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Getting home after a long shift used to mean eating some food quick before falling face first into bed and sleeping for twelve hours. Especially during the craziness of the holiday season. But now he has Tommy. It's not just their first Christmas as a couple, it's their first Christmas together but their first Christmas living together. And after several weeks of their shifts and days off refusing to line up they finally have a day to decorate and go Christmas shopping.
There was Christmas music playing softly in the kitchen where he found Tommy sitting with a stack of cards, and an address book. His boyfriend was hunched over writing when he bent over kissing the top of his head wishing him a good morning.
"Mmm, morning. I got fresh coffee in the pot for you." Tommy said as he straightened up in his chair, tilting his head back for another kiss which Buck was happy to give him.
"You are a Christmas Angel." He responded, Tommy was laughing with that scrunchy smile that Buck loves so much shaking his head fondly. "What are doing?" He asks, pouring himself a cup of coffee so good it didn't need anything added to it.
"Writing Christmas cards." Tommy said it so easily, but it still made Buck pause.
"You know they make e-cards now right, old man." He teased taking a seat next to Tommy looking at what he was writing. Tommy rolled his eyes leaning over pecking a kiss against his cheek.
"Haha. Yes I'm aware, but they are cold and impersonal and I hate them." Buck hummed thoughtfully, he loves this part of Tommy who loves maintaining traditions that might be outdated, his passion for preserving antique furniture, restoring old homes and cars. That Tommy doesn't throw things away just because they need some work and elbow grease.
"Who do you send cards to?" He asks out of curiosity moving his chair in closer to Tommy's resting his head on Tommy’s muscular shoulder. He'd only ever sent cards to Maddie, well post cards, but they are still cards so they still count. Before landing in LA and the 118, Maddie was the only person important enough to him to keep trying, keep reaching out, making sure she knew where he was and that he was safe.
He thinks of the last post card. He'd bought some cheesy Christmas postcard of the LA skyline, Hen had seen him writing to Maddie before the toy drive asking about who he was writing too. It was only a few days later Hen had presented him with a custom postcard with a picture of himself with a teddy bear in his uniform which Hen had taken at the toy drive. Hen had told him his sister deserved a better Christmas card from him. Hen, of course, was right. He has never had to send Maddie a post card after that because she finally knew she had a place to run too.
"Mmmm, my Aunties and Scott, guys I served with, Eli Cobb who Howie and I used to work with, Sal and Lucy, Sal's Nona, Alma and Lupe who used to babysit me when I was a kid, Chimney." Buck couldn't help the smile stretching across his face.
"You have Aunts?" He asks looking down at the cards with that had some beautiful print of some sort of painting of a Victorian Christmas scene.
"Aunties, yeah. They were my mom's best friends. They helped raise me. Auntie Nikki was like a second mom to me." Evan hums, not wanting to make a big deal about the way Tommy had just peeled back another layer of his childhood. He doesn't ask about them, he knows Tommy will tell him when he's ready.
"Tell me about Eli." Is what he says instead watching Tommy finish writing a note in the card. "The way Chimney talks about him he sounds like the love child of Yoda and the patron saint of first responders." He notices the way Tommy signs ever card while Tommy continues smiling and laughing. He hopes that next year they'll be signing the cards side by side next Christmas.
With Love,
Tommy Kinard and Evan Buckley