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“I think you’re more excited about this party than we are,” Chris tells Buck while he leans against the doorway of the bathroom.
“What party?” Buck asks. “We’re simply getting dressed up to go have lunch with Hen and Karen.”
“Sure,” Chris says. “And I bet there won’t be any other cars parked in their driveway when we get there.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Chris raises an eyebrow at Buck and then at Eddie, who mouths “Just play along.” He rolls his eyes half-heartedly in response before going back to his room to talk to his friends until they’re ready to go.
As soon as Chris’s door shuts, Buck whirls around to face Eddie. “Alright, when did you tell him?”
Eddie holds his hands up in defense. “I didn’t say anything. He figured it out all on his own the day you came home with matching frayed denim jackets for all three of us ‘just because’. If anything, you should be mad at yourself for spilling the beans that night in the kitchen.”
Buck rinses the curl cream residue from his hands and flicks the water at Eddie instead of drying them off. Eddie retaliates by thumping Buck on the back with his bottle of hair gel.
Before he can open it, however, Buck is snatching the bottle out of his hands.
“Buck, give it back.”
“No,” Buck says simply. He places the bottle inside the medicine cabinet before closing it so he can use the mirror on the door to finish taming his hair.
“Come on, man. My hair is gonna get all fucked up under my hat.”
Despite how small the bathroom is and how long his arms are, the medicine cabinet is just out of reach for Eddie from where he’s standing. He tries to move closer, but Buck moves with him, blocking him at every turn. After thirty seconds of this, Eddie finally places his hands on each side of the sink, boxing Buck in. They’re pressed together back to chest, not an inch of space between them. Their cheeks are pink, Eddie’s a few shades darker, and he isn’t sure if it’s from all the movement or the fact that he’s so close to Buck he can smell his citrus and bergamot body wash.
Ignoring the heat pooling low in his belly -- the very same belly pressed right up against Buck’s ass -- Eddie opens the medicine cabinet to retrieve his hair gel. Buck frowns as soon as he hears the cap pop open.
“What’s wrong?” Eddie asks.
“Nothing,” Buck replies, but he won’t meet Eddie’s eyes in the mirror.
“Liar. You made a face.”
“I did not ,” Buck insists. Eddie raises an eyebrow and squirts some gel out onto his palm. Buck’s frown returns.
“You just did it again!”
Buck lets out a defeated sigh and turns to face him. Eddie takes a couple steps back to give him room, but his body is itching to press up against Buck again.
“I just… I like the way you look when your hair is like this,” Buck says, gesturing to Eddie’s head. “Don’t get me wrong. You still look handsome when your hair is all slicked back, but I like how your hair looks now.”
“Messy? Unruly?”
Buck shakes his head and reaches up to twirl the little strand that falls across Eddie’s forehead. “Free.”
Eddie looks into Buck’s eyes, trying to see if he’s being made fun of. All he sees is sincerity and adoration. Eddie knows that look. It’s the same one Buck gives Maddie or Jee or Chris or anyone he loves. He feels his cheeks burn as hot as the sun as he tosses the hair gel into the tiny trash can next to the sink.
•••
They’ve been at the party for about an hour before Buck loses his hat.
Eddie notices immediately. One minute Buck says he’s going inside to grab more sodas for the coolers. He’s inside for about five seconds before he rejoins everyone outside, his hands empty and curls shining under the summer sun. Ravi immediately offers his up, but Buck waves him away.
Soon after, the cake is brought out. Eddie laughs when he sees “Welcome home!” messily scribbled across the top in bright green icing instead of the usual elegant handwriting.
“Oh, shut up,” Karen tells him as she hands him his slice and a plastic fork. “The bakery had originally written ‘Congrats on joining the EPFD!’ because someone conveniently forgot to mention that you turned down the job to move back to California.”
They both look over at Buck. He’s sitting at one of the rented picnic tables with Jee, his cake plate already empty in front of him. He had scarfed it down in record time and somehow managed to not get frosting in his stubble or down his front. His neice, however, hadn’t been so lucky. Buck is trying his best to clean green and white frosting off her chin while Jee squirms around, the sugar from the candy and cake running rampant through her bloodstream.
“He didn’t wanna ruin the surprise,” Eddie says to Karen before thanking her and heading over to sit next to Buck. By the time he gets there, Jee is clean and has run off to play with Mara.
Eddie’s shoulder bumps Buck’s as he sits down. Buck turns, and although his face lights up when he sees him, his good leg starts bouncing nervously.
“You okay, Buck?” Eddie asks in between mouthfuls of chocolate cake.
“Yeah, I’m good,” he responds, but Eddie sees right through him. His hyperactive leg combined with the fact that he’s staring somewhere behind Eddie instead of looking directly at him just confirms that he’s nervous about something.
But it’s a party, and Eddie knows Buck will come to him in his own time, so he drops it.
Eddie finishes his cake and gathers his, Jee’s, and Buck’s plates in his hands. He stands, and Buck says, “Hang on. You’ve got frosting on your face.”
Eddie shifts the stack of plates so he’s holding them with his left hand before he grabs a napkin. “Where is it?”
Instead of telling him, Buck says, “I got it,” and swipes his thumb across the tip of Eddie’s nose. He stares at Eddie, not moving a muscle to wipe his finger clean.
His gentle touch juxtaposed with his intense gaze makes all Eddie’s blood rush south. He tries to think of something, anything , to try and calm down. It’s nearly impossible to do so with Buck looking at him, his eyes as beautiful and blue as the sky above them.
They stand in silence, just drinking each other in, for what feels like days. If anyone sees them, they don’t say anything. Maybe they haven’t been staring at each other as long as Eddie thinks. Or maybe their friends and family are so used to the BuckandEddie of it all that this is just an average Sunday afternoon for them.
Eventually, Buck breaks the silence. “Hey, Eddie,” he says, Eddie’s name soft as a prayer on his tongue.
“Yeah, Buck?” Eddie whispers back.
Silently, Buck reaches over, grabs Eddie’s pink cowboy hat right off his head, and places it on his head.
Eddie’s blood freezes in his veins.
He grew up in Texas, so of course he knows that taking a cowboy’s hat and putting it on means you want to go home with them.
Eddie knows this, but does Buck know this?
On the one hand, this is Buck. One of his most visited websites is Wikipedia, and there’s no way he didn’t do a deep dive on everything cowboy and wild west themed before today, even if he wouldn’t need any of the information after the party was over.
Eddie desperately wants to ask Buck if he knows what he just did. And if he does know, does he mean it? And if he means it, does he only want Eddie for the night and not the rest of their lives like he wants Buck? A million questions fly around in his brain, making Eddie dizzy. All he has to do is ask.
But there’s that little voice in the back of his head telling him not to get his hopes up. It whispers over and over that Eddie’s misread the situation and Buck is just trying to diffuse the tension. It tells him that if Buck had wanted to make a move on him, he would have done so when Eddie had come out to him a few days ago over pizza and beer.
Buck is still staring at Eddie, his expression unreadable. Meanwhile, Eddie’s doubt continues to taunt him, telling him he’ll only embarrass himself if he asks Buck to clarify.
And so Eddie forces himself to smile and politely nod before finally heading inside to throw away their trash.
After taking a few minutes to collect himself inside, Eddie heads back to their table. He straddles the bench so he can face Buck, but Buck jumps to his feet as if the grass underneath them is on fire. Eddie quickly checks that it isn’t before focusing back on Buck, whose entire demeanor has flipped. He won’t meet Eddie’s eyes anymore, and his shoulders are pressed inward, almost as if he’s trying to make himself smaller.
“What’s wrong?” Eddie asks.
“Nothing. Just a bit tired,” Buck says. “Actually, I think it’s time to head out.”
Eddie cocks his head to one side. Buck had seemed fine less than ten minutes ago. Nevertheless, he stands. “Okay. I’ll let Chris know we’re heading out. I’m sure Chim and Maddie would be happy to drop him off-”
“No! It’s your party. You shouldn’t have to leave just because I’m not feeling alright.”
“Buck, we drove here together.”
“I can just take an Uber.” Buck unhooks his carabiner from his belt loop and holds his key FOB out to Eddie. When Eddie opens his mouth to insist on leaving with him, Buck dangles the key. He doesn’t stop until Eddie actually takes the key.
“Fine,” Eddie sighs, “I’ll see you back home.”
Buck gives a curt nod before rushing past him.
About ten minutes after Buck leaves, someone slides onto the picnic bench next to Eddie. “How come you’re still here?” Maddie asks him.
“Because it’s my party? Well, mine and Chris’s.”
“I mean, why didn’t you leave with Buck?”
“He said he was tired and just wanted to head home.”
“And he didn’t ask you to go with him? Or are you gonna stay here a little longer so you don’t seem rude for leaving your own party less than three hours in?”
Eddie doesn’t think he’s ever been more confused in his life. “Maddie, what are you talking about?”
Maddie scrunches her brows together. It reminds Eddie of the face Buck makes when a recipe isn’t coming out right but he doesn’t know how to fix it. “Did Buck not do the hat thing?”
“What hat thing?”
“You know,” Maddie says, her words tinged with a sing-song lilt, “when a cowboy takes the hat off your head and puts it on his, it means he wants to go home with you.”
Eddie damn near spits out his lemonade. “How the hell do you know that?”
“Buck told me,” Maddie says, as if it’s obvious. When Eddie doesn’t say anything after a bit, she carries on. “He texted me the other day to tell me that I could stop bugging him about you because he finally knew the perfect way to tell you how he felt about you. I tried to tell him to do something a bit more romantic or in-your-face in case you didn’t get it, but he swore up and down that you of all people would understand what it meant.”
Even though he’s downed his drink, Eddie’s mouth feels drier than the Sahara. Buck knew. He knew what he was doing when he took that chance, and most of all he knew that Eddie would know.
And instead of shoving down his fear of rejection and embarrassment, Eddie had pretended to be clueless and unintentionally broke Buck’s heart. The thought of Buck driving home dejected with Eddie’s hat in the passenger seat instead of Eddie broke his own heart right back.
Maddie was staring at him patiently, almost as if she knew Eddie was putting the pieces together. When he finally turns to look at her, his eyes wide, she smiles and says, “Chim and I can drop Chris off after the party.”
Eddie nods frantically, words still failing him. He stands, thanks Hen and Karen for the barbecue and apologizes for leaving early, then hugs his team goodbye. Eddie hugs Maddie so fiercely she jokes that the baby must have felt it too. When he tells Christopher he’s going home to go after Buck, his kid simply gives him a smile that says “Go get him, dad,” before digging back into his potato salad.
•••
Eddie feels like he’s been knocking for an eternity when the door finally swings open. Buck has already changed out of his party outfit and into a simple pair of black joggers and a soft red sweater that Chris picked out for his birthday years ago because it matches his glasses.
Buck squints in the sunlight. “Eddie? Why didn't you just use your key?”
Eddie doesn’t say anything as he makes his way inside. He checks the coffee table, couch, and kitchen table before Buck asks what he's looking for.
“Your hat,” Eddie replies. “Where is it?”
“You mean your hat.”
“My hat, your hat, doesn't matter. Where is it?”
“In the bedroom. I was about to take a nap before you knocked-”
“Can you go get it? Please?”
“Um, yeah, sure,” Buck says.
He slowly makes his way to the bedroom. Eddie’s running his hands through his ungelled hair, practically bouncing in the balls of his feet with nerves until Buck returns, pink cowboy hat in hand.
“Put it on,” Eddie tells Buck before he can ask the question Eddie knows is on the tip of his tongue.
Head bowed, Buck does as he's told. When he finally looks back up at Eddie, his brow is crinkled with uncertainty.
“Eds, what is this?”
“Just trust me,” Eddie says. He crosses the room in three strides, grabs the top of Buck’s hat, and places it on top of his own head.
Buck gasps. It's so soft Eddie only hears it because they're within arm’s length or each other. He stands and stares at Buck, waiting for him to say something. Buck stares right back at him, his eyes wide.
“Eddie, do you know what that means?” he finally asks. He reaches out a hand and touches the brim of the hat, almost like he's making sure it and Eddie are real.
“Yeah, I do,” Eddie says. And before he loses the little bit of courage he has left, he wraps his arms around Buck’s neck and pulls him in for the first of many kisses.