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Eddie Diaz is sitting on his couch half-naked when he realizes that he’s in love with his best friend.
Unfortunately for him, Buck is also sitting on his couch, very much clothed and bordering on catatonic.
Familiarity had met him at the door before shame had, so Eddie hadn’t even thought about his lack of pants, first opting for Buck’s here, then Buck's upset, and finally, Buck has beer. Pants don’t cross his mind until they’re beside each other on the couch and he feels the fabric brush against his bare skin. It should be fine because it’s Buck, but then Eddie can feel how hot his skin is getting and has to turn away to take a drink. From showing up at the door to opening his second bottle of beer, Buck doesn’t even flinch— not a single hint of a glance down to Eddie’s bare legs, which he only takes mild offense to. They’re nice legs, he thinks, but probably still half the size of Buck’s. Indulging himself with admiring them in the locker room from time to time is just one of those things he doesn’t think too hard about. It’s normal to be fond of your best friend, really, and Buck just has the kind of legs Eddie is fond of.
By the time Eddie stops himself from fantasizing about their roles being reversed, Old Time Rock And Roll playing behind them is beginning to border on uncanny. Buck is still staring continuously into nothing, looking vaguely afraid.
“Am I allowed to ask? Or are we quiet for the night?”
Buck remains unresponsive for a few more seconds and Eddie can see a muscle tick twice in his jaw. “Quiet, for now.”
Eddie just nods and knocks back his beer again. He can offer Buck quiet in the rare times he asks for it, because he knows Buck only asks when he needs it. That, and Buck is going to tell him once he reaches the bottom of the bottle anyway. But the song cuts and Eddie hasn't queued anything to play next, and there are a few deafening moments of silence before autoplay is blaring How Sweet It Is by James Taylor, which just makes this all feel downright ridiculous. He maintains his composure and stands to shut it off.
With his back to the couch, he hears Buck say, “You know, I thought you were a boxers kind of guy.”
Eddie cuts the music and turns on his heels. “Boxer briefs, actually. And I thought you were going to keep your mouth shut.” Buck laughs weakly, but not nearly enough to cover the despair. Eddie sighs and falls back onto the couch. “You don’t have to tell me what’s going on, but you can crash here for the night if you want. You look… tired.”
Buck swallows roughly and nods at the bottle in his hands. “Yeah, I am. Do you think…” he trails off and lets his head slump back onto the couch, staring at the ceiling. “Do you ever feel like you’re going in circles? You think you learn a lesson then a new one shows up and you have to start all over.”
Suddenly significantly more conscious of his state of undress, Eddie feebly covers his lap with an accent pillow. “Yeah, most of the time.”
They lapse back into silence for a few long minutes. Eddie considers excusing himself to grab pants, then wonders if he’s past the threshold of when it would have been normal to do it. He’s entirely fucked, probably, because he can’t even figure out why he’s thinking about it this hard while Buck still isn’t looking in his direction.
“Tommy broke up with me,” he finally admits, voice quiet as if he doesn’t actually want Eddie to hear. “I asked him to move in and he dumped me.”
The information hits him like a brick to the chest. Buck asked Tommy to move in. Tommy broke up with him. Tommy broke up with him? For his part, Eddie is more or less indifferent to him. The guy doesn’t have enough substance to be consequential in his life, and he never could wrap his head around Buck being with him. Sure, Eddie has some things in common with him, but Buck couldn’t be more different. He has all of the good parts that Tommy doesn’t. And there’s always been something unsettling in the way Hen and Chim exchange looks in his presence, something Eddie has always wanted to press about, but had gotten subsequently involved in trying to sort his own shit out first and never got the chance.
“You asked him to move in?” He asks, trying to find safe ground to stand.
Buck scoffs. “Yeah, but apparently he went into this knowing it was temporary. He told me he knows how it ends and that I would just break his heart one day. Just didn’t bother to clue me in until now.”
Eddie just nods tersely, a veiled attempt to hide his flare of anger. He can’t say he didn’t also know it was temporary, but Tommy was the one to make the commitment, the one to get access to the brunt of Buck’s feelings only to leave them lying on the floor. Then Buck is already opening another bottle of beer, which means he doesn’t really want to talk about it yet, just wants it to be known. He throws it back with his eyebrows pulled tight. Eddie wants to put his thumb there and press until he smooths out the tension.
“Sounds like you should stop asking people to move in with you,” he says instead. “Feels like a bad track record.”
Buck whines and slumps further into the couch. “A fucking curse. My relationships always end after I ask someone to move in with me.”
“There’s no curse , Buck,” Eddie reasons with a sigh. “You’re just asking the wrong people.”
“At this point, either there’s a curse or I’m the wrong person.”
Eddie’s ribcage constricts around his heart. He wants to reach out to pull Buck into him, to remind him that he’s the right person for the people that matter, but remembers he’s half-naked when he shifts and crosses his arms to keep to himself. “You’re not going to be wrong for the right person. And Tommy definitely wasn’t right for you.”
“How can you be so sure that there is a right person, though?” Buck insists, finally turning to him with wet eyes. “What if some people just… don’t get to have that?”
If he thinks about it, Eddie doesn’t actually know why he’s so sure. Maybe just because it’s Buck, and Buck is too easy to love to not be with someone who appreciates that. Or because Buck is still staring at him with those eyes, making him hallucinate siren songs bringing them closer together, lips the same shade of soft red as his birthmark and gently parted. He thinks of Father Brian telling him to stop denying himself joy, then how joy kind of looks like the way Buck smiles at him when he teases, sideways and languid. His stomach sinks.
Buck’s eyes are heavy when Eddie meets them again. Eddie almost wants to test it out, to ask Buck how he knew what it felt like to want to kiss a boy. Buck would be willing to kiss him, he thinks, because Buck is always trying to help. But he’s here with a problem, and Eddie was flailing on his couch in glee while Buck was having the worst night possible, so there’s a better time and place to ask for more than he’s rightly allowed.
“Because it’s you,” Eddie finally offers. “Because you deserve to be with someone that loves you as much as I do.”
Before it’s past his lips, he doesn't realize that it’s a confession. It registers to him as a given, a simple truth of who they are, because of course Eddie loves him. Buck is his best friend. Buck is his partner at work and the closest thing his kid has to a second parent, of course Eddie has to call it love. But Buck turns back to him with sparkling eyes and Eddie can feel it, more than anything he’s let himself feel before: he wants Buck. He loves Buck, in a way he'd always thought was reserved for people that aren't the broken thing that Eddie is– in a way he probably shouldn’t.
“You’ll find it,” Eddie insists, suddenly overwhelmed by the fear that he’ll give himself away if he toes the line. “But you’re going to be fine until you do.”
Buck nods like it's insufficient, and Eddie knows it is, but he can’t seem to think of any other platitudes while his chest is caving in on itself. Instead he stands, abandoning the pillow on the couch and clearing his throat, ready to flee the feelings starting to metastasize there. “Do you want me to get your blanket for you?”
Buck raises an eyebrow at him. “My blanket?”
“The blue one in the hall closet,” he clarifies nervously. “Chris and I always call it yours. You should stay here tonight.” He leaves so you don’t have to be alone unspoken, not wanting to push farther than Buck is willing to give yet, but the spark in Buck’s eyes tells him that they both know what he means to say.
“Oh,” Buck whispers, blinking rapidly. “Then, yeah, sure. Uh, thanks.”
Eddie turns to retrieve it quickly enough to hide the fond smile that overtakes him. The way Buck stumbles over his words when he’s flustered is cute. That’s the word that had been evading him this whole time: Buck is cute. Then he has to take a moment to lean against the wall in the hallway, just past where Buck can see him, and press a hand to his chest to keep his heart from leaping out of it. He briefly thinks he’s going to have a panic attack, a little disappointed in himself for crashing out after so long. But then he’s not thinking of Ana this time– he’s thinking of Buck. Buck’s sideways smile comes back to him like a ringing in his ears, blacking out all of his other senses. Everything is quiet besides the ringing and a smaller voice, a little further back in his mind, saying it’s Buck.
The only person that brings Eddie as much joy as being around Christopher. The only person that brings just as much comfort and passion. The only other person that can make Eddie feel like he’s home just by sitting on the couch. Louder, the voice reminds him it’s Buck. It’s been Buck the whole time.
He tries pulling back the frame in his mind back and realizes how much of that joy he’s seen in this very house, with Buck and his son. Their son, because Buck is the only person Eddie has ever been able to ask the world of, and he’d given his heart to him in return. It had just come in the shape of a few lines added to his will. It’s been Buck since Eddie made it out of that well. Probably before, if he had time to think about it right now.
He grabs the blanket from the closet and returns to Buck before he’s able to let himself go down the spiral he’s headed down. Coming to terms with his feelings is the very last thing that he should be doing while Buck is waiting on his couch, brokenhearted and jaded. Instead he throws the blanket over Buck’s lap and takes another bottle from the pack of beer abandoned on the coffee table, pointedly not looking at him in the process. Buck may be going through his own battles, but Eddie’s not naive enough to think he wouldn’t still call out any accidental slip.
“Shouldn’t you be the one with the modesty blanket?” Buck jokes half-heartedly as Eddie reclaims his spot on the couch. Eddie turns to him, confused, only to feel the air against his bare legs again as he moves. His face gets furiously hot.
Because the normal thing for him to do while getting the blanket would have been to grab the first pair of sweats he could find on the floor of his bedroom, but he’d been busy trying to pull himself back from a ledge.
“Can’t a guy Winnie-the-Pooh it in his own home anymore?” Eddie grumbles down to his bottle, thinly concealing his embarrassment.
“Are you trying to pretend that you weren’t doing Risky Business when I showed up? Because I saw you through the window,” Buck challenges, spirit beginning to return to his eyes. As humiliating as that information is, Eddie would let Buck poke fun at him as long as he needed just to earn the way Buck’s voice starts to lilt with ease.
“No, just surprised you’ve seen that movie,” Eddie replies with a shrug. “I was definitely doing Risky Business.”
Buck’s smile goes from teasing to something more like tenderness, soft and warm at the edges where he’d just been strained. “Of course I’ve seen it. I had the biggest crush on Tom Cruise when I was younger.”
“Me too,” Eddie agrees easily, bringing the bottle back to his lips. There are a few extended beats of silence before he realizes what he’s admitted, another truth he hadn’t understood to be a confession until he found his voice. He nearly chokes on his beer as he turns to Buck, who’s studying him already, wide-eyed and expectant.
“Uh, Eddie–”
“Well, you should probably be getting to bed,” he rushes out, jumping to his feet and abandoning his drink next to Buck’s. “You had a rough day. You can catch me up on the details in the morning.”
“Eddie –”
“— And I should really put some pants on, actually—”
“To sleep?”
At this, Eddie finally risks a look back. Buck’s offering him an olive branch, a silent agreement to not talk about it, a way to return the favor for Eddie not making him talk about Tommy.
“I sleep shirtless, not pantless,” he offers. Buck shakes his head with a smirk, finally letting his eyes wander down to Eddie’s bare legs, slowly enough to be deliberate. Almost as if he’s imagining it for himself. Eddie instinctually adjusts his posture and clears the lump wedged in his throat.
“Thanks for letting me stay here,” Buck says, voice and eyes softer when they return to Eddie. “I just needed to… I don’t know, not be at my place, I guess.”
Eddie gives a curt nod. “Anytime. Goodnight, Buck.”
He speeds back to his bedroom before Buck can respond; before his own brain can start blurting out unhelpful things, like stay here as long as you want to, or, this is your home, you have a right to be here. There’s too much going on up there to trust himself with a dignified response. Pressing his back flat against his door, he looks to the sky and makes a list of… well, something .
One, Eddie’s been instructed via a vessel of God to chase joy. Two, joy had been the feeling he’d opened the door to that night, in the shape of a brooding and beautiful boy. Three, he apparently finds Buck beautiful, which explains as much as it complicates. Four, he thinks a boy is beautiful. He may have even thought boys are beautiful for a very long time because, five, Tom Cruise, and probably his lack of hesitation to admit to a crush he’s only just realizing was a crush.
Five would be plenty, but his train of thought pushes right through the blockade to add the fact that Buck had— very brazenly— checked him out. That wasn’t a figment of Eddie’s Risky Business -induced high from before.
Eddie’s mind wanders to an image of Buck’s hands, wrapped around a bottle of beer, sat beside him on the couch. Those hands reaching over and being on his skin. He’s felt them before, in quick passes at work and stolen moments of affection, but he’s never felt them skirting over the expanses of his body that he knows would feel good. He imagines callouses from rough work and personal clumsiness brushing over the bare skin of his legs, his stomach, his hips. The darkness of his bedroom starts to look like Buck’s body pressed against his, panting and sweaty, impossibly close in a way they’ve never been before. The ghost of Buck’s lips passes over his neck and sends chills down his spine.
The heat starting to build in his stomach is the final nail in the coffin. Six: Eddie really, really, wants to fuck him, probably as much as he wants to take him on a date. He renames the list in his head Reasons I’m probably gay and in love with Buck and throws himself into bed, trying against reason to stop thinking altogether.
-//-
After a restless sleep with what he can only call a very enlightening dream involving Buck and a few damning google searches, Eddie is resolved to stay in bed and stare at the ceiling until his stomach unknots itself. He considers calling Hen, but figures he’d only sound like a stumbling idiot in front of the smartest person he knows, and decides he’ll circle back to the idea when he knows what to say. His brain is still too busy trying to sort the events of yesterday. Somewhere between all of the tossing and turning, he’d managed to readjust the list he’d started with. It now only reads:
List of things that are true:
- I'm gay.
- I'm in love with Buck.
- I have to do something about this.
The nagging thought he’s left with after an hour of sitting still in the silence is that he needs to call his son. Christopher is still hardly speaking to him from states away, but Eddie thinks that he needs to tell him, that he owes it after everything. For better or worse, Chris has seen every part of him still in progress, and this is one that’s been in progress over thirty years. Keeping this a secret from him feels akin to lying. Especially because it’s Buck, and he’d be naive to think he won’t be pushing his luck by asking his son to trust him not to fuck this up. So he collects himself enough to reach for his phone and send a text.
Are your grandparents around? I have something I want to talk to you about if they’re not.
Before he gets a response, a loud crash of metal in his kitchen startles him upright. He pulls on enough clothing to be decent this time around and races to find Buck crouched on the floor in the kitchen, wincing as he cleans scattered flour.
“Morning, sunshine,” Eddie grumbles, sleep cracking his voice despite evading him for most of the night. Buck looks up, frantic, then sighs and returns his attention to the mess.
“Was trying to clean up the dishes from the pancakes,” he mumbles. “Sorry if I woke you up.”
Eddie raises an eyebrow and points to the counter. “In a baking pan?”
Buck rises to his feet, a pretty blush painting his cheeks. “Baked pancakes. I saw a recipe.”
With a little more shuffling and an embarrassed grimace on his face, Buck finishes the cleanup while Eddie watches from the edge of the kitchen. He lets his gaze linger over the curves of Buck’s massive arms, the little bit of his shirt that rides up in the back and exposes skin every time he bends over, the muscles in his neck that shift when he risks a glance in Eddie’s direction. Maybe chasing joy can involve following the light trail of hair down the soft plush of Buck’s stomach and seeing where it leads. His mind only begins to wander further when Buck eventually straightens, throwing a dish towel over his shoulder and clapping the remaining flour from his palms. Hands big and strong enough to take Eddie however he wants to.
When Buck finally locks eyes with him, Eddie’s face burns hot enough to be uncomfortable, which is only a fraction of the punishment he deserves for his thoughts while Buck was unwitting and innocuously cleaning the kitchen. Eddie readjusts his posture and hikes his eyebrows to ask Buck to lead the conversation. If he tries saying anything right now, he’s worried he may admit to something about Buck and that same blue apron making an appearance in his dreams last night.
“So,” Buck starts carefully, leaning back against the counter with hands splayed out flat. “I was thinking about what you said last night.”
Fuck. Eddie is fucked. Buck gave him the night to be gracious about it and now he wants to call Eddie out. Maybe he’ll go for someone that loves you as much as I do or me too, but it only makes Eddie more nauseous to think there’s more than one option in the mix. He makes his way to the coffee maker to have something to do with his hands other than wringing them together with nerves, only to find Buck has already made his cup for him.
“You’re going to have to be more specific,” he mumbles into his mug miserably and takes a sip. He’s met with just the right amount of cream and sugar to make his heart sink into his stomach, another reminder of the ease Buck fits into his life with.
“You said Tommy definitely wasn’t right for me,” Buck clarifies, shifting his weight back and forth anxiously. “Which– don’t get me wrong, you’re my best friend and I trust you to know, but— I mean, how are you so sure? I thought you liked him.”
Shame fills Eddie as he stares into his now half-empty coffee cup, trying to process and answer the question without sounding petty or jealous, a consideration he’d never taken with his words toward Buck until about twelve hours ago. “I mean, we were alright. He was fine until the two of you started dating.” He puts a hand up in an attempt to pause the hurt he can see taking over Buck’s face. “Which isn’t your fault. Hanging out with him before was whatever, but then you started dating and I just couldn’t help but see all of the ways he made you feel small. All of the ways he shut you down or brushed you off.”
Buck retreats into himself, shoulders slumped and shrugging. “I mean, I can’t fault him for that, really. We both know I can be a lot.”
“It doesn’t matter, Buck,” Eddie groans. He puts his mug on the counter and squares his shoulders forward, shrugging off the pretense. “Tommy didn’t appreciate what he had. He didn’t appreciate you. He didn’t even have the decency to tell you it wasn’t serious until six months in. You can’t be with another person that’s going to leave you hanging because it’s more comfortable for them to let you believe in something they aren’t going to give you.”
It borders on harsh, if the way Buck reels back into the counter is anything to go by. But then Buck is nodding in resignation and the corner of his lip tugs upward, and Eddie releases a breath.
“Well, I’m glad to know how you really feel,” he finally says with half a laugh. “I guess I can’t break the cycle with the person that started the cycle.”
Eddie scoffs, light air starting to refill his lungs. He pulls plates from the cabinet and passes them to Buck. “I think Abby started that cycle, actually.”
Buck shakes his head with amusement, but he avoids Eddie’s eyes when he answers, busying himself with cutting into the thing he’d claimed to be a pancake. “Yeah, well, maybe she did it to me because Tommy did it to her. Apparently they were engaged before I ever met her.”
It’s only by the grace of God that Eddie has the wherewithal to let the plates clatter gently onto the counter before he drops them on the ground. “Excuse me?”
“Told me during our anniversary dinner,” Buck laments, still looking away. “They were engaged, he’s gay, didn’t work out. It… rocked me a little.”
Eddie collapses into the first chair he can reach and pretends to watch Buck’s plating ritual to steal time to think. Given Buck’s luck, Eddie shouldn’t be surprised that he’d managed to have his two most life-altering relationships with each half of an already failed one. But the information only makes him want to shake Buck by his shoulders or pull him into a hug or both, and either route would only give away what Eddie has been thinking about since last night. The silence as he watches Buck finish plating their breakfast grows unfamiliarly tense.
He tries carefully as Buck settles a plate in front of him, “You found out he was engaged to Abby and you asked him to move in with you?”
Buck puts his own plate down opposite to his and raises his hands in surrender. “I get it, no more asking people to move in with me. We’ll be lucky if I see a relationship last long enough to get there again.” Tension pulls his shoulders forward as he sits and begins poking at his food without eating.
“Don’t underestimate yourself, Buck. You move quickly,” Eddie jokes, trying to pull a smile back out of him.
Rather than a smile, Buck looks at him like a kicked puppy. “This is kind of my fault, isn’t it?”
“No, it isn’t,” Eddie insists with a sigh, sitting up straighter and pointing a finger at him to push his point. “I told you, he should have respected you enough to tell you what your relationship was from the start. But you also can’t fix a broken relationship by asking someone to move in with you.” He pauses and smiles tentatively. “Just want to know that you know that.”
Buck finally caves and lets a smirk pull at the corner of his lips. “Yeah, yeah. I’m cursed. Never again.” He lifts a forkful of pancakes into the air, stopping Eddie’s protests before he can make them. “Hey, are you busy tonight?”
“You’re not going to ask me to move in, are you?” Eddie lulls, cheeks full of food. It earns a real laugh out of Buck, so he can’t find the energy to be sheepish about his lack of table manners.
“Nah. Tommy got me Lakers tickets for our anniversary.”
Eddie puts his fork down. “Buck, you hate basketball. That’s a terrible gift.”
“Which proves your point about him, I know,” Buck sighs petulantly. “But you don’t hate basketball, and he did technically tell me I could take you. Want to come with me?”
It could be a date. It’s not a date, because Buck has just gotten dumped and Eddie has only known how stupidly in love he is for a matter of hours, but it could be, if the circumstances were different. Eddie could tell him how beautiful he looks and hold his hand and show him off to the world. It surprises him a little to want to do that after keeping his sexuality locked in a broom closet of his subconscious until even he had forgotten about it, but looking into the twinkle in Buck’s eyes makes him want to scream it from the rooftops.
Eddie nods his head slowly in feigned consideration, trying to keep himself from coming off overly eager. “I don’t know, I didn’t have a lot of fun the last time we were at a basketball game together.”
“I promise to stay off the court for the rest of my life,” Buck bargains with a guilty giggle and a hand over his heart. It’s an oath Eddie would never ask him to make, even after his trip to the hospital over it, because there’s a part of him that still wants to get Buck back out there; to play a game just the two of them in return for his pain, no front to knock Eddie off his feet. But Buck is already holding out his pinky expectantly, a promise to be made as an unnecessary olive branch, and Eddie is willing to give in to whatever those pleading eyes ask of him. They can just find a less dangerous sport to take up together.
“Good enough for me,” He concedes, linking their pinkies together across the counter. The minimal brush of his skin against Buck’s is enough to send chills up his spine and heat to his face, making him pull away like he’s been burned. Buck doesn’t say anything if he notices, only shakes his head fondly and finally digs into his breakfast.
They allow each other to finish eating in comfortable silence, but Eddie’s chest aches the whole time. Getting used to the domesticity of this would be too easy. Seeing Buck across from him at the table feels right, fits the picture far more naturally than anyone else he’s tried to fill the space with. Maybe he’d missed the part where Buck settled into that space and pushed every other partner of his away, albeit subconsciously. Or maybe he’d seen it and ran flailing in the other direction. It’s a bad habit of his.
Still, Buck stands with a quiet smile on his face to clear the table. He starts telling Eddie about the new doorman in his building and helps himself to cleaning the dishes. Eddie stands, in a daze, and keeps his eyes locked in as he takes the towel from Buck’s shoulder to dry the plates. Every word Buck says goes in one ear and out of the other, but Eddie watches him with a smile anyway, knowing he’ll hear again later. Despite knowing the danger, Eddie lets himself pretend for a moment, imagining that this is every morning. That he’d be lucky enough to see Buck beside him every morning, doing something so simple as rambling on over the water while they take turns washing and drying the dishes, strikes him as a daydream.
When Buck reaches the end of his story, Eddie has to divert just to pretend to have been listening at all. “Are you going back to your place before the game?”
Buck nods and makes his way over to the shoes he’d left strewn in the living room. “I was thinking about clearing my apartment of the shit Tommy left behind.”
“I’m impressed, you were despondent last night.” Eddie commends. He follows Buck as far as the entryway just to lean against it and allow himself to look.
“I think I’m just rattled about how sudden it was, at least for me,” he admits in a quiet voice. “He said that he was my first, not my last. Like we never had a chance to last just because he was my first boyfriend.” His eyes stay glued to his shoes as he slowly starts lacing them, intentionally avoiding the annoyed look Eddie knows he must be wearing.
“That’s such bullshit, Buck,” he complains anyway. “That’s just something you say when you don’t want to be the bad guy while you’re dumping someone.”
“Maybe.” Buck agrees with a shrug, looking up but somewhere past him. “But I don’t think he was wrong. I didn’t love him, Eddie. I knew that before I even asked him to move in. Now I’ll never know if I could have. It just feels like a rug was pulled out from under me.”
“You can’t force yourself to love someone, trust me. That’s what I’ve done in every relationship I’ve been in.” Eddie sighs and moves to his side of the room, perching himself on the arm of the couch. “But you’re Buck. You’ve got too much love in you to waste it on someone you don’t really want to give it to.”
Buck finally looks up at him, cheeks flushed pink and an incredulous grin on his lips. “If you start using that kind of stuff with Chris, he’ll be back in no time.”
“To tell me I’m corny, maybe,” Eddie snorts, looking down at his hands. Buck just shakes his head and laughs, but he uses an arm to rib Eddie in a clear don’t be so hard on yourself. After spending the better part of the last twelve hours going through a latent sexuality crisis while Buck was busy going through a breakup, he wants to at least give Buck something close to the truth before he leaves.
“I think I’m going to try to call him this afternoon,” Eddie informs him, rising to his feet only to nervously position himself by the door. “Then maybe watch Top Gun, depending on how that goes.”
Clearly suppressing a comment about Top Gun and a laugh, Buck beams as he nods at him. “Game’s at eight, how about I pick you up at seven?” He stands and pulls his coat back on, broad shoulders and long arms stretched out only for Eddie to try not to look at. “I know you won’t want to drive, princess.”
Eddie gawks at him and says a silent, desperate prayer that Buck misses the way he sucks in a breath. “Princess?” Heat rushes to his head, then into his lungs, then down to his dick, and he thinks Buck may be a little evil after all. That’s the only explanation for Eddie’s knees beginning to turn to jelly over a single word.
“Come on, Eddie, you’re a total passenger princess,” Buck reasons, taunting him with a smirk and crossing the space left between them, almost close enough for Eddie to reach out. “I’ve seen you in the passenger seat of my car five times as much as I’ve seen you in the driver’s seat of yours.”
Eddie swings the door open and starts bodily shoving Buck out of it before he loses his composure and climbs the man like a tree. Or— worse— Buck realizes just how much Eddie enjoys being called princess. He doesn’t even want to realize it for himself. “Shut up and get out of my house, I have grown man things to do.”
“Uh huh. Whatever happens with you and Tom Cruise is between the two of you.” Buck is grinning at his own joke the entire way to his car and waves back as he starts to climb in. “I’ll be back later, princess!” He calls out over the expanse of the driveway, blowing a teasing kiss and leaving Eddie embarrassed and flushed pink in clear sight of at least two neighbors.
-//-
By the time Chris responds to his text, Eddie has had time to clean the kitchen and living room, successfully driving out any hint of Buck that might make him start thinking in circles of domesticity again. If there’s still a lingering hint of his cologne seeped into the cushions of the couch, Eddie doesn’t mind enough to fight it.
Then Chris finally replies to him with two words: Call now.
Eddie practically sprints to the kitchen to retrieve his tablet and make it back to the couch with no time to waste, more than a little pleased with himself for getting Chris to ask for a call. The proposition had sounded serious enough to pull attention, he knows, but a win is a win in his book.
Christopher’s face is pulled into a frown when the video feed finally connects a minute later. “Is everything okay?”
“Yeah, bud,” Eddie reassures him with a light voice. “It’s about me, actually. I have something to share and I thought you should be the first to know.”
“That’s a first,” Chris grumbles into the neckline of his sweater, quietly enough that Eddie knows it wasn’t meant for him to hear, but it sends a pang of guilt bolting through his chest anyway.
“I know I haven’t been the best at telling you what’s going on with me in the past,” he admits carefully. “But I want that to change. Starting now, with this. I want you to know that you can trust me to talk to you.”
Chris says nothing for a few long moments, just nods and avoids looking at his screen, head hung in the same angle Eddie has gotten used to seeing him from since he’d left. Silence stretches long enough for Eddie to consider backtracking and telling him they can talk about it another time, but Chris looks up at him finally with resolution in his eyes.
“Then talk to me,” he says. “This is important, right?”
Eddie nods and swallows thickly against the nerves building in his throat. From the few panicked cursory searches he’d made online in the dead of the night, he already expected that coming out would be stressful no matter how supportive he knew everyone would be. Chris would possibly be the hardest, because Eddie had already wrecked his life with the grace of a bull in a china shop, and layering a gay awakening on top of that might only make things more complicated for them. He’s shocked to find that it still feels like drowning a little bit– like the feeling of wet earth collapsing over him again.
“Okay, you’re starting to freak me out with all of the squirming,” Chris calls, breaking him from his trance. It’s obvious that he’s trying to come off as annoyed with the way he crosses his arms over his chest and slumps into his chair, a mannerism eerily reminiscent of Buck, but Eddie can still see the worried tug at his mouth, urging him to get over himself and take the bull by the horns.
“Sorry,” he breathes awkwardly. “It’s just that this might change the way you see me, Chris. And it’s my first time saying it out loud.”
“Well abuelita will be back from the store soon, so if you don’t want her to hear you—”
“I’m gay,” Eddie blurts, the thought of his mother walking in striking the fear of God into his heart.
“You’re gay,” Chris repeats, like he’s making sure he’s heard right. Eddie nods and he sighs. “You’re not dating Buck, are you? Or that guy he’s dating?”
Eddie winces, both at the disappointment in his voice while asking about Buck and the implication that he’d ever entertain Tommy Kinard. “Buck and Tommy broke up, actually. But, no, I’m not dating Buck. Is that… I mean, would it be a problem if I wanted to?”
Chris has the nerve to laugh. “I fucking knew it.”
“Language, mijo.”
“Sorry.” Chris composes himself and sits back up, looking at Eddie with brighter eyes than he’s seen since the summer. “It makes sense that it’s him. He makes you happy, dad. I was just gonna be mad if you started dating him without telling me. It’s Buck, you know? You’re both important to me.”
Eddie’s chest clenches painfully. It’s the first sign of affection he’s gotten in months, no matter how small, and it takes a tremendous amount of effort not to burst into tears about it. “Of course. That’s why I wanted to tell you first.”
Chris nods and rubs a hand over his chin thoughtfully. Eddie’s taken aback, recognizing the nervous tick from himself, one that Buck has pointed out to him more than once. He wonders if Chris is even aware that they’re mirroring one another; he wonders how Chris would take that comparison.
“Okay, I think I can have my stuff packed by Thursday,” Chris finally says, looking around his room resolutely. “We should probably fly, though. There’s a new episode of Hotshots on Friday and I’m pretty sure they’re going to wake Captain Banner from his coma. I have to be home in time to watch it live.”
Eddie blinks, every muscle in his body freezing. “You want to come home?”
“I never wanted to stay here!” Chris groans, throwing his head back. “I was just mad you couldn’t tell me the truth. Now you’re my dad and you’re telling me you’re gay and I have to come home to, like, support you and stuff.” He stops, narrowing his eyes at Eddie. “Shouldn’t you be looking for plane tickets? The show airs an hour earlier in your time zone. We can’t wait until Friday.”
Eddie laughs with wet eyes and throws his hands up in surrender. “Okay, I’m looking at plane tickets.” He pulls his phone from his pocket with shaky hands, overwhelmed with relief. “Are you sure you want to wait until the end of the week? I can take off work tomorrow and come get you tonight.”
Chris shakes his head. “I want to say bye to my friends here first anyway. And you’re going to the Lakers game tonight,” he adds with a teasing voice, wiggling his eyebrows at Eddie.
“It’s not a date, Chris,” Eddie defends uselessly, immediately embarrassed at being defensive. “And when did Buck even tell you that? I just agreed to go this morning.”
“And he told me this morning. He promised to get us both those foam fingers to sword fight with,” Chris says with a shrug. “I think he misses me too.”
“Of course he does,” Eddie agrees fondly. “He’d want to come get you tonight, too.”
“Don’t tell him!” Chris yells suddenly, sitting bolt upright. “I want to surprise him when I get back.”
Eddie raises an eyebrow. “I have to sit through this whole game and our shift tomorrow without telling him you’re coming home?”
“You owe me,” Chris tells him with a wide grin and a sing-songy voice. Eddie’s chest expands with warmth and pushes a barking laugh out of him.
“Alright, that’s fair. I’ll see you on Thursday morning.”
Chris slumps back in his chair again and grumbles. “Morning?”
-//-
By what he can only call a miracle, Eddie is able to contain his excitement about Christopher’s return relatively well. Buck only gets mildly suspicious at Eddie’s incessant smiling while the Lakers were actively losing, but accepts it without question when Eddie says he’s just happy to be there. Hen and Bobby both give him curious looks when he walks into work whistling as Buck is breaking the news about getting dumped, which is only a small fraction of the reason for his high spirits, but he doesn’t bother to justify himself either way. Christopher is coming home and nothing in the world could distract him from that.
Getting through the plane ride to El Paso turns out to be the most difficult part. Nerves keep his legs bouncing and fingers wringing together the entire flight, only heightened as he touches down and tells Chris which gate to meet him at. Every reservation Eddie has about seeing his son again vanishes as he exits the terminal to see Chris standing by the benches, holding a small sign with DAD written in bold blues and greens. It melts him enough to risk a tight hug, only for him to fully lose composure when Chris returns it, arms wrapping fully around his shoulders. Eddie bursts into tears in the middle of the airport.
They’re lucky enough to only sit through one meal with Eddie’s parents before their return flight to Los Angeles. Eddie pretends not to notice the cold tone his mother takes in trying to tell him what’s happening with his son, every new update she’d conveniently not given him during Christopher’s stay. He catches the way his dad winces when Chris interrupts them mid-meal to remind them how excited he is to be going home. He’s fine with his parents, he guesses, and appreciates what they’re willing to do for Chris. But he can’t help feeling triumphant at the reminder that Christopher will always be his son and not theirs– that they won’t get their way, even after Eddie’s made his own mistakes. Because despite it all, Chris is coming home to him with a smile on his face.
Thursday night is split between unpacking Christopher’s things and four cartons of Chinese food. Eddie spends the majority of that time listening happily as Chris fills him in on every new friend he’d made and every bit of interpersonal teenage drama he didn’t get to pass on. He lets Chris talk for as long as he wants to, reveling in the sound of hearing so much of his voice again.
They manage to make it to dinner before Chris is asking questions about Buck. To Eddie’s faint surprise, Chris isn’t phased by his coming out at all, and instead intends to use it to his full advantage listing every reason he believes Buck should move in with them. The chief reason ends up being that he practically lives there already, but Chris is sure to emphasize his point that it would be stupid for Buck not to live here if he and Eddie are to date, because he’s sure there’s no way they’re getting rid of Buck once they have him. He goes as far as to use the word codependent, which only leaves Eddie reeling about where he’d learned to employ that one.
As full as Eddie’s heart feels when he bids Christopher goodnight, tucked into his own bed for the first time in months, he feels a sudden absence as he makes his way back to the living room and finds an empty couch. In what he can only call a moment of weakness, he takes Buck’s blanket from the hallway closet and wraps himself in it. He falls asleep on the couch, thinking about how Buck smells of cedarwood and flowers.
When he wakes, Chris is perched on the coffee table, watching him with his nose scrunched in distaste.
“Can you go tell Buck today?” He asks. “Taking his spot on the couch is all the pining I can take. This is sad.”
Chris coaches him the entire time he’s getting ready, suggesting pickup lines only slightly less terrible than Eddie’s own and reassuring him that he won’t be miserably rejected. He’s much more confident than Eddie, who— despite knowing somewhere in the back of his mind that they’re the only answer for each other— worries that Buck might still say no. That Buck is less than a week removed from a breakup, that there’s no space left for Eddie to ask for what he wants. But he figures he’s been telling Buck that he loves him this whole time, in whatever ways he could without saying it out loud, and he can’t keep it to himself now that he understands what to call it. Because Buck is loved and he deserves to know it.
The ride to Buck’s loft doesn’t turn out to be enough time for him to finalize a script. Despite seeing him days ago, Eddie gets overwhelmed thinking of all of the things he needs to tell him. Logically, he knows that he should start by telling Buck that he’s gay, but he has trouble finding the words when he thinks about explaining why he’d been such a terrible partner to all of his past girlfriends. He probably shouldn’t lead a confession of his undying love by laying out every relationship he’d failed. Starting with the priest may be easier, if he can tell that story in a way that doesn’t sound like he’s gone evangelical.
Of the million things running through his mind that he could choose to say when he makes it upstairs and Buck opens the door, he lands on, “Move in with me.”
Buck pulls a face, confused and maybe a little worried, but not opposed. “Uh, what?”
He’s wearing a damned apron again, a deeper blue than the one he keeps at Eddie’s house, covered in an excess of flour to match the smudge on his cheek. The familiar scent of baked apples and cinnamon wafts out into the hallway, barely stronger than Buck’s woody cologne. Between the apron and the smell and the sunlight creeping through the windows to illuminate Buck’s hair in a halo of curls, Eddie has to sink his teeth into his bottom lip to keep from reaching out and kissing him right here.
He pushes past Buck to stand in the kitchen, grabbing a beer from the fridge out of reflex as he passes. He sits it on the island counter, untouched and dripping, and tries to think of how the hell to follow that up. Chris had gotten into his head with all of the talk about moving. Buck makes his way into the room with an amused grin and his head cocked to the side, silently pressing him to go on. Eddie wraps his hand around the bottle just to have something to hold.
“Okay, let me start from the beginning,” he tries, holding eye contact to let Buck know he’s serious. “I had a talk with a priest because I bought water instead of juice, and—”
“You’ve lost me already,” Buck interrupts, holding a palm up.
“The juice is my joy, Buck, just let me tell my story.”
He raises his arms in confused and tentative concession. “Okay, but circle back. I’m not following the metaphor.”
Eddie waves him off with a hand. “Anyway, I told him about how I grew the mustache because the LAFD doesn't allow beards. Turns out I had one the whole time, she just kind of died.”
Buck opens and closes his mouth a few times, stuttering out unintelligible mutters and blinking rapidly. A reasonable reaction to the absolute nonsense Eddie had come up with, to be fair, but Eddie almost starts talking again just to fill the silence with something other than nerves. Buck simply raises a hand to stop him before he can get a full sound out, like he’d known what Eddie's instinct would be.
“Okay, I think I got it,” he finally says, slowly, like he’s testing it out. “Three questions. Can I?” Eddie nods. “Alright, number one, is this your way of telling me you’re gay? Or is this, like, one of those situations where you're completely misusing the word beard?”
Eddie rolls his eyes. “I know what it means, Buck. So, yeah, I’m telling you I’m gay.”
Buck nods, but Eddie can see the way something fights to make its way back down his throat. “Cool. I had my suspicions about Tom Cruise, but thanks for telling me. Number two,” he leans his weight against the counter, arms stretched out and palms pressed flat to the surface, “Did you throw out the priest stuff just to set up that joke? Because that’s quite a way to come out to me.”
“No,” Eddie says indignantly, crossing his arms. The defensiveness melts when Buck grins mischievously, already expecting him to cave. “Okay, maybe,” Eddie admits. “But that’s just how my feelings come out by nature. None of this is really how I thought I’d say it.”
“That’s my last question,” Buck tells him, voice softer. “What does any of this have to do with me moving in with you?”
With a gentle puff of breath and a lack of caution, Eddie moves to stand next to him on the other side of the counter, crowding into his space to reach him. “Look, I know I said the other day that you don't have a good track record with asking your partners to move in with you. So, I just figured that if I was the one asking you to move in, our relationship wouldn't be cursed or whatever, which I don’t even really believe in but I know you do—”
“Our relationship?” Buck’s eyes are wide and lips parted in surprise, which makes it really hard for Eddie to not kiss him in a showcase of his point.
“I’m not asking you to move in with me just as friends,” he says, feigning frustration. “I don't have room for another bed.”
Buck blinks rapidly as he studies Eddie, mouth hung open and cheeks flushed deep red. “I-I mean, do you… you have feelings for me?”
Eddie laughs gently and risks reaching up, placing his hands flush against Buck’s jaw and running his fingers over the stubble. He realizes it isn’t the first time he’s thought to do it, recalling a few times in the late hours of a long shift that he’d let his eyes linger.
“I’ve got a lot of feelings for you, Buck,” he breathes softly. “You drive me up the wall when you’re being stubborn. You make me feel calm and safe just by being next to me, whether you’re going on about something or just there. You scare the hell out of me with all of the stupid risks you take, because I know I can’t lose you. I’ve never been as happy as I am when I’m with you and Christopher. And more than all of that, I love you. I’m in love with you.”
Tears line Buck’s eyes as he takes in Eddie’s words, spilling down his cheek just to give Eddie a reason to wipe them away with his thumb. “I don’t know what to say,” he admits through trembling lips.
Eddie falters and begins to pull his hands back to his sides. “If you don’t feel the same way it’s fine, just say—”
“No, no, Eddie,” he pleads, catching Eddie’s hands in his own and moving them to rest on his chest, just over his erratically beating heart. “I… I just didn’t know you were an option. You're my best friend, right?” Eddie can hear the fear in Buck’s question; he can feel the desperation rattling Buck’s ribcage. So he presses his hands harder against Buck’s chest to steady him and nods.
“And you’re mine, but you’re also the love of my life. It’s both.”
Despite the painful grip he holds wrapped around Eddie’s fingers, Buck says, “I don’t know if I can be your first if it means I don’t get to be your last.” Eddie pushes against him in protest again and steps closer, a challenge Buck accepts by pulling him in anyway. “I just mean… everyone leaves, Eddie, but the people that date me leave me faster than most. I wouldn’t be able to take it if that happened with you.”
Eddie scowls and moves his hands to Buck’s shoulders, pressing his thumbs into collarbone. “Fuck that. You’re first and last, Buck, you’re everything for me. If you don’t want to date because you’re worried I’ll leave, fine. We’ll just skip the dating and get married. It doesn't matter. All I care about is that it’s you.”
“You want to marry me?” Buck stares at him in awe, a slow and easy smile beginning to tug on his lips.
“I’m going to marry you,” Eddie corrects, bashful but sure. “Just waiting on you to say yes.”
Buck blinks quickly and continues watching him, like he’s waiting for Eddie to take it back. Eddie returns his stare without backing down. “You're serious,” he finally observes, face moving rapidly from teasing to disbelief to what Eddie can only hope is fond.
He nods. “And I promise I won’t even have a panic attack about it.”
Buck is beaming brilliantly at him, eyes glittering and searching his own like they’ll hold something Eddie isn’t saying. All of the ways he knows to tell Buck how much he loves him have run out, so Eddie decides to make the last ditch effort to show him instead by twisting his fingers into Buck’s shirt and hauling him into a kiss.
Eddie has kissed a handful of people in his life. It’s something he’s only ever associated with nerves gripping his gut, a perfunctory part of dating that he’d never thought twice about. When Buck parts his lips to allow him in and slides his hands down, pulling Eddie’s chest flush against his own just to get closer, Eddie realizes he’d been doing it wrong the entire time.
He hadn’t been kissing boys, and he’d never been kissing Buck, and it never felt like warm honey running in his veins.
Kissing Buck feels like the most natural thing in the world. Maybe excessively so, because Eddie can pick up hints of light salt and cinnamon on Buck’s tongue from taste testing his baking, and it makes him so lightheaded that he thinks he’ll quit breathing altogether if they stop. The only thing keeping him from floating into the clouds is the point of space where Buck’s lips are between his.
Contrary to all of this, Eddie’s feet are still on the ground when Buck pulls away, eyes bright and laughing. “Okay, yes, I’ll marry you. Eventually. I know what I said, but I don't want to skip dating. I don't want to miss out on any part of being with you. I love you more than I've ever loved anyone, Eddie, and I'll move in with you tomorrow, if you want. But I want every second with you, so let’s just take the rest slow, yeah?”
Eddie gives a lighthearted scoff. “Buck, I’m more than happy to date you, but we’re way past slow. We’ve been co-parenting for eight years.”
Buck scrunches his nose in the same way Christopher does, proving Eddie’s point unknowingly. “Co-parenting? I love him like my own, but…” He trails off, eyes fixed down toward their chests still pressed close.
Eddie sighs and takes Buck’s face in his hands, bringing his attention back up, the way he’d wanted to when they stood in this same spot years ago; when they’d had the same conversation about their son, just in different words. “I gave you Christopher in my will, remember? He’s the only part of me that’s ever really been good, and definitely the only thing I’ve put into this world that I can say I’m proud of. A huge part of the reason he’s turned out this great is because of you, Buck. And I think you’re a lot of the reason I’m starting to turn out okay, too.”
“You’re both going to be okay because you’re trying, Eddie. You’re a great dad and person.”
“Of course I am,” he agrees easily, pulling a laugh from Buck. “You think I’m letting you take all of the credit? I’m the one that got cornered by a priest.” Buck playfully rolls his eyes and raises his hands in surrender at this, but Eddie just takes them in his own and squeezes, urging him to listen. “I know my growth is my own. You’re more like… a supplement, I guess. Something that helps me grow happier.”
“You’re secretly a romantic,” Buck teases, lifting one of his hands, still intertwined with Eddie’s, to gently tilt his chin up.
“Never a secret,” Eddie argues. “I’ve been romantic before. Remember, Evan? ”
Buck wrinkles his nose in brief disgust before his face drops altogether, eyes round and searching Eddie like he’s just seen him. “‘You act like you’re expendable, but you’re wrong.’ Of course I remember. You were very dramatic about it.” He pauses, head tilting to the side playfully. “Might have to take that name off the table from here on out, though.”
Eddie places their clasped hands over his heart. “Done. You can just take mine, be Buck Diaz.”
“Tempting,” he says slowly, pressing his thumb into Eddie’s chest. “Buck Diaz sounds kind of clunky, though. Buck Diaz-Buckley? I don’t know if I want to be a Buckley very much either, now that Maddie’s not.”
“Hey, we can figure that out eventually,” Eddie reminds him with a fond laugh. “I’d rather kiss you a little more first.” Buck smirks and leans forward to oblige, releasing his hold on Eddie’s hands and wrapping them around his neck to pull him in instead. Eddie drags him by the front of the shirt until he’s pressed to the counter, Buck’s broad shoulders bracketing him against the surface. They melt together with frantic breaths and roaming hands, sending Eddie reeling, desperate for as much of Buck as he can touch.
And Buck might let him, if the way his hips rock gently into Eddie’s is any indication. Instead, Eddie’s phone echoes from the walls of the loft, the personalized tone he’d set for Chris that has them both jumping apart as if they’ve been caught.
Eddie glances over the text in an embarrassing fit of giggles. “Shit. We also have to go home in about an hour or our kid is going to kill both of us for making him miss Hotshots while he’s waiting on you.”
Buck steps back toward him, eyes melting with pride. “Our kid,” he repeats, drawing out the syllables like he’s testing it out. The slow, sideways smile on his face falls suddenly. “Hold on, waiting on me? Eddie, is he–”
“Got home yesterday,” Eddie confirms before Buck can start bouncing from the walls. “You think I was in such a good mood the past two days over a twenty-five point loss for the Lakers?”
Already tearing off across the apartment in search of his keys, Buck calls out, “And you didn’t tell me? What’s wrong with you?”
“Chris asked me not to!” Eddie defends petulantly. “He wanted to surprise you,” he amends, gentler as he watches Buck scrambling to yank his apron off and find a jacket, coming off twice as eager as he was to accept Eddie’s feelings.
“And you just ruined the surprise!” He groans. Eddie smiles contentedly when he looks away. He’d let Buck yell like this all day if it means they get to go to Eddie’s house together , the way they should have been this whole time. It all feels too right and good to argue.
“So no kissing at all before we go?” Eddie argues anyway. “We have an hour.”
“I can’t wait an hour to see Chris!” Buck barks quickly, swinging the door open and barreling out. Eddie stands in watch for a few seconds, heart swelling at the thought of his family all in the place they belong, the overwhelming joy of it all nearly knocking him off his feet before he gets the chance to chase it. He’s only recovered enough to take half a step toward the door before Buck comes racing back inside. He reaches out to take Eddie by the waist, pulling him in quickly for a languid kiss and sliding his hand down to intertwine their fingers.
“There’s your kiss, princess. Now come on, we gotta go,” Buck mutters when he pulls away, a blinding grin on his lips as he tugs Eddie toward the door. “Chris is waiting.”
For the first time in his life, Eddie Diaz goes home.