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His dad has been in Texas for two months when he says it. They leave their therapist’s air conditioned office and step into the sweltering Texas heat, and Dad asks, “you feel like ice cream?” like Chris would ever say no. His dad grins so big his canines show. It’s been two months of trying to relearn being around each other, trying to re-establish trust, and it’s been good. Things feel easier and lighter, like maybe they’re on their way out of this thing. It’s lulled him into a false sense of security. He thinks nothing of his dad offering ice cream. Why would he have an ulterior motive?
That’s why Chris is so surprised when he’s busily trying to eat his ice cream faster than the sun can melt it even in the truck’s AC, watching a little kid crawl around on his dad’s shoulders in the parking lot, thinking of Buck, and Dad says, “so about me dating…” as if that’s just a thing he can say and not a potential live grenade thrown at their relationship.
He sighs. And it started out such a nice day. The ice cream sours in his stomach, dread curling up like a housecat in his lap and making itself at home. Chris can’t help the groan he lets out, leaning over his cone to thunk his head down onto the dash in front of him.
His dad laughs.
It’s not really funny, though, because all they’ve done is talk about their feelings for months, and if Dad still thinks it’s fair to ask Chris to deal with another girlfriend when they’re barely on steady ground he’s out of his mind.
“You’re just as melodramatic as Buck,” he says fondly, palming the back of Chris’ head.
“Learned from the best,” he says, and the whole time the inside of his head is: not another girlfriend, not another girlfriend, not another girlfriend, not another -
And then his dad says, “speaking of Buck . . .” his tone oh-so casual and also somehow forced in a way that’s so immediately suspicious that Chris snaps his head up so fast he hears a crack.
“Oh my god?” Chris says.
“Um,” Dad stutters.
They stare at each other across the center console, wide eyed and frozen, abandoned ice cream dripping onto their laps.
“You couldn’t have brought this up in therapy twenty minutes ago?” Chris finally snarks, snapping open the glovebox and handing over napkins. He loves his dad, but sometimes his choices bewilder him.
“Are you mad?”
Chris thinks about that. “I’m more confused about how it took you this long to figure it out.”
“What?” and then Chris is laughing all the way from his belly for the first time since he left home. He can’t help it. Buck and dad have been so stupid about each other for all these years. There’s something objectively hysterical about Dad bringing this up like it’s a surprise. “Christopher what the hell?” his dad says. He can tell he’s trying not to but his lips are turning up at the corners like he’s going to laugh, too.
Chris stops laughing, takes a deep breath and looks dad in the eye. “It’s Buck, dad,” he says. “How could I be mad? I’m scared you’re going to mess it up, but Buck promised I’m always going to have him, so it’s okay.”
His dad’s face does something complicated - soft with affection even while the edges of his mouth turn down with grief. They both miss Buck.
“Sorry for bringing it up like that. I was trying to figure out how to ask how you felt about going home after your school year finishes out, or if you want to stay here.”
Chris thinks about his grandparents, the kids he’s met at school, and then he thinks about their whole family in LA, about Buck, and feels a pang of grief so sharp he nearly flinches.
“I want to go home,” he whispers, and pretends not to see Dad melt in relief next to him. I want Buck, he thinks but doesn’t say. I want my Buck. He wants to scream it like a little kid, like the universe is a harried parent who will give him whatever he wants if he just throws a big enough tantrum.
He thinks about it as they go back to their ice creams and all the way home, quietly enjoying each other’s company as if there isn’t a Buck-sized hole in the truck with them, in El Paso, everywhere they go.
Buck and Dad dating would be terrifying, a little, in the sense that every relationship his dad has crashes and burns, but maybe that’s because those people aren’t Buck. And anyways, he meant what he said. Buck isn’t going anywhere. All these months in El Paso and Chris hasn’t answered his texts, but Buck is still sending funny stories and dog videos and random I love you’s, undeterred by Chris’ silence.
The drive to LA a few weeks later is such a long stretch of concentrated time with his dad that Chris feels like he’s making up for all the time they missed in the last few months. They chew on jerky and peanut m&ms and talk and talk and talk. They pass the New Mexico border into Arizona and Dad tells firefighting stories Chris has heard so many times they’re worn around the edges, soft. They cross into California and Chris tells him about his time in El Paso before he came to get him, everyday stuff he hadn’t gotten around to telling him about before - school friends and projects, the neighbors.
He’s been in control of Dad’s phone, watching directions, picking music, looking for good places to get food. They’re only two hours out from home when he realizes it hasn’t buzzed with any notifications the whole time. “I’m surprised Buck hasn’t been texting you,” he says.
Dad looks at him and then back at the road, twisting his hands around the wheel almost nervously, and says nothing.
The silence stretches on as Dad passes a semi-truck. Finally, “he doesn’t know.”
Chris blinks at the highway tarmac in front of him, at the heat curling off the asphalt, and tries to process that.
“As in, you didn’t tell him we’re coming back at all or that we’re almost home?”
“At all,” Dad says. It’s a non-answer but it tells him what he needs to know anyway. Buck and Dad have always had their own ways, and nobody ever benefited from getting in the middle of it. Chris knows enough to leave it alone - if Dad says it’s best to just show up then they’re showing up. He does wonder where Buck will go and tries to ignore the desire he’s always had for Buck to just stay.
Chris has been missing someone his whole life, but it was always out of his control. Chris was the one getting left behind. Missing Buck and knowing he’s the one who left makes him feel a little sick. He wonders sometimes if it isn’t in his blood to run away when things get hard, if he didn’t just learn it from his parents. Weirdly, it’s this guilt that’s helped him empathize with his dad the most, but it still feels bad. And the idea of Buck being home with them is comforting. Then he won’t have to miss him, even when Buck is only a few minutes away at his own apartment. If dad does something silly Chris won’t have to remember to tell Buck because he’ll already be there. And if Chris wakes up in the middle of the night dreaming about lighting he won’t have to worry about him - Buck will be down the hall. It’s a nice thought and never one he’s been able to verbalize, but his hopes have reluctantly risen every day they’ve gotten closer to going home and nobody’s mentioned Buck moving back out.
As they pull into the driveway, the sunrise paints the neighborhood a golden glowing orange, and it makes Chris so nostalgic he could cry. Buck’s Jeep is in the driveway, parked all funny because he wasn’t expecting anyone else to have to fit in with him, which means he isn’t on shift like they’d wondered. He’s home, Chris thinks, Buck is here.
They grab their travel bags but leave the rest alone, content to settle a bit before they start moving again, and start heading up the walkway.
Chris follows right behind as his dad raises his fist to knock. It feels silly to be knocking on the door of their own house, but it hasn’t been Chris’ home in a while, and Dad’s been gone too, and Buck has been sitting here in this house not even knowing if they were coming back at all but holding their place anyways. A pang of sadness rattles around inside himself, followed by nerves. He gets closer to his dad, bumping into his back and dropping his forehead to his spine.
The door swings open after a minute, and Chris looks at Buck and abruptly feels all those months without him at once. His dad has always been safe, but he wasn’t there for so long, and he still remembers those awkwards months when he was little and they were still trying to learn each other, and mom left and came back and left again, but Buck was steady from the moment he met him. He’s physically bigger than dad and all the other men in his life, and he’s only ever been so gentle, taking dad’s cues of encouraging independence while simultaneously loving him ferociously. Seeing him in front of him again feels like someone putting food in front of you and suddenly feeling starved even though you didn’t notice you were hungry before.
Buck blinks at Dad like he isn’t sure he’s awake, like he’s having the same surreal moment Chris and probably Dad are having too. He pulls his eyes away from his dad long enough to spot the truck and the U-Haul before he looks back.
“Eddie?” he whispers, and then he sees Chris peeking around from behind him and covers his mouth with his hands, eyes already full of tears. It’s the catalyst Chris needs to break the moment.
“Buck!” he cries, and rushes forward. Buck wraps him up in his arms right away despite his earlier hesitance, his whole big frame collapsing inward until Chris is completely surrounded.
Whenever someone finds out he lived through the tsunami they always bring up how scared he must have been, and he was, but it’s hard to be scared with someone like Buck there. He remembers that, here, with Buck all around him, squeezing him into his chest without crushing.
One of his hands cradles the back of his head, thumb soothing back and forth, steady even though Buck’s whole body is shaking.
The thing is Chris didn’t really keep in touch with Buck. At first he was angry at him too, for trying to talk him down after Kim in a way Chris perceived as defending his dad. His anger was all consuming and blinding, and when it faded he realized that Buck was just trying to support them both, caught a little in the middle of something that wasn’t his fault. After a month, it became about guilt. Buck promised he wouldn’t leave him, ever, and Chris hadn’t promised the same back but he figured it was kind of an unspoken part of their relationship. They didn’t leave each other. But then Chris left, and even worse, he took Dad with him.
Buck shivering against him in the middle of the summer feels like a big neon sign flashing all his pain right at him.
He’s pulled himself together by the time they separate, and then he herds them into the house, already fussing about dinner.
Chris wakes up that night from a dream about the tsunami - water in his nose, wet clothes, soggy shoes, slogging down streets looking for help after he and Buck were separated. He wakes up thirsty and reaches an arm out for his water bottle only to find empty air, which means he left it in the truck. He gets up to get a glass of water instead, but when he steps out of his bedroom door it’s to Buck sitting on the hallway floor across from his door, startling awake from where he’d apparently been sleeping.
“Chris?” he asks, rubbing sleep out of his eyes. “You okay?” Buck’s shoulders are slumped under his wrinkled hoodie, bags under his eyes, curly hair a mess. Chris remembers his dream, remembers long months without Buck, and stumbles over, still half asleep, and drops himself onto the floor next to him. He uses Buck’s head and then shoulder for leverage, which earns him a swat and a halfhearted play-shove, but once he settles next to him Buck wraps an arm around his shoulders and pulls him close. He smells like the same Buck, and his chest is warm under Chris’ cheek, and he has to battle himself not to fall asleep against him.
“You okay?” he asks. Buck hums.
“Yeah, buddy, I just couldn’t sleep. Too excited you’re home I guess.”
It’s an adult non-answer, the kind Chris hates.
“So you decided the hallway floor might be more comfortable?”
“I really missed you, Chris. You and your dad. I kept falling asleep and waking up thinking you weren’t really here,” Buck admits. “So . . . floor.”
Chris turns to wrap his arm around Buck’s belly, a fistful of his sweatshirt in his hand. “I’m sorry I left,” he whispers. He doesn’t know how else to say it. He doesn’t regret leaving but he regrets hurting Buck. He wanted to hurt his dad but actually seeing him hurt, seeing Buck hurt, it only makes him feel worse. They talked about it in therapy, sure, but he doesn’t know how to apologize, how to make it right. He remembers the simplicity of his younger years - the belief that Dad and Buck were invincible - and wishes for it to come back. Because now he knows that they hurt, he can hurt them. And he did. What does that make him?
“It’s okay,” Buck whispers back, always one to meet Chris where he’s at. “You needed some space, that’s okay.”
“I didn’t answer your texts.”
“I know, baby, but if you needed space then you needed space. I missed you but we’re together again, right? That’s what matters.”
“I was mad at first but then I realized I was breaking our promise and Dad followed me and it was even worse -” he gasps. He needs to get this out, wants to tell Buck all of it in a way he hadn’t even wanted to with Dad.
“Woah, kiddo. What promise are we talking about?” Buck asks.
“I left you,” he cries, tears sliding down his cheeks. “We left you!”
Buck leans forward to slide Chris’ legs over his own, pulling him into his lap like he’s a little kid and not fourteen years old. Whatever. It always seemed silly that kids would get older and stop letting their parents hug them. He’s not going to turn a Buck cuddle down when he’s sad and miserable.
“It’s okay, Chris, it’s okay,” Buck murmurs, mouth to his forehead.
“No,” Chris says stubbornly, and Buck barks a startled laugh. It’s loud enough to wake his dad, Chris knows, but he knows they won’t get in trouble.
Chris giggles back despite himself and then they’re both a mess of tears and laughter.
“Christopher,” Buck says, stern despite the laughter in his eyes. “It is going to be oh-kay.” It’s exactly what Chris’ dad would say and how he would say it, and a ten pound weight lifts off his chest.
Right then Dad’s door opens and Chris and Buck go silent as they watch him blearily shuffle towards them. “What the hell are you two doing?” he asks. “Are you crying?”
They both burst into hysterical giggles. Buck ducks his face down so they’re forehead to forehead, laughing into each other’s faces while Dad frowns in his bedroom doorway.
“Buck was being creepy and sitting outside my door,” Chris says, and kicks Buck when he shoves an elbow into his ribs.
“Why are you up?” Buck asks.
“Heard you two goons goofing around out here. And I wanted water.”
“He could probably use some,” he says, gesturing at Chris.
“Well can we go get water and have it in the kitchen or do we need to be in the hallway for that too?” Dad bitches, and Chris laughs and gets up off the floor.
“We gotta help Buck, his leg is bothering him.”
Dad doesn’t hesitate to grab Buck’s other hand, and together they heave him up off the floor. Buck actually lets Chris hold some of his weight, which pleases him. He was going a little nuts with the way his grandparents babied him, tried to do everything for him instead of trusting him to ask for help when he needed it.
“How’d you notice that?” Buck asks.
“You kept wiggling your toes like they were asleep, you always do that when your leg is hurting.”
Buck looks surprised at being caught. Dad, walking behind them, palms Chris’ forehead from behind and pulls him back so he can press a kiss to the back of his head like, good job.
Dad herds them into the kitchen and all three of them drink until they’re satisfied and then pile onto the couch together. “Bad dreams?” Dad asks. Chris shrugs - he doesn’t need to talk about it. The conversation drifts, and Chris goes quiet and listens to them, infinitely soothed by their voices. Eventually he tips over against Buck and drifts toward sleep.
“Is he out?” Dad asks eventually. Chris can feel his chest press into his shoulder like he’s leaning around to look at his face. He means to make a noise so they know he’s awake, but the steady thump of Buck’s heart under his cheek and his long even breaths are lulling him to sleep. The relief he feels to be on the couch with Dad and Buck, listening to the murmur of their voices while he doses, puts him into something like a meditative trance.
“Think so,” Buck says. One of his hands sweeps up and down Chris’ back again, smoothing out his shirt, flattens on the back of his neck. It’s like he’s trying to remind himself Chris is there.
“You want to take him to bed?” Dad asks.
Buck tucks his head down so his lips are against Chris’ forehead. “No,” he murmurs. “He’s not gonna let me hold him like this much longer. He’s gotten so big. It’s been so long.” Chris wants to shatter, wants to stop pretending to be asleep and crush Buck into a hug, but then Dad speaks.
“Buck, I’m so sorry we left you,” he says, voice breaking.
“Oh not again. Eddie, it’s fine, you had to get-”
“It’s not fine. It’s the thing that hurts you the most. So I’m sorry Christopher left, and that I left, and that there was no other way to fix it.”
Chris wouldn’t know Buck was crying if his head wasn’t pressed to his chest, if he couldn’t feel the way his breath hitches. The guilt he’s felt swells up again, tight in his chest, and then Dad’s chest presses against Chris again, and the whole pile of them shifts until he can hold both he and Buck in his arms. Sandwiched between them, warm and safe, Chris is pretty sure they’re going to be alright.