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Eddie comes home to the sound of the TV on low volume and the soft tunes of some type of indie pop song he doesn’t know floating through the air.
The house smells like something citrusy and clean, which isn't unusual. Buck's always been compulsive about wiping down counters and those stupid boxes of carpet powder that he claims works wonders on upholstery; but it throws Eddie off all the same. He's only been gone a few days this time, just a short trip back to Texas to finalize school paperwork for Chris and get him set up with Sophia for the next month or two until he can come fully back to LA. But re-entering the space feels like stepping into someone else's space, like slipping into a room that's been rearranged without you being there so everything feels foreign yet there’s still something familiar about it all.
Buck appears around the corner with a dish towel over his shoulder, hair damp from a recent shower, water droplets leaving a trail on the fabric of his old too tight academy t-shirt. “Hey. Thought you weren’t back until tomorrow,” he says as he runs a hand through his curls, making a face at the dampness.
“Flight got bumped.” Eddie drops his bag by the door. “Made better time than I expected.”
Buck just grins. “You hungry? I was just gonna make tea, but I’ve got leftover stir-fry if you want something decent.”
“I’m good.”
It’s a lie. He isn’t. He’s bone-deep tired, stomach tight and hollow, but something about the domestic ease in Buck’s voice makes it hard to say yes. Like stepping fully into the world Buck’s been living in while he’s been gone would make it too real—too much like he’s just a guest in his own home.
Except he’s not. This is his house.
He’s just not sure it feels like it anymore.
—
Buck had moved in after Eddie and Chris left for Texas. The arrangement just made sense when Eddie thought about it. There was something about Buck moving in that made the move to Texas easier. Like, somehow, Buck being in the home meant it wasn't’ really gone, like Eddie wasn’t really moving on.
Now Eddie’s back. Permanently. Chris is finishing out the school year in El Paso and will be home in June. Eddie is bringing everything back piece by piece. It’s been a difficult few months and he can’t pretend that being back doesn’t bring him immeasurable joy that he didn’t know if he’d ever feel again. He’s home, Chris is following soon, and it feels like everything is starting to slot back into place again.
Which means Buck should be looking for a new place.
He is looking, technically. Eddie’s heard him on the phone a few times, asking about rentals and texting apartment links to Maddie. He was excited about a place only 10 minutes from the station, another loft with exposed brick walls and no harsh overhead lighting. But weeks have passed, and Buck’s still here. Still cooking dinner. Still using Eddie’s Netflix. Still leaving his work boots by the front door. He’s still just…there. In Eddie’s space.
But it doesn’t feel invasive. No it feels… almost dangerous.
Because somewhere between “make yourself at home” and “stay as long as you need,” Eddie stopped thinking of Buck as a guest.
—
He catches himself watching Buck too often now. The way he hums while doing the dishes, how he automatically makes two cups of coffee every morning, always putting Eddie’s on the right side of the counter. The way he fixes things before Eddie notices they’re broken—the hallway light, the leaky faucet in the bathroom, the jammed dresser drawer in Chris’s room so it’s ready when he returns in a few short weeks.
Eddie knows the precise way Buck stretches in the morning, arms overhead, shirt riding up just enough to reveal a flash of skin. He knows the exact cadence of Buck’s voice when he reads on the couch, one leg curled underneath him, entirely at ease. He knows exactly the way that Buck’s body feels pressed against his in the shared bed when neither of them can handle a night on the couch.
It shouldn’t feel so intimate. It shouldn’t be so intimate.
Eddie’s not stupid. He knows something’s off inside himself, even if he can’t name it. That what he’s feeling isn’t platonic. It hasn’t been, probably, for a long time. Maybe it never was and he’d just never put a name to those feelings, the ones that were just a bit more than friendship.
He just doesn’t know what to do with that realization.
—
Buck talks about moving out with cheerful nonchalance. It’s like he’s completely in love with the idea of having his own space again, with leaving. Like he’s barely given a thought to Eddie or Chris. Like he’s completely unaware of the storm that’s brewing in his best friend's gut the closer moving out becomes a reality.
“Echo Park has this cute little duplex,” he says one evening over takeout, his thigh pressed against Eddie’s on the couch. “Tons of light. Big windows. Balcony, sort of. Maddie thinks I’d be good with plants.” He pauses and smiles as he drops the piece of chicken balanced on his chopsticks. “The loft was great but this place is on the first floor and actually has some space that's usable instead of it just being the giant open floor plan. I like it! I’m just waiting for something to feel like… me…ya know?”
Eddie nods, throat tight. “You should go see it,” he manages to choke out as he tries to stave off the panic attack he can feel building in his chest at the very idea of Buck moving out and into a duplex with soft light and plants and a kitchen that fits his mixer perfectly and–”.
“You okay?” Buck raises an eyebrow, effectively cutting off Eddie’s internal spiral.
“Yeah. Just tired.”
Buck doesn’t push.
He never does.
—
He finds the bottle hidden in his freezer two weeks later.
Eddie’s deep into prep mode—cleaning, organizing, restocking the fridge—trying to make the place feel more like home before Chris arrives. He’s been cleaning for hours, diving into nooks and crannies of the house he didn’t even know existed until now. He’s scrubbing the freezer shelves when he notices it: a champagne bottle wedged behind a container of frozen chicken and a bag of peas. It’s shoved far in the back, like it was placed in there to chill and then forgotten about, pushed and pulled between the rest of the groceries that made their home in the space until it was completely out of the way. Out of sight, out of mind.
He knows very little about this bottle that’s just been unearthed from the freezer. The only thing he’s sure of… it isn’t his.
He pulls it out with a frown, examining the label. Something expensive, imported. It’s not something he drinks, and he’s sure that Buck doesn’t either. The last time he’d really indulged in something like this was at Chim’s bachelor party when he was already past drunk and the bubbles had felt good dancing against his tongue. He twists the bottle in his hands again, frown deepening. He goes to turn, to yell and ask Buck about it when the door to the freezer slides shut against his arm, the pressure against the cork of the bottle that’s been frozen too long doing the rest of the work. It explodes in his hands with a loud pop.
Glass shatters across the kitchen tile. Foam erupts over his shirt, cold and sticky. Eddie stumbles back, heart racing, ears ringing. The cork lands somewhere in what he thinks might be the living room and he can feel the soft trickle of blood from where a shard is digging into his palm. He places what’s left of the broken bottle on the counter behind him, grabbing at the edge to steady himself.
Buck comes flying into the kitchen seconds later. “What the hell was—? Eddie!”
“I’m fine,” Eddie says automatically, even though his palms sting and he’s soaking wet.
Buck freezes, eyes wide. “Shit, that was—Jesus, are you okay?”
“I’m fine .”
Eddie wipes champagne from his face, shaking glass off his arms. He looks down at the broken pieces littering the floor, his pulse still skittering—and then he asks, low and sharp, “Why the hell was there a bottle of champagne in my freezer?” He knows that he’s being a little unfair. It’s obvious that it was forgotten about, but there’s something pooling in Eddie’s gut that makes him angry. He can’t place it, he just knows that the feelings have to go somewhere. And right now, that somewhere is hurling his frustrations and confusion at his best friend.
Buck takes a step forward, arms outstretched and then hesitates
“Uh. That was… from a while ago. Tommy brought it. When we—um. After.”
Eddie stares at him. “After what?”
There’s a beat.
“When we hooked up,” Buck says finally. “Back in–back after you uh–when you left.”
It hits Eddie like a slap. He doesn’t even know why . There’s something gnawing at his insides, causing his temper to flare and spark to life. It’s just the thought of it all. Of Buck feeling so at home even when Eddie isn’t there himself. Of Tommy, feeling so settled in his bedroom. Of the thought of them sharing champagne between log languid kisses and cuddling that turns into more. The thoughts hit him like a truck, the bile rising in his throat.
“He forgot to take it with him,” Eddie mutters, voice low and tight. Because that means something. You don’t hook up with someone once and leave goddamn champagne in their house. There’s an itch under his skin at how wrong it all feels, at how horrifying the idea of Buck and Tommy back together is as a thought now.
“I didn’t mean to leave it there. I just shoved it in when we were—” Buck trails off. “It doesn't matter.”
“It does.”
Silence.
Buck straightens a little. “Why?”
Eddie opens his mouth. Closes it. The words don’t come easy, they never do, not when it’s about this, not when it’s about him.
“I don’t know,” he says after a long moment of silence, and he feels the way the lie feel heavy in his mouth. The problem with his relationship with Buck is, the other man has always been able to see through him. Eddie’s voice comes out high pitched and a little tight, wavering around the words. Buck sees through him almost immediately.
“Yeah, you do.”
Eddie’s hands are clenched at his sides. “This was supposed to be my house. I let you stay here because—because it made sense. But now you’re—you’re in everything.”
Buck steps forward. “And that’s a problem?”
“I don’t know!”
“You do,” Buck says again, voice quieter this time, more inquisitive than accusatory and Eddie almost can’t stand it. He wants a fight and Buck’s refusing to give it to him. “You know.”
Eddie looks at him for what feels like the first time in the conversation– really looks–and it’s like something tears open inside of him. The memories rush in fast and unrelenting; Buck collapsing at the scene of a tsunami once he knows Christopher is safe. Buck sitting beside him in therapy. Buck’s heart restarting under his fingers, rainwater dripping into his eyes as he begs him to hold on. Buck screaming his name while he lies on blood-soaked pavement. Buck cradling Chris on his shoulders at the zoo. Buck making dinner. Buck doing the laundry. Buck fixing the walls after Eddie tore through them… fixing everything.
It all rushes in at once. Everything he’s been ignoring for so long filling his head and his heart without providing a single moment of reprieve. He’s not angry about the bottle. Not really. He’s angry because Buck is trying to leave.
Because Buck’s been living here like he belongs, and Eddie let himself believe—for a little while—that maybe he did.
And now it’s ending.
He’s losing him. Again .
Only this time, it’s his own fault. It’s because he never said what he needed to, what Buck needed to hear. There’s a rushing sound in his ears and his mouth feels like it’s full of cotton, but he speaks the words into the space between them anyway.
“I don’t want you to go,” he says, barely a whisper. .
Buck goes still. “Then why haven’t you said anything?”
“Because I didn’t know what it meant. I still don’t.”
Buck steps closer. “You want me to stay?”
Eddie swallows. “Yes.”
“For how long?”
“I don’t know.”
Buck’s eyes are soft, searching. “Why, Eds?”
Eddie’s hands shake as Buck takes another step forward, crowding him against the countertop as pieces of glass crush under his feet, his socks damp from the liquid neither of them have attempted to clean. .
“Because when you’re here, this place feels like home. And when you talk about leaving, it feels like—like I can’t breathe.”
Buck says nothing.
Eddie stares at the floor as he keeps going, keeps emptying his heart on the floor of his kitchen. “I was jealous,” he admits. “About Tommy. About anyone who gets to touch you and mean something to you.”
“You mean something to me.”
“I think I’m in love with you,” Eddie says.
It stuns him as much as it seems to stun Buck. But it’s true. He can feel it in every nerve. Raw and real and overwhelming.
“I am in love with you.”
Buck doesn’t speak. Doesn’t blink. Just stares and stares, almost like he’s searching for something in Eddie’s face. And then he’s there—close, pressing Eddie back against the counter with the force of his body, hands on his waist.
And he kisses him.
It’s not gentle. It’s not shy. It’s seven years of friendship and fire, of almosts and maybes and what-ifs. It’s Buck’s hands gripping at Eddie like he’s afraid to let go. It’s Eddie kissing back like he’s been starving for it.
When they break apart, Buck rests his forehead against Eddie’s. His voice is breathless when he finally speaks. “Took you long enough.”
Eddie laughs. It’s a half choke, half sob.
“Stay,” he says.
Buck kisses him again.
“Try and stop me.”