Chapter Text
The drive to the 118 was a road Buck knew so intimately he could have driven it blindfolded. For the past six months, he had driven it in his head every single night while staring at the ceiling of his painfully quiet loft.
His hands gripped the steering wheel of his Jeep, a nervous energy vibrating beneath his skin. He was back. Finally. After the crushing agony of the fire truck, after the terrifying, suffocating darkness of the pulmonary embolism, after the months of the agonizing physical therapy, the absolute devastating impact of the tsunami, and yes, after the ugly, bruising mess of the lawsuit.
Buck wasn’t stupid. He knew he had thrown a grenade into his own home when he hired Mackey. He knew the lawsuit had hurt people he loved. But he also knew why he did it. He had been suffering alone, dropped by the very people who had promised they were family. He had fought tooth and nail just to be allowed to hold a hose again, just to get back to the only place he felt he belonged. The only family he had ever known.
He expected awkwardness today. He expected a few tight smiles, maybe a stern lecture from Bobby, and a period of having to earn his keep all over again. He was more than ready for it. He was ready to grovel, to work double shifts, to take every terrible chore until they realized he was still just the same Buck.
Sitting in the passenger seat was a massive, bright pink cardboard box. He had stopped at the bakery a town over at 5AM. Inside were two maple bacon bars for Bobby, jelly filled for Chimney, the matcha glazed ones Hen liked, and a plain, old fashioned cruller for Eddie, because Eddie pretended to hate sweets but always stole Buck’s. Eddie pretends he doesn’t have a sweet tooth, but he definitely does.
Buck parked the Jeep, killed the engine, and took a deep, grounding breath. His lungs expanded fully. No pain. No blood. Just air.
I’m home, he thought.
He grabbed the pink box, pasted on his brightest, most eager smile, and walked toward the bay. The familiar smell of the firehouse felt like a warm blanket, making his eyes sting with sudden, overwhelming affection.
He bounded up the stairs to the loft, taking them two at a time, his bad leg holding his weight effortlessly.
"Good morning, 118!" Buck called out, his voice practically entirely masking the nervous tremor in his chest.
The clatter of silverware in the kitchen abruptly stopped.
Buck stepped off the landing and walked into the kitchen/dining area. Bobby was at the stove, a spatula frozen in his hand. Chimney was seated at the island, a mug halfway to his mouth. Hen was beside him, scrolling on her phone.
The silence wasn't just awkward. It was heavy. It was the kind of silence that sucked the oxygen right out of the room. It was thick and suffocating.
Buck’s smile faltered for a fraction of a second before he forced it wider, holding the box out like a peace offering. "I, uh, I brought donuts. The good ones from that place we like. Maple bacon for you, Cap."
Nobody moved.
Chimney slowly lowered his mug to the counter. The ceramic clinked loudly in the quiet room. He looked at the pink box, then looked at Buck, his expression unreadable. "Yeah, no thanks," Chimney said, his voice flat, devoid of its usual warm, teasing cadence. "Lost my appetite for sugar lately. Leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Kind of like this whole situation."
Buck swallowed hard, his throat suddenly bone dry. "Right. Okay. More for the rest of us, then?" He looked toward Hen.
Hen didn't look up from her phone. She just kept scrolling. She didn't offer a smile, a nod, or even a sigh. It was as if he were entirely invisible.
Buck’s heart did a painful, erratic stutter in his chest. He lowered the box onto the edge of the counter, the cardboard scraping against the counter. He looked toward the stove, seeking out the man who had been a father to him.
"Cap?" Buck asked, his voice softer now, the eager bravado bleeding out of it.
Bobby finally turned around. His face was a mask of rigid, unbreakable professionalism. There was no warmth in his eyes, no paternal affection. It was the face of a Fire Captain dealing with a problematic probationary firefighter.
Bobby didn't say good morning. He didn't ask how Buck’s leg was. He reached over to the counter, picked up a notepad, and walked over, stopping two feet away from Buck. He held it out.
"Buckley," Bobby said. The use of his last name felt like a physical slap. "You’re on chore duty today. The apparatus floor needs scrubbing, the hoses from yesterday’s three alarm need to be washed and hung, and the downstairs bathrooms need a deep clean. When you’re done with that, inventory the medical cabinets in the ambulances."
Buck stared at the notepad. It was at least eight hours of grueling, isolated physical labor. It was a punishment.
"Yes, Cap," Buck said quietly, taking the notepad.
Before Bobby could turn away, the sound of boots on the stairs echoed through the loft. Buck’s chest tightened. Eddie.
Eddie reached the top of the stairs, dressed in his perfectly pressed uniform, his face like thunder. Buck felt a desperate surge of hope. It was Eddie. His partner. The man who trusted him with his son. Eddie would be pissed, sure, but Eddie wouldn't freeze him out. They just needed to talk.
"Hey, Eddie," Buck breathed out, taking a half step forward.
Eddie didn't slow down. He didn't even blink. He walked straight toward the kitchen, passing so close to Buck that their shoulders collided. It wasn't an accident. It was a deliberate, hard shoulder check that forced Buck to take a step back to keep his balance.
Eddie walked past him, went straight to the coffee pot, and poured a mug. He didn't look back. His jaw was clenched so tight a muscle ticked visibly in his cheek.
Buck stood in the middle of the kitchen, holding the notepad and a box of rejected donuts, surrounded by the four people he loved most in the world. He had expected a lecture. He had expected anger.
He hadn't expected to be a ghost.
By 2PM, Buck’s hands were raw and smelled entirely of industrial bleach.
He had spent the last four hours scrubbing the bay floor until it gleamed, the physical exertion the only thing keeping his mind from spiraling into a dark, suffocating panic. He had worked through the pain, through the sweat stinging his eyes, waiting for someone to come down the stairs. Waiting for Hen to bring him a bottle of water. Waiting for Chimney to make a smart remark about him missing a spot. Waiting for Eddie to lean against the side of the engine and ask him what the hell he had been thinking with the lawsuit.
Nobody came down.
Buck was currently untangling a heavy, soot stained hose, dragging it across the concrete toward the washing station, when the blare of the station alarm finally shattered the oppressive silence.
Adrenaline, sharp and familiar, flooded Buck’s veins. He dropped the hose. Muscle memory took over. He sprinted toward his locker on the bay floor, his heart beating against his ribs. This was it. This was what he fought for. He stripped off his chore shirt and grabbed his turnout coat, shoving his arms into the heavy sleeves, the weight of it feeling like a long lost embrace.
He practically flew toward the engine, grabbing the handle to pull himself up into the truck behind Eddie.
"Hold it."
Bobby’s voice was sharp, cutting through the wail of the sirens spinning up.
Buck froze, one foot on the running board, his hand gripping the bar. He looked back. Bobby was standing by the captain’s door, his face unreadable.
"Cap?" Buck asked, breathless, his helmet clutched in his other hand.
"You’re a man behind, Buckley," Bobby said, his voice carrying easily over the roar of the diesel engine. "You aren't cleared for the field today. Finish your chores."
Buck felt all the blood drain from his face, pooling heavily in his boots. "Cap, I passed my recertification. I have the medical clearance. I'm one hundred percent,"
"I said, you are a man behind," Bobby repeated, colder this time. He didn't wait for a response. He climbed into the cab and slammed the door.
Buck stood on the concrete, paralyzed, his hand slowly slipping off the metal bar of the engine. He watched through the window as Eddie put his headset on, staring straight ahead, refusing to look out the window. Hen and Chimney were already ready.
The bay doors rolled up. The sirens screamed. And then they were gone.
Buck stood entirely alone in the massive bay of the fire station. The silence that rushed in to replace the sirens was deafening.
Slowly, carefully, Buck took off his turnout coat. He folded it and set it on the bench. He put his chore shirt back on. He walked back over to the dirty hose, picked it up, and turned the water on.
He scrubbed the canvas. He scrubbed until his knuckles turned red.
He waited for the tears. He waited for the crushing, desperate need to fix it, to run after the truck, to text Maddie and beg her to tell him what to do. He waited for the familiar, panicked feeling of 'I'm not good enough, how do I make them love me again?'
But as the hours ticked by, as he moved from the hoses to the downstairs bathrooms, scrubbing the grout with a toothbrush, the panic never came. The tears never appeared.
Instead, a strange, creeping numbness began to settle over his chest. It was a cold, heavy blanket, extinguishing the frantic, burning need for their approval.
He thought about the lawsuit. He thought about the day he had coughed up a terrifying amount of blood, his lungs failing, thinking he was going to die. He thought about how Bobby had decided, without asking him, without testing him, that Buck was a liability.
He had fought to get his life back. He had used a lawyer because it was the only weapon he had left when his own family locked the door on him.
He was legally right. He was physically ready.
They aren't punishing me for suing the city, Buck realized, staring blankly at the soapy water pooling in the shower drain. They're punishing me for not rolling over. They're punishing me for fighting back.
The shift dragged on for another agonizing fourteen hours.
When the team returned from calls, they walked past Buck as if he were a piece of furniture. Dinner was eaten in the loft without him, Bobby hadn't called him up, and Buck hadn't gone. He ate a protein bar sitting on the bumper of the engine.
By 11PM, the station was quiet. The crew had retired to the bunk room.
Buck finished his final chore, inventorying the gauze in the back of the ambulance, and wiped down the counters. He was tired. His muscles ached, not from injury, but from unbroken labor.
He walked toward the bunk room, pushing open the door quietly. The steady breathing of the team filled the space. Chimney was lightly snoring. Eddie was shifted on his side, his back to the room.
Buck walked to the only empty bed, situated in the far corner. He sat down on the edge of the mattress, toeing off his boots.
He looked around the room. These were the people he had fought for. He had pulled them from burning buildings and stood between them and death more times than he could count. He loved them so fiercely it used to ache.
But as he looked at Eddie's rigid back, as he thought about Bobby's cold eyes and Chimney's cruel joke, the numbness fully set. The desperate boy who would do anything for a scrap of affection quietly closed the door and locked the door behind him.
Buck laid back on the mattress and stared at the ceiling.
They wanted a coworker? Fine. He would be the best damn coworker they had ever had. He would do the chores. He would follow the orders. He would keep his mouth shut, smile politely, and do his job.
But he was done bleeding for people who wouldn't hand him a bandage. He was done begging for conditional love. His heart was his own again, and he was never, ever letting them break it twice.
Buck turned over, closed his eyes, and fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.
The first week back at the 118 set the precedent.
If anyone in the firehouse expected Buck to crack under the weight of the silence, they were severely underestimating the stubbornness of Evan Buckley. Or perhaps, Buck thought as he scrubbed the underside of the ambulance for the third time that week, they just didn’t realize that the old Buck, the one who would have loudly demanded to know why they were mad, the one who would have bought a second box of donuts and begged on his knees for forgiveness was gone.
Buck treated the firehouse like a corporate office. He arrived exactly fifteen minutes before his shift started, dressed in his uniform. He greeted everyone with a polite, even, "Good morning." He took whatever list Bobby handed him without a flinch, said, "Yes, Cap," and disappeared.
It was jarring how easy it was once he stopped expecting them to care.
By his fourth shift, the subtle shift in the station’s ecosystem became palpable. The 118 was used to Buck constantly seeking validation, filling the silence with random facts or chatter about a new documentary he’d watched.
Now, there was just silence.
Buck was a ghost who did the chores perfectly. He ate his meals at the dining table with them, but he always brought a thick paperback book, his eyes glued to the pages while the team talked around him.
On Friday, Chimney tried to test the waters. Buck was wiping down the kitchen counters. Chimney leaned against the island, crossing his arms.
"Hey, Buckley," Chimney said, a hint of his usual snark bleeding into his voice. "You missed a spot by the coffee maker. I know the lawsuit probably made you soft, but let’s try to keep the standards up, yeah?"
A week ago, Buck would have felt a hot spike of shame. He would have stammered out an apology, furiously scrubbing the spot, and then laughed nervously to show he was a good sport.
Today, Buck just paused. He turned to look at Chimney. He didn't glare. He didn't look hurt. He just smiled, a perfectly pleasant, entirely vacant customer service smile.
"You’re completely right, Chimney. My apologies," Buck said smoothly. He walked over, wiped the spot down, rinsed the rag, and gave Chimney a polite nod. "All set. Have a good afternoon."
He walked away, leaving Chimney staring after him with his mouth slightly open, the joke dying a sudden, awkward death in the air between them.
Bobby watched from his office, his brow furrowed. Eddie watched from the couch, his jaw tight. They were waiting for Buck to break, but Buck was realizing something incredibly freeing, Teflon didn't break. It just let everything slide right off.
As liberating as the polite shield was at work, the energy that Buck used to pour into the 118 had to go somewhere. He was a man made of moving energy and a desperate need to be useful. If his family didn't want it, he would find people who did.
That was how he found himself standing at the base of the Santa Monica Mountains on a Wednesday morning on his day off, lacing up his hiking boots.
He had found the group on a local community board. They were an eclectic mix of people who met twice a week to tackle the grueling trails before the California sun hit its peak.
"You must be the new guy," a sharp, breathless voice called out.
Buck looked up to see a woman in her early thirties, dressed in pristine, high end athletic gear, adjusting a smartwatch. She had a fierce, competitive glint in her eye.
"Yeah. I'm Evan," Buck said, offering a hand.
"Maya," she said, shaking it firmly. "I set the pace. If you fall behind, we don't wait."
"Maya, relax, it's a hike, not a corporate merger," a slow, relaxed voice drifted over. A guy with a scruffy beard and a faded band t shirt wandered over, sipping from a massive hydro flask. "I'm Elias. I'm the unofficial leader, mostly because I'm the only one who brings extra trail mix. This is Sam and Leo."
A couple walked up, holding hands. Leo gave a dry, sarcastic wave, and Sam beamed.
"Nice to meet you, Evan," Sam said warmly. "Don't let Maya scare you. She's vicious on the incline but she buys the smoothies after."
Buck smiled, a real one this time, small but genuine. "Good to know."
For the next three hours, Buck pushed his body to its absolute limit. Maya wasn't kidding about the pace, she attacked the mountain like it owed her money. But Buck had the stamina of a firefighter and the pent up frustration of a man who had been scrubbing grout for a week. He matched her step for step.
The physical exertion was intoxicating. The smell of dry eucalyptus and dust, the burn in his calves, the sweat dripping down the back of his neck, it grounded him. Up here, he wasn't 'Buck, the liability.' He wasn't the guy who sued the city. He wasn't Eddie's rejected partner.
He was just Evan. A guy with good cardio and a quiet laugh.
When they finally reached the peak, overlooking Los Angeles, Elias passed around a bag of almonds.
"So, Evan," Leo asked, leaning against a boulder. "What do you do that lets you hike on a Wednesday morning?"
"I work weird shifts," Buck said vaguely, keeping his eyes on the horizon. "City job."
"Say no more," Elias laughed. "As a freelance graphic designer, I respect the hustle of a non traditional Wednesday."
Buck breathed in the thin air. He felt a knot in his chest loosen, a knot he hadn't even realized he was carrying. It was so incredibly simple. No drama, no history, just putting one foot in front of the other.
While the hiking group burned off his physical energy, Buck knew he needed something else for his heart.
He missed Christopher with a physical ache that sometimes made it hard to breathe. He missed the weight of the kid against his side, missed the shared laughter over terrible jokes, missed the feeling of being a protector and a friend. They made an agreement, Eddie agreed to give him Chris every other weekend, but those days felt so far away, and the drop offs with Eddie were so agonizingly tense that Buck found himself dreading the very thing he looked forward to most.
So, on Thursday afternoon, Buck walked into the local public library.
It was quiet, smelling of old paper, floor wax, and the distinct, faint scent of apple juice. Buck walked up to the circulation desk, feeling absurdly large in the quiet space.
Marian, the head librarian, peered at him over her tortoise shell reading glasses. She took in his broad shoulders, his muscular arms, and his nervous posture.
"Can I help you?" she asked, her tone suggesting she thought he might be lost.
"Hi, yeah, um," Buck rubbed the back of his neck. "I saw on the bulletin board that you need volunteers for the toddler storytime program? I'd like to help."
Marian’s eyebrows shot up into her graying hairline. "You want to read to toddlers."
"I have a lot of experience," Buck offered, a small, sad smile tugging at his lips. "I’m really good at voices."
Twenty minutes later, Buck was sitting in a comically small, bright yellow plastic chair in the center of the children's section. A foam mat was spread out in front of him, currently occupied by fifteen squirming, babbling toddlers and their exhausted looking parents. Toby, a lanky college student who volunteered on Thursdays, handed Buck a copy of The Gruffalo.
"Good luck," Toby whispered. "They're feral today."
Buck took the book. He looked at the tiny faces staring up at him. He cleared his throat.
"Alright, everybody," Buck said, his voice dropping into a deep, theatrical rumble. "Who wants to hear a story about a very brave mouse?"
The room went dead silent. A few kids gasped.
Buck launched into the book. He didn't just read it, he performed it. He used the exact same gruff, rumbling monster voice he used to use when reading to Christopher in the safety of Eddie’s living room. He did a squeaky, fast paced voice for the mouse. He animated his face, widening his eyes and gasping at all the right moments.
Buck felt a piece of his old self slot perfectly back into place.
When he finished the story with a dramatic roar, the toddlers erupted into applause and shrieks of delight. Even the exhausted parents were clapping, a few of them giving him impressed nods.
"That was amazing," Toby beamed, collecting the foam mats as the parents started wrangling their kids into strollers. "Marian usually puts them to sleep, but you actually kept their attention."
"It's all in the voices," Buck chuckled, standing up and stretching his long legs.
He was stacking a pile of picture books on a low table when he felt a sudden, surprisingly heavy weight slam into his right calf.
Buck looked down.
A little girl, no older than a year and a half, had her chubby arms wrapped securely around his leg. She had a mop of wild, curly brown hair, big brown eyes, and a streak of what looked suspiciously like strawberry jam smeared across her cheek.
"Da!" she announced loudly, burying her face into his jeans.
Buck froze, his heart doing a strange little flip. He slowly knelt down, bringing himself eye level with the toddler.
"Hey there," Buck said softly, his voice gentle. "I don't think I'm your dad, little one."
The girl just giggled, reaching out a sticky hand to pat Buck’s nose.
"Heidi! Oh my god, Heidi, no!"
A woman came jogging around the bookshelf, looking frantic. She was wearing a pair of faded blue scrubs, her hair thrown up in a messy, chaotic bun that was entirely losing itself. She had dark bags under her eyes that spoke of overwhelming exhaustion.
She swooped down and scooped the toddler up, balancing the girl on her hip while at the same time trying to wipe the jam off her face with a crumbled tissue.
"I am so, so sorry," the woman gasped, looking at Buck with wide, apologetic eyes. "She has absolutely zero survival instincts. I turned my back for two seconds to grab her sippy cup, and she bolted. Did she get jam on your jeans? I have a Tide pen in my bag somewhere,"
Buck let out a sudden, loud laugh. It startled him, it was the first time he had laughed out loud in months.
"It's completely fine," Buck smiled, standing back up. "Jeans can be washed. She's fast for a little thing."
The woman let out a heavy sigh, her shoulders slumping. "She’s a menace. A cute menace, but a menace. I'm Sarah."
"Evan," Buck said.
"Well, Evan, thank you for not pressing charges against my daughter for assault," Sarah deadpanned, shifting Heidi’s weight. Heidi was currently trying to chew on a strand of Sarah's hair. "And thank you for the storytime. It was the first twenty minutes of peace I've had in a week."
Buck looked at Sarah's scrubs. He recognized the specific shade of blue from his time waiting in the ER corridors. He also recognized the exhaustion radiating off her. It was the exact same exhaustion he saw in the mirror after a bad 24 hour shift.
"ER nurse?" Buck guessed.
Sarah blinked, surprised. "Yeah. How'd you know?"
"I know the thousand yard stare," Buck said gently. "Long shift?"
"Fourteen hours," Sarah groaned. "I was supposed to be off at six this morning, but we had a pile up on the 405. I picked the gremlin up from daycare, but I felt too guilty to just take her straight home and put her in front of the TV, so... the library."
Buck felt a sudden, intense wave of empathy for the woman standing in front of him. She looked like she was drowning, entirely alone, just trying to keep her head above water for the sake of the kid on her hip. He knew a thing or two about drowning.
"There's a coffee shop right across the street," Buck found himself saying, the words tumbling out before he could overthink them. "I love their black coffee, but I hear they make a terrifyingly strong double shot espresso. If you have twenty minutes before naptime, I'd be happy to buy you one. You look like you need it.”
Sarah looked at him, her eyes scanning his face. She was looking for a catch, looking for a hit on, but Buck just looked back with a soft, open expression. Two exhausted people recognizing each other in the wild.
A slow, tired smile spread across Sarah's face.
"Evan," she said, "if you buy me an espresso, I might legally have to name my next child after you."
The coffee shop was quiet. Buck grabbed a corner booth, sliding into the vinyl seat while Sarah got Heidi into a highchair, immediately offering the toddler a handful of Cheerios to keep the peace.
Buck returned with a black coffee for himself and the largest, most caffeinated iced latte the barista could legally construct for Sarah.
She took a sip and closed her eyes in pure, unfiltered bliss. "Oh, that is the nectar of the gods. You are my new favorite person."
"Glad I could help," Buck smiled, wrapping his large hands around his warm mug.
"So," Sarah said, wiping a rogue Cheerio off the table. "You do voices for toddlers, you buy exhausted mothers caffeine, and you know what an ER shift feels like. Are you secretly a superhero, or do you just have a fascinating day job?"
"I'm a firefighter," Buck said, the word feeling a little strange on his tongue after the week he'd had.
"Ah," Sarah nodded knowingly. "That explains the shoulders. LAFD?"
"Yeah. The 118."
"I've probably seen your rigs at the hospital," Sarah said. She leaned back, looking at him thoughtfully. "You know, usually when I tell a guy I'm an ER nurse with a one year old, they suddenly remember a very pressing appointment they have to run to. It's excellent birth control."
"Well, I'm not trying to date you, if that helps," Buck laughed.
Sarah pointed a finger gun at him. "Good. Because I am aggressively, undeniably gay. And entirely too tired to date anyway."
Buck relaxed completely. The final bit of tension he hadn't realized he was holding evaporated. This was safe. This was completely, utterly safe. No messy romantic entanglements, no firehouse politics, no historical trauma. Just a woman who liked caffeine and a cute kid who liked jam.
"So, where's the other half of the parenting equation?" Buck asked gently, gesturing to Heidi.
"There isn't one," Sarah said matter of factly. "I used a sperm donor. I wanted to be a mom, I didn't want to wait around to find the perfect wife to do it with, so... I did it myself. Best decision I ever made." She looked at Heidi, her eyes softening into something incredibly tender. "She's my whole world."
Buck felt a pang in his chest. It was a beautiful kind of independence, but he could see the crushing weight of it on Sarah's shoulders. To do it all entirely alone.
"It must be hard, though," Buck said quietly. "Working ER shifts and doing it all solo."
"It is," Sarah admitted, her guard dropping a little. "Daycare costs a fortune, my landlord just upped my rent, and I haven't slept a full eight hours since Obama was in office. But we make it work." She took another long drink of her coffee and looked at him. "What about you, Evan? You seem like a guy with a lot of heavy thoughts for an afternoon. Rent hike got you down too?"
Buck traced the rim of his mug. He thought about the crushing medical bills sitting on his kitchen counter at the loft. He thought about the lawyer fees Mackey was still billing him for. He thought about the rent increase his landlord had slapped on his door two days ago. He wasn’t struggling, but his budget was tight.
"Yeah," Buck breathed out, a wry smile on his face. "Medical bills and a rent hike. The Los Angeles special."
"Amen to that," Sarah chuckled darkly.
They sat there for an hour. They didn't talk about Buck's lawsuit or the blood clot. They didn't talk about the crushing silence of the 118. They talked about the ridiculous cost of living, about Heidi's absolute refusal to eat anything green, and about how difficult it was to find good Thai food in their neighborhood.
As they packed up to leave, Sarah wrestled Heidi out of the high chair. The toddler immediately reached her arms out toward Buck, making a grabbing motion with her little hands.
Buck looked at Sarah, silently asking for permission.
Sarah smiled and nodded.
Buck stepped forward and gently scooped Heidi into his arms. She was so incredibly small, her little head tucking perfectly into the crook of his neck. She smelled like baby lotion and Cheerios. She patted his shoulder twice and yawned widely.
"She likes you," Sarah said softly, watching them. "She doesn't usually take to strangers this fast."
"I'm a very likable guy," Buck joked, his voice a little thick. He carefully handed Heidi back to her mother, instantly missing the warmth.
"Hey," Sarah said as she hoisted her diaper bag over her shoulder. "If you're ever free on another Thursday, and you feel like buying a desperate woman another coffee... we'll probably be around."
Buck smiled, the corners of his eyes crinkling. "I'll hold you to that, Sarah."
Buck walked back to his Jeep in the fading afternoon sun. He had a shift tomorrow. He knew exactly what was waiting for him, the silence, the cold shoulders, the isolation. He knew Bobby would hand him a notepad, and Eddie would look through him.
But as Buck unlocked his car, he just thought the firehouse was his job. It was no longer his entire life. He had Elias and Maya in the mountains. He had Marian and Toby at the library. And now, he had a tired, brilliant nurse and a jam covered toddler who wanted him around.
The 118 could have his sweat and his labor. They could have his skills on the field.
But his heart? His heart belonged out here now.