Work Text:
2024
Here’s what Buck remembers.
He remembers the beginning of the night, the disappointment of Chimney not showing up, and then of Tommy leaving before the party even started, and everyone else bowing out early. He remembers his first drink, something awful Eddie mixed together in the corner that Buck suffered through because he was feeling particularly fond of Eddie at the moment. Eddie, who had dressed up with him. Eddie, who had stayed at the party.
He remembers his second, third, and fourth drinks—consecutive vodka shots, taken surrounded by the strangers they’d invited to join them. The shots were almost refreshing after the toxic sludge Eddie had given him.
Buck doesn’t remember when, or why, he and Eddie started singing, but he remembers badly botching the lyrics to an old country song and making Eddie laugh so hard he had to sit on the floor.
After that, things start to get hazy.
Bits and pieces have been coming back to him all day, blurred memories of last night trickling slowly into his consciousness. And every time he looks at Eddie, the trickle turns into a flood.
Eddie slumped next to him in the backseat of their Uber to the wedding, his eyes squeezed shut against the too-bright morning sun. Eddie squished into the middle seat between Buck and someone they’d met that night in the backseat of their Uber to the hotel, one ankle hooked over Buck’s, his hot breath ghosting over Buck’s ear every time he leaned in to tell him something.
Eddie stumbling slightly as he climbs out of the car, leaning against Buck for a split second to steady himself. Buck tripping over his own feet on the stairs up to Chimney’s hotel room and instinctively reaching out to grab onto Eddie to catch himself. Eddie laughing and guiding Buck’s arm around his own shoulder, holding him tight to his side the rest of the way up, like Buck had broken a leg and couldn’t walk on his own.
Eddie’s hair standing up in all directions in messy spikes as they make their walk of shame into the wedding venue. Soft, short hair under his fingers. An argument, something about—
“Hey,” Buck says, nudging Eddie. They’re sitting side by side on a short, uncomfortable bench, waiting to hear any news about Chimney. The bench is too small, and their knees knock together whenever one of them shifts in their seat. Eddie visibly winces, and Buck makes an apologetic face, lowering his voice.
“Sorry, sorry. Hey, do you remember…were we arguing about conditioner last night?”
Eddie gives him a strange look.
“Conditioner for hair?”
“Yeah,” Buck says distractedly, keeping an eye on Maddie in the corner of the room as she paces, dialing Chimney’s phone over and over. It feels weird talking about something that’s not Chimney’s disappearance, but he’s grasping on to any small thread of memory that might be helpful in their search. This is as good a place to start as any.
“Um,” Eddie frowns, looking to the ceiling as he tries to jog his memory. “Oh—yes, actually,” he smiles, giving a small shake of his head. “You were railing on me for my shampoo and conditioner choices. Apparently they’re…what was the word you used? Insufficient. You, uh, you were…feeling it?”
“Feeling it,” Buck repeats dumbly, flexing his fingers.
“To see how soft it is,” Eddie elaborates. “Or isn’t, I guess.”
“It is,” Buck says quickly. “I remember that much.”
“Thank you. See, my shampoo is perfectly fine,” Eddie says, reaching up to pat his own hair. He withdraws his hand almost immediately, looking mildly disgusted. “Eugh. Not right now, though.”
“Yeah, there’s something gross in there,” Buck confirms, peering at the top of Eddie’s head. Eddie groans, dropping his head into his hands and scrubbing them over his face.
“Do you…remember anything else?” Buck prompts, growing increasingly concerned about Maddie’s frantic pacing. She looks beautiful, he thinks, somewhat sadly. He doubts, at this point, that she’ll have anything close to the wedding she had planned.
“Did you black out?” Eddie raises his head slightly, looking up at Buck through heavy, tired lids.
“Not—not exactly. It’s coming back to me,” Buck says slowly. “Pieces. We should compare notes. Maybe it’ll help us find Chimney.”
“I don’t remember anything useful,” Eddie says immediately, like he had the answer prepared. “Just, uh, stupid stuff.”
“Like what,” Buck says impatiently.
“You first.”
Buck raises an eyebrow.
“You’re being weird.” He studies his face. “Why.”
“I’m not,” Eddie insists, “I just want to make sure…that we—that our stories line up,” he finishes lamely. Buck just stares at him, confused and slightly annoyed.
“Hardly anything, Eddie, that’s why I’m asking you. You’re not making sense.”
“Okay, okay, alright.” Eddie sighs, closing his eyes. “You remember karaoke?”
“Mhm. And the Uber, mostly. I remember walking up the hotel stairs.”
“Not sure why we didn’t take the elevator,” Eddie frowns, his eyes still closed.
“Couldn’t find it,” Buck mutters, the memory filling out, coloring itself in with this new detail.
“Right,” Eddie nods. “We got into the hotel room. We couldn’t find Chimney.”
Buck remembers this too.
“We didn’t just get in,” he says, with a vague sense of dawning horror. “Eddie, we broke the door down.”
The door had been hanging off its hinges, just a little bit, when they left the room that morning. But Buck’s distracted, hungover, half-asleep brain had not connected this fact with we broke the fucking door down.
Eddie groans again, something that sounds vaguely like Oh, God.
“Okay. Okay. It’s fine,” Buck rushes past this revelation. “We’ll pay for the damages.”
Eddie cracks an eye open, looking at him sideways.
“Those weren’t the only damages. And we’re broke, remember?”
“I remember.” Buck sighs heavily. The state of the hotel room when they woke up was not something he’d soon forget. After a moment of silence to mourn their bank accounts, Buck speaks again.
“Anything else?”
“Nothing, um, relevant,” Eddie mumbles, looking deeply uncomfortable.
“Just spit it out, dude. I’m trying to put everything together.”
“Ugh, Buck,” Eddie says, exasperated. “It’s—I think I, like—“ he widens his eyes, attempting to communicate something to Buck without actually saying it.
Buck just looks at him, raising his eyebrows, like go on.
“Hooked up. With someone.” Eddie forces out the words, cringing like they’re bitter in his mouth.
Buck’s brain goes blank for a second, stalling completely. And then, his first thought—That sounds like something I’d remember.
“Oh,” is all he says, unable to keep the surprise from his voice. “That’s…like—wait, sex?” he whispers.
“No, dude!” Eddie exclaims, looking horrified. “No. I said that wrong, I just meant—just kissing. Or, uh, making out, maybe?”
His reaction strikes Buck as disproportionate to the situation, but he also knows Eddie has never been particularly interested in casual. As far as Buck is aware, this is Eddie’s first time kissing someone random on a drunken night out. No wonder he seems so freaked out.
“Who? A woman?” Buck asks, the words slipping out before he can think about them.
“What?” Eddie reels back, defensive, some of the color draining from his face. “Of course a woman.”
“Right, right. Yeah, of course, sorry, I—it’s just, I only just realized that about myself, that—you know. Men are an option. I was just checking,” Buck says, tripping over his words in an effort to explain himself. Eddie’s shoulders relax slightly.
“Oh. Yeah. Sorry, man.”
“No, it’s—look, Eddie, you know you didn’t do anything wrong, right? Last night. You kissed someone, so what? You’re a single, young, attractive—“ At this, Eddie’s cheeks pinken slightly, and Buck blushes in response, not entirely sure where that came from, “guy. It was a bachelor party. You’re a bachelor, aren’t you?”
“Yes,” Eddie mumbles, still looking bereft. “But I don’t do that, man. I don’t even remember what they looked like!” He throws up his hands. “I remember…there’s parts of it I remember. But not their face.”
Buck notes the use of the pronoun. They, not she. Of course a woman. Right. But Eddie doesn’t remember their face.
“Was it…good? Did you enjoy it?”
Eddie’s face takes on an expression Buck can only describe as dreamy.
“Well…yeah. It was. I remember that pretty clearly. The—maybe the clearest part of the night. I really, really enjoyed it.”
“Hey,” Buck smiled, knocking his shoulder gently against Eddie’s, “that’s good, man. That’s a good thing. You had fun. That’s, like, the whole reason people drink alcohol.”
“I guess,” Eddie says, shrugging, slumping down in his seat. “But what’s the point, if I don’t even remember them?”
Buck gives him a look, an Are you stupid? raise of his eyebrows.
“Again…fun. Enjoyment. Something you’re allowed to have, by the way.”
Eddie looks unconvinced.
“But…what, now we never talk again? I can’t even ask them out? I’ll just—just never know who it was?” Eddie gestures with his hands, growing frustrated.
“That’s how it works, yeah.” Buck pats his shoulder comfortingly. “You’ll be okay.”
Eddie’s expression says otherwise.
“But I really liked it,” he says, a slight whine in his voice.
Buck grins at him, leaning in closer.
“That good, huh? Wanna tell me about it?”
The corner of Eddie’s mouth turns up, Buck’s goofy enthusiasm breaking through his sour mood.
“This isn’t gonna help us find Chimney.”
“You never know,” Buck pushes, suddenly weirdly eager to hear Eddie’s recollection of his makeout. It’s just…exciting. He’s excited for his friend. He wants to be supportive.
“Fine, Buck,” Eddie says, sounding amused, willing to play along now. Like all he’d needed was Buck’s assurance that there wasn’t anything wrong with what he’d done.
“We—we were on the couch. I think I initiated it, because I remember thinking—“ he pauses, frowning in concentration—“I remember watching them for awhile. All night, maybe. Thinking—beautiful. Over and over. I don’t remember their face, but I know that. Beautiful.”
“Uh, w-wow,” Buck says, sorting through his limited snapshots of memory, trying to recall everyone in the group they’d invited back to the hotel. It’s impossible. There were so many people, and he doesn’t remember anything about any of them. Not a single identifying feature.
“And…I remember they were in my lap. Like, straddling me,” he gestures, flushing again, bright red this time. Buck blushes too, which feels slightly ridiculous, because they talk about this stuff all the time. Eddie is his best friend, they’re grown adults, they’re guys—if anything, they know too much about each other's sex lives. And this wasn’t even sex!
“I remember the weight. They were heavy. Which was…nice.” Eddie smiles slightly. “The pressure, I don’t know. Like a weighted blanket. I liked that about them—about her,” he says, finally correcting his choice of pronoun.
“Huge thighs,” he continues, warming up now, seeming to lose himself in the memory. “Strong, too. She was, like, wrapped around me. Arms, hands, legs. She was pulling my hair,” he chuckles, touching his messy hair self-consciously. “I hope it didn’t get this gross until after.”
“Oh,” Buck repeats, the word coming out strangled. It seems he’s been reduced to single-syllable responses. He’s hyper aware of how close his leg is to Eddie’s, the short space between their thighs humming with tension.
“And the kiss…” Eddie shakes his head, disbelieving, “it went on forever. I know time is weird when you’re drunk, but—years. I swear we were on that couch for years. Realistically, if I had to guess, an hour. Maybe more. It was just kissing, nothing—ah, indecent, but, God, Buck, it never got boring.”
Buck wants to say something then—well, Eddie, kissing isn’t supposed to be boring. The right person, the right kiss, would never stop feeling good. You could lose yourself in it. He keeps quiet though, not wanting to break the spell, to do anything that might stop Eddie from sharing more.
“They were good. A good kisser, really good. Nice lips.”
He’d slipped back into saying they. Buck bites down on his tongue, holding himself back from questioning Eddie on it. He’s sure it doesn’t mean anything.
“Kissin’ all over my neck,” Eddie says, his voice low, sending shivers up Buck’s spine. “Really gentle, though. Like, uh, licking me, kinda.”
“Oh, wow.” Buck manages to get out two syllables. Eddie’s description is getting detailed, so detailed that Buck feels like he’s there. Like he was a part of all this, somehow. The one in Eddie’s lap, licking his neck. He blushes, terrified for a moment that Eddie can suddenly read minds. Or that it’s written all over Buck’s face, that he’s now imagining himself as the mystery person in Eddie’s story.
“It was hot. Temperature-hot. The other kind, too, obviously, but I remember their mouth was…yeah. Hot. And slippery. Y’know, drunk kissing. I mean, you know how it feels.”
Embarrassingly, Buck’s mouth begins to water. He nods to show he’s listening, swallowing roughly. Eddie doesn’t seem to notice, though. He’s in his own world now, lost in the memory, talking more to himself than to Buck.
“And they did this thing,” Eddie gasps, his eyes widening, “with their tongue. I don’t know how to describe it. It’s like…it’s like they knew everything about me—about what I like. If I didn’t know better, I’d think it was…”
“Was what?” Buck manages, somehow, to keep his voice level.
“Someone I’ve been with before. Or at least someone who knows me really well,” Eddie shrugs. “But I know it wasn’t one of—I mean, it never felt like that with Marisol or Ana. Not even when we’d had a few drinks.”
Buck almost opens his mouth to say something about that, but it feels like the beginning of a much bigger conversation, one he doubts Eddie has the energy for in his current state.
“Okay, so. Sounds like you had, uh…instant chemistry with this person,” Buck says instead, prompting Eddie to continue. He’s not ready for the story to be over. He could sit here, prying details out of Eddie, for as long as he lets him. He needs to know more, he needs to know everything. He feels like he’s on the cusp of something, of unlocking some part of his brain that’s currently closed off to him. Every new piece of the moment that Eddie reveals is slotting into place, creating a kind of half-finished patchwork of the scene in his head. Even incomplete, it’s so vivid that it almost feels like his own memory.
“Yeah,” Eddie agrees, seeming just as eager to get back on track as Buck is. He’s enjoying this, Buck realizes, with an unexpected twinge of arousal. So is Buck.
“They had short hair. Didn’t remember that until just now, but it’s coming back.” He closes his eyes again, pausing briefly. “Short for a woman. Curly. Soft. I…I was sort of obsessed with it. Scratching her scalp—not, like, scratching,” he clarifies, making a face. “Just lightly. Like this.”
Eddie reaches over, scratching his fingers gently on the back of Buck’s hand to demonstrate. Buck freezes, feeling goosebumps rise on his arms, the sensation of Eddie’s fingernails on his skin oddly familiar. Like something he’d experienced recently. A thin, wispy thread of memory swirls in the back of his consciousness, just out of reach. He grasps at it desperately, but it slips away.
“This is all…i-it’s pretty specific, Eddie. You still don’t remember their face?”
“I had my eyes closed for most of it,” Eddie says. “And it was dark in there, remember?”
Buck did remember. Someone, at some point, had turned off all the lights in the hotel room, had even drawn the blackout shades to block out the lights of the city. It was dark, and he was dancing. Dancing with someone. Not a group, someone specific. He had his hands on their waist, there were arms around his neck, he could feel their body pressed in close to his. Oh, God. Fuck.
“Eddie.”
“Yeah?”
“I think I-I might have—have cheated on Tommy.” The words feel like lead on his tongue.
“Oh, shit,” Eddie’s eyebrows shoot up. “Seriously?”
“Seriously,” Buck says morosely, looking down at his lap. “I-I remember a little, now. We were dancing, and—and we kissed. A lot. God, I don’t even remember who it was.”
“It was dark,” Eddie puts in helpfully.
Buck groans, long and low and miserable.
“Hey, are you totally sure?” Eddie asks softly, giving Buck’s elbow a gentle, reassuring squeeze.
“Well…no,” Buck says honestly, his heart lifting a little. “It’s blurry. Really blurry. And I’ve danced with and—and made out with a lot of people at parties before. I could just be…I don’t know. Mixing up my nights? Human memory is totally unreliable, y’know. We rewrite our memories differently every time we recall them.” He’d listened to a podcast about it the other day, actually, and it was really interesting. Buck makes a mental note to tell Eddie more about it later.
“It is,” Eddie agrees. “Especially when you’re that drunk.”
“Right.” Buck clings onto this fact, carefully reshaping his own blurred memory into something innocent, unremarkable. Maybe he danced with someone. So what? He probably didn’t actually kiss them. His brain was likely embellishing things, influenced by Eddie’s recollection of the night. Buck wasn’t a cheater. He would never do that.
Well. Except the last time he was drunk and cheated on his partner.
But that was before. Before he was—what version of Buck is he on now? Four? Buck 4.0 would never do something like that. Cheating isn’t something he wants to do, sober or not. He likes Tommy! He wouldn’t do that.
“I like Tommy,” he says out loud, with as much conviction as he can muster. “I would never do that.”
“Of course not,” Eddie says soothingly, loyal to a fault. “It’s hangover anxiety. That’s all it is, Buck. Relax.”
“Should I tell him?” Buck asks, scratching nervously at a suspicious stain on the sleeve of his jacket.
“No! Nope. Definitely not. Buck.” Eddie waits until Buck looks up, meeting his eyes. “Do. Not. Tell him. There’s no point if you don’t actually remember what happened. If it comes back to you, and you think you really did cheat, sure. Be honest with him. But, man, you’ve gotta just let this one go. Don’t borrow trouble.”
“Yeah,” Buck exhales, relief flooding through him. “No, you’re right. Absolutely. Thanks, Eddie,” he says gratefully. Eddie shakes his head, looking at him fondly.
“Don’t think about it anymore. Need you on your A-game today, man. Brother of the bride.” He shakes Buck’s shoulder encouragingly.
Buck has never been further from his A-game. His head feels like it’s been run over by a train, his eyes are puffy and swollen, and—
“H-hey, Eddie,” he says slowly, feeling his mouth begin to water again—for a completely different reason this time. “I’ll be right back.”
“Where are you—ah.”
Buck does not make it to the bathroom. He makes it to a potted plant, at least. Unfortunately, it’s a very well-groomed and expensive-looking plant.
“We’ll just add that to our tab,” Eddie calls, the effort of holding back a laugh evident in his voice.
Buck finishes gagging and wipes the back of his mouth, shooting Eddie a watery-eyed glare.
“I’m never drinking again.”
—
2025
Buck is very, very drunk.
It starts at the karaoke bar. They all need some cheering up, something Chimney seems to think is his personal responsibility now that he’s captain. His answer, unsurprisingly, is karaoke.
Buck doesn’t want to go. At all. He’d been prepared for, excited for, a chill night in after a long shift. Dinner, beer, TV—or just talking, if they couldn’t decide on anything to watch—on the couch with Eddie until he dozed off. Nothing special, nothing different from what they’d been doing almost every night they both had off for the past few months. But warm. Comfortable. Still, somehow, exciting, despite its mundanity.
Maybe because of its mundanity. He spent so much time while Eddie was in Texas daydreaming about evenings like that. Evenings he took for granted while Eddie and Chris still lived in LA. Evenings he thought he might never get to experience again. Buck treasures them now, cradles them in his hands like precious jewels, these moments that are so regular now they’ve started to become mundane, to blend together into one happy blur of domesticity.
After a few weeks of half-hearted and unsuccessful apartment hunting, Buck kind of just gave up. He sheepishly moved his things back into Eddie’s house, promising it was just for now. Only until I find something. But it’s been months now, and neither of them have brought it up since.
The house feels like Buck’s home now. It’s always felt like home when Eddie and Chris are there, but this…living there with both of them, sleeping under the same roof, making pancakes with Chris on the weekends, just knocking on Eddie’s door instead of calling him when he wants to talk…it’s blissful. Dreamlike.
“I just want to go home,” Buck whines, letting his head fall back dramatically when Hen corners him and Eddie on their way out of the firehouse. Eddie makes a small noise of agreement, locking eyes with Buck. They have leftovers in the fridge and a new season of their current favorite show waiting for them. Karaoke sounds like hell compared to the evening Buck and Eddie were picturing for themselves.
“It’s not—oh, my God. It’s not for us, idiots. It’s for him,” Hen says, lowering her voice and lifting her chin towards Chimney. He’s sitting at his desk, flipping through paperwork, a grim expression on his face. “He needs this. He needs to feel like he’s helping us. Like he’s holding things together. Lifting our spirits, y’know?”
“But—he’s doing great,” Eddie says. “He’s…he’s a great captain. We tell him all the time!”
Buck nods furiously in agreement.
“Put yourself in his shoes,” Hen says softly, her eyes not leaving her best friend. He looks like he’s about a minute away from stabbing himself in the eye with a pen. “He feels powerless. He can’t fix this for us, he can’t bring Bobby back. He feels like he’s failing us as captain and as a friend.”
“What? Did he say that?” Eddie looks stricken.
“No. He didn’t need to.” Hen tilts her head, giving them a long, searching look. “You two can read each other’s minds. I can read Chimney’s.”
Eddie sighs, looking over at Buck. Buck shrugs, giving him a What can you do? look. He can sacrifice his relaxing night of Thai food and binge-watching for Chimney. The couch will still be there when they get home.
“Think of it as a make-up bachelor party,” Hen adds, smirking. She knows she has them.
“We’ll be there.”
-
“I’m so tipsy,” Buck announces, watching with mild interest as Eddie pours him another shot. “So, so tipsy.”
“There’s a word for that,” Chimney says drily, his eyes not leaving the screen as he searches through the list of karaoke songs.
“M’not drunk,” Buck sits up, straightening his posture to prove it. Could a drunk person do this?
“Yeah, we’re not drunk,” Eddie pipes up, sloshing a little of his own shot over the sides of the glass as he lifts it to his lips.
“No one was talking to you, Beavis,” Hen snorts, pointing wordlessly to a song on the screen. Chimney nods his approval, clicking ‘select’.
“And if we were drunk,” Buck says, jabbing a finger in Ravi’s direction, “it’s his fault. I was just gonna drink beer.”
“Yeah!” Eddie downs his shot, pausing for a moment to make an awful, scrunched-up face before continuing. “We were just gonna drink beer!”
Ravi squints at them.
“How the hell is this,” he gestures at the two of them, the mess of shot glasses and spilled liquor littering the table, “my fault?”
“Oh, you know damn well—” Buck hiccups, and Eddie picks up where he left off.
“You know damn well what you did, buying this whole bottle. What’re we s’posed to do? Waste it?” Eddie asks, holding up the half-empty bottle and wiggling it in Ravi’s face.
“It was, like, thirty bucks,” Ravi says, rolling his eyes. “It was cheaper than getting individual shots. And the rest of us had, what—two drinks?” He glances around the room at the rest of them.
Maddie holds up one finger, Chimney and Hen two.
“Well,” Buck huffs, “there’s our problem. Maybe if the rest of you started pulling your weight, we wouldn’t have to pick up your slack!”
“It’s all of your faults!” Eddie says triumphantly, holding out his hand out for a fist bump. Buck misses his fist and punches the air the first time, and they have to try again.
“Hey, Butt-head. Are you two done?” Chimney asks, waving at them with a microphone. “You’re up. Let’s get this over with.”
Buck needs a little bit of liquid courage. He doesn’t bother with the shot glass this time—he doesn’t need a full shot anyway. He gets to his feet unsteadily, unscrews the bottle, tilts back his head, and pours a small amount into his mouth, swallowing quickly. Without really thinking about it, he turns to Eddie, tapping him on the underside of his chin and holding up the bottle.
Eddie opens his mouth obediently, looking up at Buck with glassy eyes as Buck pours it slowly into his mouth, careful not to let it go directly down his throat or spill over his lips. Eddie swallows, grimacing, and licks his lips, smiling up at Buck.
“Ready?” Buck offers him a hand, pulling Eddie to his feet, and turns to Chimney, who’s still holding the mic. He doesn’t hand it to Buck—he’s just staring, jaw slack, eyes bouncing between Buck and Eddie.
“We’re ready to sing,” Eddie says impatiently, reaching for the mic. Chimney ignores him.
“You’re—you two—“ Chimney turns to Maddie, raising his eyebrows questioningly. “Have they—did they finally…”
Maddie shakes her head slowly, her eyes just as wide.
“No…no, he would’ve told me.”
“They’re just like this,” Ravi puts in, resigned.
“It’s gotten worse since he moved in,” Hen sighs. “Clearly. Because that was psychotic.”
Buck rolls his eyes, reaching out and snatching the mic away.
“You guys are so bad at karaoke,” he gripes, exchanging an annoyed look with Eddie. “You’re s’posed to sing, y’know. Not just stand around talking.”
“Uh—yeah, go for it,” Chimney says faintly, leaving them to join Maddie on the couch. They start whispering intensely about something, glancing occasionally in Buck and Eddie’s direction.
Buck could not possibly care less. The music has started, and he has to focus very hard on reading the lyrics scrolling across the screen.
“Hey,” Eddie says slowly, looking down at the mic in Buck’s hands, and then to his own, which are empty. “Where’s the other mic?”
“Broken,” Chimney calls out through a mouthful of chips and salsa. “Take turns. Or share.” He picks up two chips and passes one to Maddie. “And at least try to be normal about it?”
“Yeah, I’m not driving you guys home if you’re going to be like this with each other the rest of the night,” Ravi warns. ”I don’t want you two in my backseat together. I’m not dealing with that.”
“You have to drive us home,” Buck reminds him. “My sweater’s in your car.”
Ravi presses his lips together, giving them a flat, unsympathetic look.
“Don’t do any more weird shit in front of me or I’m calling you guys an Uber.”
-
They had originally set the Uber destination to their house. Our house, Buck thinks, resting his head against the cool glass of the window. The words fill him with a warm, shivery feeling of pleasure. Our house, our house, our house, our house.
But the driver is taking a slightly different route home, and Buck vaguely recognizes the street ahead as the road they cross to get to their favorite club—somewhere they haven’t been in awhile, not since Texas, and then Bobby dying, and then Buck and Eddie falling into the safe, comfortable routine that kept them in every night. Tonight is different, though. They’re having fun. Buck doesn’t want it to end.
“Hey,” Eddie taps Buck’s foot with his own, and Buck lets his head loll to the side to look at him. One side of Eddie’s face is bathed in the soft red glow of the stoplight, and his eyes are glinting in the dark, and Buck thinks he might have the most gorgeous best friend in the entire world.
“Y’know what we’re about to pass?” Eddie asks, an undercurrent of excitement in his voice.
A slow grin spreads across Buck’s face.
“You read my mind.”
“You’re an open book, Buck. It’s not hard.” He sounds genuinely, unmistakably flirty. Buck loves drunk Eddie.
“I love drunk Eddie.”
“I know.” Eddie taps a finger against his own temple. “Mind reader, remember.”
The light changes, and Eddie’s face is lit up green. He holds Buck’s eyes for so long that Buck has to look away, grabbing for his phone to change their dropoff location, his heart thumping in his chest.
And then they just sit there quietly in the dark of the backseat, and Buck can feel the excitement and tension buzzing between them, a feedback loop of giddy anticipation. He’s excited because Eddie’s excited, and Eddie’s excited because Buck is excited, and they’ve both had enough drinks to make dancing sound like a really good idea.
They don’t speak again until they’re out of the Uber and through security, and by now it’s loud enough that Eddie has to yell in Buck’s ear to be heard over the music.
“Wanna dance?”
Buck feels a powerful sense of deja vu wash over him, a near certainty that he’s experienced this moment before. But it passes, and Eddie is looking at him expectantly, swaying slightly where he stands.
Buck nods his head in the direction of the dancefloor and Eddie leads the way, slipping expertly through the tightly packed crowds of people. Buck is already sweating by the time Eddie slows, turning to face Buck. And he’s sweating, too, his hair damp around the edges, cheeks dewy and flushed. He’s looking at Buck, staring directly into his eyes with an intensity that makes Buck lightheaded.
There isn’t much space here. It’s a Friday night in LA, and the club is packed—there’s hardly room to move, let alone dance. It seems to Buck like Eddie has purposely sought out the most crowded spot in the entire place. At least four different people are touching Buck right now. Eddie’s one of them.
Buck moves in closer, pressing against Eddie, his hands moving instinctually to Eddie’s hips, sliding under the thin fabric of his shirt and trailing his fingers across bare skin. There’s no thought involved, he doesn’t make any kind of conscious decision before touching Eddie like this—it’s muscle memory, a conditioned response to the pounding music and strobe lights, the heavy, suffocating heat of bodies jostling around them. The crush of people lends a certain anonymity and surreality to the moment, like they can be anyone, do anything, and there won’t be real life consequences.
Buck doesn’t want them to be just anyone, though. He wants consequences. He wants it to be them. BuckandEddie. He doesn’t have the chance—or the presence of mind—to unpack this, though, because Eddie starts moving, rocking his hips and swaying to the music, and Buck remembers—oh, yeah. Eddie can dance.
Buck slides his hands up Eddie’s back, rucking up his shirt, feeling along hard muscle and slippery, feverish skin. Eddie doesn’t stop him. He loops his arms around Buck’s neck, holding tight, and they’re closer now, impossibly close—Buck can feel the quick rise and fall of Eddie’s chest where it presses against his own, and Eddie’s sandwiching his leg between Buck’s, and the memory hits him like a truck.
A memory. A real one, not deja vu—he’s never been more certain of anything in his life. Last year. The bachelor party. He already knew he danced with someone, he remembers that much. It’s not until now, squished in so close to Eddie that they’re barely dancing, just holding each other, that it all comes flooding back.
They’d danced like this before, swaying in the dark of the hotel room last year, Buck holding a glass bottle loosely in one hand and Eddie’s waist with the other, feeling crazy, frantic, his heart pounding so quickly he thought it might beat out of his chest. There had been hours of lead-up that night, hours of hanging off each other, of pushing the boundaries further and further, of Buck picking silly fights about shampoo and conditioner as an excuse to run his fingers through Eddie’s hair, before Eddie had finally grabbed onto Buck in the dark and pulled him in by his jacket, his voice low in Buck’s ear. Wanna dance?
It was so dark in the hotel room he couldn’t see an inch in front of him, and he had no warning before Eddie’s mouth found his, forceful and confident, lacking any of the finesse of a sober, well-lit kiss. It was sloppy, enthusiastic, a little desperate, and Buck didn’t have even a split second of hesitation before he kissed him back, the half-empty bottle slipping from his fingers, its contents bubbling steadily out onto the hotel carpet.
Buck didn’t care about the carpet, he didn’t care about his boyfriend—couldn’t even remember his name in that moment, not with Eddie’s tongue in his mouth. It didn’t even register as cheating to him. It was Eddie. Eddie was exempt from the rules. Any moral code surrounding infidelity Buck held himself to didn’t apply here. His loyalty and affection and desire for Eddie was a more powerful force, the most powerful force.
They made their way to the couch, clumsy, inefficient, tripping over bottles and pillows and their own feet, unwilling to pull away from the kiss even for the time it would take to walk over and sit down. Buck had to feel his way around the couch with his one free hand, the other one thoroughly occupied with holding onto Eddie, gripping his waist like he’d slip away if Buck let go for even a second. He pushed Eddie onto the couch, and climbed into his lap, and—
That’s where the two pieces of that night stitch together. Buck’s vague, blurred memory of dancing, of kissing someone, and Eddie’s morning-after recollection of his own kiss on the couch, of the mystery person straddling him, and licking his neck, and pulling his hair, and making him feel good. It was Buck. Buck is Eddie’s mystery person, and Eddie is his.
And Eddie is his again, now, all over him, under his skin, filling his lungs, his breath hot and fast against the side of Buck’s face where their cheeks and ears are nearly touching. His fingers dig into Buck in a way that feels almost possessive in its intensity, and he’s getting bolder with his dancing, grinding against Buck’s leg, his hands making their way from Buck’s neck down his back, slipping his fingertips just barely underneath the waistband of Buck’s pants.
The sensation of Eddie’s leg between his, the rocking motion—Jesus, was Eddie fucking humping him?—brings the situation into sharp relief for Buck. They’re not as drunk as they were the last time this happened. They didn’t buy drinks when they got to the club, skipping straight to dancing, so they’ve sobered up slightly since leaving the karaoke place. This was something they would both remember.
Good, he thinks fiercely, tugging Eddie towards him, repositioning their legs, slotting them flush together. He wants to remember this. He wants Eddie to remember this. Eddie’s mouth is so close to Buck’s ear that he hears him gasp even over the deafening roar of music.
“Buck,” Eddie breathes, his voice deep and rough and familiar. “Buck.”
“Yeah?”
Eddie pulls his head back, letting his forehead rest against Buck’s. They’re both drenched in sweat, it’s dripping from Eddie’s temples, running in little rivulets down the sides of his neck and soaking the collar of his shirt, and Buck can feel it stinging his eyes, tastes salt when he licks his lips. It shouldn’t be as hot as it is. He wants to lick Eddie clean.
“Buck,” Eddie repeats, and Buck knows, of course, what he wants. He can read Eddie’s mind just as well as Eddie can read his. But he needs to pause before he kisses Eddie. He needs to cement this moment in his mind, he needs to be sure he won’t forget how Eddie’s looking at him right now. Open, and wanting, and so himself. It’s his Eddie, the Eddie he sees and talks to and thinks about every day. His eyes are clear—certainly not sober, but present and alert, staring unblinkingly into Buck’s.
The music fades away, the people around them disappear, dissolving into the periphery like someone has placed noise-cancelling headphones over Buck’s ears and blinders on either side of his face. All he can see is Eddie, all he can hear is the blood rushing in his ears.
It’s not a first kiss, but it feels like one. For Buck, it’s just as thrilling, if not moreso, as the first one. Because they’re more sober, maybe, and he’s half-hard from the dancing, and he knows, now, what Eddie likes. The hair pulling, and the neck kissing, and the weight of Buck pressing down on him.
He wants to recreate that first kiss for Eddie, to give him another chance to experience what had been the best and most important first kiss of Buck’s life. No, not recreate it—he wants to blow that first kiss out of the water. He wants to take Eddie apart, to make his big, strong, competent firefighter best friend weak-kneed, to melt him into a puddle on the floor.
So he takes it slow, taking Eddie’s face in his hands, stroking a thumb across his jawline, gently tilting Eddie’s chin up to make up for their height difference. Eddie’s lips are already slightly parted, waiting, and they open easily under Buck’s own, his tongue sliding obscenely against Buck’s, and Buck wants to do crazy things to him, disgusting, inappropriate things that would get them both kicked out of the club and banned for life. The idea sends an unexpected thrill through Buck. The concept of losing themselves so completely in each other that they get in trouble for it fills him with a strange, sick sort of delight.
Any clarity of mind he’d had before the kiss, any sense of control, evaporates as Eddie’s lips move against his. Heat coils low in his belly, arousal and anticipation buzzing under his skin, tiny jolts of electricity shooting through his body wherever Eddie touches him. Eddie’s hand is in his hair now, his fingernails doing that light, scratching thing Buck now remembers from last time. He gasps into Eddie’s mouth, and Eddie pulls back just barely, panting. There’s a thin string of spit stretched between their lips, and Buck can barely hear what Eddie says next, he’s dizzy and disoriented and his brain is leaking out through his ears. But he can read Eddie’s lips.
“D’you remember,” he asks.
Buck doesn't have to ask what he means. He nods, and Eddie starts to say something else, but Buck is having a really hard time focusing. Unable to hold himself back any longer, he leans in, licking a long stripe up Eddie’s neck, and—oh, my God. He can feel the vibration of Eddie’s moan under his tongue, deep and throaty and desperate, something Buck knows he could easily get addicted to.
Or maybe, probably, he already is. Maybe Eddie Diaz is the type of drug that you get hooked on after one use, maybe he’ll be consumed forever, unable to think about anything else again except his next fix.
“Fuck,” Eddie groans, or maybe Buck, and so Buck does it again, and again, and he thinks, gleefully, this is so gross. So, so gross. He hopes everyone is watching. Look! Look what I’m doing to my best friend. Look what he’s letting me do.
“This is doin’ it for you, huh?” Eddie says into Buck’s ear. “You’re getting off on this, Buck.”
“Mhm,” Buck hums into his skin. It’s all he can manage.
”Good t’know,” Eddie grins, his teeth flashing shiny white under the club lights, and the wicked look on his face—Buck knows him well enough to recognize it as his scheming face—is also doing it for him.
Buck startles at the feeling of warm fingertips brushing the small sliver of exposed skin on his lower stomach, the space between the bottom of his shirt and his waistband. Before he can even register what’s happening, Eddie is slipping a hand down the front of Buck’s pants, and Buck doesn’t have time to react, because Eddie’s kissing him again, eagerly swallowing down Buck’s involuntary noise of surprise and pleasure. Eddie kisses him in a filthy, unselfconscious way, no technique, the kind of messy, open-mouthed kiss that’s mostly just something to do with your mouth while your hands and body are otherwise occupied.
Eddie isn’t moving his hand, though, just resting it there, and Buck thinks, wildly, Aren’t you a paramedic? Can’t you feel my heart rate? Aren’t you worried I’ll go into cardiac arrest?
“You’ll really let me do anything I want to you,” Eddie says, pulling back from the kiss, sounding amazed.
”Y-yeah—yes,” Buck agrees, although he thinks the question was probably rhetorical. They both know he would. Everyone knows.
“Hey,” a different voice, sharp and unfamiliar, breaks through Buck’s Eddie-induced haze, “you can’t be doing that shit here.”
It’s a man in a security jacket, and he’s standing a few feet away from Buck and Eddie, arms crossed over his chest, looking mildly irritated but mostly just bored. Buck notices, distantly, that the crowd has thinned out considerably since they started dancing, and people are filtering out through the front doors. Some of the lights near the bar have been turned on, and the music is significantly quieter. Buck probably should have realized earlier, because he’s been able to hear Eddie talking for awhile now.
“That’s fine,” Eddie says easily, removing his hand from Buck’s pants, placing it on the small of his back. “Sorry, man. We were just leaving anyway.” He leans in close to Buck’s ear. “Buck, y’wanna go home?”
Buck will never get tired of hearing Eddie say that. Home. He nods, and they follow the flow of traffic out of the club, Eddie’s hand not leaving his back the whole time. They’re stopped at the front door, and the bouncer who let them in grabs Buck’s shoulder.
“Hey—we have pictures of your IDs on file. Don’t come back here,” he says firmly, and Buck just nods weakly, letting Eddie steer him out the door and into the cool night air.
“There’s other clubs,” Eddie says, and Buck shrugs. He genuinely could not care less. Maybe they could make a checklist together, make it their mission to get kicked out of every nightclub in LA. The thought makes his head swim, and he shivers, taking a moment to regain his ability to form thoughts and words.
“So, Eddie, you—you remembered? The bachelor party, the hotel room—“
“I have for awhile,” Eddie confesses, his hand slipping from Buck’s back, leaving him feeling cold and exposed. There’s a slight breeze, and goosebumps prickle on Buck’s arms. “I’ve—I remembered when I was in Texas. I don’t know what triggered it, maybe I was just thinking about you too much, missing you too much…” He looks down at his feet, avoiding Buck’s eyes.
“I wanted to tell you, Buck. I wasn’t trying to keep it from you, but it’s—it wasn’t something I wanted to talk about over FaceTime, and then Bobby died, and it was never the right time, and—I was just too…honestly, Buck, I’ve just been too scared.”
“Why,” Buck asks, his voice scraped raw. He suddenly feels very, very sober. This whole time? This whole time, Eddie knew?
“I didn’t think I deserved it,” Eddie says quietly, practically whispering. “And it wasn’t just a kiss, Buck, or a drunken mistake, or something we could just move on from once it’s out there, y’know?”
“Didn’t think you deserved what,” Buck asks. He needs to sit down. He leans up against the brick wall behind them and lowers himself gingerly to the ground, bending his legs and resting his elbows on his knees. Eddie sits down next to him, his shoulder pressing against Buck’s.
“You,” Eddie says simply. “Us.”
“Eddie,” Buck’s voice cracks.
“I know. I know,” Eddie waves him off. “I’m working on that. The allowing myself joy thing.”
“Okay, Eddie,” Buck says softly, turning his hand palm-up on his knee, letting his fingers fall open. He waits for Eddie to take it. “We can work on it together.”
They’re quiet for a moment, Eddie gently stroking his thumb back and forth on Buck’s hand.
“That day,” Buck says, turning his face slightly to look at Eddie, “the morning of the wedding, when you were telling me about—about what happened at the party…”
Eddie turns his head too, gazing at him as he waits for Buck to finish.
“It was—it’s been driving me fucking insane. Never heard you talk like that before, Eddie. I’ve been thinking about it for months. Tried not to at first, ‘cause, y’know. You’re straight.”
Eddie snorts, a sharp exhale of air through his nose.
“I didn’t last very long, though,” Buck continues. “Not—not when you left for Texas, and I was living alone in your house, sleeping in your bedroom, showering in your shower, missing you so fucking bad I-I—”
“Couldn’t take it anymore, Buck?” Eddie’s eyes flick down to Buck’s mouth. “What, you’ve been jerking off thinkin’ about me?”
“Yeah—well—not, like, on purpose,” Buck protests, blushing furiously. It really wasn’t purposeful. It’s just—he’d be in the shower, and Eddie had left a half-empty bottle of body wash when he’d moved, and when Buck used it, the whole shower would smell like him, an overwhelming cloud of Eddie-scented steam, and if Eddie just happened to be on his mind when he came, well…that’s not really something Buck can control, is it?
“Okay,” Eddie scoffs, the corner of his lip twitching up. “Sure, Buck. I’ve been thinking about you, though. On purpose.”
Buck gulps, his throat clicking audibly as he swallows.
“Maybe we were thinking about each other at the same time,” Eddie muses, his thumb still tracing slow circles on Buck’s hand. “Did you ever have to go hop in the shower after we hung up on FaceTime?”
“S-sometimes,” Buck stutters, knowing there’s no point in lying to try and maintain any small scrap of dignity he has remaining. Eddie’s probably reading his mind as they speak.
“Mm,” Eddie hums in acknowledgement, looking pleased. “We might’ve even finished at the same time once or twice.”
Buck likes this idea. A lot. He needs to kiss Eddie for coming up with it.
Eddie’s a step ahead of him, though, already closing the short distance between them and kissing Buck, slow and sweet, one hand splayed across Buck’s jaw to hold him in place. The angle is awkward, and Buck’s neck has already started aching after a few seconds of twisting to face Eddie, and his ass is cold and numb from sitting on the ground, but Buck has no intention of breaking away from the kiss any time soon. If ever.
It’s quiet outside, quiet enough that Buck can hear the soft, intoxicating sound of his lips moving against Eddie’s. His nose is full of the overwhelming scent of Eddie’s sweat and cologne, something Buck only ever remembers him wearing on dates. Eddie probably put it on for Buck—he sure as shit wasn’t wearing it for Chimney. The realization sends a sharp zing of pleasure down his spine.
Then, to his immense disappointment, Eddie pulls back from the kiss, pushing lightly on Buck’s chest to keep him from leaning in again.
“Hey, hey,” Eddie laughs, giving Buck one more quick, close-mouthed kiss to pacify him. “Hey. We should get home before the sun comes up, yeah? How do you feel about sleeping in an actual bed?”
“Nah, no thanks. I’m kinda used to the futon now.” Buck deadpans, earning an exasperated look from Eddie.
“Suit yourself.”
“Aw, c’mon, you’re not even gonna try and convince me?” Buck whines, batting his eyelashes.
“Missed your chance, bud,” Eddie says, fighting a smile.
And then they’re home, and Eddie is taking Buck’s shirt off for him, pulling back the bedsheets, setting two full glasses of water on the nightstand, pressing a kiss to the crown of Buck’s head. Buck sleeps on his side. He wants Eddie to be the first thing he sees when he wakes up.
-
Buck’s hangover isn’t as bad this time. He’s also not laying face-down on a hotel carpet.
His mouth tastes awful, and he feels like he might die from thirst, but there’s no nausea, thank God. His head is pounding, too, but that may have more to do with the chime of his ringtone blasting directly into his ear. He feels for his phone, accepting the call without checking the caller ID.
“S’Buck,” he mumbles, and it takes some effort to unstick his tongue from the roof of his mouth enough to speak.
“Buck?” It’s Maddie. She sounds worried. “Where are you?”
This strikes Buck as a silly question, because he’s pretty sure Maddie has his location. But he’ll never complain about his big sister checking on him. It’s nice to be fussed over. He cracks one eye open, and is met with the familiar sight of his bedroom ceiling. Well—no, it’s not his bedroom anymore. It’s Eddie’s room again, and Buck is in Eddie’s bed.
“M’at home,” Buck tells her, rolling over on his side to check the other side of the bed. A tuft of brown hair is poking out over the mound of blankets, and Buck’s chest squeezes.
“Okay,” Maddie exhales. “I thought so, I was just checking in. Is Eddie with you? How are you guys? We didn’t hear from you at all after you left karaoke last night.”
“No, he’s not with me,” Buck says quickly, slightly panicked. How did she know?
“What? Where is he?” Maddie asks, puzzled.
“Oh—I mean, yes. He’s here. We’re both at home. In the same house.”
“In the…okay,” she says slowly, and Buck can picture her expression even over the phone. That searching, doubtful, I know more about you than you do face that drives Buck up the wall. Especially because she’s always right.
“Buck?” Eddie’s voice is raspy, and he clears his throat, trying again. “Buck? What time is it?”
Buck tenses, fumbling for the mute button on his phone. But he’s too late.
“Is that Eddie?” Maddie asks, and Buck widens his eyes at Eddie, pointing down at the phone. Eddie clamps his mouth shut and pulls the covers back over his head.
“Yeah…yes. We’re in the…the kitchen,” Buck lies, and he hears a short burst of laughter bubble up from under the sheets.
“I thought I woke you up,” Maddie says, a smile in her voice. “You were sleeping in the kitchen?”
“No…” Buck sighs. They’re caught. They didn’t even make it twelve hours. He switches to speaker phone and sets it between their pillows.
“Hey, Maddie,” Eddie says, poking his head out again and leaning in to speak into the phone.
“Hi, Eddie,” Maddie laughs. “Are you in bed with my brother?”
“I am,” Eddie confirms, sounding proud. “No funny business, though. I’m taking him out to dinner first.”
Buck‘s ears perk up. He wasn’t aware Eddie was already planning their first date. Maybe they’ll actually go inside the Thai place this time, instead of carting their rice and curry home in thin plastic bags to eat in front of the TV.
“I don’t—that’s fine. I don’t need to know about any of that,” Maddie says quickly. “I’m just glad you guys are okay.”
“More than okay,” Buck adds, smiling at Eddie.
“I’m sure,” Maddie says, and Buck is a little surprised by the wobble in her voice. It sort of sounds like she’s holding back tears. She clears her throat. “Hey, Chimney wants to talk to you guys real quick, can I put him on?”
“No!” Buck says quickly. “No, hold on. Maddie—don’t tell him anything yet, please,” he begs.
“But…he’ll be so happy for you guys,” her voice is lower now, closer to the phone. Chimney must be nearby.
“I know,” Buck wrinkles his nose. “He’ll be too happy for us. He’s gonna take full responsibility for this, he’ll be gloating for years! We’ll never hear the end of it, please don’t tell him just yet.”
“Tell me what?”
Before Buck can respond, Eddie is snatching the phone from him, speaking into it hurriedly.
“Buck and I kissed last night. After karaoke. Thanks for organizing that, Chim, we really needed it.” He shoots Buck a guilty look, and Buck scowls at him.
“You suck,” he mouths, but there’s no heat behind it. He understands why Eddie told him, and if this is what it takes to shake Chimney out of his funk, well…he supposes it’s fine. Weird, but fine.
“What?” Chimney cries, his voice so loud that the sound is distorted through the phone speaker. “Seriously? Ha! I knew it. I knew it!” He laughs, and Buck can’t help the small smile spreading across his face.
“It was the karaoke, wasn’t it,” he says gleefully. “I knew that would help.”
“Yeah, Chim,” Eddie says. “The karaoke. That’s what did it for us.”
Buck snorts, and Eddie shoots him a stern look, which only makes Buck laugh harder.
“Okay, well, this is great,” Chimney says, “and I’m really happy for you guys.”
“Thanks,” Eddie says warmly, locking eyes with Buck. There’s a tenderness in them that makes Buck squirm, and he ducks his head, feeling his face grow warm.
“But I do have some news regarding your tab from last night.”
“Our tab?” Eddie asks, his brow crinkling in confusion.
“Yeah…there were some…uh, damages. I don’t think the karaoke place wants you guys going back there. I believe their exact words were ‘banned for life’.”
“Oh, shit, I’m sorry, man,” Eddie frowns. “I know you like that place.”
“No, it’s okay,” Chimney says brightly. “The rest of us can still go. Just not you two.”
“Ah. Got it,” Eddie sighs. “Just send us the invoice,” he says tiredly. Buck smashes his face into a pillow and groans into it. They’re still recuperating their losses from paying for the damages from their last wild night out.
“Will do. And, hey—don’t worry about getting banned from the karaoke place. You guys are terrible singers, anyway, so it’s probably for the best.”
“That’s okay,” Buck says, lifting his head from the pillow. “I think we’re gonna get really into dancing. Take advantage of the, uh, LA nightlife, y’know?”
Eddie’s eyebrows shoot up.
“We are, huh?”
“Yeah…” Buck says thoughtfully, tilting his head, taking Eddie in—sleep-rumpled hair, tired eyes, dry, kiss-bitten lips. “I had fun last night.”
“Yeah? I couldn’t tell,” Eddie says drily, and Buck gives him a gentle shove, rolling his eyes.
“Didn’t you?”
“What do you think, Buck.” Eddie reaches for Buck’s hand, pressing a kiss to his knuckles.
Chimney coughs pointedly.
“You guys are getting weird again, so I’m gonna hang up now. I’ll text about the bill.”
Neither Buck nor Eddie hear him.
“I mean…I love nights in with you and Chris,” Buck says, injecting as much sincerity into his voice as he can muster, making sure Eddie knows how much he means it. “But we could…we could let loose a little sometimes,” he grins, wiggling his eyebrows. “Have some more fun.”
“And by that you mean you want everyone watching us when I stick my hand down your pants and—“
“Eddie,” Buck hisses, his ears burning. But he doesn’t correct him.
“I think you like it when we freak our friends out, too,” Eddie continues, undeterred. “I think you do it on purpose. Even before we…before this.”
“And you don’t?” Buck counters, propping himself up on his elbow so he can hover over Eddie.
“Never said that.” Eddie looks up at him, smiling, and Buck has to lean down and kiss him to stifle the stream of sticky sweet endearments threatening to spill from his mouth. He thinks he should maybe wait at least twenty four hours to make any kind of dramatic proclamations of love to the man who ended up in the hospital the last time someone brought up commitment to him.
Eddie probably already knows, anyway. And from the look in his eyes, and the way he’s kissing Buck, holding his face, sliding one bare leg between Buck’s under the covers—Buck isn’t too worried about his feelings being reciprocated.
“Eddie,” Buck pulls back, laughing when Eddie chases his lips, making a small, frustrated noise. “Hey. This is important. Whenever we have our own bachelor party, we’re filming the whole thing. Okay? I don’t want to forget any of it.”
Eddie raises one eyebrow.
“Joint bachelor party, huh? Doesn’t that kinda defeat the purpose?” He seems completely unphased at Buck’s mention of their future wedding. Maybe he thinks Buck’s joking. Maybe he’s over the commitment thing. Maybe Buck is the exception. Maybe Eddie’s problem was never about commitment at all, but that he was already committed to someone else, in ways that run much deeper than a marriage certificate.
“Wha—you’re my best friend, Eddie.” Buck frowns, bewildered. “It’d be boring without you there. And I’d miss you.”
“Right, of course,” Eddie laughs. “Okay, Buck. Joint bachelor party. Glad we got that figured out.” He’s stroking Buck’s leg with his foot now, sliding it slowly from his ankle to his knee and back again, his thigh brushing against Buck’s with every movement. “Anything else?”
“N-no,” Buck assures him, shaking his head quickly. “All—a-all good.”
Eddie wraps a hand around the back of Buck’s neck, pulling him down into another kiss.
They’ll have to get out of bed soon. Buck wants to make Eddie breakfast; cheesy scrambled eggs and coffee and a buttered slice of the fresh loaf of sourdough he’d made the other day. He wants to get in the shower with Eddie, take his sweet time shampooing his hair for him, kiss him hard up against the slippery tile wall. He wants to hold his hand under the dinner table and tattoo Eddie’s initials on his wrist and fuck him six ways to Sunday. He wants everyone who sees them to know they’re together, that Buck is Eddie’s and Eddie is his.
And one day, when they’re both ready for it, he wants to get falling-over drunk with his best friend and kiss him senseless the night before their own wedding.