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They don’t talk about it on the way to the hospital. The doors to the ambulance close right as Buck hangs up the phone that was pressed into his shaking hand, and he’s left with the EMTs fretting over him for about six seconds before someone pounds on the outside. The doors open again a moment later, revealing a slightly-annoyed cop and a desperate-looking Eddie. Eddie’s clambering into the ambulance before anyone has time to protest.
“Sorry,” the cop says, looking like he wants this day to be over. Buck gets the feeling. “He insisted.”
And Eddie all-but shoves an EMT out of the way so he can sit near Buck’s head. The EMTs don’t comment on it, adjusting around the new presence. The doors close again and the ambulance rumbles to life. Eddie lets one hand rest on the curve of Buck’s shoulder, near his neck. Neither of them say anything. Eddie’s fingers creep a little higher, then a little higher, and then Buck realizes Eddie’s feeling for his pulse.
Normally, he thinks, he would comment on it. But nothing about this is remotely close to normal. He’s pretty sure he used the last of his energy grabbing that stupid fucking cattle prod and crawling on his stomach out of the stupid fucking shed as soon as he realized Eddie was in danger. He’s been there before, on his stomach, crawling to Eddie. He’s been there before, and he’ll do it again, as many times as it takes to make sure Eddie is safe.
The look on Eddie’s face is unreadable. He’s not looking at Buck. Buck can feel his eyes drifting shut and he doesn’t think he’s in any immediate danger of dying, he just hurts like hell, so he takes a deep, shaky breath and lets his eyes fall shut. Eddie makes a wounded noise, almost like it’s involuntary, and Buck cracks an eye open again.
“‘M fine,” he manages to get out. “Sleepy.”
“Okay,” Eddie says, looking maybe a fraction calmer. “Okay. Sleep.”
“Mhm,” Buck agrees.
They don’t talk about it in the hospital. The doctors try to bring them into separate rooms to look them over, and Eddie looks like he’s about to grab a scalpel and go to town on the next person who even hints at separating them. Buck doesn’t peg it as odd because he feels pretty much the same way. Maybe for different reasons. He doesn’t really want to be alone in an unfamiliar hospital right now. Eddie, he thinks, probably doesn’t want to let Buck out of his sight, and probably won’t for a while. Or maybe ever again. Buck would be good with not ever again.
It’s pretty easy to put the pieces together. Eddie woke up in a bed in the hospital, Buck woke up in a bed that was decidedly not in the hospital. Eddie showed up to Bonnie’s house in clothes that were definitely not his, still covered in blood and bandages, in a car that looked about a hundred years old that was also definitely not his. Buck doesn’t know where he got the car or the clothes, but he guesses it doesn’t really matter right now.
The cops try to separate them again to get their statements. Eddie looks even more murderous than he did when the doctors suggested it. He practically growls at the sheriff, and the sheriff looks very apprehensive, so even though it’s pretty easy to put together the pieces Buck has, he assumes he’s still missing some. But the sheriff concedes and gets full statements and tells them he’ll be following up soon, but they’re free to go as soon as the doctors release them.
“Out the door, this time,” he says with a pointed look at Eddie. Eddie does not look ashamed in the slightest. Buck makes a mental note to ask about that.
“Thanks,” Eddie says, a little cold.
“Yeah, thank you,” Buck adds, trying to be a little warmer. The sheriff gives him a funny look.
“You watch out for your boy, now,” he says, and Buck’s not sure which one of them he’s talking to but he’s out the door before Buck can ask. Eddie slumps down in the chair next to Buck’s bed, where he’s been situated since they were brought in. Buck watches after the sheriff for a moment.
“What–” he starts, but Eddie cuts him off with a long, loud exhale. Buck drops it.
They don’t talk about it when they start driving. Eddie’s gripping the wheel maybe a little tighter than necessary. The car stutters around them but holds steady. Eddie stares straight ahead. Buck thrums his fingers against his leg, then winces when he taps a little too hard on one of the burns. Kansas starts playing on the radio maybe ten minutes into the drive, and it takes all of ten seconds before they both burst into pained laughter.
“Jesus Christ,” Eddie says when they’ve calmed down, and he doesn’t change the station.
The car does its damn best, but it’s seen better days even before Eddie broke about twelve traffic laws driving to Bonnie’s secluded house. It starts puttering an hour into the drive, then slowing down, and it’s not long after that they realize something’s wrong.
“Well,” Buck says, as Eddie slams the hood of the car shut on the smoking engine, some twenty minutes after crossing the border into Arizona. “That’s unfortunate.”
Eddie grumbles something under his breath, then looks up to the sky like he’s searching for salvation. Buck purses his lips, watching Eddie and ignoring the fact that they’re now stranded in the desert. Again. At least they’re conscious this time.
“Look on the bright side,” he tries, and Eddie shoots him a venomous look that softens before Buck even has a chance to consider withering under his stare. Buck doesn’t finish the statement, anyways.
“Yeah,” Eddie says after a moment, perhaps trying to avoid being gloomy. “There’s a bright side.” Buck raises his eyebrows, makes an encouraging face. Eddie rolls his eyes– fondly– and says, “We’re both alive, and we’re going home.”
“Yeah,” Buck says softly, a little surprised. “We are.”
“Might take longer than ten hours though,” Eddie snorts, and then Buck laughs, and his hand flies to his side when he laughs a little too hard and Eddie gives him a concerned look.
“It’s fine,” Buck says, and then he lets out another incredulous laugh. “We must have the worst luck on the planet. Holy shit. How many shitty things can happen to two people?”
“We should make a bucket list of near-death experiences,” Eddie agrees as he pulls out his phone. Then he lets out a long sigh of relief. “Small mercies. I’ve got service.”
“Bright side,” Buck says.
They don’t talk about it as they wait for the tow truck. The car’s pulled far enough off the road there’s not a chance of someone hitting it unless they do it on purpose, and while Buck really isn’t looking to push his luck right now– especially after verbally acknowledging it– he figures the chances of someone purposefully ramming into their car again are pretty goddamn low. Sitting behind the car in the sand provides enough shade that Buck’s not worried about the sun getting to him, and sitting next to Eddie provides enough relief that Buck’s not worried about getting into his own head, even if they’re not talking.
He lets his hands rest in the sand on either side of his outstretched legs. He traces a few absentminded patterns, not really paying attention, before he realizes that Eddie’s staring very intently at his fingers. Buck stills, and Eddie frowns.
“Everything okay?” Buck asks, and Eddie startles. He glances up at Buck like he hadn’t even realized he’d been staring. His face doesn’t change, but something shifts when he makes eye contact with Buck.
“Other than being stuck on the side of the road?” Eddie asks. Buck gives a half-smile that Eddie returns, but there’s still something in his expression that sets Buck on edge, a little bit. “I’m okay. I’m ready to go home.”
Buck thinks about how Eddie wasn’t planning on coming home, at one point. About how even when Eddie wasn’t sure, Bobby was. Bobby had faith in Eddie coming home. Bobby sent them to Nashville. Bobby had faith in them.
He doesn’t think Bobby anticipated it ending in the dust in a desert in New Mexico, but Bobby was with them nonetheless. He can’t fucking believe the first person he really talked to about it was Bonnie. He can’t– he can’t–
“Buck?” Eddie asks, and Buck realizes he stopped breathing for a moment.
“Um,” he says. There’s sand coating his fingers. His hands feel sticky with blood. There’s electricity coursing through his veins. He’d just stopped feeling like that. After the lightning strike, for a while, it was all he could feel. He’d just stopped, he was getting better, he was–
“Buck,” Eddie says again, and this time Buck realizes he’s breathing a little too fast. He takes one stuttering inhale, tries to calm himself down, and it’s not until Eddie rests a hand over his that he stops feeling electric.
“She used a fucking cattle prod,” Buck says, so quietly he almost can’t hear himself. Eddie seems to get it anyways.
“Hey,” he says, his grip on Buck’s hand tightening. “Hey, hey, hey– Buck, hey, look at me–”
Buck does– how could he not? The thing in Eddie’s gaze that was setting him on edge is gone, replaced not with concern but with fear, and Buck fucking hates that look on Eddie’s face and he hates even more that he’s the one that put it there but he keeps looking at Eddie, if he had a choice he’d never stop looking at Eddie, but before Eddie can say anything else they hear an engine rumbling up the road toward them.
“That’ll be the tow,” Eddie says a little darkly, the moment broken, but Buck’s calm enough now that it doesn’t really matter.
They talk about it in the shitty motel room.
The tow truck takes them to the nearest mechanic, who tells them grimly it’ll take a while to get the car up and running again, and they might as well find somewhere to spend the night. Shouldn’t be more than a day or two, she says, she might need to send her boy to the next town over for replacement parts, but the car’s pretty much toast even if they get the engine replaced. Eddie says it’s fine, they just need to get as far as Los Angeles and then they can scrap the car as far as he cares, and the mechanic laughs and says she’ll see what she can do. Buck gets caught up on the words my boy and doesn’t really pay attention beyond that.
It’s what the sheriff called Buck. Or maybe what he called Eddie. Your boy. Buck’s not sure what it means, or why he’s caught up on it, but some of the missing pieces are a little closer, almost within reach. There’s a motel three streets down from the mechanic’s shop and she gives them directions, then takes a look at the state they’re in and hollers into the shop for someone to give them a ride. The kid that comes out can’t be older than seventeen, but he gives them a toothy grin and chatters at them the whole two-minute ride about how their car is just about the worst he’s ever seen.
“You should see the one we started this drive in,” Eddie snorts from the passenger seat, and Buck chokes on a sip of water from the plastic bottle the mechanic gave him with a comment that he looked on the verge of passing out.
“Oh yeah?” the kid asks. “I don’t even wanna know.”
No, Buck thinks, a little darkly, you really don’t.
The motel they’re brought to has six rooms and all but one are occupied. Buck leans against the wall as Eddie talks to the guy behind the desk. Something’s itching at the back of his mind. He’s not really paying attention to what Eddie’s saying beyond once he’s confirmed they’ll have a place to stay, even when Eddie jerks a thumb toward him and the desk attendant stares for a long moment. The pieces are getting closer. He’s not sure if he’s going to like them. Eddie shakes the guy’s hand and comes back to Buck with a key.
“Got the last room,” he says, even though they’d already figured as much. There’s a twinge to his voice that Buck can’t place.
“How much was it?” Buck asks.
“On the house,” Eddie says, nodding to the attendant as they make their way to their room.
“On the house?” Buck repeats, a little confused, and Eddie opens the door to their room and Buck figures out pretty quickly why it’s on the house. There’s only one bed.
Because of course there is.
It’s a queen-size, miraculously, so it’s not like they’ll be pressed for space. Buck takes a long, deep breath, then pushes his way past Eddie into the room to collapse onto the mattress. It’s stiff in some places and squishy in others. He smashes his face into the pillow, which smells a little funky. Not bad, but… funky. Eddie closes the door and sits down tentatively on the other side.
“I can–” Eddie starts.
“Don’t you fucking dare finish that sentence with something about taking the tub or the floor,” Buck warns, muffled by the pillow, and Eddie doesn’t say anything else for a long moment. Buck tries to sit up with a stifled groan and settles for just rolling over until he’s facing Eddie. Eddie’s looking at the wall. “Hey.”
“Hey,” Eddie says, shifting a little so he can look at Buck over his shoulder. Buck raises an eyebrow, unimpressed. Eddie sighs, kicks off his shoes, and swings his legs up onto the bed so he can turn and face Buck fully.
“I have a few questions,” Buck says, then stops, turning the words around in his head before he can get any further. Eddie waits. His expression is almost unreadable– almost. There’s a little anxiety, and a little concern, and a little bit of that thing Buck couldn’t decipher that was setting him on edge before. He thinks for another second, then says, “Did you jump out of the hospital window?”
Eddie lets out a startled laugh.
“Yeah,” he says, then before Buck can press for details, “I woke up in the hospital and no one knew where you were. They thought I was hallucinating because I was concussed. Then the cops showed up and they thought I killed you.” Buck snorts at the very idea of that, and Eddie nods. “That’s what I’m saying. I called Athena, she told me to jump out the window.”
“Athena told you to jump out the window?” Buck asks, and Eddie grins.
“She was worried,” he says. “Everyone was.”
“But–”
“They were too far away to do anything quick enough,” Eddie cuts him off. “I would’ve done it anyways, probably. We didn’t have time to wait for her to get on a plane. You needed me. You–” This time Eddie cuts himself off. “You needed me,” he says again, a little weakly. Buck gets the feeling.
“Okay,” Buck says. “So you jumped out the window. You–”
“Got on a horse,” Eddie says. “Which would’ve been fun, I guess, but I was mostly thinking about– well. A cowboy took me to the diner, a waitress gave me Bonnie’s name, Athena and Maddie were able to get me an address.”
“And the car?” Buck asks.
“For sale outside the gas station,” Eddie shrugs. “Real cheap. It’s a piece of shit.”
“No kidding,” Buck agrees, and they both laugh a little. “And then…”
“And then I drove to Bonnie’s. And she said– I mean, she gave me the names of those three guys, you know, the ones who thought we were having a lover’s spat, the ones I figured ran us off the road, and I was getting ready to track them down and I… Buck?”
Buck’s a little hung up on the words lover’s spat. He’s also still thinking a little about your boy. The pieces are ever more clearer.
“Yeah,” Buck says.
“Then I found the decked-out truck and got the rest of it pretty quick,” Eddie says, but he’s got a strange look on his face again, like he’s just finding some missing pieces himself. “Did you… did you know I was there?”
Eddie was sitting right there when Buck gave his statement. Eddie heard everything Buck told the sheriff. Buck did not tell the sheriff everything he said to Bonnie. It’s easy to lie to someone who doesn’t know you. It’s infinitely more difficult to lie to someone who knows you better than maybe anyone else in the world.
“Yeah,” Buck says quietly. “We heard you pounding on the door. They were gonna kill you too.”
Eddie goes still, but not stiff. He waits for Buck to continue. Buck doesn’t really have any other choice. He pushes himself up onto one elbow, then further up until he’s sitting, so he can look Eddie in the eyes and be level when he says it.
“I told her she had to make you leave,” Buck says, stronger, surer. “I told her– you have Chris. You couldn’t– she couldn’t hurt you. I wouldn’t let her hurt you, I would’ve– I would’ve done anything. I told her as much, I said–”
“Buck,” Eddie says.
“She had the gun in her hands, she was gonna kill me either way, but I couldn’t let her kill you too–”
“Buck.”
“I fought like hell to get out of there before that, but at that point I thought I was a goner,” Buck says firmly. “If I didn’t think she would’ve killed you too, I would’ve screamed.”
And that– finally– seems to make something click. Buck figures out that look Eddie’s been giving him, the hair-raising one. It’s some strange combination of rage and relief. Rage at the situation. Relief that Buck’s still here. Rage at what Bonnie did. Relief that Buck kept fighting.
“I fought like hell,” Buck emphasizes.
“I know you did,” Eddie says, but he still looks a little devastated.
“I fought like hell,” Buck repeats again, because it still doesn’t feel like that long ago that he wouldn’t have. But he’s– better now. He knows he matters. He knows there are people that need him. He knows there are people that would mourn him. He knows there are people that love him.
Like Maddie, sobbing on the phone when she heard his voice. Like Chim, who said brother you had better never leave L.A. again. Like Hen, who texted him halfway through her surprise trip, said he’d better still be in one piece when she got back. Like Athena, who the sheriff said called him over and over and over again even when the sheriff wouldn’t listen. Like May and Harry and Ravi. Like Chris. Like Eddie.
You watch out for your boy, now.
Bobby had faith that Eddie would come home. Bobby sent them to Nashville. Bobby had faith in them. Bobby always had faith in them. Buck– Buck has faith in them, too. He grabs that last piece he hadn’t even realized he was missing, something that’s been missing longer than New Mexico, longer than Nashville, longer than Texas, longer than lightning and bullets and mud and lawsuits and tsunamis and–
“Did the sheriff think we were together?” Buck asks. He scoots a little closer to Eddie. Eddie bites his lip and looks away.
“Yeah, I think so,” Eddie says.
“Right,” Buck says. Then, “And so did those guys in the diner.”
“Yeah, I think so,” Eddie says again.
“Right.” Then, “You were gonna fight them. For me.”
“Yeah, I was.” Eddie’s still not looking at Buck.
“And in Nashville. You shoved Blue. For me.”
“Yeah, I did.” He’s still not looking at Buck.
“Right,” Buck says. Then, “Eddie, I’m in love with you.”
And Eddie looks at him so fast Buck swears he hears every bone in Eddie’s neck crack. His eyes are blown wide and his mouth has dropped a little bit and Buck holds eye contact as firm as he can. Because he’s incapable of doing things in halves and God knows that he’s always been one half of BuckandEddie. And Bobby had faith in them, and Buck has faith in them, and this piece has been just outside his grasp for as long as he knew there was a puzzle being put together, probably from the moment he laid eyes on Eddie all those years ago– so he’s sure. He knows. There is no other puzzle. This has always been the ending. Not mud, not blood, not lightning, not fire, and certainly not in a shed in the desert in New Mexico.
“Buck,” Eddie says, like he’s not really sure what else to say. He doesn’t really need to say anything else, honestly, because Buck can see it. Buck can see it in the way his shoulders lose the tension, and his body relaxes, and his face softens– but mostly Buck can see it in his eyes. Eddie’s looking at Buck the way he’s always looking at Buck. Eddie’s looking at Buck like he never wants to look away. Eddie’s looking at Buck like he loves him.
“Just,” Buck says, not really hesitant, or regretful, but so Eddie knows– “In the interest of being honest. I’m in love with you.”
“How– um– how long?” Eddie asks. His fingers have crawled toward Buck’s on the bed. Buck would crawl across dirt and asphalt toward Eddie. Buck takes his hand, and Eddie grips his tightly, presses fingers against the pulse point in his wrist and takes a breath– steady, not shaky. This has always been the ending.
“Years,” Buck says. “Years and years.” And he thinks Eddie gets it, then– Buck’s loved him since the beginning.
“Yeah,” Eddie says, nodding, like that makes sense. “Yeah.” And Buck thinks he gets it, then– Eddie’s loved him since the beginning, too.
“So,” Buck says. And then, because he’s not the only one who can share life-changing truths without any real build-up, Eddie says–
“I think you should move in with me.”
Buck blinks at him for a moment.
“Eddie,” he says, because he’s not really sure what else to say. Eddie doesn’t seem to feel the same sense of calm that Buck felt after blurting his life-changing truth, though, because he rushes to continue–
“I know you just got settled in your new place, and I know this is– I mean, really, really fast, but– I don’t ever want to be away from you. I didn’t before, and I certainly don’t now. You’re– Buck.” A little bit of that desperation is creeping back into his voice. “Jesus, Buck, I love you so goddamn much I don’t know what to do with it sometimes. So. I think you should move in with me, and honestly I think maybe you should marry me, but that’s moving even faster than cohabiting, but– we’re already coparenting, so– so– say something?”
“I love you,” Buck says, and maybe that’s all the answer Eddie needs, because he takes another long breath.
“I love you,” Eddie echoes, very earnestly. His fingers are still pressed against Buck’s wrist, Buck’s pulse fast but steady. “I’m in love with you. And I’d really like to kiss you, and marry you, and grow old with you, but maybe we can start with kissing?” He sounds almost shy about it, and Buck breaks into a wide grin.
“Yeah, that sounds alright,” he says, and Eddie laughs and leans in and their noses bump together and they laugh against and Eddie’s fingers are still against his wrist, his other hand brushing against his neck, his jaw, thumbing under his eye, and Buck leans in this time and presses their lips together in a soft, chaste kiss. It lasts less than two seconds. They’re both grinning into it, both a little breathless. It’s the best kiss Buck’s ever had.
He pulls back because they’re both still laughing but he doesn’t go far, just far enough that he can really look into Eddie’s eyes and he’s not looking for anything in particular, just looking. Eddie seems to be doing the same. When Eddie kisses him again, it lasts a little longer, goes a little deeper, but it’s no less soft.
“I think,” Eddie says, against Buck’s lips. “This has always been the ending.”
“Yeah,” Buck agrees. “It has.” There’s lightning in his veins but this time it’s a comfort. This time it feels like coming home. They’re in a shitty motel somewhere in Arizona and they’ve had a few days from hell and they have the worst luck in the world, maybe, but they have it together. Always together.
“I hope you know I’m never letting you out of my sight again,” Eddie says. “You better not be planning on going anywhere anytime soon, Buck.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Buck says. They’re in a shitty motel in Arizona. There’s lightning in his veins. He has always had faith in them. “I’m right where I want to be.”