Chapter Text
Buck loves children. People tell him that it's because he still acts like a child or because he is a child at heart. While both of those things are true, he thinks the real reason is because he can be his true self. Every impulse, every wild thought that pops up in his head is welcomed when playing with a kid under the age of like 6. Sure, he might say the wrong thing or make the wrong joke but all that is forgotten within 30 seconds because the kid will take it in a new (oftentimes better) direction and Buck is more than happy to follow along.
Buck's love for kids has grown exponentially since Theo came into his life. Buck and kids get along, but Buck and his kid are a match made in chaos heaven. His days off are a jam-packed non-stop adventure that typically consists of being woken-up way too early for Buck to function. Buck relies on coffee more than any human should and Theo eats a well-rounded breakfast of dry cheerios and a random piece of fruit that thankfully hasn't gone bad yet. The first half of the day is spent running around the jungle gym playing spider-man and annoying the other parents trying to have a peaceful morning. Buck and Theo run around until they're ready to scarf down the sandwiches Buck packed. They eat in the car then head home for a nap.
In the beginning, Buck tried to get Theo to nap in his own bed, but after repeated instances of Buck finding Theo curled up between him and the couch cushions, he decided it was easier to nap there together. When they woke up it was coloring and coffee time (no coffee for Theo, obviously). This is usually the most relaxing part of the day for Buck. He is happy to just sit back and watch Theo pick the exact opposite colour he suggested to use, even though Theo specifically asked him what colour should be used. It never matters what colour he uses, Theo had trouble staying in the lines so none of his pictures really looked like anything. Once Theo gets bored with that, they play animals in the backyard. Theo has been recently obsessed with tigers which means a lot of being on all fours, roaring, and batting around an inflatable ball. This also means that Buck's leg, ribs, and back are giving him aches that really make him feel like an old man. He never lets on that he's hurting or tired though. He powers through hours of play, and just when he thinks he can't go on any longer, Theo asks for chocolate milk.
This is what a normal day looks like for Buck and Theo.
Today is not a normal day.
Why? You may ask.
Because after Buck had given Theo his afternoon pick-me-up (chocolate milk) Buck had turned his back to make his own afternoon pick-me-up (double shot espresso and Tylenol). This day had been particularly rough on Buck because he did not sleep well after getting off shift and had forgotten to make himself breakfast before going to the park. Buck was operating at 15 percent - at best. And on that particular day apparently decided that half a glass of chocolate milk was not good enough and decided to drink right from the carton.
The. Entire. Carton.
With lightning in his eyes Theo turned the property into a natural disaster. Theo somehow managed to get the cheese of his pizza to stick to the wall. The sauce ended up on the ceiling like an abstract painting, and the crust jammed into the flower vase. Buck had noticed the mess by the time Theo had moved on to dumping all of his toys on the living room floor. Buck rushed in and tried to grab the kid but Theo was fast and the meds hadn’t kicked in yet. Theo thought it was funny, screaming and laughing as Buck chased him around the living room, kitchen and hallways. Buck made a valiant effort but Theo was just too fast and he was making a bigger mess with every tiny step Theo made. So, he diverted Theo back outside and chased him while he texted the only person he could think of to help.
Eddie help me
Where are you?
Home
Be there soon.
Eddie, true to his word, showed up fifteen minutes later to a house that looked like it had been robbed, a Theo covered in blue and red coloured stripes sitting on the couch beside a broken Buck.
“Eddie!” Theo screams as he runs into Eddie’s leg and he leans down to give him a hug. Theo’s stripped shirt smells of chocolate and sweat, mostly sweat though.
“Hi Spiderman, what’s going on?”
“Go on, tell him what you did.” Buck’s voice carries over the back of the couch
“I drank chocolate milk!” Theo announces with an excited bounce.
Eddie looks down at him expecting more but when Theo doesn’t explain further Eddie responds.
“Uhhh…sounds good.”
Buck pulls himself over the side of the couch he looks awful with bags under his eyes and pen marks all over his face and neck. Eddie’s pretty sure Theo decided that Buck needed a bigger birth mark too.
“Tell him all of it.” Buck instructs and gives Theo the parental look of ‘you’re in trouble’.
“I drank all of it!” Theo announces again to Eddie.
“You drank…” Eddie looks back and forth between Buck and Theo in slight shock.
Buck finished Eddie's non-question. “All of it - the entire carton.”
“That tracks.” Eddie says as Theo begins to climb his legs and Eddie takes in the state of the messy house. “Ok, so where do we start?”
“Can we play animals?” Theo asks as he’s hanging off Eddie’s knee.
Eddie looks at Buck and he nods. Eddie, wasting no time, drops down into a squat and starts snarling at Theo. Theo screams in excitement and runs out to the backyard once again with Eddie following behind howling like a wolf. Before exiting the house, he turns back to give Buck a thumbs up, Buck returns it as he gets up and begins to clean up.
Eddie loves his children. From a young age he was taking care of his younger sisters. He would make dinner for them when their mom was too busy dealing with family drama and their dad was still gone for work. He loved hanging out with them and gossiping about the girl’s classmates. He liked to help clean their rooms or get them ready for school. It made him feel helpful. It made him feel like the man of the house. Then he had his own kid and panicked. He’s been making up for that mistake in the form of hypervigilance and overprotectedness, which he was then called out for by Chris, then had to switch tracks. Chris is the place where Eddie begins and ends. That kid, his kid, is his whole world. So if his kid wants independence and space then Eddie will have to learn how to live with that. Eddie loves Denny and Mara, he loves Jee-Yun and Nash, and May and Harry (although they aren’t really ‘kids’ anymore but they will always be inside his mind). Now, he gets to love Theo.
He should have known that he was Buck’s kid when they first met. Granted he had no reason to think he was Buck’s kid, but looking back on it now it only seems obvious that a kid who climbed an electrical tower for a balloon would be half Buck. Theo even looks like Buck; the same dirty blonde hair and bright blue eyes that light up when they get a brilliant (stupid) idea. They have the same infectious energy that can bring Eddie back to life after a long shift or when he can’t seem to get out of that head of his. But most importantly, Theo has Buck’s sweet kind heart. Eddie always, always, sees that no matter their seemingly stupid decisions, it is never made with ill-intent, they just tend not to think about the consequences to their actions. So when Buck asks for help with Theo, he knows that even though Buck is Theo’s (not) dad, Eddie is one of the few people capable of understanding and calming Theo properly.
While Buck cleaned up inside, Eddie and Theo played in the backyard. Which was made more difficult by the jeans he was wearing. He really needs to start keeping a change of clothes in his truck because he has ruined at least three pairs of jeans since Buck started fostering him. Two were lost to grass stains and one was lost to an unfortunately located rip. Theo was adamant about being a ferocious alpha wolf that protected the pack, Eddie was designated the runt of the litter that needed protecting. Theo instructed him to sit like a dog on the bench as Theo surrounded Eddie with ‘enemies’ (toy trucks) then would ‘protect’ Eddie by barking and swatting at them. Eddie would whimper from time to time to really sell the experience for him. While Theo was attacking some of the enemies Eddie caught Buck smiling at them from the window. The pen streaks were off of his face and he had put on a black hoodie, most likely to save from further stains. His hair was still a mess, a tasteful mess but still. Eddie gave Buck the ‘whatever works’ shrug and Buck did it back. When Buck disappeared from the window he could see that Buck had at least cleaned the kitchen. A moment later he appeared in the window and held up two frozen boxes, Eddie gave a quick nod and Buck disappeared once more.
“Where's Chris?” Theo's face inches from Eddie's.
“He's out with his friends.” Eddie moves his legs out from under him to sit normally on the bench. He gets the feeling they're done playing.
“But I'm his friend.” Theo states innocently, big blue puppy eyes on display.
“Yes you are. He's with his other friends” Eddie gently explains, not wanting to have to explain that Chris is having a video game marathon with friends and he was trying to figure out what to do with his day.
“Can they come here?” Again, Theo asks so innocently that he wants to say yes.
“No bud, sorry, they’re busy.”
“oh”
“Next time, I promise.” Eddie ruffles Theo's fluffy hair and they laugh together.
Theo uses Eddie's arms and legs as tracks for his toy firetruck, constantly making siren sounds. Eddie looks up into the blue sky, breathing in the fresh(ish) LA air. He missed this. Eddie doesn't know how much time has passed between when he was entranced by the sky and when Buck opened the sliding door to call them inside for dinner but when he does, Theo bounds back to Buck and Eddie slowly follows.
Buck just removes his apron and Theo crashes into his legs. This has been his new ‘thing’, crashing into people’s legs. It was cute at first, like all of his little ‘things’. For example, calling adults “poop”. He could take being called Mr. Poop.” What was harder to take was his shins being attacked every hour. He picks Theo up and then checks behind him for Eddie. Buck sees him trailing behind them, he wonders if he threw out his back.
“Did you have fun with Eddie!”
“We played wolves!” Theo announces as he places Theo in his chair at the dinner table. Buck, not wanting to have to learn a lesson twice, had secured a clear plastic bag over the table and under Theo's chair. Buck passes the note on the fridge to never leave chocolate milk out again.
“Yes I heard.” He said as Eddie entered the house and closed the door.
“Yeah I was the runt.” Eddie says dramatically.
“Of course you were.” Buck responds as he pulls the pizza and chicken strips out of the oven.
“Ok boys, dinner is served.”
“Yay! Pineapple!” Theo exclaims as Buck places a plate with a slice of Hawaiian pizza and a chicken strip on the table.
“Yeah….yay” Eddie deadpans and gives Buck a look.
Buck dramatically turns to the second pan. “That’s why there’s chicken strips, weirdo.”
Eddie grabs his plate. “It’s not weird to not want warm fruit on your pizza.”
“What about tomatoes?” Buck baits.
Eddie waves his hands in front of him.
“I’m not having this discussion again.”
“Fine, here.” Buck hands Eddie a glass of water and he sits down beside Theo.
After dinner Buck takes over Theo duty to give him a bath. Eddie took over cleaning the kitchen when Buck and Theo disappeared into the bathroom. Maybe Buck should have let Eddie take over bath duty because Theo decided that he was hyper again and splashed water all over the bathroom. He should have known better than to go right from dinner to bath, but, hey, today is apparently not the day of good decisions. Once Theo was as clean as he could get, Buck wrapped him in a towel and tried to guide him to his room. They had just made it to his door when Eddie made a noise in the kitchen and Theo got excited all over again, slipping away from Buck and right into Eddie’s legs once again. Eddie, ever so gracious, turned right back into his energetic facade. On their way back to his room, they passed the bathroom dripping with water from the ceiling. Eddie looked back at Buck in disbelief. Buck shrugged at him and went to start cleaning that too.
Twenty minutes and another outfit change later Buck plopped himself off the couch and fiddled with one of Theo’s plush tigers. The sun has begun to set, lighting his house with the perfect mood lighting for a cozy nap. He’s been listening to the low register of Eddie’s voice for a few minutes now. In the beginning Theo would interject every couple minutes but Buck hasn’t heard him in a while so Buck has been letting Eddie's voice soothe him. Eddie’s a really good dad. Just when Buck thinks he’s going to fall asleep, Eddie’s voice stops and there’s the soft thump of the door being closed and latched. Eddie appears in the hallway, his jeans slightly green from crawling around the yard and his shirt rumpled from Theo climbing all over him. He looks tired. He looks happy.
“He’s finally asleep.” Eddie whispers. The lamp Buck turns on is just perfectly lighting Eddie in a way that makes it feel like a scene from a movie. He can’t help but smile
“You’re a miracle worker.” He adjusts himself as Eddie makes his way to the couch.
“I do have more experience than you.” Eddie responds then as he grabs the throw pillow out of his way and holds it on his lap.
“Cause you’re old.” Buck teases then feels a thump of a pillow on his chest.
“Yeah, sure.” Eddie responds sarcastically.
They chuckle for a moment then sigh in unison. They’re both tired, Buck can tell. He doesn’t even know what Eddie was doing before this. He didn’t even ask where Chris was. All Buck had to do was send the signal and Eddie came running like he always does.
“Thank you - for today.” He says without looking up, still playing with the tiger.
“It’s no problem, Buck. I miss when Chris was this age. Granted he wasn’t as mobile but still -”
Eddie trails off and is clearly reliving the days when Chris was younger. When he was attached to Eddie while also craving independence. The constant struggle between needing help and not wanting to need help. Now, he's growing up and hanging out with his friends outside of his friends homes. Chris has told Buck about the times they've gone out for dinner and watched the sunset at the beach. How he finally doesn't feel like Eddie is treating him like a baby anymore. That conversation - those conversations always make him wonder what Chris was like when he actually was a baby. He would ask Eddie, but he wasn't around for the first four years of Chris’ life. Just like he wasn't around for Theo's.
“I wish I was around when he was this age.” Buck ponders out loud.
Eddie sighs, Buck looks over at him, meeting his eyes.
“I know.” Eddie answers. “But you were there when you needed to be.”
He says it with such stable confidence that it almost takes his breath away. Any compliment from Eddie about Buck being - an adult? Responsible ? Makes him feel - like a responsible adult, which very few people do. He knows he helped with Chris. He found Carla for Eddie and babysat whenever he could. He always thought that he could do more. Be more. But he never wants to insert himself where he doesn’t belong. Now that he has Theo, he wonders when the right person will come along and help him now.
Buck drops his head onto the edge of the couch. “You think we’ll find our people when they need to be?”
Buck watches Eddie try to decode what he's asking.“What do you mean?”
“Girlfriends or boyfriend, romantic partner…..people.” Damn he’s really not good at forming sentences.
“I’m not interested in getting a girlfriend.” Eddie says matter-of-factly.
“Like at all?”
Eddie contemplates and Buck is desperate to hear his answer. “You know I’ve been going to therapy a lot right?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, something we’ve been working on is figuring out what I really want out of that kind of relationship.” He pauses. “After Shannon, I think I was dating to find a mother figure for Chris. Ana was great with Chris but I never connected with her the way I thought I was supposed to.”
Eddie doesn't usually mention his past relationships. It's always been this unspoken rule between them that they don't bring up their exes. He liked Ana - from what he remembers about her- which isn't much. Eddie was very careful about letting her into the 118 circle. I guess that's how he could tell that Eddie was never in love with her - he never talked about her.
“Yeah I remember.”
“Yeah, then Marisol which she was great and then I fucked that up,” Eddie adjusts himself, talking more to himself than to Buck but he doesn't mind. This is more than Eddie has said about his love life in years. “I lost focus on Chris and so I spent that year-off of dating to focus on work and Chris.” He pauses, either because he's tired or can't decide what to say. Then - “The thing is - I didn’t miss it. Dating.” Eddie meets Buck's eyes.
“So…you’re done dating?” He asks. Eddie considers.
“I’m done trying to force something that doesn’t work.” He offers. Buck doesn't understand. Even though Eddie is bad at dating, he's always been a good and supportive partner. Sure he's made mistakes, but hasn't everyone?
“Eddie, you can’t just give up on love.” It comes out like a plea when it was meant to come out like he was rallying him. Eddie looks at him confused.
“I’m not. I’m just - recognizing the love that I already have in my life.”
“Yeah that’s great but, come on, you’re a relationship guy.”
Eddie laughs a little.
“And I have a lot of loving healthy relationships. I have Chris. I have Chim, Hen, Ravi, Harry, May, Maddie, Karen, Athena. I have you. And then all the kids. All of us have such a good dynamic and we support each other. We are a family. A complete family. Why would I want to go and mess that up?”
He says it so confidently and he doesn't know why, but it kinda pisses Buck off.
“But what if you found someone-” His voice raises slightly, he knows he should keep it down so he doesn't wake Theo.
“Then I found them” Eddie's irritated. “and I’ll figure it out. I’m not saying I'll never be in another romantic relationship, I’m just - happy where I am now. I’m happy with this family we built.”
For whatever reason, that placates him.
“That’s very evolved of you.” Buck says slyly.
“Ok,” Eddie dismisses.
“Very mature.” He says as he gestures with the tiger to make believe it was the stuffy that said it.
“Think what you want man, I'm just trying not to make the same mistakes.” Eddie comes off a little defensive.
“No, no, I mean if that's what you want and you're happy then who am I to judge - you know.” Buck never wants Eddie to feel like he has to explain himself and his decisions. Eddie takes in the rest of the house, visibly relaxing.
“Mhmm. Need help cleaning up?” Eddie asks. He doesn't know why, they both did a pretty good job at cleaning their areas.
“No I got it, you go home.” Buck places the stuffy on the couch and gets up to see Eddie out. Eddie follows Buck's lead.
“You sure?” He asks as he puts the pillow back in place.
“Yeah man, go relax, Theo's out for the night.”
“That's what he wants you to believe.” Eddie says as if he's tempting the universe. Sure, Eddie doesn't believe in that stuff but he knows Buck does.
“Don't. Jinx. It.”
“I don't know… it seems pretty q-”
“Don't.” Buck cuts him off, finger in his face. Eddie grins. “Ok get out.” He pushes Eddie to the front door and he laughs, he really laughs at Buck's misery.
“Oh come on!”
“Bye Eddie.” He says as Eddie crosses the threshold.
“Bye Buck.” Eddie calls back.