Archive of Our Own

It’s not often at the big age of thirty-four that you figure out things about yourself. It’s not often that the things you figure out rock your world, either.

Well, Eddie’s thirty-four and has come to a few conclusions at that big age. Firstly, the jumble of feelings that’s been pressed into a dark corner of his mind has finally unraveled, letting the dust fall away, and the cracks to appear. The feelings he’s been ignoring for some twenty years have finally come to light, clawed their way to the surface, and let Eddie know they aren’t going away.

He’s always known, deep, deep down, that he was different—boys’ eyes don’t linger often on their competition in the changing rooms at national dance competitions. They don’t think about the sculpt of built shoulders, the long slopes of their backs, and how he wishes he could paint them with his kisses and hidden reminders of their love. They don’t think those thoughts; well, normal people don’t. Eddie’s never been normal, though, and he’s tried—dios, he tried to be. He tried to pray away those thoughts, bent over the edge of his bed, pressing his head into his mattress as he whispered, begged, under his breath for these thoughts to go away, to make him normal.

Nothing worked, though. Even as he shed tears, begging for a god he didn’t really believe in, even then, but he was willing to, to make him into a normal boy—to make him into a boy his parents would be proud to love. Instead, he got deafening silence and the realization that nobody is going to help him change. So, he changed on his own. He turned his eyes away, punched walls hard enough to crack them or bruise his knuckles when the thoughts rose like hidden corpses finally coming untied from the depths of a lake.

Those corpses were his secrets, and every time, without fail, he’d dive back down into black, noxious depths and tie them back down. He’d do it over and over without fail for years; decades.

Until now, because Eddie is tired of swimming. He’s tired of trying to take a big enough breath to fill his lungs so he can dive down and banish his secrets to the bottom of that lake. He’s tired of chopping up pieces of himself to fit into a too-small mold; he’s tired of shaving pieces away from his soul that he knows he’ll never get back. The wounds on his physical body barely hold a torch to the ones on his soul.

It’s in that dark, quiet room in El Paso, knees digging into the cold hardwood floor, and face buried in his mattress, his hands held above his head in a prayer position, that Eddie tries one last time. It’s one last time that he whispers prayers that have been cut into his skin and scarred there, that he begs for this god to make him normal, to make him someone his mother and father would be proud to love. The boy who danced till his lungs gave way, but kept going, the one who won gold at too many competitions to count, the boy who failed before he could even try.

“Please, god,” he tries, dios, he tries. His words are tired, and so is he. He wants to run away, shut his mouth, wipe the tears slipping down his face and burning holes into his mattress, and give up. “Please, just this one last time,” he whispers, breath unsteady, and voice even worse off.

How long has he prayed to a god that won’t give him anything? How long have his knees held bruises that won’t heal, no matter how much arnica gel or care he gives them? How many words have been said, yet go unanswered?

Eddie doesn’t want something extravagant; he doesn’t want endless riches he could swim in, he doesn’t want something unreachable. There’s no wish to reach for the stars, there’s only the wish to be normal, to get rid of the flood of feelings that won’t be held back anymore.

“Make me normal,” Eddie whispers with as much emotion as he can push into his voice, head bowed, and hands shaking where they’re pressed into a prayer position. It burns; his skin is so cold, yet every droplet of sweat is like a torch to ice.

Make me normal, he begs, no… pleads. Make me normal,

Make me not love Buck.

Only, that’s impossible, isn’t it? Eddie could never stop loving Buck, even if he tried. He’d fall in love all over again, and again, and again. It’s impossible not to love Buck, despite how much he wishes he wouldn’t—he wishes to be normal. Or, he hopes to love Buck freely.

Neither option makes him feel good. On one hand, being normal would be denying himself once more. On the other hand, loving Buck scares him. Scares him so much that he cannot even fathom it. But he knows he can love Buck; hell, he already does. But loving Buck should be natural. However, it was never for him. Loving another man was never supposed to be normal; his parents would tell him that all the time when he was younger.

Love a woman, not a man. Settle down, give me a grandchild or two, Edmundo. His mother would say, though, he supposes he fulfilled that deal years ago, so maybe it’s okay this time. Surely, it’s finally okay to embrace the love he so wishes he wants to; perhaps it’s all right this time. However, the scars of years and years of praying away this… this feeling inside of him remains.

The wounds on his body, depicting words of gospel and prayer, continue to haunt him. They burn his skin at the mere thought of finally breaking free and loving someone as naturally and wholly as he can. He wants to break free, oh god, he does, but he doesn’t.

He’s scared.

There are so many things that can go wrong, will go wrong, if he gives in, right? He could lose his son, his best friend, everything. Would it be worth it? Will this festering feeling inside of him finally go away? Or would it all be for not? Would he lose everything just to be a little selfish just for once? His selfishness has gotten him burned more than once, as he remembers, quite vividly, leaving for the army yet again right after Chris was born, and when he was told of Chris’ existence.

His selfishness has ruined things time and time again, and he’s not sure he can take losing Buck because of it.

So, does he push it all down? Does he let it out?

He’s not sure, but all Eddie wants to be is normal.

All he wants to do is not feel wrong, all he wants to be is a normal boy, someone whose eyes don’t linger on men, someone who doesn’t love people who he’s been told not to love in a romantic way since he was so young. They scarred the gospel inside his body, inside his mind; he can’t discern whether they’re right or wrong. He knows, fundamentally, that they are wrong, but he can’t bring himself to acknowledge it.

He’s too scared to.

He’s scared to admit his love for Buck; saying he is gay to a dark, empty bedroom is going to be hard enough, but telling the man who has been his rock for nearly eight years he’s in love with him is scarier than anything Eddie has ever faced.

So, he waits till something, anything, happens. He waits for his whispered prayers to be heard, to be acted upon, and to be released from this self-inflicted prison he’s found himself in yet again.

He waits, oh, he waits—waits till his knees ache, till his shoulders slump, and he has to muffle his sobs into his mattress. He waits until he cannot anymore, till his hands fall away from the prayer position to grip strands of his hair, digging till his fingernails scrape his skull; till the pain is a momentary escape from the realization. There is no god coming to fix him, no matter how much he asks or prays. No god will answer the prayers he swore off years ago; nobody will be there to give him the miracle he’s been waiting for since twelve.

There is nobody there to shield him from the realization that’s waiting patiently beside him, waiting to be let in. It’s not some great big monster, but it feels like it. It’s not something that is going to haunt his shadow and whisper thoughts of sorrow and pain into his ear.

It’s him.

It’s him sitting next to Eddie, waiting for him to stop being scared; to crack his ribcage open and let himself back in. It’s every part of his soul that he’s shaved off, every shaving he’s tossed aside to fit the right expectations, the right idea of himself that everyone had for him.

It’s him in his truest, rawest form; it’s not a monster under the bed, it’s him.

“I’m…” Eddie whispers, feeling his heart shake in his chest. It’s a rattle that feels less daunting and more encouraging, like his heart—the piece of his body past his soul that knows everything about him—is trying to push him to say it finally. He doesn’t want to, especially not in El Paso, not in the place that he felt like he had to melt himself down to fit the right mold. He doesn’t want to give more power to this place.

How long? How long will he continue to deny himself this? The truest part of himself?

Does it even matter? Will he just say it, to have it out there, and never say anything? What difference does it make if he never tells anyone? If he’s stuck here in El Paso, withering away, and keeping the part of himself down that he couldn’t deny longer, verbalizes it, and then shoves it back down?

Is it fair to himself to do that?

No, he thinks, it’s not.

It’s not fair to him either way; he’s in a lose-lose game. There are no winners here.

“I’m gay,” he whispers to the ether, to the monster under his bed that has the same shade of brown eyes as he does. “I’m gay, and I’m… I’m in love with Buck.” Buck, who is eight hundred miles and three states away. Buck, who has the most perfect smile that Eddie’s ever seen. Buck, who loves like it’s nothing; like it’s breathing to him. Inhale, love, exhale, love.

Buck, who is his best friend—Buck, who should be off-limits.

What if he says something to him, slips up, and Buck thinks it’s weird? What if Buck doesn’t love him back? What if Buck pities him and loves him back because he doesn’t want to hurt Eddie?

“Fuck,” Eddie says to the darkness of his bedroom. “Fuck,” he whispers again, just for the hell of it. His hand comes up to cup his mouth, fingernails digging into his cheek to leave half-moon crescents there that pulse with pain and anger. He wants to scream, to rage till there are holes in the wall he has nobody to patch with, till this… disgust for himself burns itself out of his system.

But he doesn’t. Instead, he rises from the floor, ignores the way his knees quiver from kneeling, and crawls into bed—into the safety of a warm bed and a way to escape, even for a few hours.

In the morning, Chris asks to go back to LA.

-

Buck is, as Eddie suspected, absolutely elated when Eddie calls him in the morning to tell him they’re moving back as Chris packs up. It’ll take a few days, and he’ll need to get logistics in order, but Dios, Eddie wants out of this state.

Wants out of the cold bedroom where secrets he should have gone to his grave with have come to light. He’s tired of staring up at the same ceiling, brushing his hand over the same place he buried his face into his mattress and cried for a normal he knew would never come, and he wants to leave.

“Eddie, why don’t you guys stay at the house instead of getting a hotel? It’d be easier on your wallet, and I wouldn’t mind,” Buck says, and Eddie pulls himself back into the conversation, blinking slowly. He can hear Chris shuffling around in his room, the sounds of his heavy footfalls echoing across the house. “Plus, it’s, well… even though my name is on the lease now, it’s still your guys home, y’know?”

It’s not a bad idea, and it’d alleviate the possibility of finding a temporary housing option while he gets everything in order. However, where would Buck sleep? Eddie’s not going to put him out of his own bed just for him.

“Where would you stay, though? I’m not kicking you out of your house or bed, Buck. I can already feel your offer to take the couch,” Eddie says, reclining on the couch, feet thrown up on his rickety coffee table. A leg chipped when moving, and Eddie never got around to fixing it.

“Well, we could… could just share, I guess? I mean, it’s not as if we’ve never slept in the same bed before, Eds. It’ll just be like when we all quarantined together! Except without the imminent fear of getting infected with a dangerous disease, I guess,” Buck rambles over the phone, excitement infectious even when he’s eight hundred miles away. However, Eddie’s heart lurches at the thought of sleeping in the same bed as Buck.

Yeah, they did share Buck’s bed while he, Hen, and Chim all stayed at Buck’s loft during the height of quarantine. However, Eddie feels like it’ll be different now. How can he possibly act normal, sleeping and waking up next to the guy he loves? How can he possibly go back to being friends with Buck when he realizes he likes waking up next to him? How will he patch himself back together if that happens?

However, before he can think of the possible irreparable damage this could do to him, Eddie speaks before he can think about it.

“If you’re sure,” Eddie says, and nearly slaps a hand against his forehead, shoving down his groan of pure defeat and annoyance at himself. “If not, I’ll sleep on the couch. I’m sure it’ll be fine,” Eddie adds, to give himself an out. He wants to be mad at himself for accepting and giving in so easily, but it’s Buck. He always gives in when it comes to Buck.

“Yeah, man, I don’t mind! Chris can have his room back, and then you can room with me. Don’t worry, Eds, we can figure it out more when you get back to LA,” Buck says, his tone becoming softer. He sounds so happy, and Eddie’s heart flutters. He knows that feeling, and he’s as delighted as Buck is to go back to LA finally.

Leaving LA was like ripping himself in half. A part of himself wanted to stay, wanted to stay in the bubble Buck created for him inside the man’s soul and hunker down and weather out the storm there; however, he knew he had to go to his son. He hated leaving Buck, but he also hated Chris living in a different state from him.

Now, though, he gets to go back to Buck and reunite their little found family—he knows Chris is as excited as he is, seeing as the teen is doing his own packing, and not delegating most of it to Eddie.

“Okay, Buck,” Eddie says, a soft smile on his face. In a different life, he would be next to Buck, and be able to kiss the man freely—the way he sounds on the other line, tinny yet so clear in his ear, makes Eddie want to drive to LA right this instant and kiss him silly. “I’ll see you soon, yeah?”

“Yeah, Eds. I’ll see you soon. Tell Chris I said hi, okay?” Buck says, the soft sigh of his voice making Eddie sink deeper into his sofa. Dios, what he’d do to hear that tone of voice profess his love for Eddie to him.

“I will,” Eddie promises, trying to swallow down the desire for Buck. It doesn’t work all that well, but he’s trying. It’s a giant lump in his throat, one that feels alive; like there are little hands pressing against his larynx, and tinier claws tearing through muscle to get free. “I gotta go pack, but I’ll see you soon. Bye, Buck.” Eddie can hear Buck say goodbye as well, but he pulls his phone away from his ear before he can listen to it fully and ends the call.

He lets his phone slap against his chest and fall down his body, a rough groan falling from his mouth as he places his hands on his face and contemplates screaming into them. It’d do him no good, but maybe it’d give a little relief; or, it’d just worry the hell out of Chris. He doesn’t want his son to call him a decrepit old man again that needs a nursing home, because teenagers are mean, and Eddie is not old, damnit.

With a sigh, he feels his phone buzz on his lap, but he ignores it for a moment. He ignores the world for a moment as he tries to swallow down the bubbling feelings. He doesn’t feel like he can get away from them, and burying them in a shallow grave on the land he lives on in El Paso probably wouldn’t work either. Killing them would just lead to more and more problems, which Eddie doesn’t have time to deal with,

Plus, he doubts they’d stay dead for long anyway.

“Dad!” Chris calls out, startling him, and making his head pop up, hands falling away. “I n-need your help, please,” his son calls, and Eddie pops off the couch, grabbing his couch as he does. He takes a quick glance at the screen and smiles when he finds Buck sent two articles about proficient packing and the best way to pack up a house quickly, which makes him huff softly. He shakes his head and tries to wipe the smile off his face.

It doesn’t work; instead, it stays cemented onto his lips.

“Coming. Mijo,” Eddie calls back, walking to his son’s room. He knocks on the half-closed door before pushing it open. Chris is sitting in the middle of a few packed boxes, right next to his little shelf of books he’s accumulated. Apparently, he and Buck communicated mostly through book recommendations when he wasn’t talking to either of them. Now, he has a myriad of books that the two of them have read, and he needs help packing them up.

“Can you…?” Chris asks, gesturing to the full shelves. There are a few action figures and other miscellaneous trinkets on the shelves as well that Eddie needs to find a way to package up without having them break during transit, and, well, Buck did just send him a few articles.

“Yeah, scooch over, kiddo,” Eddie says, taking a seat on the floor with a soft huff and crossing his legs. “Don’t even say it,” Eddie says, pointing a finger at Chris. It gets a giggle from his son and hands raised in mock surrender.

“I didn’t even say anything!” Chris says, but they both know what he was about to say. Eddie rolls his eyes, poking his tongue out at his son like the mature adult he is, and Chris reciprocates the action, making him laugh. It makes Chris laugh as well, which is a sound he missed dearly—so many months of being stonewalled, and nothing but curt answers over video call, and eventually in person when Eddie moved to El Paso made him miss his son’s laugh.

At least there is someone in his life that he can love freely; there’s no fear when it comes to loving his son.

When it comes to Buck, though…

Eddie banishes the thought before it can properly take hold, shaking his head and clapping his hands together. “Let’s tackle this together, yeah? Space the books out between a box or two so they aren’t that heavy to carry,” Eddie says, beginning to pull some of the bigger, sturdier books off the shelf.

“Okay, Dad,” Chris smiles at him, and matches his tactic, handing big books to Eddie slowly. It takes a bit, and some banter between the two of them that flows just like old times, but they get it done. It’s one step closer to leaving this damn state and getting back home.

Back to Buck.

-

Let it be known, Eddie sort of hates his Prius. It’s nothing against the car, but it’s also everything against his car—eventually, when he gets back to LA and sells the El Paso house, Eddie will be getting himself a truck again. He misses it, and even though Eddie doesn’t have street-fighter money anymore and misses his Denali dearly, he’s fine with a truck like his old one.

He also doesn’t want to drive again for a very long time, so he’ll take advantage of Buck’s love for driving and have the man cart him around. He doesn’t think Buck will mind, so.

They’ve been on the road for a few hours already, his Prius hauling a U-Haul trailer behind it as they cruise down the highway. He doesn’t have to make another turn or get off an exit for the next hundred miles, so Eddie has his phone off, but his directions are still going. Chris is slumped in the passenger seat, reading one of the books he and Buck are reading.

It’s been primarily quiet, with the radio turned down to low as background noise for Eddie, and he’s content with it. Usually, he’d try to fill the silence and ask Chris stuff, or try to get a conversation going, but he’s happy with this content silence in the car—there’s no cavern to cross to mend their relationship, and they can both just bask in one another’s presence.

“Hey, Dad?” Chris asks, pulling an earphone out of his ear, letting it dangle from the cord. Chris looks at him through his glasses, an odd look in his eyes that Eddie catches when he takes his eyes off the road for a scant moment. “Can I... Can I ask you something?”

“Of course, mijo, you can ask me anything,” Eddie says, trying not to white-knuckle the steering wheel. Dios, does the kid want Eddie to turn back? The house is sitting vacant, and evem though he’s handed the extra key over to a realtor, he’s sure he can back out of the preliminary process. Even though he would, because Eddie would do anything for his kid, the thought of turning back and driving into El Paso again shatters something weak inside of him.

“It’s... It’s nothing bad, I promise,” Chris says, fiddling with the edges of the book pages. Eddie nods quietly, letting his son take the reins of this conversation. Nothing but the sound of crinkling book paper and the dull outside noises echo in the cabin before Chris speaks a minute later. “Is it… bad to love the same gender? Li-Like a girl loving a girl, and a boy loving a boy…? Isn’t it… not normal?” Chris asks, and Eddie has to breathe so he doesn’t jerk the car too much and veer into the other lanes.

Eddie opens his mouth and then shuts it for a minute, letting himself recalculate. He hadn’t expected that to be the way this conversation would go, so he needed a moment to change course and stop his heart from trying to beat out of his damn chest. “It’s not, it’s not bad. Nor is it not normal; everyone’s normal looks different, mijo. It’s perfectly okay to love a guy as a guy, or love a girl as a girl. Love isn’t a fixed variable, mijo,” Eddie says, and tries to breathe as normally as he can.

Eddie’s thought of this conversation coming up before, has thought of the ways he’d explain to his son that no, loving a person of the same gender isn’t bad but he never thought it’d be this soon. He still thought he’d have a few years; although, he was much younger than Chris when he realized these things out for himself, then, he promptly buried it all.

He doesn’t want Chris to do that. He’s trying so hard to break the cycles his parents set up for him, to shatter a curse that’s been laid upon his shoulders.

“Is… is that something you’ve been thinking about? I’m not the best person to talk about with this kind of stuff,” mainly because I’ve been hiding this part of myself for so long, I often forget it’s there with how deep I’ve repressed it, “but you can always talk to Buck or Hen. Hell, you can even talk to Karen if you want to. But I’ll always be here to talk, okay?” Eddie says, licking his lips and trying to ignore the aching burn under his eyes. God, how long has he wished to be Chris in this situation and be told that it’s okay to be himself, to be the normal that’s his normal, and not the normal his parents decided for him?

“I was just curious,” Chris says, shaking his head. “I like girls, I don’t really think I like guys, but I’m also fourteen, so it might change,” his son shrugs, adjusting his glasses when they slip down the bridge of his nose slightly. “But thanks, Dad. Love you,” Chris says, and looks at him in a way that makes goosebumps stand up on Eddie’s neck, but he chalks it up to the AC. He can’t take his eyes off the road for longer than a second or two—because he knows and has seen first-hand what distracted driving does to people—but he slips a hand off the wheel and holds it out for his son to take.

It’s a breath of fresh air that Chris doesn’t even hesitate to take it and slip his fingers against Eddie’s. He smiles softly and squeezes Chris’ hand, and smiles even wider when Chris squeezes back. “I love you, too, mijo. Nothing could ever make me stop loving you, never forget that, okay?” Chris nods from his peripheral, settling something inside of Eddie.

“Same here, Dad,” the words feel both pointed and nonchalant, but Eddie doesn’t dwell on it much, and keeps his and Chris’ hands intertwined till the teen pulls away to go back to reading his book, and Eddie returns his hand to the steering wheel.

-

Hours and hours on long, winding roads, a terrible stay in a… less than savory motel, and even more hours of driving, Eddie is finally home. Technically, it is no longer his home, but Buck is here, and Buck counts as his home—as does Chris. Wherever his boys are, that is where home is.

Buck is waiting in the pathway to the driveway, hands in his pockets, and looking absolutely radiant. It’s getting dark, dusk beginning to paint the sky in burnt oranges and deep, royal purple at the edges as the sun sets. Realistically, Eddie knows they’ll need to unpack soon, but everything can wait for the morning, because all he wants to do is hug Buck, eat the food he knows Buck has cooked for them—as Buck has been raving about the dish he’s been putting together for their return—and fall asleep. His ass is sore, one cheek being completely numb, and he’s tired of sitting down. Eddie’s an active guy, and being cooped up in a tiny Prius is not his ideal way to spend hours on end.

The car bumps and jostles slightly as it crawls up the driveway, U-Haul truck poking out over the sidewalk, but not onto the street. The only plus to a Prius, he guesses. He can fit it and the trailer in the driveway without any need for adjustments. That was something he couldn’t have done with his old truck, or the one he just sold a few months back for this stupid Prius. As much as Eddie does not condone arson, he might just burn this thing. It’s served its purpose, but Eddie wants it out of his sight.

Chris stretches with a soft whine, blowing out a big breath. “Let’s go greet Buck before he starts trying to open the doors,” he says with a huff, unbuckling his seatbelt, with Eddie doing the same. Eddie laughs because that is exactly what Buck would do. He’s too impatient at times, but Eddie doesn’t blame him. He’d be tugging on door handles right about now if it were him, but Buck is waiting patiently, rocking back and forth on his heels with a big, cheery grin on his face. Chris pushes open his door, using his foot and grabbing his crutches.

Eddie waits for a moment till Chris gets steady on his feet, till he pushes his door open and exits the car. He takes a minute to groan loudly, stretching his arms up above his head to do a full-body stretch, eyes slipping closed as he basks in LA’s beautiful but hot as hell weather despite it being nearly seven-thirty. At least there’s no humidity to deal with. Before he can finish stretching, Buck is there, molding himself to Eddie, who is midway through his stretch, and startles him.

“Well,” Eddie huffs softly, hugging Buck back and abandoning stretching out his spine to wrap his arms around Buck. The blond is already digging his face as deep as he can get into Eddie’s shoulder and neck, damp breaths puffing against his neck that are suspiciously shaky. “Hi, Buck,” Eddie murmurs, holding Buck as hard as he’s holding Eddie, running a hand up and down the blond’s back.

“Hi,” Buck whispers into his shoulder, refusing to let go. Not that Eddie wants him to, because he wants Buck as close as possible to him for at least another minute. He missed hugging his best friend, okay? He missed sinking into Buck’s hugs and feeling the blond sink into his arms.

“What am I, chopped liver?” Chris says from beside them, making him and Buck pull back to stare at the teen who is waiting expectantly, eyebrow raised, and pouting. Not that Eddie would point it out to him, because as Chris gets older, he swears he does not pout anymore—it’s a thing of the past.

It’s not, but he’ll let his son live in his naivety.

“Hi, Superman!” Buck says, and promptly abandons Eddie for sweeping Chris up into a hug that has his crutches clattering to the ground as he races to hug back. They rock back and forth as Buck hugs Chris as hard as he did Eddie, burying his face in Chris’ messy tangle of curls on his head and pressing kisses there. Chris pushes into the affection eagerly, laughing and smiling where they stand. Eddie smiles softly, slightly sour at being abandoned, as he wanted to hug Buck a bit more, but Eddie supposes he’ll live.

“Let’s go inside, yeah? Before dinner gets cold,” Buck says, barely pulling back from Chris as he pushes a hand through Chris’ curls gently, coiling them around his fingers to tame them, and letting them snap back into place. “We can get luggage after? Or now, I don’t mind helping.”

“I think we get it now, before dinner wipes us out,” Eddie says, opening the back passenger seat of the car and tugging out two duffel bags: one being Eddie’s LAFD-issued one, and the other being Eddie’s army duffel. Most of their stuff is packed away, but inside the duffels are at least a week of clothes, just in case they don’t get around to unpacking quickly enough. “Let’s go, I’m starving.”

Buck laughs softly, letting Chris pull away first before he leans down and grabs the teen’s crutches, giving them back to Chris, who places them on the underside of his arms, adjusts them, and starts walking to the door. Both he and Buck wait for a moment, standing shoulder-to-shoulder, and gazing at Chris, who walks up onto the porch. “I missed you guys,” Buck whispers, voice somber, and a bottomless pit of emotions that Buck rarely lets come to the surface in his words. “So much.”

“We missed you, too, Buck,” Eddie murmurs, pressing closer to Buck. If he could, he’d meld them together, and fuse their atoms till they were one; not Buck and Eddie, but BuckandEddie, a singular entity. “Every day, you hear? Not a day went by without me missing you,” missing your smile, missing silently loving you in close proximity. Eddie doesn’t think about swallowing down those words, and lets them rest at the edge of his tongue. He doesn’t say them, though; instead, he lets them burn on his tongue.

They taste like a mix of bitter ash and honey.

Buck looks at him and smiles softly, shaking his head. “Same here, Eds,” he sighs softly, knuckles brushing his with how close they are standing. Eddie wants to reach out, to tangle their fingers together, but he doesn’t. Instead, he lets Buck’s hand brush against his and mourns what he could have if he were braver.

If he were allowed to love Buck.

“Why don’t we head inside and eat? You look about dead on your feet, and I’m sure if we take any longer, Chris is going to eat everything,” Buck says, looking at him softly. He’s haloed by the setting sun, the few minutes of golden light casting Buck in an ethereal way. Eddie has to swallow hard to shove down the urge to turn, press forward, and kiss Buck, to see if his lips taste like the golden rays of sunshine that paint his frame.

“I wouldn’t put it past him to eat everything without us,” Eddie laughs softly, moving away from Buck to take a step up the driveway. “Let’s not test that theory, though. C’mon,” Eddie says, and walks forward. Oddly enough, even as he hears Buck’s footsteps follow him, it feels like he’s leaving something behind on his driveway, something fundamental. However, he doesn’t look back. He clicks his car keys to lock the car, and walks into 4995 South Bedford St with a hollow feeling in his chest.

He can’t shake it the entire dinner, even as he laughs with Buck, and relishes their little family being back together.

-

Eddie returns to work on a warm Tuesday morning, walking into work with Buck by his side, talking about the different types of poisonous dart frogs. Buck is like his own personal podcast, and honestly, Eddie’s digging the poisonous frogs facts Buck manages to scrounge up from nowhere in his big brain. They’re pretty interesting, and though Eddie hasn’t gone more than a few hours—depending on if Buck is asleep, or at work—without a fact about some obscure topic, even while he was in Texas, he missed being there in person and hearing it. Seeing it, too.

Watching Buck talk animatedly, flail his arms around in deft movements that actually add to whatever he’s talking about, and just be himself is a sight Eddie missed. Of course, he got to see it whenever they facetimed, and although his enthusiasm and rapid movements don’t translate well via text or over the phone, Buck still managed.

However, the real deal is better than anything else, and Eddie’s glad to be back.

“There he is! The man of the hour!” Hen says, her arms spread out with a wild grin on her face as everyone pops little party poppers from where they’re standing under the loft platform, a large WELCOME BACK EDDIE banner overhead. Chimney is blowing a kazoo, and Bobby is smiling happily at him, Athena by his side.

“Guys!” Eddie says, laughing happily, and walking forward as he very quickly finds himself in the middle of a big, big hug. Dios, he missed this—this family he built for himself over seven years, welcoming him back with open arms, makes him feel warm inside as he laughs with them, pats on the backs, and welcome backs echo. Eddie doesn’t know if he’s ever felt more loved, smiling and hugging everyone one by one, once the big group hug slowly dissipates.

“Glad to have you back, Eddie. Buck was getting insufferable with you gone,” Chimney laughs, patting him on the back as Eddie pulls him into a hug. Eddie snorts loudly, shaking his head as he pulls back—neither of them acknowledges Buck’s indignant squawk at the declaration. “But seriously, man. We’re happy to have you back. Wasn’t the same without you.”

“I’m glad to be back, Chim,” Eddie smiles, clapping the man on the shoulder before turning to Hen, who has been eagerly awaiting a hug of her own. “Hi, Hen,” Eddie says, and happily opens his arms for the shorter woman, laughing softly as she barrels into him. They sway in place, Hen’s laughter muffled into his chest as her glasses press into his skin.

“Boy, I missed you,” Hen says, smiling at Eddie as they pull back. Her hands linger on his sides, eyes slicing up and down his body for any nicks or bangs he’s hiding. Her gaze is calculating, as if she has x-ray vision, and is scanning Eddie up and down. However, he isn’t like Buck, and he doesn’t hide his injuries.

He just hides the nature of them… the street-fighting debacle flashes in his mind.

“I missed you, too, Hen,” Eddie smiles, squeezing Hen’s shoulders softly. “I’m happy to be back, really, really happy.” It’s true, Eddie feels like he’s finally been able to breathe for the first time in a long time after driving onto LA soil. He doesn’t feel like he needs to compress himself anymore, and he can just… be himself.

Mostly.

“Good, because I don’t think any of us will ever let you leave again. Least of all Buck,” Hen laughs, and their eyes skirt over to Buck, who has been standing beside Eddie the entire time, looking mildly offended. When their eyes meet, Buck’s arms flail in offense.

“I wasn’t that bad!” Buck squawks, feebly trying to defend himself. Everyone around them raises an eyebrow, and Buck deflates. “Okay, maybe I was, but I missed him, okay?” Buck’s eyes are earnest, and his shoulders slump slightly, curling in on himself. It’s like a dog being scolded for something he didn’t mean to do, and it makes Eddie’s heart clench.

He shuffles a foot out and kicks Buck’s boot with his own, making those baby blue eyes focus on him. “I missed you, too, Buck. Probably drove myself crazy a few times with it,” Eddie smiles softly, trying to swallow the embarrassment of letting everyone know the fact that he almost drove himself up the wall with how much he missed Buck. He often laid in bed before he slept, just… missing Buck. Whispering into his pillow how much he missed him, and frequently drove himself crazy with it. Missing Buck was like missing a limb; it was constant and unwavering. It was always there.

He never thought he’d be actually admitting this stuff, but he supposed to save Buck some relentless teasing—because as much as they teased, they, and Eddie was guilty of this as well, sometimes took it too far—and give some to himself.

“You did?” Buck asks, tilting his head to the side with a suspiciously glossy look in his eyes. Seven years with this guy, and he still finds ways to surprise Eddie with how low his self-esteem is. Of course Eddie missed Buck, how could he not? Even if he weren’t irrevocably in love with the guy, he’d still miss Buck on a fundamental level. Buck is family, and Eddie misses his family a lot. Hell, he still missed Chris even while they were living together through the tense days where Eddie honestly didn’t think their bond would survive.

“Duh, you idiot. You’re my best friend, Buck, how could I not?” Eddie huffs, knocking the front of their boots together again. Buck brightens visibly, smiling proudly as if Eddie hasn’t been calling him his best friend for literal years. Despite how often he calls Buck his best friend, he doesn’t think the guy ever gets tired of hearing it.

Eddie thinks if Buck had a tail, it’d be wagging with how visibly happy he is.

Before he can say anything more, the tones blare loudly. Eddie can’t help the way he startles slightly at the noise, no longer used to it. He gets moving, but Bobby stops him with a hand on his shoulder. “You’re man behind for the call, okay? Go get everything squared away with your locker, and you’ll be with us next call.” Bobby says to him and is gone before Eddie can do more than nod.

The yes, cap dies on his tongue as he watches the firetruck race through the open bay doors, sirens wailing a sound of urgency as they disappear from the bay. He supposes it’s reasonable to give him time to unpack and get his turnouts out of his duffel, but man, he wishes he could be out there with his family. The adrenaline from hearing the sirens continues to flood his blood despite him standing in the empty engine bay under the banner with WELCOME BACK EDDIE painted on it, flapping in the breeze entering through the doors.

Eddie sighs and groans a bit into the palms of his hands before he shakes his head. No, he won’t let this dampen his excitement to get back to work; it’ll only add to it. Bobby said he’ll be on the next call, and Eddie has no doubt he will be. He doesn’t need time to get back into the running; he just wants to start in a dead sprint to catch up to everyone else. He knows he can do it, and he will show them.

Well, he doesn’t think he needs to show them, because Eddie has known them for seven years, and they all know he’s more than capable. He recertified with ease, the innate knowledge of this job never leaving him, and Eddie is back with his team.

Life is good, Eddie has the same locker as he did with the same engraved nameplate slotted into the front of it, and Eddie feels better than ever placing photos of him and Chris, him and the 118, and him, Buck, and Chris onto the door of his locker as he places his personal items inside, along with his duffel. Then, he shakes out his turnouts and hangs them up proudly.

It feels like coming home.

But why won’t his heart stop beating wrongly?

-

Eddie finds himself wanting to punch his past self for saying yes to sharing a bed with Buck. He wants to turn back time, return to El Paso—just this once, and never again—and punch the living hell out of his past self and say nah, Buck, I’ll take the couch, it’s fine.

He shouldn’t have been so selfish, shouldn’t have listened to the want pressing against his skull, shouldn’t have fucking taken the offer.

Now, he has to learn what waking up next to Buck is like—sure, he knows what Buck looks like when he sleeps already, seeing as they shared the same bed during COVID, but this is different. Back then, Eddie was still repressing that part of himself so much that he often forgot it was there, and definitely did not realize how in love with Buck he was until he missed the blond like one would miss an amputated limb. Back then, he didn’t have to worry about the knowledge this might just ruin him.

Like giving an addict a taste of a stronger drug, and leaving them to chase the high with something less potent; to try and regain that lost feeling desperately, they destroy themselves and everything around them simultaneously. That’s how Eddie feels right now, staring up at the ceiling. It’s dark in his old room, night long since fallen, and Eddie is still awake. Despite how bone-tired he is from his first shift back—he recertified with ease, but those tests are nothing like the real thing, but damn, did Eddie miss firefighting—he just… can’t sleep.

Can’t find it in himself to get comfortable, or turn onto his side and close his eyes. He feels innately aware of the sleeping man beside him, like he just woke up from getting black-out drunk and finding himself in some random person’s bed—not that he’s ever done that before; however, he’s watched enough shitty rom-com movies to know the scenario, and that is exactly what this feels like. The bone-deep regret, the fear of looking over to see who the hell he is laying next to, the weary anxiety pooling in his gut. His heart continues to hammer against his chest, making him feel nauseous.

Eddie groans softly, just quiet enough not to wake Buck, and places his hands over his face to press them into his cheeks. The little sparks of pain are enough to drag him out of his doom spiral, but barely. He feels like he’s clawing at the edges of it, just barely being able to escape; however, he knows it won’t last long.

Beside him, Buck snuffles softly, rolling onto his side to directly face Eddie. Without his permission, Eddie’s fingers splay enough so he can stare at the blond through them, and stare at his peaceful, droopy face. Buck’s curls—which Eddie will say look much better on him than his previous haircuts—lay on his forehead, the loose coils frizzy from the blond’s tossing and turning before he reached deep sleep, and he stopped moving. Despite how much Buck moves, he doesn’t move that much while he sleeps.

Buck’s face is slack with sleep, little airy breaths blowing out of his nose as he hugs his pillow close, tucked up to his chin under the covers. It’s… It’s… fuck, Eddie cannot say it’s cute; that’ll just make everything even worse. He sighs again, scrubbing his hands up and down his face to try and rub the thoughts right out of his overthinking brain. Buck is supposed to be the overthinker of this relationship, not Eddie; however, he has his moments.

Like right now.

Eddie almost wants to slip out of the bed—which is too damn comfortable for its own good, damn Buck’s nice-ass mattress—and sleep on the couch, but he fears Buck would get all twisted up about it. He’d ruminate over why Eddie felt the need to leave the bed and sleep on the couch, and Eddie doesn’t think he could come up with a satisfactory answer to Buck’s questions without them being bald-faced lies, which would make everything worse. He can’t take lying to Buck right now; he can barely lie to himself right now, he knows he wouldn’t be able to do it to Buck.

“Mierda,” Eddie whispers to the blanket of darkness over the room as he shifts slightly, wincing at the way the covers shift and crinkle. He feels like, with any movement, Buck would wake up and ask him what’s wrong. Because Buck would know when something is wrong with Eddie. It’s like he has a little built-in sensor that says something is wrong with Eddie!

Well, Eddie also has one, too, but it’s mostly just called reading Buck’s subtle body language and the fact that Buck cannot lie to him. Or, well, he can, but he usually cracks under the pressure and guilt of lying to Eddie.

Buck grumbles softly in his sleep, flopping over to lay on his back, the silhouette of his face clear to Eddie despite how dark it is in the room. Eddie stares; he can’t help it, okay? He stares; stares till his heart thunders in his chest for another reason that isn’t anxiety and nausea, and wants. Eddie wants to be able to shuffle over to his side, to pull Buck close till their atoms decide to fuse, and they become one. Eddie wants to have Buck pressed up against him, their heartbeats syncing, and Buck fast asleep in his arms. Eddie wants to be able to push his hand through Buck’s curls, and fix the little loose coils; to feel them shift around his finger, and watch them snap back into place softly.

Eddie wants, oh, he wants. He wants till he can taste the blood in his mouth from biting his tongue too hard. He wants till his hands grip the sheets tightly, enough for his knuckles to go snow white. He wants till his heart beats for Buck. He wants; he wants.

But he can’t. He shouldn’t. He doesn’t deserve it; he doesn’t deserve Buck.

He sure as hell doesn’t. He’s messed up every relationship he was in—although, the fact that he is gay might’ve also played a part in it, but even so, Eddie fucked up in multiple ways he cannot simply chalk up to him being gay. That’d be denying every fault and flaw he has, and he knows he has. He’s selfish, withdrawn, and tends to dive headfirst into things to impress his parents; he’s just… bad. Bad at loving. Bad at being loved. Bad at not doing anything but performing.

Eddie’s performed for his parents his entire life; from being the man of the house and taking care of his sisters, to the boy who danced till his lungs burned like hell in his chest to win gold to see happiness and pride on his parents faces, to being the good son who stepped up to marry his pregnant girlfriend, to the man who gave them a grandchild to love in place of him.

Eddie’s whole life has been a performance, and he wants to stop, but he knows he can’t. He cannot do that to Buck. He wants to love him so badly anywhere but in secret, but he shouldn’t. He shouldn’t put Buck through Eddie’s terribleness as a boyfriend; that’s the absolute last thing he wants to do to Buck.

Plus, would he even be worthy of Buck’s love? Buck is worthy of his, but he’s not worthy of Buck’s. He’s done so much wrong, hurt people, and ruined things by just being himself.

So, no, Eddie doesn’t think he’s worthy of Buck’s love—hell, he might not even be worthy of love at all. Love has ruined so much of his life, and Eddie feels like denouncing it entirely. It might as well be for the best to protect everyone in the LA community from having to deal with Eddie’s type of love. It’s bad, it’s chaotic, and it’s distant—it’s not exactly an ideal romantic prospect for any possible partner he could have.

With a groan, Eddie closes his fingers and tries to wish all the thoughts out of his head so he can sleep. He’s bone tired, and his blinks are getting slower, but Eddie cannot find it in himself to let his eyes fall shut completely.

However, he lets his hands fall from his face and rolls over to face the edge of the bed. He tries to forget Buck is there, tries to drown out his little airy breaths, and clamps his eyes shut. Sleep welcomes him, but he feels it’s only out of pity.

-

Eddie needs to do something about this whole… thing. He needs advice, because he’s about to crawl up the wall if he has to sleep in Buck’s bed with the guy for another day. It’s nothing against Buck, it’s all on Eddie’s part, but damnit, he’s going crazy. Waking up and finding Buck sleeping right next to him, drooling on his pillow, and looking too damn cozy in the mornings isn’t good for his heart. He feels like it’s constantly on the decline, and Eddie is yearning.

Eddie Diaz does not yearn; especially for his guy best friend, who is firmly in the off-limits category of possible romantic partners. The entirety of LA is in the off-limits category to save everyone the trouble of Eddie’s terrible dating habits.

So, Eddie needs to do something about it. He either needs to get over this whole yearning for his best friend, or just… move to Antarctica, or something. There’s nobody there to date or end up messing up with. It’ll just be orcas, penguins, seals, and polar bears; things he can view from a distance and try not to get eaten by—or pecked by. There is nothing Eddie can irrevocably fuck up with his love.

Eddie would usually go to Buck for advice on his life stuff, but he can’t this time, because Buck is the one causing his crisis. So, he goes to the next best option: Hen. Usually, he’d choose Bobby, but he feels too close to Buck. The blond is basically Bobby’s son, and even without official documentation stating it, he just is.

Bobby is also a father figure to Eddie as well. It’s another thing he found out at his big age of thirty-four: Bobby is more like a father to Eddie than his actual dad, who spent most of his childhood working to provide for them, and when he’d be home, he always found something to be disappointed in Eddie in.

So, Eddie doesn’t really want to let down another father figure. Dios knows he did that enough his entire life; he doesn’t need to do it again. He holds Bobby in high regard and doesn’t want to let the man down. Plus, like Eddie said earlier, Bobby is too close to Buck; not that Hen isn’t, but she’s more of a middle ground.

Plus, he’s sure she’ll have some advice for him concerning his predicament.

Eddie slides up to Hen, who’s leaning against the kitchen counter, eating cherries as she watches Buck and Chimney watch some video on the TV, yelling and complaining loudly. She eyes him from her periphery, raising an eyebrow as he steals one of her cherries. “Did you come over here to steal my fruit, or do you need something?” Straight to the point, so Hen.

“I did need something, and I also wanted a cherry,” Eddie jokes, snapping the fruit off the stem. He eats it and places the pit and stem into the little cup she has, wiping his hand on the napkin handed to him. “I need your help with… something,” It’s vague, Eddie knows, but it’s the best she’s going to get while they’re at work. Buck tends to gravitate to Eddie whenever he spots him, and he doesn’t want Buck to get concerned if he overhears his and Hen’s conversation.

Hen raises her other eyebrow, eyeing him with evident confusion and interest. “Okay… that’s a bit ominous, Eddie. But sure, I’ll bite,” she says. “Do you just want me to help, or can I bring my wife into the loop?”

“Uh,” Eddie says, quite eloquently in his opinion. He thinks for a moment, and comes to the conclusion of why the hell not? Another opinion would do some good, he supposes. “Sure, you can. I don’t mind. Why don’t we meet at Rickies?” Rickies is a low-key bar with a pleasant atmosphere that doesn’t make it feel like a bar, making it perfect for tough decisions, especially when the added bonus of alcohol is factored in if they meet there.

“Sure, thursday is the start of our forty-eight off, so thursday at eight?” Hen says, popping another cherry into her mouth. Eddie nods wordlessly, confirming the date with it before he steals another cherry and jogs off. He ignores Hen’s indignant huff of annoyance as he goes downstairs to try and work out the ball of anxiety rumbling loudly in his chest, festering and growing like an infection in an open wound.

Thursday.

He can do this. Buck can watch Chris, and Eddie can spill his feelings all over a cold table, and drink them down with stronger alcohol than his usual go-to beer.

-

Eddie’s early. Way too fucking early. He’s been sitting in Rickies for the past thirty minutes, and eight pm is still another forty-five minutes away. Somehow, he’s managed to get a few people’s attention: one girl who looked way too young to be in a bar, someone who was his mother’s age, and a very drunk, very tall dude. Eddie isn’t the one to flirt mindlessly with people to pass the time, or find someone; he’s here to confess his undying love for his best friend to his co-workers, and he’s not exactly looking to pick someone up and take them home.

Where, not only is his son, but where his best friend he is, you know, undyingly in love with. Yeah, that’d be weird. It’s not like Eddie is looking for anyone either, nor does the attention make him feel good. Fake smiles and talks about how his co-workers are coming soon seem to get them all to leave him alone, though the older woman was a bit more persistent. She had to be talked away with the little fib that he’s engaged happily—he would have gone with married, but Eddie didn’t have a ring on his finger, so engaged seemed like the better, believable lie—and he was not looking to step out on his imaginary fiance.

He totally wasn’t thinking of Buck as his fiance the entire time he spun the story of being together for seven years, proposed a year back, and the wedding being soon. No, why’d you think that?

Thankfully, Hen and Karen come early, and like beautiful guardian angels, they descend upon the table with fruity drinks in their hands and curiosity in their eyes. “So,” Hen starts, sipping her espresso martini with a sharp glint in her eyes. It’s like she’s flaying him open and looking at all of his secrets that he’s keeping hidden inside of him. Honestly, he wouldn’t put it past Hen to have that ability; she’s always been perceptive, although he supposes that comes with the territory of being a paramedic and a mother.

“So,” Eddie replies, taking a sip of his lukewarm beer that’s sweating all over the tabletop. The condensation is cold against his clammy hands, and makes him want to wipe them all over his jeans. He doesn’t, because he’d be giving into how fucking nervous he is, so he keeps calm.

Because Eddie Diaz does not panic. He does not, okay? He’s perfectly fine, not anxious at all, and ready to have this conversation.

Yeah, yeah.

“You gonna make small talk and stall, or are we gonna get into what you really want to say, Eddie?” Hen asks, and Karen snorts politely into the rim of her cocktail, shaking her head. Eddie opens his mouth, closes it, and opens it again to find… what? An excuse? Mindless small talk? The truth?

Eddie sighs, planting an elbow on the table, and burying his face in his hand as his hand clenches tightly around the body of the beer bottle. “I don’t really know how to say this,” Eddie mumbles loud enough to be heard, but quiet enough to be drowned out by the upbeat music playing over the speakers.

“Then take your time, Eddie,” Karen says, smiling softly at him. “We’re here to wait for you, get some food, drinks, and talk, okay? And if not, we’ll gossip, I have so much from work that I need to fill you and Hen in on.” Dios, she makes it sound so easy—and it is, really. All Eddie has to do… has to do is say it.

But why can’t he? Why are the words lodged in his throat? They claw and scrape at the walls of his throat, barbed with thorns, and making him bleed. It’s like every line of prayer, the cold bite of rosary beads, the suffocating walls of a confessional, everything is coming back to haunt him; to press into his body to keep him quiet.

He once said to Buck while he was dating Marisol I've just got a reservoir of Catholic guilt just lying dormant, waiting to be activated, and he supposes he was very, very correct about that. It’s like everything he was taught in the pivotal years of his life is coming back to haunt him; to tear their cracked and rotting claws into his body to keep him complacent with his misery; to keep him at the bottom of the lake that his catholic guilt seems to be able to fill and never let him leave the murky depths.

He still remembers the talk of telling his parents that everything religious wasn’t for him; he still remembers the way he ducked his head, how he crumpled the knees of his jeans, how his father’s disappointed sigh filled the kitchen. It had been one of the days he had been home for more than dinner, sleep, and breakfast, which was too early for his kids to join him on. His mother’s silent whispers of Are you sure? while his dad grumbled about money wasted on catholic school, just for him to tell his dad he didn’t like it.

They accepted, but just barely. It was a battle, and Eddie walked out a winner, but felt even more defeated.

Eddie takes another sip of his beer, finding that he can barely stomach it. It seems he spaced out longer than he thought, because there’s a basket of mozzarella sticks between Hen and Karen, and one right in front of him. He looks up to find the two staring at him with gentle but concerned expressions.

“Eat, Eddie,” Hen says, nudging the basket a bit closer. The smell is wafting toward his nostrils, and he feels like a starving dog smelling a juicy steak. It’s only when he uncaps the marinara sauce that he realizes, belatedly, he hasn’t eaten since breakfast. It seems the coil of ever-present anxiety that settled like a boulder in his stomach the second he roused to consciousness at six in the morning had eaten away at his appetite, and he’s only now realizing how fucking hungry he is. “We’ll talk after you’ve at least had half of the mozzarella sticks, okay?” Eddie feels like a damn child being talked to by his mom, but he complies.

The words he would rebut with are stuck to the roof of his mouth anyway.

Eddie wolfs down the mozzarella sticks with a vicious greed, chasing them with the occasional sip of beer. He tries not to think with every bite of warm crust and gooey mozzarella splitting under his teeth, the tomatoy and spiced taste of the marinara following. It’s a beautiful, delicious symphony that staunches the production of more anxiety. It doesn’t get rid of the anxiety buzzing away in his body like a nest of angry hornets, but it quells the factory of anxiety inside of him. Finally, after he eats half of the basket, he takes one last sip of beer and blurts it out before he can stop himself. Or wipe his mouth.

“I’m gay,” Eddie says between breaths, tongue darting out to nervously lick the crumbs off his lips. “I’ve known since I was twelve, but I was never… never allowed to be gay; the image my parents wanted for me was a respectable man, a nice wife, a child or two to fulfill my mom’s wish of grandchildren, and be the man of the house. I never got to be anything but that, and I don’t know… I don’t know how to be me. The me I’ve been repressing for twenty-two years,” Eddie laughs without humor, hands shaking where they now rest in his lap. “Dios, I tried to pray it away. I tried to pray to a god I haven’t believed in since I was seven to try and make myself normal, to make me fit the person my family wants me to be. To be normal, not… not me.”

Hen and Karen stare; he can feel it, but he refuses to look at them. He can’t look at them until he gets this all out; it’s like unplugging an overfilling bathtub and finally letting the water down the drain.

“I always wanted to be normal, but I knew I wasn’t. I knew normal people’s eyes didn’t stray to boys’ shoulders and bodies, and I wondered things no fourteen-year-old should think. I was told all my life marry a nice woman, Edmundo, and I thought that was my only destiny, you know? The only thing for me: marrying a nice lady, settling down, and fulfilling my parents’ wishes. Not disappointing them.” A hollow, slow-suffering breath whistles out of his wet lips as he sips his beer, soothing his dry throat. Now that the words have started, they don’t stop.

“Yet, I think I only succeeded at that. I quit dancing when they wanted me to continue, I made them waste money on catholic schools even thought I knew I hadn’t believed in a god, or religon for years at that point, and I failed time and time again when they needed me to step up, to… to be the man of the house. I left Shannon to go through a pregnancy alone, had to be dragged back, and then left right after. I ruined everything, and I ran away; away from Shannon, from Chris, from my parents, from everything; everyone. Myself included.” It’s almost cathartic to get it all out; the things he’s left unsaid for years, decades. If it were up to Eddie, they’d go unsaid forever. “I ran from everything: my wife, my child, my parents, my true self that I can’t keep ignoring in mirrors.”

“Oh, Eddie,” Hen breathes, and Eddie braves looking up at them. Their eyes are wide, and sympathy clouds them, but it’s not… it’s not pity. Eddie doesn’t need pity; he’s ruined his entire life. The last thing he needs is pity. “It’s not not normal to be gay, Eddie. I think you’re torturing yourself with that wording, but it’s not wrong, Eddie. You’ve had the weight of everything placed on you by your parents, and felt the need to live up to it, and that’s not fair. Sure, you made some mistakes, but you’re human.”

They both move closer, abandoning their seats across the table to sit on the ones next to Eddie. “Eddie,” Karen starts, a hand on his shoulder, gently rubbing circles into it. Eddie sags into the contact, blowing out a slow, shaky breath. He feels as if he’s been taken out at the middle, and he’s rapidly collapsing: like an old building being blown up for the land to be repurposed, the supports holding Eddie up are crumbling from the blast that is about to come. “Everyone’s normal is different. Nobody’s normal is the same; it’s impossible. Like Hen said, did you make mistakes? Yes, I think you did, but it’s time to forgive yourself and to stop denying yourself; you are doing yourself more harm than good. There’s nothing wrong with being gay, nor is there anything wrong with being late in embracing yourself. Better late than never, no?”

God, it sounds exactly like what he said to Chris in the car when they were returning to LA.

Nor is it not normal; everyone’s normal looks different, mijo. It’s perfectly okay to love a guy as a guy, or love a girl as a girl. Love isn’t a fixed variable, mijo.

Dios, he should take his own advice.

“I’m proud of you, Eddie,” Hen says eventually, adjusting her glasses carefully. “I can’t imagine how hard this is, considering how you were raised, and how I’m sure that every expectation laid upon your shoulders is probably still dragging you down. But I’m proud of you; of your strength to tell Karen and me, of not backing down,” Hen said, and Eddie laughs a soft, warbling sound, throat clicking as he swallows thickly. He’s hunched over, staring at his cooling mozzarella sticks, and wondering if this pit in his stomach will ever go away.

In due time, he believes, if he manages to shove enough repressed emotions into it to pack it full like a bleeding wound, maybe.

“Thanks, Hen. You, too, Karen,” Eddie mumbles, swallowing around the words that continue to press against his throat. He’s sure they all know this isn’t everything, but Eddie’s not sure if his waning confidence is enough to get him through that part. He’s not sure if all the confidence in the world could, honestly.

“Is there… is there anything else? Not to downplay you coming out, and everything. But… I feel like there’s something else eating at you, Eddie,” Karen broaches the topic gently, like Eddie is some wild animal ready to bite, teeth bared, and claws at the ready. He bristles under their touches, not unlike one, and breathes out slowly. How should he word this? Does Eddie even have the words to say it?

Should he just blurt it out like he did his coming out and subsequent dump of childhood trauma? Should he ease into it? How is he supposed to tell his coworker and her wife that he’s utterly in love with their other coworker, who is literally at his house, probably watching a movie with the kid that he gets if Eddie ever kicks the bucket?

“I,” Eddie starts, and stops. Is he really doing this? Is he bearing his soul for them? Eddie trusts them, but dios, this is almost too much for him. He’s feeling the urge to slap down a twenty-dollar bill for the beer and mozzarella and book it to the door; to get lost in the growing crowd as it nears party time for a lot of people; to lose himself in the treble of the music and escape with a single secret left.

But he doesn’t. Instead, with trembling lips and the innate urge to wipe his dry eyes, Eddie says it. “I’m in love with Buck. I love Buck,” it feels like the devastating blow, and nothing at the same time. It feels like the final nail in the coffin, and a daisy picked off the side of the road; a twisted dichotomy that has Eddie wanting to heave up his delicious mozzarella sticks at the confession.

It feels like he’s back in the confessional booth, thirteen, and confessing to his sins; to his wandering eyes, and impure thoughts about the same gender; to the whispered plea of don’t tell my parents, please, I’ll do anything, Father. I’ll do better, I’ll look at girls, a-and be normal. Please, Father. It feels like remembering how he cried his eyes out after leaving the confessional, then biked home in the frigid rain that fell despite a zero percent chance of rain that day. It was as if the sky was mourning with him, helping him hide his red-rimmed, puffy eyes from his parents. All his mom cared about was him tracking mud and water onto the rug, and then she sent him off to shower once she got a towel for him to wrap himself with.

It feels like never really looking into a mirror for more than a cursory once-over in fear of seeing the real Eddie. The one whose eyes strayed and had impure thoughts about the same gender. The one who stole his sister’s 2005 issue of Top Ten Hottest Men and shamefully kept it hidden under his bed. The one who swallowed the rejection to Shannon and remembered his mother’s wishes trumped his.

“I don’t even deserve him; I don’t deserve love,” Eddie laughs with as much misery as he feels. He feels miserable. He is miserable, has been for a long time, and he’s just learned to live with it. Misery loves company, he supposes. It sure as hell loves Eddie’s company. “I’d ruin Buck. I ruined all of my other relationships, and Buck deserves more, way more than I could ever give him. I ruin everything I touch, you know? Every romantic partner I’ve had ended in misery and me doing something wrong; I’m flawed in so many ways I’ve lost count, and Buck deserves someone better.” It feels good to get it out there, in a way; however, it feels even worse to verbalize it at the same time. It feels like it’s crushing him with the realization that, despite how much he loves Buck, he’ll never be with him.

“In a kind world,” Eddie says quietly into his half-full beer, unable to meet any of their eyes. Karen’s hand remains on his shoulder, gently rubbing circles into it. He can hear Hen’s sharp inhale, her readying to start speaking, but Eddie doesn’t let her. “In a kind world, Buck knows, and he loves me back. In the kindest world, though, we’ve never met.”

He can’t do this. Not now. Maybe not ever. This was stupid.

He needs to go.

He needs… he wants to leave; Eddie doesn’t listen to his wants often anymore, but right now, he is. He’s being selfish; he’s leaving Hen and Karen with the pile of words he’s spewed over who knows how long, and then running off. Again.

It’s his signature move at this point.

“This was- this was stupid, I gotta… yeah,” Eddie murmurs, unable to look up; he doesn’t want to know how they react. Disgust? Sympathy? Regret? Curiosity?

He doesn’t want any of it.

Shaking their hands off gently—because despite how much he wants to break into a dead sprint and shove them away, they’re still his friends, and Eddie doesn’t want to hurt anyone tonight; well, anyone but himself, he supposes—Eddie fishes his wallet out of his pocket, slaps down a twenty—far too much for his shitty IPA and mozzarella sticks—and walks off.

Nobody says anything about the single teardrop next to the crumpled bill.

Eddie cries in his stupid, shitty Prius, hits the wheel hard enough to hear something creak, and drives back to Buck’s house—because 4995 South Bedford St isn’t home; he’s not letting it be home—in silence.

Halfway through the drive, Eddie contemplates veering off the road, crashing this stupid car as stupid country music plays through the speakers, and walking into the night and never reappearing. However, his phone lights up with a soft buzz where he’d mindlessly put it after doing so during his Uber days. Buck and Chris’ face lights up his lockscreen, and a text from Buck reads want to watch a nature doc when you get back? New one just dropped earlier today n I wanted to watch it with you!!

How can he possibly crash this shitbox of a car—actually, despite Eddie’s hatred for this thing, it’s stupidly good with gas, and mileage, and isn’t much of a shitbox; however, to Eddie, it is—and disappear like that when Buck is waiting for him at the house, wanting to watch a nature documentary with him? How can he disappoint Buck?

Eddie drives back to the house safely and stops for two seconds at a stop sign instead of the standard three. It’s about as reckless as he gets.

-

Pulling into the driveway feels like a weight off his shoulder, and a new boulder dropping into his stomach. He can’t find it in himself to get out of the car after he turned it off, leaving him to sit in it. He’s been sitting here long enough for the interior lights to switch off, plunging him into darkness. He needs someone to talk to, someone who isn’t Buck. Buck would understand, but he can’t bring himself to tell Buck about any of this. Hen and Karen were enough, but Buck is just too much for him to take in one night.

Finally, Eddie sighs and pulls his phone off the mount, slips out of the car, locks it, and… lays down on the driveway. It’s well past eleven pm by this point, and the neighborhood is asleep; streetlights are dim and spaced out, leaving the streets mostly dark past a few switched-on porch lights. The concrete of the driveway under him is still warm despite the darkness of this part of the world, leaving him just laying there behind his Prius. He’s probably hidden from the front porch if Buck has decided to take a peek out to the driveway if he heard Eddie driving up, but he hopes he hasn’t.

Eddie needs a moment alone; a moment to finally let the tears clogging his ducts fall. They burn as they slip down his cheeks, red-hot against his cool skin. It feels bad to cry, and it goes against everything he’s been told. Strong men don’t cry, Edmundo, his father would say. Strong men roll their shoulders back and march on.

Eddie would march on, would roll his shoulders back, but he’s tired. He’s tired of marching, of wiping tears before anyone can see them fall, of hiding every emotion in a weathered box labeled do not open. He feels like the box is broken now, letting everything spill out, and Eddie doesn’t have enough energy to stop it.

His phone buzzes in his pocket, startling him. His head pops off the ground, but he lets it thunk back before fishing his phone out, pressing the accept button to the incoming call without looking at who is calling. “Hello?” he says, and his voice sounds hollow and bone-tired, shaking in his raw throat.

“Eddie?” Bobby’s voice comes through the phone, slightly tinny, but clear as day. It’s like the man is sitting there with him as Eddie sits like a pathetic idiot mimicking a starfish on what used to be his driveway. “Hen called, told me that you were a bit upset about something; she didn’t say, but I thought I’d give you a call. See how you are.”

Eddie doesn’t think he could hold back the tidal wave of tears if he tried. They burst forth, destroying every feeble attempt to block it as he sobs a rough, wrecked sound, and slams a hand over his face in an effort to muffle it. “Cap,” Eddie cries weakly, tears rushing down his face. “I’m not okay, Cap,” he confesses, sniffling an ugly sound. His face is a mess of tears, and Eddie feels like a mess; he’s completely embodying it. He’s too tired not to.

“Tell me what’s up, see if I can help, okay? I’m here for you, Eddie.” It’s everything Eddie’s ever wanted to hear, especially from the man he loves like a father more than his actual dad. His relationship with his dad has been strained since he was sat down at eight and told the expectations of being the man of the household.

“I fucked everything up, Bobby,” with a mirthless half-laugh, half-sob, Eddie gets ready to spill his secrets for the second time this night. A record for him, honestly—he’s always been one to keep things inside; to keep his cards close to his chest and never let most of them flip open. He’d rather fold than let his hand be known.

“I’m sure that’s not true, Eddie,” Bobby says with this soft, reassuring voice, like he has all the answers. He doesn’t put it past his captain to actually have all the answers. “Tell me what happened tonight.”

Eddie does. It’s not like he can sew his lips up to prevent his secrets from coming out; plus, why hide it now? He’s trying something new, it seems: spilling every secret he’s kept hidden for twenty-two years in the span of three hours. “I came out to Hen and Karen, and, fuck, they were supportive; of course they were, I wouldn’t expect anything less from the… y’know, lesbians, but I fucked up. I ran away, Bobby. Told them about how fucking guilty I am for finally embracing the secret of me being gay for the first time in twenty-two years, maybe even longer. I pushed it all down for so long, you know? My parents didn’t want a gay son, they wanted the man of the house, a-a son who’d give them grandchildren, who’d marry a nice lady they approved of; not some sinful abomination.” With each word, Eddie feels like he’s stabbing himself. He wouldn’t be surprised if his body were full of wounds by the time the night ended.

“I tried, I tried so hard, Bobby. I did the best I could to be the son they raised and would be proud of, the one they’d brag about to the other churchgoers. I did what they wanted; I tried… I tried to pray to be normal—to be the good son my parents dreamed of. It never worked, but I attempted it. I look at girls, not guys; I swallowed every rejection I wanted to say to the girls that’d ask me out; I did the best to be the man of the house my father had raised me to be when he was home. I did it all, I tried it all, but I still hated myself.” The tears roll down his face unbidden like magma against his skin as he stares into the starless LA sky.

It’s cloudy out, the moon hidden, and the warm breeze whistling gently through the neighborhood. “I hated who I was—I pushed my true self down. I don’t even know how to be that Eddie anymore; I don’t know how to be me. I haven’t been me since I was twelve. I don’t know how to live with this… this crushing weight on my chest, Cap. I thought coming out—finally embracing myself after twenty-two years—was supposed to alleviate that, but it only made it worse; I just feel… heavy. Wrong. I’m so tired of feeling wrong, Cap, I don’t know what to do anymore.”

“Oh, Eddie,” Bobby murmurs, and Eddie curls onto his side and muffles his cries into his bicep, biting the sleeve of his henley. He’s so tired of being wrong, of not being the perfect person everyone wants him to be. “Fuck your parents, and excuse my language, but they don’t get to dictate your life, Eddie. Pleasing people while trying to be yourself will never work—you’ll cut yourself up and make yourself fit their image while damaging yourself. It’s not worth it, kid.” Bobby takes a moment, a soft sigh flowing through the phone.

“You don’t have to be their picture-perfect son they get to brag about to churchgoers, you get to be Eddie. Embrace yourself; it’s not going to be linear or quick, kid, but you gotta do it. Eat your favorite food, make mistakes, grow your mustache back,” a wet laugh ripples through Eddie’s mouth at the mention of his mustache.

“Just… be yourself. I know it sounds like stupid advice, but I promise you, once you get over the fact that you don’t need to be perfect to anyone, and you are human, you can feel better. I’m proud of you, too. I know you’re brave from years of working with you, but this takes a lot of bravery, and I’m proud of you; for telling me, for talking about it, for letting yourself feel.”

“Thanks, cap,” Eddie mumbles, breathing out a slow breath as he takes Bobby’s advice to heart. He uncurls and flops back onto the driveway, once again mimicking a starfish. A less pathetic one, this time. Maybe, he still feels a bit miserable and pathetic, especially since he’s still laying on his driveway.

“Now, I feel like there’s something else going on here, so do you want to talk about that, too? Or, we can leave it at that, and I can enlist some more wisdom,” Bobby jokes softly, and, damn having a field sergeant as a wife must’ve rubbed off on Bobby, because he’s too damn preceptive.

Eddie blows out a slow, deep breath. He might as well, right? What’s one more person to know about his love for Buck? “I… It’s complicated,” Eddie croaks weakly, bowing out of the confession at the last moment.

“I have time, Eddie,” Bobby says, and Eddie almost wishes he didn’t. How is he supposed to explain to his captain that he’s not only in love with Buck—who is basically Bobby’s son—and also talk about his innate fear of ruining someone by loving them, and how he doesn’t feel like he’s deserving of love?

Eddie might not even have the time to unpack all of that.

“I… I’ve never been good at love; I’ve always fucked up my relationships, as I’m sure you know. I just… I never knew how to love properly, you know? Everything was a performance, a song and dance I perfected, but never found myself intertwined with. I could get it right, but never perfect enough; I gave my girlfriends what they wanted, but I was always distant—my heart just wasn’t in it. Probably didn’t help that even though I had been repressing myself for so long, a small part of me just never got over the fact that I’ve been gay since before I even started puberty. Eventually, I just thought I wasn’t made for love; I wasn’t worthy of it because of how many times I fucked up,” Eddie mumbles into the phone, blinking rapidly to clear his blurring vision. It doesn’t work, and the tears that spill down his cheeks are unbidden. “I feel like every romantic relationship I will touch will be tainted with my fucked up inability to love properly.”

“Maybe it’ll be different with a different crowd,” Bobby says, “You can’t beat yourself up like this, Eddie. You have to forgive yourself for your past mistakes; if you don’t, it’ll poison you and everything. Take it from me, Eddie. You don’t have to forget, but you have to forgive yourself. Give people a chance, give yourself a change; maybe you’ll find you are made for love when you aren’t trying to perform.”

“I don’t think I know how to do that, Bobby. I don’t want to ruin more people because I can’t get my shit together,” I don’t want to ruin Buck. The words almost slide out of his mouth, but he tries to swallow them down; it barely works as they try to claw their way up his throat.

“Can I tell you what I think, Eddie?” Bobby asks suddenly, making Eddie’s stomach twist. He almost doesn’t want to know what his captain is thinking, but he trusts Bobby. He nods before realizing Bobby isn’t right next to him and is on the phone.

“Yeah, sure,” Eddie replies weakly, licking his lips. They taste like salt and misery. “Go easy on me, Cap.” It’s a feeble attempt to break the building tension in Eddie’s body, which loosens at Bobby’s amused huff.

“I think this is about someone. You’re scared to hurt someone, not just the general LA population. There’s someone on your mind as you talk about how bad you are at loving people, isn’t there? You have to give them the chance; you can’t just assume that you aren’t deserving of their love if you haven’t given them the chance to love you. Who knows, they might surprise you.” Dios fucking mio, Bobby really hit the nail on the head and drove it straight into Eddie’s chest. His heart bumbles and pounds in his chest. Eddie takes in a shaky, sharp breath as he tries to get his heart to not beat out of his chest. “Am I right?” Bobby asks after a moment of silence from Eddie.

“Yeah,” Eddie croaks, “Yeah, you are.” Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuuuck, fuck. Bobby is getting way too close to the truth, to the not-so-hidden secret that three people know, and he has a feeling it’s soon to be four. Bobby is perceptive like that.

“Let Buck show you that you can be loved, and love another man, Eddie. Give him a chance,” Bobby says, and Eddie shoots up to a sitting position, a choked-off sound dying in his throat.

“It’s not- wha- you-” Eddie stammers and stumbles over his words, feeling entirely too see; too exposed. How did he know? Is Eddie that obvious? Mierda, does Buck know about this? About how much Eddie loves him? No, he wouldn’t; surely not, right? If Buck knew Eddie was in love with him, he wouldn’t let Eddie sleep in the same bed as him, so he has to be oblivious. “It’s no… It’s not,” Eddie tries to deny weakly, but the words It’s not Buck feel like acid and betrayal on his tongue. He can’t manage to get the words out, and instead, he flops down onto the driveway again, covering his face with his hand. “Am I that obvious?”

“No, you aren’t,” Bobby says reassuringly. “I just pay attention, very close attention. It’s not really that obvious, seeing how close the two of you are as friends, but I can see it in your eyes. I’ve been around almost double the time you’ve been alive. I’ve seen the same look you have whenever you look at Buck, sometimes more times than I can count, Eddie. I suspect Hen had her suspicions, but she’s never verbalized it.”

“Fuck,” Eddie groans. “I… I’m so fucking in love with him, Cap, it hurts. I’m so scared of how much I love Buck,” he says quietly, swallowing around the lump in his throat. “I’m so scared of fucking it up, regardless if I have a chance with him or not—I’m so scared of telling Buck and having him reject me, and we can never go back to the way things were, or worse. I don’t want to lose him, Bobby. I think losing Buck would kill me inside.”

“Give him a chance, Eddie. Don’t decide his and your fate without giving him a fighting chance. I don’t think he’d reject you,” Bobby says, and Eddie wants to believe him, but he can’t. He’s so utterly terrified of Buck rejecting him and breaking their friendship beyond repair; Eddie would be utterly devastated if he lost Buck to the fact that he confessed his love for the blond. He’d ruin one of the best things—past his son—in his life because of his selfish desires; he’s already done that more times than he can count on his fingers and toes, and he’s not about to do it again.

“I can’t, Bobby. I can’t. I want to believe you, but I can’t. I’ve already ruined so many things in my life because of my selfishness; I can’t ruin this. I’d be lost without Buck, the few months in Texas proved that, and I would be broken beyond repair if I ruined our friendship because of my crush on Buck.” It’s not a crush, but that’s the best Eddie can simplify it to. To call the love inside of him that’s burning inside of him, taking up every waking moment with the reminder of oh, yeah, I’m in love with Buck, a crush feels wrong, but it lessens the blow to Eddie. Or, he’d like to think it does. The sucker punch to his stomach doesn’t feel any softer.

“Well, then I guess I can’t help you, but I know who can,” Bobby says, then goes silent. What the hell?!

One, what the fuck does Bobby mean by that, and two, how can such a simple sentence be so damn ominous?

Eddie stares at his phone in shock, the screen slowly fading to black as it turns itself off, the call remaining connected despite the silence on the other side of the line. Then, with a groan, he lets it flop onto his chest as he buries his face into his hands, wishing to scream into them. He would, but it’s nearing midnight, and Eddie is a respectable neighbor; he wallows in silence, thank you very much. He almost contemplates asking Bobby what the hell he means, but Eddie feels like he’s talked enough for today and spilled enough as well. He feels like his reservoir of words is dried up, leaving him a quiet husk of misery.

He doesn’t hear the front door open, but he does startle when Buck sits next to him, making him pull his hands away from his face to gape openly at the blond. Buck is sitting criss-cross next to him, hands planted on the driveway, and looking down at Eddie with open, raw concern in his baby blue eyes. He goes to say something, but Bobby’s line filters through the silence from his phone that lays on his chest. “Talk to him, Eddie. Give him a chance; don’t rob yourself or him of the happiness you two deserve.” Then, Bobby hangs up on him. He hangs up!

“What the hell?” Eddie whispers, staring down at his phone as the dial tone fades, leaving an awkward and stifling silence between him and Buck. What an exit, Bobby. Leave him to flounder, lovely.

“Are you okay, Eds?” Buck asks, voice soft and tentative. Eddie’s eyes flick up to him, and then look away because he can’t take looking at Buck and lying at the same time. How is he supposed to talk to Buck? How dare Bobby force him to do this, to put him in such a position? “Bobby texted me to ask me to come out here and sit with you, cuz I’ve been waiting for you to come in for a while. I thought the whole laying on the driveway was just… a way for you to decompress, I guess? I didn’t want to pry or barge in,” Buck whispers, looking away and fiddling with his fingers in his lap, head bowed.

“Ugh,” Eddie groans, and contemplates rolling over till he reaches the grass and hopes the earth will open up and swallow him whole. “I’m okay, Buck, I promise,” Eddie says, sighing softly. He’s really not, but he wants to reassure Buck, and maybe himself, that he is. Lying to himself is easier than confronting the truth; it’s just the way Eddie works.

“You and I both know that’s a lie, Eddie. But if you don’t want to talk about it, we don’t have to. I’m not going to force you,” Buck smiles at him, and Eddie’s heart wobbles in his chest, which should be quite concerning to him, with him being a paramedic and all.

However, before he can wonder what the hell his heart is doing inside of his chest, his brain takes the reins and rudely blurts out, “I’m gay, and I’m tired of hiding it.”

Well. Great going, Eddie. Maybe he can disappear and go to like… Tijuana, or something, so he doesn’t have to face Buck after that quite startling blurted confession.

“Oh,” Buck says after a second, blinking at him. Oh? Is that it? “O-Oh, uh, wow, bad response. But, I’m proud of you, Eds. It takes a lot of courage to come out,” Buck smiles that good ole Buck smile at him, and Eddie wants to reach out and kiss him, or punch himself in the face. Either option sounds good right about now. “Nothing’s gonna change between us, if that’s what you’re worried about… you’ll still be my best friend, always will be, Eddie.” Eddie knows Buck is trying to be supportive, and say the words he said to Buck when he came out to Eddie as bisexual and having gone on a date with… ugh, Tommy.

However, Eddie doesn’t want things to stay the same between them; he wants things to change, in a good way, though. He wants to kiss Buck, he wants to hold his hand, he wants to love Buck.

Eddie groans loudly and sits up, putting his head between his knees, and burying it back into his palms. He’s trying real hard not to scream, but it’s getting harder with how fast his heart is beating, and how much he wants to kiss Buck.

“O-Oh, uhm, did I say something wrong? S-Sorry, geez, uhm, I’ve never been in this situation before, ‘m sorry, Eddie,” Buck stammers, shuffling closer as Eddie and hovering awkwardly next to him. It’s clear Buck doesn’t know what to do, and Eddie doesn’t blame him; Eddie’s not exactly giving the clearest signals right now. “I-I’m sorry, Eddie. Did I say something bad?” God, he sounds so fucking earnest and scared. Eddie wants to kiss him.

“No, you didn’t, Buck,” Eddie barely holds back the long-suffering sigh. “I just… I don’t want things to be the same; I want things to change,” Eddie says carefully, eyeing Buck from his peripherals to see how the blond reacts. His face is blanketed in confusion, a little furrow between his brow forming that Eddie wishes to smooth out with his thumb. His head is tilted to the side like a damn puppy trying to understand its owner’s command.

Buck blinks, clearly confused. He isn’t saying anything, which means he’s waiting for Eddie to give more context to what he just said. Eddie’s not sure if he’s strong enough for that, but he has to do it; he owes it to Buck, because blurting out I want things to change and not elaborating on it will likely drive Buck insane if he doesn’t expand on it. “I, Buck…”

Marry a woman, not a man, Edmundo his mother’s voice cuts through the panic in his head, making his fingers flex as he drops them. Of course, right as he’s trying to build the confidence to confess to Buck, his mother’s words that have haunted him since he could understand them come back.

Give us a grandchild or two; it’s your job as my son.

Eddie opens his mouth, but no words come out; instead, it’s just a weak croak that makes him want to scream. He wants to say it, he wants to confess, he’s ready—he’s not, but when will he ever be?—but of course, his mother has to ruin everything. Her words burn like a brand on his skin, as if he’s been doused in gasoline, and her words are an ember floating dangerously close to him, taunting him with the prospect of going up in flames if he doesn’t stay complacent to her wishes.

You are the man of the house, Eddie. We’re preparing you for when you marry your future wife and have kids. Oh, look, his father’s voice, what joy. It’s a cacophony of every reminder, every sentence his parents have tattooed into his skin of their wishes. Marry a good woman. Give them a grandchild or two. Be the man of the house. Be the distant provider. Be the son they can brag about.

Keep your eyes straight, Edmundo. He’s always wondered if his parents repeated these words so often because they knew there was something off about him. His mom would go on long tangents about his lack of care and frequent rejections to the girls from the church when Eddie still went with them. His father would merely shake his head and sip his whiskey calmly, never adding to the chiding, but his silence felt like enough.

That girl at church, Elaine? She’d be good for you, Edmundo. Eddie grits his teeth in frustration, gazing at Buck, who looks concerned, hand floating in the air, so close to reaching out, but never bridging the tiny gap. Eddie forces his eyes to the ground, taking in the concrete he’s sitting on in an attempt to drown out his mother.

It’s not working.

Eddie sucks in a deep breath as he lies back down, staring at the starless sky, the moon hidden by clouds, and Buck, who is looming over him, face pinched with concern. He has to say it before the words that have haunted him for years can tie him back down; can make him complacent in his misery and secrecy. He has to, if not for him, but for Buck. Buck deserves to know, deserves to know that the man who has been sleeping in his bed for the past month-and-a-half is in love with him.

Like Bobby said, he has to give Buck a chance; he can’t rob Buck of the opportunity to make his own decision before Eddie can make it for him.

“I’m in love with you,” he blurts before he can stop. “I’m so fucking in love with you, it hurts, Buck. I’m afraid to love you, but I’ll never regret it. I’m so scared of hurting you, of ruining you like I’ve done with every other relationship, and I would have taken this to my grave if I could, but you deserve to know. You…” Eddie trails off, hands flexing at his side rapidly. Dios, what did he do? Why’d he say that?

Why didn’t he keep quiet, explain the I want things to change away with a lie, and be done with it? Why’d he actually listen to Bobby?

Why’d he ruin the best thing that has happened to him?

Dios, Buck should be running for the hills right now. He doesn’t deserve to deal with Eddie’s fears and should just let him down gently and sever all ties with Eddie. It’d be better that way, despite how much Eddie thinks it’d kill him.

He’d deal with it, though, because that’s his burden to bear. His love for Buck is his burden to bear—even though it’s never been a burden to love Buck; it never has, and never will be—and he shouldn’t have to take on Eddie’s messy feelings because Eddie has finally decided to break the latch on his true self for the first time in twenty-two years. He shouldn’t be responsible for Eddie’s selfish desire.

Edmundo, when you grow up, make us proud and start a family.

Edmundo, make us proud.

Edmundo, be the man of the house; it’s your duty.

Edmundo

Edmundo

Edmundo

Edmun-

Ed-

Eddie-

“Eddie?” He snaps back to the present, his mother’s voice a harrowing whisper in his ear as he stares at Buck. The blond is leaning over him, gazing at him with such warmth in his eyes, which is surprising. However, he knows Buck is a kind person, and he’s swallowing down the words he wants to say; he wants to beg Buck to stay, to disregard everything he said so that they can go back to before this whole conversation. Eddie will swallow his feelings again if it means keeping Buck by his side. “Can I kiss you?”

Oh.

Eddie nods before his mother’s clawing whispers can take hold again. Buck leans down, but Eddie meets him in the middle, pushing himself up with a hand braced on the concrete, and his other coming up to cup Buck’s cheek and guide him to Eddie’s lips.

Kissing Buck isn’t like fireworks and a burst of right; it’s like coming home. It’s just… good; right. Their lips meld gently, and Eddie swallows Buck’s soft noise, his eyes refusing to close so he can make sure this isn’t some crazy, realistic dream he’s having; make sure he’s not dreaming, and he’s awake. The kiss goes on for what feels like forever and a millisecond. Buck pulls away, but Eddie chases him with a fervor, pushing himself up till he’s sitting up completely, and pressing their lips together. Now that he doesn’t need his hand to keep him upright, it finds its home fisting Bucks’ shirt, keeping Buck as close as possible to Eddie.

Now that he has Buck, he can kiss him; he’s not letting him go anytime soon.

Buck sighs into the kiss, the sound sugar-sweet, and Eddie’s eyes finally slip close. Their breaths meld, and the touches from Buck’s now-wandering hands are feather-light and soft; gentle in the way you’d touch precious, expensive china.

“Buck,” Eddie murmurs, smiling despite the absolute roller coaster this night has been. If you had told Eddie earlier this morning that it’d end with him kissing Buck, he’d throw something at you. It almost feels unbelievable, but here he is, kissing Buck.

“Eddie,” Buck whispers back, smiling at him. “I love you, too, you know? I never said anything because I thought you were straight, but… well, knowing you aren’t gave me the confidence I needed. I’ve loved you for a long time, a lot longer than I really know, and you don’t need to worry about breaking me. Neither of us is perfect, but I think we’re perfect for each other.”

“Getting romantic on me, Buckley?” Eddie jokes, his hand remaining on Buck’s cheek. His thumbs strokes a gentle path up and down Buck’s cheekbone, finally being able to touch the blond, he never wants to stop. “I love you, too. A lot more than I even know, and dios, am I glad you love me back.”

“Me, too,” Buck giggles, gazing at him with such love in his eyes, Eddie’s not sure how he didn’t catch it before now. Maybe he did, but never allowed himself to make the correlation in fear of what it’d make him do; of what it’d bring up to the surface. Buck lays down on the concrete, tugging him down with him, and lacing their fingers together. “Man, if you told me I’d be kissing my best friend by tonight, I’d probably not believe you, but I guess dreams do come true,” Buck says, knocking their feet together as Buck swings his back and forth.

“You dream about kissing me much?” Eddie asks cheekily, but he’s genuinely curious. It’s not like he could ever ask Buck these questions before literally kissing the guy, so there’s a whole different side of Buck he needs to get to know.

“Uh, yeah? Eddie, I’ve literally been in love with you for a long time, although I only realized it recently, but I do dream about that. It happens a lot more than I’d like to admit, though,” Buck says, tone turning slightly sheepish at the end. If it were a little brighter out, he’s sure he could see the blush coloring Buck’s cheeks.

“Well, good to know, am I a good kisser in your dreams?” Eddie asks, laughing with Buck, who barks out a sharp, giggly laugh.

“Stop fishing for compliments, Diaz. But, you outdid your dream-self, so take that as you will,” Buck says, squeezing his fingers, and Eddie squeezes back, smiling softly. Dios, he feels like a teenager in love all over again with how absolutely head-over-heels he is for this man. Eddie grins up to the sky, tears long since dried, and his mother’s voice has gone quiet by now.

They lay there in comfortable silence for a few more minutes, just taking it in. Whenever they lock eyes when they sneak glances at each other, they turn away like bashful teenagers holding hands for the first time. The night is getting colder as it creeps past midnight, but Eddie doesn’t feel the need to go inside right now. He’s enjoying the peaceful atmosphere outside and enjoys laying next to Buck, hands gently clasped together.

He’s not sure how much time passes, but his head pops up when he hears the soft slap of feet against the concrete, looking behind him to find Chris standing above them, looking at them through the lenses of his glasses. Wordlessly, Eddie holds a hand out for Chris to hold onto as he works himself down to the ground, legs wobbling slightly. His legs usually get weaker around bedtime, exhaustion and muscle fatigue winning out.

Chris braces on his hand and wiggles his way between him and Buck, using Eddie’s bicep as a pillow. It’s quiet for a moment as he and Buck adjust, their hands falling away from each other as Eddie uses the arm Chris is laying on to pull his son’s head closer to his so he can press a kiss into damp curls. “Daaad,” Chris whines, but only minimally. He’s not trying to wiggle away; instead, he lets Eddie kiss his head softly without complaint.

Or… mostly without complaint.

“You guys are weird,” Chris says after Eddie lets his arm fall against the concrete again. “Laying on concrete, seriously? Weird. We have perfectly good beds inside,” Chris says, and Buck laughs softly, snickering as Eddie groans and rolls his eyes.

“Exactly, we have perfectly good beds inside that you should be in right now. Shall I mention your curfew, dear son?” Eddie says, eyeing the teen, who quickly shuts with mouth with raised hands in mock surrender.

“I hear laying on your driveway past midnight is really in right now, quite popular,” Chris says, and Buck laughs louder, making Eddie huff a laugh as well. Then, Chris starts laughing, trying to stifle his giggles, but it’s not working all that well.

In a moment, they’re all a mess of giggles and snickers, trying to muffle and shush each other, but it only serves to make their laughter even louder. It’s infectious, building off one another till they’re slapping hands over mouths to try and not wake up their poor neighbors. It doesn’t work, and a porch light a few houses down the street is flipped on, making all three of their heads pop up to look at it. A moment later, it’s flicked off, and they’re backed to giggling; however, it’s quieter now.

“Not that I don’t like laying on concrete, can we go inside? It’s cold, and I have a curfew to ignore again,” Chris says, and Eddie smacks his son’s arm gently. “Excuse me, I have a curfew to follow to the tee, my apologies.”

“Uh-huh,” Eddie says, rolling his eyes. “But, yes, we can. Need some help up, mijo?” Eddie asks as he sits up, helping Chris up. Buck sits up as well, running a hand through his hair and stretching. Eddie tries to avert his eyes from the sliver of skin exposed to him, swallowing thickly and focusing on his son.

Chris blinks sleepily behind his lenses, yawning softly. “Carry me? My legs have decided that they need to obey curfew and have checked out, quite rudely, I might say,” Chris grumbles, leaning against Eddie. Eddie blinks at the request, having not carried his son for a good few years. As Chris grew, his want for contact dwindled slightly; not enough to shy away from hugs and forehead kisses, but more of being carried and falling asleep in Eddie’s arms.

“Yeah, mijo, I can,” Eddie murmurs, kissing his son’s forehead again. He stands after shoving his phone into his pocket, and Buck stands as well. Before he can reach out a hand to help Chris up so he can sweep him up into his arms, Buck holds his own out, smiling softly at Chris.

Chris takes Buck’s hands and tugs himself up, yawning loudly. “Thanks, Buck,” he mutters as Eddie moves forward and picks Chris up, adjusting him till he’s chest-to-chest with Eddie, and it’s like a reverse piggy-back. Dios, he used to fit perfectly in Eddie’s arms, and now he barely fits. It’s bittersweet and makes him want never to let go, but he needs to when they get back into the house. “Thanks, Dad,” Chris whispers, laying his head on Eddie’s shoulders as Buck smiles at them softly.

“Of course, kiddo,” Eddie says, kissing Chris’ temple before slowly walking up the driveway, Buck following behind him softly. He’s humming something under his breath gently, the quiet melody following them up the driveway. Eddie opens the front door, holding it open for Buck, who slips into the entryway behind him and locks the door. Then, he steps closer and slips his hand into Eddie’s pocket, fishing his car keys out of it. He kisses Eddie’s cheek and then kisses Chris’ forehead.

“Sleep well, Chris, love you,” Buck murmurs, running a hand through Chris’ hair gently, getting a soft, pleased huff from the teen completely limp in Eddie’s arms.

“Love you, too, Buck,” Chris says, and Eddie can feel his smile against his shoulder as he walks off to Chris’ bedroom, pushing the door open with his foot gently. Chris’ bedroom is a little more to the taste of a teenager’s liking, but it’s pretty reminiscent of his old bedroom before they moved. Apparently, Buck kept everything they left behind the same, but added a full-sized bed in there that Chris was very happy to discover when they moved back in with the blond.

Gently wading through the small pile of clothes all over Chris’ bedroom floor, Eddie walks to his son’s bed and sets him down in the spot where his covers have been flung back, muttering a soft there you go. Chris is half-asleep, and lets Eddie tuck him in without any complaint. He takes off his glasses and hands them to Eddie so he can place them on the nightstand before taking a seat on the edge of his son’s bed. “G’night, Chris. I love you, buddy,” Eddie murmurs, carding a hand through Chris’ soft curls. Chris hums softly, smiling with his eyes closed. “Sleep well.”

“Love you, too, Dad, sleep well,” Chris slurs, sleep already beginning to take him under. Eddie smiles softly, leaning down to leave one last kiss on Chris’ forehead before he stands up and walks to the door, where he pauses for a moment. “Hey, da’d?” Chris calls out sleepily, stalling Eddie in the doorway.

“Hm?” Eddie hums, looking back at his son, one hand on the doorjamb while the other rests on the handle. “What’s up, mijo? You need anything before bed?”

“Nah… just, keep the PDA with Buck to a minimum, m’kay?” Chris says, yawns, and then rolls over, asleep a moment later. Eddie blinks, stunned where he stands. Then, he laughs softly, shaking his head. Of course, his son would now, and now that he thinks about it, that conversation in the car felt very pointed. He couldn’t figure out how, or why until now.

At least he knows his kid will support him. He wants the PDA to a minimum, as all teenagers surely do when they see their parent kissing their partner. The acceptance makes him feel warm inside.

Eddie shakes his head, smiling as he closes Chris’ door gently, yawning. This whole day has drained him; wrung him dry like a wet rag. He feels about thirty seconds from collapsing.

Buck appears from nowhere, clad in his sleepwear: a hoodie, fleece sweatpants, and socks with little cacti on them. “Bed?” He asks, sliding up to Eddie and hugging him. Eddie hugs back with a soft breath whistling out of his parted lips, hooking his chin on Buck’s shoulder.

“Mm, yeah,” Eddie mumbles, squeezing Buck. He pulls back gently, looking at sleepy baby blue eyes half-hidden by fluttering flaxen lashes, and needs to kiss him. And, well, he can now, so he does. Eddie leans in carefully, foreheads and noses brushing together before Eddie closes the distance between their lips. The kiss is sweet, and Buck tastes like his slightly minty toothpaste. The blond hums into the kiss and presses close till he’s standing on Eddie’s toes, like a little penguin would do. It’s cute.

It’s revolutionary what Eddie is privy to now: a whole new side of Buck he gets to explore.

“Let’s go to bed, mi amor,” Eddie whispers as he pulls back slightly, wiggling his fingers under Buck’s sweatshirt to press into soft, bare skin. He’s warm under Eddie’s touch, but not overly so.

Buck flushes at the nickname, swallowing thickly, his face flushing under the dim hallway light. “Y-eah,” Buck’s voice cracks, doing something Eddie finds quite enjoyable. It wobbles as he swallows thickly, nodding, and pecking Eddie on the lips. “Bedtime,” Buck says, trying to act composed, but the way he never drifts further than about six inches from Eddie as he tugs the blond down the hallway paints a different picture.

Eddie finds it quite enjoyable, smiling softly as he laces their fingers together and slips into their bedroom. He can brush twice in the morning, but right now, he needs to be in bed now. He should have been in bed a good twenty minutes ago, or maybe two hours ago, but all that matters is his bed is about two feet away from him, and Buck is trying to mold himself to Eddie, and all he wants sleep.

Without much preamble, Eddie breaks away from Buck’s attempts to latch himself to Eddie like a barnacle would to a stone and launches himself into bed. The whole frame squeaks from the motion, and Eddie’s half-suffocating himself in his pillow, but he’s in bed. He’s here, and he’s not leaving this nauseatingly expensive mattress Buck has for at least ten hours minimum.

“That tired, huh?” Buck says, slipping into his side of the bed. It’s furthest away from the door, while Eddie sleeps the closest. He doesn’t mind it at all, and the subtle fulfillment of keeping Buck safe warms his bones. Eddie manages an unintelligent grunt into the pillow, shifting his face till he can look at Buck. He’s all cozy, already swaddling himself with the covers tucked up to his chin, and dios, he’s so close. They’re basically sharing Eddie’s pillow, but he’s never been so happy to give up a section of his prized pillow.

“C’mere,” Eddie grunts like a caveman, raising his arm and beckoning Buck forth with a very stern, floppy shake of the arm hovering in the air. It’s a bit half-assed, but he left his leftover energy in the hallway, and Eddie is truly too tired for more than vague arm waves and grunts that’d make you think the glaciers melted and unleashed a perfectly preserved old human named Eddie.

However, it works as desired, and Buck dives into his arms. He’s against Eddie in point-oh-two seconds, sidling up to him, and sticking his sock-clad feet between Eddie’s calves, like he’s trying to siphon his warmth one sock-clad icy toe at a time. Eddie lets him, though, and throws his arm over Buck’s shoulders, humming softly as Buck tucks himself under Eddie’s chin somehow. It’ll always amaze him what odd positions Buck can fit himself into, considering the guy is six-foot-two.

“Good?” Edie mumbles, dropping a kiss on Buck’s curls. Buck moves a bit, shuffles till he gets comfy, an arm resting over Eddie’s waist, his head tucked under his chin, and his feet under Eddie’s calves, and then he nods.

“Uh-huh,” Buck says, and sighs like he’s getting into a jacuzzi. He wiggles happily, humming softly, and kisses Eddie’s Adams’ apple softly, Buck’s chapped and bitten-to-hell lips still soft against his skin. “G’night, Eddie,” Buck whispers, but he’s already asleep, sated with the fact that Buck is happy and warm in his arms, right where he belongs.

-

Eddie wakes with a low groan dying in the back of his throat. He feels like death warmed over, eyes weakly trying to unstick themselves. His body feels like a wet noodle personified, a yawn cracking his chapped lips open. He’s tired, he’s dehydrated, and there’s a headache coming on as he wakes up. It stirs at the base of his skull, and he knows that’s going to be a bitch to nurse.

His eyes manage to peel open, and Eddie finds the room dark, but the alarm clock on Buck’s side of the nightstand reads eleven AM, so Buck must’ve pulled the blackout blinds he has on the windows closed before they went to bed last night. He could kiss Buck for that move, as he thinks light would make his headache even worse. It might even encroach on migraine territory after crying his eyes out and going through about four different roller coasters of emotions simultaneously last night.

Last night sucked, but it also didn’t, but it also did. It’s a very confusing feeling that Eddie doesn’t feel like unpacking; he’d say because it’s too damn early, but it’s about forty-five minutes—if his half-assed math is correct—till noon, so that excuse doesn’t cut it.

Eddie looks down and finds Buck fast asleep, snoring softly. His face is peaceful, the pinch in his brow from last night long gone. His lips are slack, soft breaths whistling past them as he breathes slowly, the warm puffs of air hitting Eddie’s chin and neck. He’s so… so peaceful, it’s beautiful. He’s gorgeous with the way his curls turn into a little golden blond halo when he sleeps, and how long his lashes are, and how they flutter as he sleeps. His nose scrunches too, but only when he’s dreaming. When he’s deep asleep, Buck doesn’t move much. His foot will maybe twitch occasionally, or he’ll move onto his side or back, but he’s like a pretty, sleepy log.

Eddie allows himself a moment to… take Buck in. Usually, when he’d wake up before the blond, he wouldn’t allow himself to gaze at Buck for more than a cursory second to see if the man was awake or not before he launched himself gently out of bed to start on his day and run from the thoughts of kissing Buck’s forehead as he slept, or kissing him awake.

Now, though? Now Eddie gets to look at Buck, and gently cups his cheek with his hand and thumbs the blond’s cheekbone gently. He gets to lay a feather-light kiss on Buck’s nose. He gets to lay so close to Buck, their chests press together when they breathe in effortless sync. He gets to love Buck; not in the quiet, shadowy depths of his shameful mind, but out in the open. He gets to take Buck in, gets to kiss him on the forehead and nose, gets to just… love him.

There’s no fear, no clawing shame and guilt for sinning. There’s no need to drop to his knees, press his head into the bed, and drag his hands into a prayer position to pray away the sins he’s committing. There’s no urge to walk into a church, and the suffocating depths of a confessional.

There’s none of that.

Right here, right now, he gets to love Buck; he gets to prove to himself that maybe he is worthy of love, of happiness—that he’s worthy, deserving, of loving Buck, for as long as Buck thinks he is.

And if that’s eternity, then Eddie is ready for it—has been for a long, long time.

Now he gets to show it.