s you . It’s always been you, Eddie. And I’m sorry it’s taken me so long to figure it out.”
Eddie leans forward, kisses him again, releases his grip on his shirt so he can pull back and really look him in the eyes. “You’re not stupid. You’re perfect. I’m sorry I was too scared to say anything, but--”
Buck shakes his head. “You don’t have to be sorry.”
Eddie smiles, closes his eyes, breathes in, exhales. “Good.” He opens his eyes, looking at Buck, and his smile widens. “Now will you please take me home so we can make out on my couch.”
Buck barks a surprised laugh, and turns and starts the ignition, pulling out of the empty parking lot and tangling his fingers with Eddie’s as he takes them home.