Work Text:
Buck had never liked Sundays.
When he was a boy, Sundays smelled of tobacco and sour whiskey. His father’s friends arrived in pressed shirts that carried the stench of smoke, crowding the living room with their laughter and loud conversations, voices that left no space for him. He remembered sitting small in the corner, listening to their words slur and tumble, while his skin prickled under glances that lingered a moment too long, filled with something he didn’t understand but instinctively feared.
Outside, through the window, he could hear the laughter of neighborhood kids, the thud of a ball on the pavement, the creak of swings swaying back and forth. Their joy lived in a world Buck couldn’t touch. Maddie tried to save him sometimes, inventing excuses to spirit him away —ice cream, a movie, a walk. But their parents never allowed it. “Family day,” they said, as though that word held any meaning inside a house that had never felt like family at all.
When he was a teenager, Sundays became a prison with unlocked doors. He snuck out, slipping past shadows, drawn toward Maddie. But even she was slipping away, always with Doug, leaving him to walk streets painted orange by the setting sun. He memorized every crack in the sidewalks, every rusting stop sign, until he returned home under cover of darkness. His parents scolded him for skipping “family day,” but they never noticed the hollowness in his voice when he replied.
Later, when he finally ran, the sound of the Jeep’s engine roared like freedom and loneliness wrapped into one. He drove on Sundays, down endless highways where the horizon shimmered but never came closer. He parked on the side of the road, staring at the car ceiling until his eyes burned. Sundays in that Jeep were long hours of silence, the kind that made him feel smaller and smaller, as though he could vanish without the world noticing.
Even in Los Angeles, where the city pulsed with life, Sundays dragged like weights. He’d watch families spill into parks, barbecues on balconies, children’s laughter echoing in courtyards. He felt the press of being outside , watching a world that had no place for him. LA glittered, but on Sundays, Buck was a ghost.
At the 118, things changed a little. Sundays weren’t always good, but at least the slow rhythm of the firehouse let him forget himself for fragments of time. An hour, maybe two. Surrounded by the hum of the team, he could almost believe he wasn’t alone. But the moment he returned to his apartment, the silence was waiting, patient, unyielding.
Then came Eddie. And Christopher. Small shifts that became anchors. A Sunday wasn’t just a void anymore. Sometimes it held the sound of Christopher’s laughter, sticky fingers on his shirt, Eddie’s steady voice, the warmth of belonging that felt almost too good to be true. And when they weren’t there, the memory was enough to dull the sharp edges. Until the apartment door shut, and the loneliness bled back in.
For Eddie, Sundays had carried a different weight.
In Texas, they began with the scrape of church shoes against tile and the long sermons he barely listened to. He sat in pews where the air smelled of old wood and incense, hearing words about love and forgiveness while feeling judged by every sideways glance that never offered kindness, only scrutiny.
After church came lunch —crowded tables filled with relatives and neighbors who talked over each other, who dissected every choice he made with surgical precision. Who he was, who he wasn’t, who they thought he should be. They didn’t need to know him; they preferred the version they had invented. Sundays were a stage where Eddie learned to keep his head down, his mouth shut, and his heart locked away.
Only when Christopher was born and he was back from Afghanistan did Sundays begin to shift. He saw the day through his son’s eyes: cartoons in the morning, pancakes that left syrup on the counter, little giggles that made the walls of their home feel warmer. With Abuela’s help, Sundays started to mean something different—a day for him and Chris , a day to protect from the same suffocating expectations he had endured.
Then came Los Angeles, and Buck.
That Sunday, Eddie should have been content. He had gone to his cousin’s christening, smiled politely through conversations, let family chatter fill the air around him. But as the hours wore on, the itch to leave grew stronger. He thought of Buck, of the way silence sometimes clung to him like a second skin. By the time he dropped Christopher at Abuela’s, the decision was already made. He drove straight to Buck’s apartment.
When he opened the door, the weight of it hit him instantly.
The room was cloaked in shadows. The last glow of the sunset spilled through the curtains in golden streaks, illuminating dust motes drifting in the stillness. Buck lay on the couch, perfectly still, eyes locked on some faraway point. His chest rose and fell, slow, shallow, as though even breathing was a task. The city outside carried on, indifferent.
“Are you okay?” Eddie’s voice broke the silence.
Buck’s head jerked up, too quickly, and pain flickered across his face. He offered a thin smile, brittle around the edges, and nodded.
“I don’t like Sundays,” he said softly, words barely carrying across the space.
It was enough. Eddie understood.
He sat beside him, close but not pressing. Carefully, he lifted Buck’s legs, resting them over his own, grounding him with the weight of simple touch. His hands began to move —slow, steady circles, massaging tension out of muscle that had carried too much for too long.
“I told you to come with me to the christening,” Eddie murmured, almost casually. “Why didn’t you?”
“I didn’t want to inconvenience you.”
A sigh escaped Eddie, though he didn’t stop his hands. Each stroke was unspoken comfort, each touch a quiet promise. The golden sunlight reached across Buck’s shoulders, gilding him like something fragile and holy.
“Thank you for being my friend,” Buck whispered, his voice rough with honesty. “Especially on Sundays I don’t like.”
Eddie looked at him, long and steady, before replying. “You don’t have to thank me for looking out for you. That’s what you do for people who love each other.”
The words cracked something open inside Buck. His chest tightened, then softened. He leaned forward without hesitation, resting his head on Eddie’s shoulder. Eddie’s arms came around him instantly, firm and protective, as though he could shield him from every empty Sunday that had ever come before. His hands traced Buck’s spine, gentle, grounding, a map leading him home.
And then —quietly, naturally— their lips met.
The kiss was slow, careful, like neither wanted to scare it away. Their breath mingled, their hearts syncing, each movement a delicate conversation. Buck’s hands pressed against Eddie’s chest, feeling the steady thrum beneath his palms. Eddie deepened the embrace, pulling him closer, lips brushing again and again, each one saying what words had never been able to.
When they finally parted, it wasn’t really a parting. Their foreheads touched, breaths falling into the same rhythm. The room glowed with the dying sun, wrapping them in amber light.
“You’ll never be alone on a Sunday again,” Eddie whispered, lips brushing his cheek.
Buck’s eyes closed. The words weren’t a promise —they were a truth, one he could finally believe. Outside, the city kept moving —indifferent, relentless—, but inside that small apartment, on that couch where loneliness once lived, Sunday had been rewritten.
For the first time, it felt perfect.