Chapter Text
The oncology floor smelled like antiseptic and burnt coffee.
It had been a tough year.
A year ago, Buck had been diagnosed with cancer and they had done everything possible to push it into remission.
A year worth of surgeries, of chemo, of radiotherapy, of blood transfusions, multiple hospital admissions and trying to keep things stable at home.
Christopher was older, he understood that things were serious, but they did their best to shield him from the worst of it.
Theo was much younger but he’d already lost both parents and understood more than they would have liked, but still they tried their best to shield him too.
Buck had learned over the last year that every hospital had its own smell. Some were sharper with bleach, some carried stale cafeteria food through the vents, some smelled faintly metallic beneath everything else. This one always smelled tired.
Today it also smelled like tissues infused with eucalyptus because Buck had gone through nearly half a travel pack already.
“Hh… hih—”
Buck pressed two fingers under his nose, eyes watering.
“Hang on,” Eddie murmured instantly, already reaching for another tissue before the sneeze even came.
“HAH’TSCHOO! HAHH—HE’TCHIEW! HEH… HEH’ITCHOOO!”
The sneezes cracked painfully through the quiet waiting room. A few people glanced over sympathetically before looking away again. Cancer floors had an unspoken rule about privacy. You pretended not to notice anyone else’s suffering unless invited.
Buck groaned softly and accepted the tissue Eddie handed him.
“You okay?” Eddie asked.
It was automatic now. Every cough, every wince, every bad lab result, every exhausted blink over the last year had been met with that same question.
You okay?
Buck honestly didn’t know anymore.
His nose was streaming again. He pinched the tissue hard against it and blew miserably.
“Honestly,” he rasped afterward, voice ruined by congestion, “I think I’ve gone through more tissues than blood cells this year.”
Eddie huffed a weak laugh.
It wasn’t a real laugh.
Buck looked over at him properly then.
Eddie sat beside him in the too-small waiting room chair, elbows on his knees, fingers locked together so tightly the knuckles had gone white. Buck had seen him doing a couple hail Mary’s in the corner when he thought Buck wasn’t looking.
Eddie’s leg bounced relentlessly.
Bounce.
Bounce.
Bounce.
Buck had watched that leg bounce through every surgery consult. Every overnight admission. Every chemo infusion. Every moment where doctors used careful voices and avoided eye contact.
Eddie had spent an entire year trying not to fall apart.
Buck reached over quietly and rested his hand on Eddie’s knee.
The bouncing stopped instantly.
Eddie looked up. His eyes were wrecked.
God.
Buck’s chest tightened painfully.
Because Eddie had been carrying all of this too.
The diagnosis. The surgeries. The nights Buck woke up vomiting after chemo. The radiation burns. The blood transfusions. The terrifying infections. The exhaustion. The fear.
Buck squeezed Eddie’s knee gently.
“Hey,” he said softly.
Eddie swallowed hard.
“You’re sneezing your lungs out and you’re still checking on me.”
Buck managed a tiny smile.
“Well,” he said thickly, “marriage vows and all that.”
Eddie’s expression crumpled for half a second before he got it under control again.
Buck knew what Eddie was really hearing.
In sickness and in health.
The sickness part had come hard and fast.
One year ago Buck had gone in for fatigue.
That was all. Fatigue. Then bruising. Then bloodwork. Then more bloodwork. Then specialists.
Then the word cancer dropped into their lives like a bomb.
After that everything became appointments and medications and side effects and statistics.
Buck had lost weight he couldn’t afford to lose. Lost his hair. Lost weeks of memory to pain medication and exhaustion. Lost the ability to walk unassisted for a while after one surgery.
Eddie had never left.
Not once.
Buck sniffled wetly.
Immediately Eddie handed him another tissue.
“You married me for my excellent timing,” Eddie muttered.
Buck snorted softly before it dissolved abruptly into another fit.
“Hh—hih! Hih’ITSCHOO! AITCH! AITCH! AITCH! HAHH-HE’TCHIEW!”
The sneezes bent him forward hard enough that his chest hurt afterward.
“Oh, baby,” Eddie said quietly.
Buck rubbed miserably at his nose.
“Think Chris cursed me.”
“Theo definitely did,” Eddie corrected. “That kid sneezed directly into your mouth.”
“He’s five.”
“He’s contagious.”
Buck laughed weakly before coughing.
Immediately Eddie’s hand landed warm between his shoulder blades.
That too had become instinct.
Touching Buck constantly.
Checking constantly.
Making sure Buck was breathing. Making sure Buck was still here.
The nurse finally opened the door.
“Buckley-Diaz?”
Eddie stood immediately.
Buck rose slower.
His joints ached today. The cold had settled deep into his body overnight, making everything heavier.
Eddie noticed instantly.
He always noticed instantly.
“You dizzy?”
“Nah.”
Buck lied automatically.
Eddie gave him a look but slid an arm around his waist anyway as they followed the nurse down the hallway.
The oncologist’s office looked exactly the same as it had during every other appointment over the last year.
Diplomas on the wall. Muted paintings. A tiny fake succulent on the windowsill.
A room built for delivering life-changing news.
Buck sat down carefully beside Eddie.
The doctor came in a few minutes later holding a tablet and several printed lab sheets.
Dr. Morgan was kind. That almost made it worse.
Doctors who were too cheerful terrified Buck now.
Kind doctors knew how to soften bad news.
“How are you feeling today, Evan?”
Buck gave a congested shrug.
“Like Theo weaponized preschool germs against me.”
That earned a small smile from her.
“And otherwise?”
The room went quieter.
Buck glanced at Eddie briefly.
“Anxious,” he admitted.
Dr. Morgan nodded slowly.
“That’s understandable.”
She sat across from them.
Buck watched her arrange the papers.
Noticed the careful movements.
The pause.
His stomach dropped.
Eddie’s hand found his instantly.
Cold fingers. Shaking.
Dr. Morgan began reviewing the scans first.
Residual inflammation. Post-treatment recovery. Healing markers.
Numbers. Terms. Information.
Buck heard maybe half of it.
Because he was watching her face.
Waiting.
Then finally she set the papers down.
And sighed.
Very softly.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
Eddie went completely still.
Buck stopped breathing.
“The cancer markers are not where we’d like them to be.”
The room tilted.
Not dramatically.
Not like television.
Just enough that Buck suddenly felt untethered from his own body.
Dr. Morgan kept speaking gently.
“There’s enough elevation that I don’t feel comfortable calling this remission.”
Eddie made a small sound beside him.
Buck had never heard that sound before. Not from Eddie.
It sounded injured.
“We’re going to need another round of chemotherapy,” Dr. Morgan continued carefully, “and likely additional radiotherapy as well.”
No.
No no no no—
Buck stared at her blankly.
He’d done everything.
Everything.
Surgeries. Months of chemo. Radiation. Isolation. Pain. Infections. Fevers. Blood transfusions.
He’d survived all of it. They’d all survived all of it.
Christopher had survived watching his dad disappear into hospital rooms.
Theo had survived another year terrified someone he loved would die.
Eddie—
Buck looked at his husband.
Eddie’s face had gone white. Absolutely white.
One hand covered his mouth.
His eyes shone instantly with tears he was trying desperately not to let fall.
Buck’s own chest started hitching unevenly.
No.
No.
Please.
He couldn’t do it again.
Couldn’t watch Eddie break himself apart holding their family together again.
Couldn’t watch Christopher pretend not to cry.
Couldn’t hear Theo asking if Buck was going to heaven like Mommy and Daddy.
Buck suddenly couldn’t breathe through the congestion clogging his nose.
“Hh—hih…”
The hitch built sharply.
“Hih… hih’ITSCHOO! AITCHOO! HAHH… HAHHH-HE’TCHIEW!”
The violent sneezes snapped him forward.
Pain lanced through his chest.
His eyes flooded.
And suddenly he was crying. Not dramatic sobbing.
Just tears pouring silently down his face while he tried to breathe around congestion and panic and grief.
“Oh, Buck,” Eddie whispered immediately.
Eddie turned toward him fully, one arm wrapping around Buck’s shoulders instinctively.
Dr. Morgan’s voice softened further.
“I know this isn’t the news you hoped for.”
Buck bowed his head hard.
A wet cough tore out of him.
Then another sneeze.
“HE’TCHIIEEWWW!”
Eddie pulled tissues from his pocket immediately because of course he had tissues in his pocket.
Buck took them with shaking hands and blew his nose hard.
The sound seemed horribly loud in the room.
Humiliating.
Everything about cancer was humiliating eventually.
The weakness. The dependence. The loss of control.
“I thought…” Buck’s voice broke completely. “I thought we did it.”
Eddie made another wounded sound.
Dr. Morgan leaned forward slightly.
“You’ve made tremendous progress, Evan. This isn’t starting over.”
It felt like starting over.
It felt worse somehow.
Because hope had existed this morning.
Real hope.
Buck had let himself imagine telling the kids.
Imagine Eddie finally sleeping through the night again.
Imagine no more hospitals. No more chemo. No more watching Eddie stare at him like Buck might vanish if he blinked.
Eddie finally spoke.
“What are the chances?” he asked roughly.
Dr. Morgan answered carefully and clinically.
Buck barely processed it.
More treatment. Aggressive monitoring. Manageable odds. Promising indicators despite refraction.
Words. Just words.
Because all Buck could see was Eddie trying not to cry beside him.