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Eddie always knew his Abuela had knickknacks. He just didn’t know how many until she passed. Her stuff was split between LA and Texas, which made sorting through it even harder. Because she passed so close to the impending holidays, Eddie and Pepa decided to wait until after to go through it all. It was too overwhelming to deal with right now. They just boxed up a few things and left it. It wasn't until Eddie was digging out the Christmas decorations after Thanksgiving that Christopher mentioned it.
Eddie is dealing with tangled up lights that he knows he put up neatly while Christopher placed the popcorn and cranberries on the string.
"Hey, Dad?"
"Hm?" Eddie sticks his tongue out, yanking the lights, careful not to break them. One knot down.
"Who's getting Abuela's Christmas village?"
Abuela had an elaborate Christmas village that she added to every year. She had it all over the house: the mantle, the bottom of the fireplace, the entertainment center. Eddie even saw pieces in the kitchen and bathroom one year. When Eddie first moved to LA, he found a fire station piece with a little fireman figurine and gave it to her. She cried and made sure to center her main section around that fire station.
"Um, well. We haven't really had time to go through it all," Eddie says.
"Oh." Christopher puts the garland down to look at him. "Can we?"
"You want it?"
Christopher nods.
"Yeah, okay. Um, let me ask Pepa and Abuelo. Then I need to make sure your Tías and primos are okay with it." Eddie stands up, patting his pockets for his phone. Eddie finds his phone buried under Christmas decorations and shoots off a text to Pepa, then his dad. Pepa is the executor of Abuela's will but they still needed to ask Ramon. "You want anything else, buddy?"
Christopher shrugs. "I don't know right now but I want us to put up the village. To remember her."
Eddie moves to sit by him, wrapping his arm around him and pulling him tight. "It's a great idea. I think she would love for us to have it."
"I just…" Christopher grabs on the bottom of Eddie's shirt and plays with the hem. "I miss her. She would make this huge deal out of decorating."
"Now I know where you get it from," Eddie teases.
Christopher laughs. "She always waited to put up the village until I could come over though. She would make us hot chocolate while she let me decide where each piece went."
"Yeah?" Christopher nods. Eddie bumps his head with his nose. "She did that with me too."
Christopher looks up and grins. "Yeah?"
"Yeah," Eddie grins. "Your Tías and I would go over and she would put on Christmas music."
"Only the classics though."
"Right. Then she would make the best hot chocolate. Your Tía Sophia and I would fight over where to put the pieces."
"What about Tía Adriana?"
"Adriana didn't help." Eddie laughs at the memory. "She would knock it all over. It would make Sophia and I so mad. All that hard work for her to ruin it. But Abuela didn't care. She loved it and would leave it how we placed it."
Christopher smiles, putting his head on Eddie's shoulder. "I miss her."
"Me too. So much."
If Pepa and his dad say no to the Christmas village, Eddie decides to go out and start one. It would be a nice shared memory for him and Christopher. Plus Eddie always felt his Christmas decorations were lacking compared to his Halloween. But Pepa and Ramon agreed. His primos asked for a piece each which was fine. She had so much that there was plenty to go around. Sophia and Adriana were a little more difficult and asked for specific pieces which had him and Pepa digging through the totes.
Eddie stills takes home over five totes full of village pieces even after setting some aside for his primos and sisters. Christopher's face lights up when he sees the tote and they plan to decorate on Eddie's next off day, which also happens to be a Saturday.
Eddie puts on Christmas music and makes hot chocolate, just like Abuela used to make. Christopher fights Eddie for the snowman mug, leaving Eddie to take the tree mug.
The music is just high enough that they can hear the lyrics. Christopher meticulously plans out the village, a notebook and pen sketching it out while Eddie unboxes all the pieces and sets them carefully on the dining room and coffee table. The door opens just as Eddie is packing up the last of the totes.
"Good morning to my favorite people!" Buck's voice cuts through the house.
Eddie pokes his head out, scrunching his eyebrows. "Did we have plans?"
"Nope." Buck holds up several Christmas tins. "I baked cookies the other day with Jee and had plenty of leftovers. What's going on here? I thought you already decorated?"
"Christopher wanted Abuela's Christmas village and we're putting it up," Eddie says. "Chris is taking it very seriously."
"It has to be just right, Dad." Christopher holds up his notebook with a sketch of the mantle.
"Of course." Buck nods. "Well, I should get out of your hair."
"What? No," Eddie quickly says. He takes the tins out of Buck's hands. "Stay. We could use some help."
"Really?"
"Yeah, I'll make you some hot chocolate," Eddie nods, smiling at him.
"Ooh, can I have the Santa mug?" Buck asks, excitedly.
"Of course." Eddie walks in the kitchen, putting the tins down. He grabs the Santa mug and gets to work. When he comes back, Buck is leaning over Christopher's shoulder, pointing at the notebook. He looks up when Eddie walks in and grins, taking the mug.
"Ooh, mini marshmallows."
Eddie claps his hands together. "What's the plan, kid?"
"We need the table we used for the ofrenda," Christopher says seriously.
"Of course we do."
Hours later, the mantle, table in the corner, and around the hearth are full of village pieces and fake snow. The fire station Eddie gave Abuela long ago at the center of the mantle. Eddie places the little fireman next to it and stands back, his hands showing off his work where Christopher sits on the couch "supervising."
"Well?" Eddie asks. "Is everything to your satisfaction?"
Christopher looks over the set up before nodding. Then he cocks his head to look at the fire station. "We need another fireman figure."
"Oh yeah?" Eddie grins, crossing his arms. Buck walks out of the kitchen with two mugs of hot chocolate. He hands one to Christopher then the other to Eddie. "You hear that, Buck?"
Buck stands by Eddie to look at the village, making a "hmm" noise.
"Chris says we need another fireman," Eddie bumps his shoulder.
Buck turns around to look at Chris with a bewildered look before grinning back at him. "Yeah, that sounds awesome."
Eddie claps his hands together. "Alright, now that the village is up, stockings time!" He wanted to wait to finish the mantle before hanging them up. The final piece. He grabs the last tote and opens it, pulling out the stockings.
Each stocking is different. Eddie's has Santa on it, Christopher's has a snowman, and Buck's reindeer with a Christmas sweater. All three of their names are written in green glitter. When Christopher was eight, Buck told him that he hasn't had a stocking since Maddie moved out. Christopher was so upset that he demanded Eddie take him to the store so Christopher could pick out a stocking for Buck. He was delighted when he saw the reindeer stocking and Eddie couldn't tell him no. The next day, they invited Buck over and presented it to him. Buck almost cried when he opened the poorly wrapped box. He spent the rest of the day attempting to paint his name on it with Christopher watching. The "K" was smudged from Christopher touching it before it was completely dried.
The last stocking was Shannon's. It was just a simple red stocking with her name in silver glitter. The letters were peeling off from being in the tote. Eddie smooths it down and hands it to Chris.
"Want to put Mom's up this year?"
Christopher takes the stocking from him, tracing each letter. "Why is it different from ours?"
"It's not." Eddie pulls out two more stockings, both red but one smaller than the other. Christopher's name was on the smaller one and Eddie's on the other. "I was deployed for your first Christmas. Your mom still wanted to do stockings so she went out and got these three. She wanted to do everything just right even though you wouldn't remember and I wasn't there. She told me that she spent hours writing each letter in glue and covering it in glitter. Then you started crying, causing her to spill glitter everywhere."
Christopher laughs knowing he did something similar when he was younger and Eddie spent hours vacuuming it up. Months later, a small piece of glitter would appear on their clothes and Eddie would get so mad.
"Abuela was in El Paso at the time and came over after your mom called her crying. She helped clean up the glitter then finish decorating," Eddie says.
Christopher smiles, tears filling his eyes. "That sounds like Abuela."
"Yeah."
Christopher stands up and walks to the mantle. He hangs Shannon's stocking up then turns to Eddie, holding his hand out. Eddie hands Christopher the other stockings and watches as he hangs them up carefully; Eddie's first, then Buck, then finally Christopher's by Shannon's. Christopher turns back around and throws his arms around Eddie, burying his head in Eddie's shoulder. "I like when you talk about them. Keeps them alive."
Eddie kisses the top of his head.
Buck clears his throat, causing Eddie to pull away. Buck is standing at the door, shifting from one foot to the next. "I'm gonna head out."
"What?"
"No! We were going to watch How the Grinch Stole Christmas," Christopher pouts.
"Another time, superman. I-I need to head home," Buck stammers. "See you guys later."
"Buck-" But Buck closes the door before Eddie can finish his sentence.
"I wanted him to stay," Christopher frowns.
"Yeah, me too."
"He's coming over on Christmas though, right?" Chris asks.
"I don't know," Eddie answers, frowning. The open invite stands but since Bobby then Abuela, things have felt distant between them. "I'll text him and make sure he knows."
Eddie pulls out his phone and sends Hey. You're coming over Christmas day, right?
But Buck doesn't answer him right away. He doesn't answer for hours which is unlike Buck. Eddie is close to calling Maddie when Buck finally, finally texts back.
Buck: I can't. I have a shift.
Eddie frowns. That's not right. They're off. Chimney made sure of it since he wanted to be home with the new baby.
Eddie: We aren't on shift.
Buck: I picked one up so Johnson could be home.
Buck: Sorry :( Tell Chris I can come over the next day though!
And that just won't do. So, Eddie starts planning. He wants to surprise Buck like Buck surprised them all those years ago. Christopher is excited when Eddie tells him and starts helping him. Roping in the others is easy and they agree right away. The difficult part of his plan is talking to B shift. He texts Julie to help him out on that side. It's easy when she agrees if all of their loved ones can join. Then suddenly Eddie is in a group message with so many people and sign-up sheets and trying to figure out who is bringing what. But even though it's overwhelming, he wants to do this for Buck.
On Christmas day, Eddie packs up everything they need. He gets the okay from Julie and they're off. It doesn't take long to set up because there are so many people. Everything goes seamlessly as they wait for B shift to return from the call.
It doesn't take long for the bay doors to open up,the engine back into the empty space. They all gather around the rail, watching as they climb out of the engine. Julie spots them first, grinning. She elbows Buck who rubs his eyes and looks up. His face lights up when he spots them and bounds up the stairs.
"Merry Christmas!" Everyone yells.
"Uncle Buck!" Jee runs into Buck's arms and he expertly lifts her up. She places a Santa hat on his head. "Merry Christmas!"
"Merry Christmas, Jee," he squeezes her. "This is amazing."
He walks around, hugging and greeting everyone. Eddie leans against the island, watching with a smile on his face. Maddie walks up to him, leaning against the island, baby Robbie on her hip.
"Thanks for putting this together. He's so happy," she says.
"Yeah." Eddie smiles, watching him. "I didn't want him to be alone. Not after the year we've had. And I thought this would be a good way to come together and celebrate in Bobby's memory."
Maddie squeezes his arm. "It's a great idea. It's what Bobby would have wanted."
Eddie looks over to see his family. Buck is still holding Jee, laughing at something Hen said. Karen has her arms around Hen, listening. Chimney and Ravi are standing near, listening but also whispering something; probably about food if Eddie had to guess. Christopher and Denny are showing Mara the pinball machine. Athena is fussing over the food with May and Harry helping.
Buck glances up, as if he feels Eddie's eyes on him and grins so big. Eddie watches as he whispers something to Hen and hands Jee to Chimney before slowly walking over. He feels Maddie squeeze his arm one more time before she's gone and Buck is standing in front of him.
"Hey."
"Hey."
"Thanks for this," Buck says.
"How did you know it was me?"
Buck rolls his eyes at that. "I figured when you didn't say anything else about tomorrow that you had something up your sleeves. Plus Jee let it slip."
Eddie huffs. "Knew not to trust her."
Buck laughs, his head titled back. He looks back at Eddie, his eyes soft. "But really. Thank you. This is great."
Eddie nods. "All of us together. Like Bobby would have wanted."
Buck sniffs as he tries not to cry. "He would love it."
"Alright!" Athena's voice booms throughout the loft. Buck turns, stepping a little closer to Eddie. "If we could all take our seats, it's time to eat!"
Eddie bumps Buck's shoulder. "Come on. Let's eat."
The head seat is left empty as they all take their spots. Buck glances at it, his eyes shining. He feels Eddie’s hand on his thigh, squeezing it. Buck turns to look at him.
“You okay?” Eddie asks.
“Yeah,” Buck nods. “Yeah, I’m okay. I just miss him.”
“Me too,” Eddie whispers.
“Do you remember the Christmas Bobby shut down the apartment building?” Hen asks.
Chimney frowns. “No, I don’t.”
Hen launches into the story, Athena filling in when she can. Soon, everyone is telling their favorite Bobby story.
Eddie squeezes Buck’s thigh again, leaning in close. “Merry Christmas, Buck.”
Buck moves his hand and places it over Eddie’s. “Merry Christmas, Eddie.”