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By the time Maddie drops Jee-Yun off at Eddie’s house on a sunny Saturday morning, Buck has already made three separate lists.
One is titled Emergency Contacts.
One is titled Approved Snacks.
And one, written in all caps across the top page of Eddie’s notepad, says:
THINGS TODDLERS CAN LEGALLY DIE FROM???
“You know,” Maddie says slowly, eyeing the lists spread across the kitchen table, “most people just babysit.”
Buck points at the third list defensively. “Do you know how small batteries are?”
“Why are there twenty-seven bullet points under ‘grapes’?” Eddie asks.
Buck looks personally offended. “Because grapes are a menace.”
Jee-Yun, sitting on the counter swinging her little sneakered feet, grins at him. “Uncle Buck scared of grapes.”
“I’m not scared of grapes,” Buck mutters.
“You read an article at three in the morning,” Eddie says.
“It was medical literature, Eddie.”
“It was a mommy blog.”
“It cited sources.”
Maddie snorts into her coffee.
Across the kitchen, Jee-Yun is carefully peeling the stickers off Buck’s lists and attaching them directly onto Eddie’s arm.
Eddie lets her.
Which is exactly the problem.
“You two are going to be fine,” Maddie says, grabbing her purse. “She already had breakfast, her bag’s packed, and if she naps before two she won’t turn into a tiny sleep-deprived dictator.”
“Got it,” Buck says immediately.
“Nap before two,” Eddie repeats with a solemn nod.
Maddie looks between them.
Then at Chimney, who has remained suspiciously quiet this entire time.
“Aren’t you going to say anything?”
Chimney shrugs. “No. I want to see what happens.”
“Chim!”
“I give them three hours before they call 911 on themselves.”
Buck scoffs. “Please. Eddie and I have handled emergencies together for years.”
“That’s different,” Chimney says. “Adults generally don’t lick electrical outlets because they’re shiny.”
Jee-Yun gasps dramatically. “I no do dat anymore.”
There’s a beat of silence.
Buck slowly turns toward Chimney.
“Anymore?”
Chimney is already halfway out the door.
For the first twenty minutes, everything goes weirdly well.
Suspiciously well.
Jee-Yun sits at Eddie’s kitchen island coloring while Buck cuts strawberries into aggressively safe sizes.
Eddie makes grilled cheese.
There’s music playing softly from Buck’s phone.
Sunlight spills through the windows.
At one point Eddie catches Buck smiling helplessly while Jee-Yun explains, with grave seriousness, why pink crayons draw faster than blue ones.
It’s domestic enough that Eddie’s chest does that stupid warm ache thing he’s been trying very hard not to think about for approximately three years.
Then Jee-Yun says, “I gotta potty.”
And everything immediately collapses.
“Okay!” Buck says brightly. “Great. Awesome. We can do potty.”
“I’ll do it,” Eddie says at the exact same time.
“No, no, I got it.”
“Buck, you almost passed out changing Christopher’s stomach bug sheets that one time.”
“In my defense, bodily fluids should remain inside the body.”
Jee-Yun stares at both of them.
“I already gotta go.”
“Right,” Eddie says quickly. “Bathroom. Now.”
This somehow turns into both of them crowding into Eddie’s tiny downstairs bathroom trying to coach a toddler through using the toilet like they’re diffusing a bomb.
“Maybe the stool needs to be closer,” Buck says.
“She’s fine.”
“She looks unstable.”
“I’m sitting right here,” Jee-Yun informs them.
Buck crouches immediately. “You’re doing amazing, sweetie.”
Eddie pinches the bridge of his nose.
Five minutes later, Buck yelps, “ABORT, ABORT—”
“I MISSED,” Jee-Yun announces proudly.
“Oh my God.”
“It’s on my sock.”
“It’s on both your socks,” Eddie says.
“How is that possible?!”
Jee-Yun dissolves into hysterical giggles.
And somehow—somehow—Eddie starts laughing too.
Buck looks betrayed.
“You’re supposed to be helping me!”
“I can’t,” Eddie wheezes. “Your face—”
“My SOCKS ARE WET.”
Jee-Yun laughs harder.
And there it is.
That sound.
The loud, delighted, absolutely unfiltered toddler laughter filling Eddie’s kitchen while Buck stands there in dinosaur socks soaked with toilet water looking personally victimized by fatherhood.
Eddie has to look away for a second because the affection hits him so hard it’s almost embarrassing.
Buck would be such a good dad.
The thought arrives suddenly. Easily. Like it’s always been there waiting for Eddie to catch up.
Buck catches him staring.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“You’re smiling weird.”
“You’re wearing damp dinosaur socks.”
“That’s not an answer.”
Before Eddie can respond, Jee-Yun gasps dramatically from the bathroom doorway.
“I hungry again.”
Buck blinks. “You just ate.”
“I growing.”
“Well. Can’t argue with science.”
Snack time turns into a hostage negotiation.
“No more cookies,” Eddie says firmly.
Jee-Yun immediately flops bonelessly onto the kitchen floor.
Buck startles. “Is she okay?”
“She’s throwing a tantrum.”
“Oh.”
A pause.
“She looks dead.”
“She’s fine.”
Jee-Yun lets out the single most dramatic sigh Eddie has ever heard from a three-foot-tall human being.
“No one love me.”
Buck’s expression crumples instantly.
Eddie points at him. “Don’t you dare.”
“She said no one loves her.”
“She wants cookies.”
“She might also need emotional support.”
“She needs apple slices.”
Buck crouches beside Jee-Yun. “I love you.”
Eddie groans.
Jee-Yun peeks one eye open. “Can I hab cookies?”
“No,” Eddie says.
“Yes,” Buck says simultaneously.
Eddie whips around. “Buck.”
“What? She’s tiny.”
“She’s manipulative.”
“She’s three.”
“She’s winning.”
Jee-Yun smiles serenely from the floor.
Traitor.
By noon, Eddie has learned several things.
One: toddlers possess infinite energy.
Two: Buck somehow possesses even more.
And three: leaving those two unsupervised together is probably classified as a public safety hazard.
Currently, Buck is chasing Jee-Yun through the backyard pretending to be a dinosaur.
Not a normal dinosaur.
An apparently deeply method actor dinosaur.
“RAAAARGH!”
Jee-Yun shrieks delightedly and runs in chaotic circles while Buck stomps after her.
Eddie watches from the patio chair with a beer and the exhausted expression of a man witnessing inevitable disaster in real time.
“Buck,” he calls lazily, “watch the—”
Too late.
Buck trips over Christopher’s abandoned football and goes down hard into the grass with a noise that sounds genuinely prehistoric.
Jee-Yun gasps.
Then climbs directly onto his back.
“I DEFEATED DA DINOSAUR.”
Buck groans into the lawn. “Tell my family I loved them.”
Eddie laughs so hard he nearly spills his beer.
Buck lifts his head enough to glare at him through the grass.
“You could help me.”
“Nah. This is funny.”
“You’re supposed to support me emotionally.”
“You’ll survive.”
Jee-Yun pats Buck’s head. “Good dinosaur.”
Buck sighs deeply. “Thank you, tiny warrior.”
Eddie’s chest does that warm ache thing again.
Because this—this right here—is dangerously close to a fantasy Eddie has spent years trying not to name.
Buck in his backyard.
Christopher laughing upstairs somewhere.
Jee-Yun climbing all over both of them.
Sunlight.
Noise.
Home.
It hits too hard, too fast.
Eddie looks away first.
The meltdown arrives at 1:17 p.m.
Like a natural disaster.
One second Jee-Yun is happily watching cartoons between Buck and Eddie on the couch.
The next—
“I WANTED THE BLUE CUP.”
Buck freezes.
Eddie freezes.
On the coffee table sits the apparently offensive pink cup.
“Oh,” Buck says carefully.
“I WANTED BLUE.”
“Okay, sweetheart, we can get the blue one—”
“NOOOOOOO.”
And then she cries.
Not normal crying.
Full-body devastation.
Tiny apocalypse crying.
Buck looks horrified.
“Eddie.”
“I know.”
“She’s so sad.”
“She’s tired.”
“We broke her.”
“We did not break the toddler.”
Jee-Yun sobs harder.
Buck immediately gathers her into his lap. “Hey, hey, it’s okay—”
She shoves the pink cup away with enough force to send juice across Buck’s shirt.
There’s silence.
Buck looks down slowly.
Eddie presses his lips together.
“Oh no,” he whispers.
Buck stares at the spreading juice stain.
Then at Eddie.
Then at the screaming toddler in his lap.
And something in his expression snaps.
“I think,” Buck says with terrifying calm, “I finally understand why Chimney always looks dead inside.”
Eddie loses it completely.
He laughs so hard he has to bend over onto the arm of the couch.
Buck looks deeply betrayed.
“This isn’t funny.”
“You said that like a war veteran.”
“I’ve seen things today, Eddie.”
Jee-Yun hiccups sadly against Buck’s chest.
And Buck—still covered in apple juice, exhausted, hair sticking up everywhere—just keeps rubbing her back patiently.
“Hey,” he murmurs softly. “Blue cup. We can do blue cup.”
The tenderness in his voice nearly kills Eddie on the spot.
Because Buck doesn’t get frustrated with her.
Doesn’t get mean.
Doesn’t stop being gentle even when he’s overwhelmed.
He just keeps loving loudly and completely and with everything he has.
Like always.
Like Eddie’s been watching him do for years.
“Oh,” Eddie says quietly before he can stop himself.
Buck glances up. “What?”
Nothing.
Everything.
I’m in love with you.
But before Eddie can catastrophically ruin his own life, Jee-Yun suddenly sits upright in Buck’s lap and announces:
“I sleepy.”
Both men stare at her.
Then at each other.
Slowly.
Carefully.
Like hostage negotiators approaching a live explosive.
“Naptime?” Buck whispers.
“Naptime,” Eddie agrees.
Hope rises.
Dangerous, beautiful hope.
Putting Jee-Yun down for a nap becomes the hardest thing either of them has ever done.
Including the tsunami.
Including the sniper.
Including that time Buck got trapped under a firetruck.
“Can you sing?” Jee-Yun asks sleepily from Eddie’s guest bed.
Buck immediately says, “Absolutely not.”
“You sing all the time,” Eddie says.
“That’s different. Shower singing isn’t legally binding.”
“Please?” Jee-Yun asks, already halfway asleep.
Buck looks helpless.
Then quietly starts singing anyway.
It’s soft.
Off-key.
Terrible, objectively.
But Jee-Yun curls closer into her blankets almost instantly.
And Eddie—
Eddie is absolutely done for.
Because Buck’s voice goes warm and gentle when he sings to her.
Because he smooths her hair back instinctively.
Because he looks so unbearably natural standing beside a child in Eddie’s house that it makes something deep inside Eddie ache.
Jee-Yun falls asleep halfway through the second verse.
Neither of them moves for a second.
Buck whispers, “Did we do it?”
Eddie exhales slowly. “I think we survived.”
Buck grins at him.
God.
That smile.
Eddie’s heart feels like it trips over itself.
Quietly, they step out into the hallway and close the door.
Then immediately collapse against opposite walls.
“We’re never having kids,” Buck whispers dramatically.
Eddie snorts.
Five seconds pass.
Buck frowns.
“Wait. That came out wrong.”
Eddie’s stomach drops a little anyway.
Because of course it did.
Because Buck doesn’t mean them.
Buck means—
“You know what I mean,” Buck says quickly.
“Yeah.”
Silence settles awkwardly.
Buck rubs the back of his neck. “I just mean—this is hard.”
“It is.”
“But kinda fun?”
Eddie smiles despite himself. “Yeah. Kinda fun.”
Buck looks toward the closed guest room door.
Then back at Eddie.
And something soft shifts in his expression.
“I get it now,” he says quietly.
“Get what?”
“Why you love being a dad so much.”
The words hit Eddie straight in the chest.
Because Buck says them with wonder.
Not fear.
Not uncertainty.
Wonder.
“You’d be good at it,” Eddie says before he can stop himself.
Buck blinks.
The hallway suddenly feels too small.
Too warm.
Eddie can hear his own heartbeat.
Buck’s gaze locks onto his for one dangerous second—
CRASH.
Both of them jump violently.
Jee-Yun’s voice rings through the baby monitor.
“I THROWED UP.”
Buck closes his eyes.
Eddie tilts his head back toward the ceiling.
“Of course she did,” he says weakly.
And then both of them sprint for the bedroom like firefighters charging into battle.
The first sign things have gone catastrophically wrong is the smell.
Eddie stops dead halfway down the hallway.
“Oh no.”
Behind him, Buck—still running entirely on adrenaline and misplaced optimism—nearly crashes into his back.
“What? What happened? Is she okay?”
Eddie just points silently toward the guest room.
Buck sniffs once.
His entire face changes.
“Oh, that’s biological warfare.”
From inside the room, Jee-Yun sniffles sadly.
“I frew up.”
“Yeah, baby, we know,” Eddie says, already sounding exhausted beyond human comprehension.
Buck squares his shoulders like a man preparing for combat. “Okay. Okay. We can handle this.”
“You literally gagged changing Christopher’s stomach bug sheets.”
“That was years ago. I’ve grown.”
A beat.
Then Buck opens the bedroom door.
The smell hits full force.
Buck immediately turns around and walks directly into the wall.
Eddie loses it.
“Oh my God,” he wheezes, laughing helplessly while Buck presses both palms against the hallway wall like he’s trying to steady himself during an earthquake.
“I haven’t grown,” Buck says faintly.
Jee-Yun sits miserably in the middle of the guest bed wrapped in blankets, hair sticking to her forehead.
“Sorry,” she whispers.
And instantly both men soften.
“Oh, sweetheart,” Eddie says gently, crossing the room immediately. “Hey. It’s okay.”
Buck rallies enough to stumble in after him, dramatically pulling the collar of his shirt over his nose.
“You’re still cute even when you’re horrifying,” he informs her.
Jee-Yun giggles weakly.
Eddie starts stripping the bed while Buck carefully lifts Jee-Yun into his arms.
Which would be easier if she wasn’t now half-asleep and clinging to him like a tiny koala.
“No Uncle Eddie,” she mumbles into Buck’s shoulder.
Buck freezes.
Eddie freezes.
Jee-Yun tightens her arms around Buck’s neck. “Want Uncle Buck.”
Something stupidly soft flashes across Buck’s face.
“Oh,” he says quietly.
Eddie pretends not to notice the way his own chest squeezes painfully at the sight.
Because Buck immediately shifts into comfort mode like it’s instinct.
One hand rubbing Jee-Yun’s back.
Voice soft and low.
“No problem, bug. I got you.”
God.
Eddie is never surviving this day.
Twenty minutes later, the washing machine is running, Buck’s shirt has become an acceptable casualty of war, and Jee-Yun is freshly cleaned and wrapped in one of Christopher’s old dinosaur blankets on the couch.
She looks tiny.
Sleepy.
Pathetically miserable.
Buck sits beside her with the kind of intense focus usually reserved for bomb defusal.
“Do you think she needs medicine?”
“She threw up once, Buck.”
“What if it’s a stomach virus?”
“She probably just got overheated running around outside.”
“What if it’s appendicitis?”
Eddie stares at him.
“How do you even make that jump?”
“I read things.”
“That’s the problem.”
Jee-Yun raises one small hand weakly. “Can I hab cartoon?”
Buck gasps. “She’s recovering.”
Eddie snorts.
Buck immediately grabs the remote and carefully tucks the blanket tighter around her shoulders.
“You need hydration too,” he says seriously.
“She’s not crossing the Sahara.”
“She’s been through a lot.”
“She threw up one time.”
“She’s brave.”
Jee-Yun nods solemnly from her blanket cocoon.
“I very brave.”
Eddie watches Buck hand her a juice pouch like he’s personally delivering life-saving medical treatment and feels his entire heart betray him all over again.
Because this shouldn’t feel this natural.
Buck shouldn’t fit here this easily.
On Eddie’s couch.
In Eddie’s house.
Taking care of a sick kid with sleepy patience and endless gentleness like he was made for it.
Like he belongs there.
Buck catches him staring again.
“What?”
Eddie looks away too slowly. “Nothing.”
“That’s the third time you’ve said that today.”
“Maybe stop being weirdly domestic then.”
Buck blinks.
Eddie immediately regrets having a mouth.
But Buck just goes pink around the ears.
“Oh.”
Jee-Yun looks between them.
Then squints suspiciously.
“You two acting strange.”
“We are not,” Eddie says instantly.
“Very weird,” Jee-Yun confirms.
Buck points accusingly at her. “You are three. You can’t judge anybody.”
She gasps dramatically. “I almost died today.”
Eddie chokes on his own laughter.
Buck looks scandalized. “You threw up once!”
“It was very hard for me.”
“You are so dramatic,” Eddie tells her fondly.
“Learned from Uncle Buck.”
“Hey!”
“Accurate though,” Eddie says.
Buck throws a throw pillow at him.
Unfortunately, this starts a war.
Because Jee-Yun immediately shrieks, “PILLOW FIGHT.”
And before Eddie can stop them, Buck launches himself over the couch cushions with the energy of a man who has absolutely never once acted his age.
“TRAITOR,” Eddie yells as Buck pelts him directly in the face.
Jee-Yun cackles.
The next ten minutes devolve into complete chaos.
Blankets everywhere.
Pillows flying.
Buck dramatically fake-dying every thirty seconds.
Jee-Yun using his stomach as a trampoline.
Eddie laughing so hard his ribs hurt.
And for one dangerously perfect moment, it feels easy.
Too easy.
Like this is normal.
Like Buck belongs in the middle of Eddie’s living room getting attacked by a toddler while sunlight spills across the floor.
Like they’ve always been this.
Family.
The thought hits Eddie so hard he nearly misses Buck tackling him sideways onto the carpet.
“Oof—Buck!”
"You were distracted,” Buck says smugly.
“You’re thirty-three years old.”
“And winning.”
Jee-Yun launches herself onto both of them with a delighted shriek.
The combined force sends all three collapsing into a tangled heap of limbs and blankets.
For a second nobody moves.
Then Jee-Yun yawns hugely.
Buck and Eddie freeze.
Slowly.
Carefully.
“Oh no,” Buck whispers.
The toddler exhaustion crash.
Eddie knows it well.
Three seconds later, Jee-Yun’s eyes fill with tears.
“I tired.”
Buck panics instantly. “Okay, okay, that’s okay—”
“I wanna mama.”
And there it is.
The heartbreak.
Jee-Yun starts crying again, quieter this time. Sad instead of explosive.
Buck’s face crumples immediately.
“Oh, bug…”
Eddie watches him gather her close automatically, rocking gently while she cries into his shoulder.
And something about it wrecks him completely.
Because Buck doesn’t hesitate.
Doesn’t pull away.
Doesn’t treat affection like something embarrassing or inconvenient.
He just loves people openly.
Fearlessly.
Like it’s breathing.
Jee-Yun sniffles miserably. “Miss mama.”
“I know,” Buck murmurs softly. “She’ll be back soon.”
“You stay?”
“Yeah. I’ll stay.”
Jee-Yun relaxes against him almost instantly.
Eddie looks at Buck holding her there in the dim afternoon light and realizes, with sudden terrifying clarity, that he could spend the rest of his life wanting this.
Wanting Buck in his house.
In his family.
In every quiet little moment exactly like this one.
The realization lands so hard it almost knocks the air out of him.
Buck glances up.
Their eyes meet.
And maybe Eddie lets too much show on his face this time because Buck stills slightly.
The room suddenly feels smaller.
Quieter.
Too warm.
Then the front door opens.
“Mama!” Jee-Yun shouts immediately, wriggling out of Buck’s arms at lightning speed.
Maddie barely has time to crouch before Jee-Yun collides with her.
“Oh, hi baby.”
“We survived,” Eddie says weakly from the floor.
Chimney walks in behind Maddie carrying takeout and immediately stops.
The living room is destroyed.
Blankets everywhere.
Pillows on the ceiling fan somehow.
Buck lying spread-eagle on the carpet looking emotionally broken.
Eddie sitting beside him with blanket lint in his hair.
Chimney takes one slow look around.
Then nods once.
“Yeah,” he says. “This looks about right.”
Buck points at him accusingly. “You knew this would happen.”
“I absolutely knew this would happen.”
Maddie looks delighted. “Did she behave?”
Eddie and Buck both start talking at once.
“She threw up—”
“The blue cup thing was insane—”
“Buck got toilet water on his socks—”
“I was emotionally manipulated by a toddler—”
“She called me brave,” Jee-Yun informs Maddie proudly.
“You are brave, baby.”
Buck looks vindicated immediately.
Eddie groans.
Chimney snorts. “You’re attached now, huh?”
Buck opens his mouth to deny it.
Then Jee-Yun sleepily reaches for him again instead of Maddie.
“Oh,” Maddie says softly.
Buck melts instantly, taking her without hesitation.
And Eddie—
Eddie’s done.
Absolutely gone.
Because Buck sways gently with her resting against his chest like he’s done this a thousand times before.
Like he was always supposed to.
Maddie notices Eddie staring.
Her eyes narrow slightly.
Then slowly, knowingly, she smiles.
Oh, absolutely not.
Eddie immediately stands. “I’m getting water.”
He escapes to the kitchen before anybody can perceive his emotional crisis.
Unfortunately, Buck follows him two minutes later.
“Hey.”
Eddie pretends to be deeply invested in the fridge. “Hey.”
A pause.
Then quietly:
“Today was nice.”
Eddie closes the fridge door slowly.
Buck’s expression is soft around the edges. Tired. Fond.
Dangerous.
“Yeah,” Eddie says carefully. “It was.”
Buck leans against the counter beside him.
“You know,” he says after a second, “for the record… if I ever did have kids someday…”
Eddie’s heart immediately starts beating too hard.
Buck glances at him.
“I’d want it to feel like this.”
And there it is.
The complete and total destruction of Eddie Diaz.
Because Buck says it simply.
Honestly.
Without realizing what those words do to him.
Eddie stares at him for one suspended second too long.
Buck notices.
Of course he notices.
His expression shifts slightly.
Softening.
Understanding something.
Then from the living room, Chimney yells:
“IF YOU TWO START MAKING EYES AT EACH OTHER AFTER TRAUMATIZING MY CHILD ALL DAY, I SWEAR TO GOD—”
Buck bursts into helpless laughter.
Eddie nearly chokes to death.
And out in the living room, Jee-Yun’s sleepy little voice drifts after it:
“Uncle Eddie in looooove.”