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Eddie wasn’t expecting a Save-the-Date in his mail. It came in May of 2029, in a tumultuous time for him. He was balancing the fact that Chris was about to graduate high school, along with his college plans in the fall slowly becoming more and more real, and the mixed messages from his parents about whether this development meant more work for Eddie (“You’re still responsible for him, Edmundo!”) or he should focus his energy elsewhere (“You’re getting old, maybe you should settle down with someone else”). Anyway, Eddie took one glance at the card, thought to himself that he didn’t really have any friends anymore (unless you counted the parents of Chris’s friends, which Eddie did not), and tossed it to the side, determining that it was likely sent to the wrong address.
He didn’t think about it again until months later, when he’d just returned from tearfully dropping Chris off at Texas A&M, and distracted himself by sorting through all the mail that had piled up in the week he was gone. The feeling of Chris being gone from a home they had made together was all too familiar, and Eddie needed to get rid of it. Except, he only replaced one horrible nostalgia with another, because he hadn’t seen Evan Buckley’s full name in almost five years.
You’re Invited!
Celebrate the Wedding of
Evan Buckley and Jaime Whitaker
February 21st, 2030 - 4:00-9:30 PM
1375 Lennox Ave. Los Angeles, CA
RSVP: ________________ + 1 guest __________
Fuck.
Jaime Whitaker? Why was that familiar? A quick facebook search revealed that no, Eddie hadn’t met this Jaime person, a kind-looking woman with long brown hair and a smile as beautiful as Buck’s. Suddenly, an image flashed into Eddie’s mind of a card thrown onto a table. He frantically stood up and rooted through the pile of mail he always promised he’d sort through at some point until he found the offending bit of cardstock.
There it was, next to the name that Eddie could care less about, below his name that he secretly hated - Eddie wondered if he would take Jaime’s last name or they’d hyphenate, since he could never imagine Buck living his whole life as just a Buckley - Buck’s handwriting.
“Hope you can make it Eddie, let me know Chris’s dorm address, would you?”
It could have been a text. Should have been a text, apparently, because Eddie had nearly thrown out this very important piece of mail. He found himself tracing the curves of Buck’s lettering with his thumb, imagined his estranged friend at the dining room table in the house that once belonged to Eddie - the same place they sat the last time Eddie saw Buck’s handwriting, a signature on the deed to a house that they both considered home.
Eddie hesitated as he ran his thumb along the card, stared at his phone on the counter, Buck’s contact pulled up, and he didn’t call. Instead, he texted Chris, booked some plane tickets, and filled out the RSVP card with their names.
Chris ended up not being able to go. A sort-of-destination wedding in the middle of midterms season just wasn’t feasible. So Eddie went alone. He’d visited the linked wedding website a few times, something that was certainly set up by someone other than Buck, if the difficult navigation and non-functional links were anything to go off of.
He’d bought the happy couple a new dutch oven, something Buck would no doubt make good use of, and reviewed the dress code - garden party casual (whatever that meant - Eddie interpreted it as a loose button-up and tan slacks) - and the wedding party. He didn’t recognize any of the names on Jaime’s list, but Buck’s side was all too familiar. Best (wo)man - Maddie Han; Chimney, Hen, and Ravi right behind her. It pained Eddie that he wasn’t on that list, that he wasn’t at the very top, standing there at the altar with Buck, supporting his friend.
When Eddie arrived at LAX, he realized he hadn’t texted anyone, that no one was waiting to pick him up, that no one knew he was coming. He’d arranged a hotel, though he still had the keys to his (Buck’s) house. He’d never felt quite so alone as he did taking the slow uber through LA traffic to the unfamiliar, cold-feeling hotel room a mile from the venue.
Had it really come to this? Had he really let himself become so distant from the people he once considered family that he couldn’t even shoot any of them a message to say “hey, I’m in LA for Buck’s wedding?” He had come this far, they were going to see him the next day, and if they still knew him at all, they’d see right through him.
Maybe that’s what he was scared of. Eddie hadn’t realised he was in love with his best friend until they were 800 miles apart and there was nothing he could do about it. But Hen had always said the oddest things about their relationship that only made sense if you put it in the context of Eddie’s crush, and Bobby had had always looked at them working together like there was something he knew , and it only took a couple minutes alone with the discerning gaze of Maddie Han before Eddie felt like he would fold under the pressure of her protectiveness.
So maybe Eddie was scared that he wouldn’t even make it to the wedding if someone saw him ahead of time, if someone could see what he was trying so carefully to hide. He felt so fragile in LA he could break, and he didn’t even have his son as a buffer. Fuck. How was he going to get through this wedding?
A side effect of Buck having a small group of very close friends/family was that Eddie knew practically no one in the audience before the ceremony started. The Buckley parents were nowhere to be seen, and Eddie assumed they hadn’t even been invited because Bobby and Athena were missing, too. In fact, the only people on Buck’s side of the small venue other than Eddie were May Grant and Josh Russo, who spotted him at approximately the same time and promptly froze in place.
“Eddie Diaz?!?” Josh gasped above the buzz of who Eddie presumed were Jaime’s family. His face betrayed his actual shock and - was that glee that Eddie sensed?
“Hey Josh, hey May.” He sauntered up to them as casually as he could, leaning down to hug May with a smile, then nodding curtly at Josh, who was still reeling.
“And I thought you couldn’t get any hotter.” Josh mumbled, but Eddie heard it just the same, and choked a bit.
“What?” He spit out as May started cackling next to them.
“Oh my god, you showed up.” A familiar voice whispered from behind Eddie, and he whirled around to find a very surprised Karen staring at him like she’d seen a ghost - close enough, Eddie supposed. “Where’s Chris?”
“Midterms.” Eddie shrugged, then leaned in to hug her. “How are you and Hen? How’re Denny and Mara?”
“Denny’s at CalTech,” Karen smiled broadly. “And Mara’s doing great.”
“Are the kids here? I wasn’t sure if the wedding was kid-friendly.”
“The Lees are watching everyone under 18. Jaime isn’t a big kid person.”
That surprised Eddie. He’d cyber-stalked her a little and had gotten enough information to discern she was an elementary school teacher. “Isn’t she-”
“A teacher? Yeah. I don’t get it either.” Karen brushed him off. “Now tell me about El Paso.”
Eddie did not want to talk about El Paso, but it was a better way to waste the time before the ceremony than for a lesbian, an attitude-heavy gay man, and a Gen-Zer to zero in on the fact that he was still in love with the groom, whom he hadn’t seen in years. So he talked about the fire house he moved to until he became a fire marshal - he left out the part where he got so depressed at missing his old team that he basically had no choice but to do something else - and let Karen admire his scruffy almost-beard that he was never able to grow as a firefighter. He talked about Chris and left out the countless arguments he’d had with his parents. He’d just turned the conversation back on Josh, asking what was new at dispatch, when the music changed to indicate the ceremony was about to start.
Bobby and Athena snuck in through the wedding party entrance, eyes going wide at the sight of Eddie before they shared a knowing look and Athena sat down in the row in front of the group as Bobby took his position as officiant. It just so happened that when Buck came out, looking as handsome as ever and making Eddie’s breath hitch, Athena’s head was positioned conveniently between them, blocking Eddie from view. The attention wasn’t on the audience anyway. Pairs of groomsmen (and women) and bridesmaids began to step in rhythm down the aisle. As Eddie’s old friends took their positions behind Buck one by one, they each spotted Eddie in the audience and made uncomfortable eye contact.
Did no one know he was coming? He did RSVP.
When Maddie finally took her place just behind Buck, she made an audible yelp when she spotted Eddie, drawing the attention of Buck, who was meant to be admiring his bride as she slowly approached to the tune of Here Comes the Bride . Instead, Buck shifted towards Maddie and fixed his eyes, wide and ever so blue, on Eddie, like he was trying to see past a hallucination. Eddie could see Buck’s breathing quicken in time with his own, his large chest rising rapidly and shallowly. Too rapidly, too shallowly.
Fuck. The groom was having a panic attack.
But by the time anyone else on his side of the altar caught on (too distracted by the ghost in the audience to notice), Jaime, looking quite beautiful, Eddie could admit as he saw her out of the corner of his occupied vision, had reached the end of her walk, settling in front of Buck and quickly noticing that she did not have his attention.
The bride scoffed gently, grabbing at Buck’s hand, but it barely stirred him, his breathing was still too fast, his eyes too wide, looking around frantically to make sense of the situation. Eddie itched to go up there, to calm him down, but Eddie was the cause of the panic attack, he probably wouldn’t be a good solution this time.
Luckily, Maddie was a good best woman and pulled her brother aside slightly and coached him through his breathing as Jaime looked slightly offended from where she stood. Eddie couldn’t blame her, really, but he found himself angry at her nonetheless.
Buck returned to his spot a second later, calmer, but still clearly very anxious, and focused all of his attention on his soon-to-be wife. Bobby started going through the motions, introducing the couple and making a few witty remarks before turning the page of his notebook to what Eddie guessed was the script to make the wedding actually official. But he paused, looking right at Eddie. Athena, seemingly in on whatever was going on, slid slightly to the right to allow those at the altar a clear view of the real spectacle of the evening. Jaime didn’t catch on, not even when Bobby very loudly continued with something Eddie was almost certain wasn’t in his script.
“If anyone here has any reason why these two should not be wed, speak now or forever hold your peace.” Bobby stared into Eddie’s soul. This part of the ceremony was antiquated. Bobby hadn’t said it either time Eddie had seen him officiate before, which Jaime didn’t know. Buck’s eyes went wide again with understanding, with worry or dread or - maybe, just maybe - hope, as he too turned to Eddie.
But Eddie was frozen. It was like his body had suddenly turned to stone, his mind into air, and he couldn’t make himself do what he wanted so badly to. It had been a minute, Eddie supposed, before Karen kicked him into gear.
“Eddie! Stand your ass up right now!”
He was vaguely aware of both May and Josh next to him, phones focussed on Buck and him respectively. Multiple angles, he supposed.
“Uh, I object!” He said, too quietly at first, then again, too loudly, as he stood up. Then suddenly, all eyes were on him.
Fuck. It’s not like he had anything planned, and he didn’t really do well with this much attention.
“Go on.” Really Bobby? Can’t he see that Eddie is struggling here?
Eddie sputtered a couple of times, trying to find his words, before he blurted out the only thing he could think of, a good way to get to the point, but maybe too efficient. “I love you.”
Several people gasped. A grandmother on Jaime’s side might’ve fainted, based on the clamor. Buck’s face had softened into a shocked plea, eyes darting to the side door.
“Jaime, who is that?” Someone on the other side of the audience seating yelled. Eddie vaguely registered him as her father. Whoever it was, they were sorely mistaken about who Eddie has just confessed his love to.
Eddie flicked his eyes to Jaime, who was staring daggers into Eddie’s head. Sorry , he thought, but that’s my man.
Eddie ran. Towards the door Buck came through, heartbeat thumping in his ears as he halted in the center of the prep room. A few seconds later, someone else burst through the door, all long legs and flailing limbs that felt like home to Eddie as they wrapped around him, light brown curls soft on Eddie’s face as they embraced, before Buck pulled back and lifted Eddie’s face to meet his own.
If Buck’s arms felt like home, his lips were like heaven. Eddie never wanted to leave. But after sloppy kisses for what felt like an instant and an eternity all in one, they needed to come up for air.
“I love you.” Eddie muttered, laughing.
“You said that.” Buck whispered breathlessly. “God I love you, Eddie, why did you wait this long?”
“I’m not the one that was two minutes from marriage.”
“Fuck off, I love you so much.”
“I better not get anymore save the dates in the mail. I almost threw it out when I didn’t recognize her name.”
“I was hoping you’d stop me before we made the first payment on the venue.”
“Sorry about that, it’s a nice place.”
“Her folks paid for it.”
“Fuck them, then. I think they thought I was having an affair with her. ”
“She could never pull you.”
“Be pretty hard, since I’m gay and all.”
“I love you Eds. I’ve loved you since I’ve known you, pretty much.”
“Me too.” Eddie laughed into Buck’s neck. “Just didn’t know it until I left. I love you, Evan, and I’ll never stop.”
“Marry me.”
“What?”
“I know how to get a marriage license now, it’s easy.”
“Slow down, tiger. I haven’t seen you in five years.”
“I know, it’s gonna take a bit to forgive you for that. You could make it up to me by marrying me. You look so hot right now, anyway.”
“The beard is doing it for you?”
“The outfit too, goddamn how did I bag you?”
“You never even had to try. I was smitten from the start. I’ll marry you when Chris can come to the wedding, how about that?”
“Don’t you dare shave until then.”
“No promises. Depends on if Bobby will have me back at the 118.”
Buck’s eyes lit up even brighter. “I love you.”
“I love you too. You still have our house, right?”