Archive of Our Own

To say that 2025 was a busy year for Evan Buckley was an understatement. 

It started with his sister getting kidnapped and nearly killed. 

Then his best friend moved to Texas. And to help said best friend out, Buck out of his loft and into Eddie’s house. (Something he would come to regret, not the helping his friend out, but giving up the loft.)

Then he almost rekindled his relationship with Tommy, only to mess it up completely less than twelve hours later. 

Then there was the lab accident. 

And then Bobby died. 

The month following Bobby’s death, Buck had tried to keep himself busy by helping everybody, but looking back on it, he blocked most of it out. From what he could remember, there was a building collapse, that day was hectic. And Eddie had suddenly decided he was moving back to LA. 

There was also that fight between him and Eddie in the kitchen. Buck didn’t like thinking about that. 

But not everything that happened this year was bad. Maddie gave birth to her second kid. He had a nephew now. That was one good thing. 

And that was all within the first six months. 

He was lucky he opted for the 3 month lease when he moved into the new apartment. Yeah it cost a little more, but he figured from the beginning that he wasn’t going to be living there long term and it was just a temporary place until he could find where he would actually want to live long term. Two weeks into living there, he discovered he was right when the neighbors upstairs sounded as if they had their own home gym and were constantly dropping weights, and the two maintenance requests he put it on the first day of living there still hadn't even been acknowledged. It was also just a little too far from work to be considered convenient. 

And then Tommy had texted him. Accidentally mind you, he meant to be texting Evan Bernard on Harbor’s B-shift, who was actually one of the Evans in Buck’s Academy class. But Buck didn’t let Tommy fall into the weird semi-radio silence they had been having on and off since Bobby’s funeral. 

One thing led to another, and it was nearing the end of September. The lease for his sucky apartment was about to end at the end of next week, and while he had toured a handful of apartments and some townhomes, two of which he could see himself living in, he hadn’t decided yet. 

Then Tommy offered for him to move into his house. The man had offered it so casually, Buck had almost said yes without thinking. 

Granted, the offer hadn’t come completely out of nowhere. 

Buck really hated his apartment and tried to spend as little time there as possible really. The only nights he really spent there were the nights neither he nor Tommy were on shift. Otherwise Buck usually slept at the firehouse or Tommy’s. 

So yeah, the idea didn’t come from completely out of nowhere. 

It was a slight surprise though, considering it’s part of what drove them apart in the first place. 

Either way, Buck immediately said yes. 

Now here they were, two weeks later, moving Buck’s stuff into Tommy’s house. Their house. 

They were leaving all of Buck’s larger furniture in his old place until later this week. Tommy had all of the necessary furniture to get by anyway. Today, they were moving anything that could be put inside of a moving box. 

“So where should we start?” Buck asked as he looked over all of the boxes put about Tommy’s living room and entrance way. Man, he really should have labeled them. 

“Let’s start with this one,” Tommy said taking a step to the one closest to him. He took out his pocket knife and cut open the tape holding the top flaps together. At the top were some books. Cookbooks Bobby had given him over the years, and a few novels he had picked up from places. Taking those out and setting them on a kitchen counter, Tommy looked down at the rest of the box. “Most of this is miscellaneous stuff,” He said as he moved his hand through it. 

Tommy picked up what looked like was a stack of photos, but quickly realized they weren’t. They look like… postcards? 

“What’re these?” he asked. 

“Huh?” Buck said as he looked over at his boyfriend. His eyes lit up when he recognized what Tommy was holding in his hands. “Oh those! The postcards!” 

“Yeah, I can see that,” Tommy said as he looked at the top of the stack. “So you remember me telling you about how I left home at 18 and just started going places and working random jobs for couple years right?” Tommy nodded, he remembered Buck mentioning it a handful of times, and a couple stories. “Well, at each stop I sent Maddie a postcard. She saved all of them, and gave them back to me a couple years after moving to LA.” 

“Really?” Tommy asked as he picked a couple up and began reading what Buck had written on the backs.

“What’s this about getting lost trying to find the presidents?” Tommy asked as he was reading the postcards from Mount Rushmore. 

Buck started laughing to himself as he thought about that story. While at the time he was super stressed, looking back on it, it was hilarious. 

“Well you see,” Buck began. “I had really wanted to see Mount Rushmore. But I’m sure you’ve seen the photos where the lookout station is like… miles away from the thing, and so far you can barely see it. Well I ran into this group of guys who said they knew of this hiking trail to a spot where we could get a better view and I went with them. Now on the way we went by a bunch of off limits signs but you know…” Buck shrugged. “We were like… at most 21, so we just ignored them. About an hour into the hike we realized we were super lost. Then these two park rangers found us, and they got super mad, nearly kicked us out of the park.” 

By the end of Buck’s story, Tommy was laughing and shaking his head. “It never occurred to you that something like that would happen?” 

“Like I said, I was 20, the oldest guy was 21, none of us knew any better!” 

As Tommy recovered from the laughter, he leafed through the postcards again.  “And this one from… Denver? There’s hot springs there?” Tommy asked. 

“Yeah,” Buck nodded. “You need to drive a bit outside the city, but they’re up by all the ski resorts.” 

“Really?” Tommy asked. “I’ve been snowboarding out there before years ago, must have missed the hot springs.” 

“You got to go snowboarding?” Buck asked. “I was there in the middle of the summer. Didn’t see much snow. But I got to do about everything else. Hiking, hot springs, I took the Jeep off roading for the first time! Hey, we should make a trip out there this winter.” 

“A trip out there? In the winter?” 

Buck nodded his head eagerly. “Yeah, so I can finally go snowboarding, and you can visit the hot springs. And maybe we can fit in some other stuff.” 

“Have you ever been snowboarding?” Tommy asked. 

“No, but I’ve been skiing a couple times. Haven’t been since middle school, but it can;t be that much different can it?” 

“They’re completely different things,” Tommy said. 

“So what’s this one?” Tommy asked, picking up and reading the postcard from the San Diego Zoo. 

“Oh, that’s the first time I went to California. Went to San Diego instead of LA. It was my last stop before I went down to Peru. I think that was the last postcard I sent before leaving the country,” Buck explained. 

Tommy chuckled. “You never actually told me about any of your adventures in Peru.” 

“I never did?” Buck asked, then his eyes widened. “Oh! Then I have so much to tell you about!” He reached over for the stack of postcards and began leafing through them, pulling out a few. “This was from Machu Pichu, and this was from Lima, the capitol…” 

From there Buck launched into telling Tommy a dozen more stories, having at least two or three per postcard. By the time he was finished, the sun had already gone down and it was nearing 9 p.m. 

“Oh shit,” Buck said as he turned around and looked into the living room. The living room still full of moving boxes. “We only got to one box!” 

Tommy walked around the kitchen island, coming up behind Buck and wrapping him in a hug. “Well, I think this can all wait until the morning. How about we go to bed now?” 

Buck turned around in Tommy’s arms. “Bed now? You can’t be that tired already?” 

Tommy smiled at him. “Lets just say you telling stories in very thorough detail is enticing.” 

Buck bawked. “Really? Why are you always like this?!” 

Tommy grabbed hold of his shirt and pulled him to the bedroom. “Don’t act like you’re the only one, Evan.”