Work Text:
Eddie had always had a fascination with Buck.
And don’t take that the wrong way —he didn’t mean it in a shallow, fleeting kind of way. It wasn’t about looks, though Buck was objectively striking. It wasn’t even about his larger-than-life personality that could fill an entire room. No, Eddie’s fascination ran deeper. It was in the quiet parts of Buck, in the unguarded moments when he forgot to perform for the world, when he wasn’t trying to prove himself to anyone.
Since they met —or rather, since they stopped circling each other and finally started getting along— something strange had happened between them. They’d developed this uncanny ability to find each other across a crowded room without even trying. It was instinct now: Eddie could be knee-deep in paperwork, in conversation, or even in his own thoughts, and still, his gaze would drift until it landed on Buck. As if gravity had chosen a new center, one only they seemed to feel.
And that was magical. Terrifying, yes, because Eddie didn’t believe in magic and he certainly didn’t believe in happy accidents —but there it was, undeniable, unshakable. It was theirs. A secret tether neither of them named but both relied on, and Eddie wouldn’t trade it for anything in the world.
Except —sometimes— he liked when that tether loosened just enough to let him simply watch. Those rare instances when Buck was distracted by something else, completely absorbed in one of his rabbit holes. A book he’d picked up because it caught his attention. A random documentary that no one else cared about but that Buck would later recount in enthusiastic detail to him, or to Chris, or to anyone at the 118 patient enough to listen. In those moments, Eddie thought Buck was at his most beautiful.
Because Buck wasn’t trying.
He wasn’t trying to help anyone, to carry anyone, to fix anything. He wasn’t trying to fill the silence, or to hold the weight of the world on his shoulders. He wasn’t fighting to prove he was worthy of love or belonging —a fight Buck’s parents had planted deep in his bones, a fight Eddie sometimes wanted to rip away from him with his bare hands.
No. In those moments, Buck was simply Buck. Evan. Firefighter Buckley. Bucky. He was every name people had given him, every role he had embraced, everything everyone loved about him —without even realizing it himself. And Eddie got to see it. He got to hold that image in his heart, this living, breathing proof that Buck was enough, more than enough.
It felt like the most magical thing in the world.
And God, Eddie wished with every corner of his heart that Buck could see himself that way. That even in a crowded room, even surrounded by people who adored him, he could look in the mirror and know he was perfectly imperfect, and that was more than enough.
"Is there something on my face?" Buck’s voice pulled Eddie back, low and teasing, but with an edge of uncertainty.
Eddie blinked hard, realizing he’d been staring too long, too openly. Heat rushed to his cheeks, spreading down his neck, and he tried to shake it off with a small smile. His lips parted, his chest rose and fell, and the words came before he could stop them.
"I love you," he whispered.
And the world stopped.
He hadn’t said it because they were standing at the edge of some catastrophe. Not because one of them was about to die, or because they were in the middle of an argument, or because Eddie feared losing Buck to a relationship that would inevitably crumble.
He said it because Buck deserved it.
Buck deserved to hear those words spoken out loud, not implied, not tucked between gestures or silence. He deserved to be loved in a way that didn’t hide, didn’t wait for tragedy, didn’t make excuses.
"I love you too, idiot," Buck replied instantly, the words coated in his usual humor, his blue eyes sparkling with a mix of doubt and curiosity. He tilted his head. "What’s this about? Are you about to drop some bad news on me?"
Eddie laughed softly, shaking his head. His heart thudded, steady and certain, and before he could think better of it, he pushed himself to his feet. Crossing the loft in a couple of steps, he stopped in front of the couch where Buck sat, half-curled with a thick book on Russian history open on his lap.
Eddie cupped his face with both hands, his calloused thumbs brushing gently along Buck’s cheekbones. And there it was —the secret of the universe, hidden not in stars or prayers, but in Buck’s blue eyes, in the faint blush dusting his skin, in the softness of his lips, in the birthmark that Eddie had traced a hundred times with his gaze but never with his fingers.
"I’m in love with you, Evan," Eddie said, voice breaking into something raw, something vulnerable.
And before Buck could react, before doubt could sneak into either of them, Eddie leaned down and kissed him. Soft at first, tentative, a sigh leaving his chest the moment Buck kissed him back with equal gentleness. Their mouths lingered, clumsy in their tenderness, until Eddie finally pulled back, their eyes still closed, their foreheads almost touching, their breaths mingling.
"And I couldn’t let you go through life without knowing how much I love you," Eddie whispered, his thumb pressing a little firmer against Buck’s skin, "and how much you mean to me, to Chris, to our family. Because you give us all the happiness in the world just by being you."
When Buck finally opened his eyes, his face broke into a smile so wide it almost hurt to look at.
“Oh…” Buck breathed, the sound caught somewhere between a laugh and a gasp.
Eddie’s lips curved too, relief and joy spilling out of him, and he kissed him again —deeper this time, fiercer, as if making up for every unspoken word, every stolen glance, every moment they had both held back.
And if the firehouse fell completely silent around them, if every creak and shuffle and breath stilled as the two of them finally ended the dance they’d been spinning since the very beginning —well, that was everyone else’s problem.
Because Eddie Diaz had finally said the words. And Buck had heard them.