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Eddie’s had four hours to think about what to say.
The silence in the car the first thirty minutes of the drive back is reminiscent of when he would miss out on a first place trophy.
He wouldn’t even look his parents in the eye, walking back to them. He’d hear a, “Good job, mijo,” from Fabian’s parents, even though he didn’t even place, and Eddie’s third place ribbon felt like a stone in his hands, when he held it up, eyes still on the floor.
His abuela would always have to pick up the pieces—not so subtly smacking his dad in the shoulder from where the Diazes stood in a bunch, and he’d—he wouldn’t even try to sound excited, is the thing. Eddie could tell that he was plastering on a smile from the way he sounded—tight and unenthusiastic.
He’d only raise his eyes when he heard his abuela softly call out, “Eddito,” and beckon him forward. Would only smile when she tugged him in and whispered, “Bien trabajo, mi Mundo.”
The car ride home, without her, was silent.
Somewhere between Brownfield and Seagraves the anger dissolves, swiftly replaced by assurance. He’s got his baby next to him, and he’s smiling and laughing and cracking jokes, and it’s—such a distinct contrast, to how he was earlier, working himself up until he was sick, that Eddie feels like he could sing with it. The knowledge that Chris doesn’t have to feel the way he did.
Not anymore.
When Eddie gets out of the car, cuts through the green grass of the front yard, he isn’t upset. He isn’t angry. He just knows what his son needs. And that’s enough to push through the nerves he’s felt for months.
Christopher needs him. Christopher has always needed him.
“Eddie? What’s going on?”
“Dad didn’t call you?” he asks. He has to bite back a smile about it, imagining how that conversation went. God knows Dad was on the phone as soon as Eddie took off.
“Yeah, he said you pulled Christopher from the tournament,” she says, eyebrows pulled together. Eddie keeps walking, and walking, and walking.
He is smiling, when he says, “Then you know what’s happening,” and skips right up the porch steps, moving past her to get to the front door.
“You left your father in Lubbock,” she gets out, mouth curved in a disbelieving smile.
Eddie gets the door open. He raises his chin, looks back at her, and says, “I didn’t want him to lose his seat on the bus.”
He watches his mom stare after him, mouth open, as he walks right into the front door. Buck said dad up, and he is—skipping through the house with a serene little smile, catching the doorway with a hand and catapulting himself inside like he’s on a goddamn mission.
His mom starts speaking again when he grabs Christopher’s backpack from the floor. “What are you doing?”
“Right now?” He asks, fluffing it out. He’s barely looking at her now, just scanning all over the room, figuring out what’s going in the getaway bag. “Just making sure he’s got everything he needs for the night.”
“So,” she says, slow. “He’s sleeping over at your place?”
Eddie grabs his headset. Maybe Buck will be up for a game tonight. He lolls his head, looks his mom in the eye. “Yeah. Until he’s eighteen. At least.”
She makes a soft noise, but he’s already turning around to grab more things. His favorite shirt, that Buck found, already on the floor again, about to be hidden in between his bed and the nightstand. A book left on his comforter.
“I’ll be back in a couple days, to get the rest of it,” he continues, not letting her cut in. A couple pens. An assignment on his desk.
“So,” she says again, in that voice, and Eddie wants to laugh at her, he really does. “You’re really just—disrupting his life right now?”
And—he can’t not, after that. He snorts, loud in the quiet of the room, and his words are bubbled with laughter when he speaks.
“I’m not disrupting his life, mom. I am his life,” he says, matter of fact, setting the backpack on top of Chris’ desk so he can get into his dresser. “’Cause I’m his father. Not dad. And you? You’re not his mother. You’re his grandmother. And he loves you, but—do you know what he hates?”
He doesn’t even give her a chance to answer. He’s walking back and forth, shoving whatever clothes will fit into the bag.
“Chess, mom. He hates chess. And he’s so—anxious, to please you and his abuelo, that that kid’s about ready to pop. And you can’t see it.”
His mom hasn’t moved from her place in the doorway. She’s fidgeting, moving her hands in front of her, and when he pauses, to give her time to speak, she’s almost hysterical with it. “That’s—that is ridiculous. He loves chess. He is so—good at it.”
He’s grabbing a pair of undershirts, when she says it, and it hits him, square in the chest. He’s a teenager again, panicking backstage, and his mom is—trying to help, but all she’s doing is putting her hands on his shoulders, and telling him: “But you’re the best dancer here, Eddie. Go show them. Go show them.”
Eddie—should drop it. He should keep packing, and he should drop it. Get everything he needs, and get the hell out of there.
But, instead, he clicks his tongue and looks at her. It feels the same. Her, in the doorway. Him, further inside, hugging himself around the middle. “That’s exactly what you said to me when I was fourteen, and—I told you I wanted to quit ballroom dancing. Probably in this very room. Do you remember that?”
She doesn’t answer him. Just bursts out with, “You loved ballroom dance. I know you did. I mean—like, you took home nearly every trophy!”
Eddie grips Christopher’s backpack and faces her, and—he feels small again. Like he’s a good five or six inches shorter. Like if he looked into the mirror, he’d see himself at fourteen. “You know, I did love it. Until you and dad sucked out all the fun and made it all about trophies.”
The way she’s looking at him—eyes melted into some semblance of warmth, her bottom lip working. For a second, Eddie thinks she might apologize.
A second.
“Look, if you had kept at it—you would have been on the road to a scholarship, honey,” she says. Eddie looks away from her and puts Chris’ backpack on. “You could’ve gone to college.”
Eddie inhales. Looks back just to blink at her. “I could’ve gone to college anyway, Mom. I chose not to.”
“Yeah? Well, look at you now. Huh? You’re a driver.”
He doesn’t fall for it. He doesn’t take the bait. He doesn’t even think to raise his voice. “Yeah, well. In this case, a getaway driver.”
“Oh, Eddie,” she says, and—Eddie can’t listen.
“Mom,” he shakes his head, cutting off whatever she’s going to say, and steps forward, gently cupping the back of her head. He pulls her in and kisses her forehead, like she used to do when she woke him up for school in the morning. “I love you. I’m really grateful that you were there for him when he needed you. But now? He needs me.”
He takes two steps before she’s talking. Frantic and wired.
“You can’t—when your dad gets home, we’re going to—”
He looks back at her, eyebrows raised. He smiles, just because he can. Because he’s not worried. Not anymore. “You’re going to what?”
“Fight this,” she says. She crosses her arms. Eddie stands up a little bit straighter. “You’re not able to provide for him. And you’re a—”
“A driver, you’ve already mentioned.”
She’s staring at him like he’s crazy. Eddie can’t stop smiling. Chris is in the car, ready to be with him, and—Buck’s going to get an earful tonight. He doesn’t care. “He needs—stability. Do you really want him moving into that—that place you’re in?”
“Mm, yeah. I do,” he says, shrugging. “I’ve been fixing it up, you know. It’s coming together pretty nicely. You can come over this weekend, see him, if—”
“Eddie. We don’t—we don’t want it to have to come to this, but we’d be prepared to—”
Eddie’s as calm as ever when he cuts her off. “You’re not taking my son.”
“He called us. He wanted to be here,” Her eyes are wide, and the warmth gone. Eddie stares at her and tries to remember when they went so carefully blank. “We would be within our right to—”
“You have no right to Christopher,” he says, not looking away. Not backing down. He sees Chris sick, at the chess meet. He sees his eyes, unfocused and panicked. He sees the way he looked back at his abuelo, anxiety thrumming through his body. “None. And if—if anything ever happened to me, you wouldn’t be getting a phone call. I need you to understand that.”
She blanches. She takes a step back, hands on her hips. “What does that mean?”
“It means,” he says, slow. In that voice. His heart is—pounding so much that it makes his legs a little weak, but he licks his lips and pushes forward. “He would be taken care of, and your name didn’t even cross my mind. Dad’s name never crossed my mind.”
She’s nodding, trying to piece it together and failing. Eddie’s going to make her wait. “And—you went and—did this? Made sure of that?”
“Years ago,” he answers. “Years ago.”
“You don’t even,” she begins, frazzled, looking up at the ceiling. When she drops her gaze back to him, her eyes are hard. Eddie plants his feet. “You don’t have anyone that could possibly be a better option for Chris than us. You can’t just—name anyone, to—to spite us—”
Eddie laughs. “I didn’t do it to spite y’all. I did it because he loves Chris more than anything. I did it because he’s the person I trust the most with him.”
“Who?” she finally asks. Point blank.
There’s a moment, right before he speaks, where his stomach drops. It drops, right to his feet. Like he’s on a fucking rollercoaster. “Buck.”
She throws her hands up like she’s the star of a soap. “Your—your coworker? Eddie, you’ve got to be kidding. Tell me you’re kidding.”
He’s about to speak, but she’s barreling through, stepping into his space. “What is this? You move to Los Angeles, find a guy, and want to play house with him? Are you—what are you trying to tell me?”
Eddie’s had four hours to think about what to say, and he’s said most of it. But this—floors him. His grip on Christopher’s backpack tightens. He’s got half a mind to just book it outside, get back into the car and get Chris home. But he’s—rooted to the floor.
He’s fourteen. She’s looking at him the same way.
She tsks at him. “That’s not fair to Christopher. You can’t just pawn him off on a coworker. It’s not fair, Eddie. It’s not fair to—to raise him alone. Here, he has us both—”
“He has us both,” Eddie interrupts, mouth moving before he even knows what’s coming out. It’s the loudest he’s been since he’s crossed over into the front lawn. “I haven’t been raising him alone, and if you—do you listen to him? Do you listen to anything he says? He talks about Buck all the time, Mom. He’s been a constant in Christopher’s life for seven years. There isn’t a thing he wouldn’t do for him.”
She opens her mouth.
But Eddie can’t stop.
“You know how he sometimes stops talking during a conversation and googles something? That’s all Buck. When he offers to help out in the kitchen, it’s because of Buck. The way he tries to squeeze you during a hug? Buck. I’m not raising him alone.”
She stares at him. The world is so quiet. Not a thing happening in the house. Just birds chirping where the front door is still opened.
Something inside of Eddie shifts, as his words sink in, and he starts seeing in technicolor.
“I’ll call you later,” he finishes. Like he isn’t changed.
Christopher beams at him when he crosses the threshold.
They’re about five minutes into eating dinner when Christopher drops his half-eaten slice of pizza onto his plate and looks at him seriously. “Dad?”
“Yeah, mijo?”
“Can we call Buck?”
Eddie’s smiling, because he can’t stop himself. Christopher continues to look at him, eyes sparkling, a mischievous little grin on his face.
It’s all Buck.
A FaceTime doesn’t seem like enough, now, but he’s pressing the call button anyway, Christopher giggling excitedly across from him.
When Buck answers, eyes sparkling, Eddie’s heart speeds up. Goes double time.
There’s a lot of things he has to think about. A lot of things to process. But right now, he just lowers his voice, like he’s the only one in the room, and says, impossibly soft, “Hey, Buck.”